Setting Travel Goals: the Bucket List

Once Tim and I committed to traveling regularly, we needed to figure out where to go. The world is so big, it's hard to know where to start. We had both traveled a fair amount before we met, so we focused on visiting countries neither of us had been. We asked ourselves, "If we could to just one more place where would it be?" We each gave our own answers and then repeated the question a few more times to create our very first bucket list:

Destination	Picked By	Why / What We Hoped to See
Africa	Both of Us	OK, there is far too much to learn about the many diverse countries on this continent with one visit, but for starters the idea of an African Safari was exciting to both of us.
Antarctica	Tim	Tim liked the idea of going some place few others have been.
Australia	Both of Us	Sydney and the Great Barrier Reef; this was a place we had both fantasized about visiting since we were young; in my case since I had recited Alexander and the No Good Very Bad Day by Judith Viorst.
China	Deb	​I was interested in learning more about Chinese culture as well as seeing some of their incredible world heritage sites like the Great Wall.
Costa Rica	Tim	Pre-Deb, Tim thought this is a place he could retire and live happily on one of their beautiful beaches.
Peru	Both of Us	We both wanted to see Machu Picchu and thought this might be a great hiking experience.
Russia	Deb	Russia interested me from a cultural and architectural perspective.

Once we had our lists, we started saving and making plans. We took turns picking which place on the list we would travel to next, allowing a little bit of flexibility to snag a deal should we see one. In six years we travelled to every place on the list and even a few more when it made sense to make stops enroute to the chosen destination.

Creating a list helped us reach our travel goals, and we have continued this practice to this day. Each time we finish a list, we creat a new one. See our Bucket List 2 and Bucket List 3 for more travel inspirations!