We are not the biggest fans of New Year’s resolutions. Resolutions can cause you to change for the wrong reasons or leave you feeling defeated if you don’t accomplish them. However, we do like to dream and work towards goals, especially travel goals. A travel goal has the idea of “let’s do it” and a resolution is more of a “we have to do it”. That might not make sense in your mind, but it does in ours.

We are really excited about a ton of different things in 2020. We do believe that this will be a great year for us on the road. There are a bunch of trips already planned and we have dreams to do some other things as well. We wanted to put on paper (or screen) 20 travel goals that we have for 2020. These goals are related to all things travel. That means these goals could be personal, locations, blog, or anything else. As long as it has a travel tie-in we can use it (hey, we are trying to get to 20 here!). We wanted to put our dreams out there (and we think these dreams can come true). So, without further ado and in no particular order, here are our 20 travel goals for 2020.

Go To Canada

Ok, starting off with an easy one. We want to visit our neighbors to the north. We have always wanted to go to Canada and this is the year to do it. Why do we want to go to Canada? I think it is because we have heard of all of the natural beauty there. Also, the wildlife there is crazy nuts and we have been wanting to see a bear in the wild for a long time. Will we make it this year? We may or may not already have a trip planned…

Visit 30 National Park Units

Currently there are 419 different sites run by the National Parks. These include parks, historic sites, seashores, preserves and so many more. Our family has a goal to get to all 419 before our son graduates high school – 10 years away so we better get going! At the beginning of 2019 we have visited 35 of the sites like Yosemite, Mammoth Cave, and Booker T. Washington. We have a trip planned where we are going to visit 6, so we have to get to 24 or more somewhere along the way. These sites are always awesome and make for a great way to plan road trips.

Go To 5 New States

So, we (Megan and Justin) have been to a different amount of states. Our count is based solely on states we have visited together. Currently we have 23 states under our belts. In 2019 we added Kentucky, Louisiana, Texas, Oklahoma, and Arkansas. We had a great time in these states and are hoping to visit at least 5 new ones this year. We have a trip planned for Montana, Wyoming, and Idaho already. Definitely excited about planning a trip with two others. Any suggestions?

Write 100 Blog Posts

We started the blog in late August of 2019. We have been going for a little over four months now and have had a blast doing it. Over the holidays we took a break to focus on family and some other writing. We have been pretty consistent with it (when we were able to be) and we want that to continue in 2020. 100 posts might seem like a lot but it is a little under two a week. Some weeks we might post more, some less, but we are going to be hovering around that two a week number. Of course to have 100 blog posts you need to have 100 good ideas. You only get the good ideas by getting out and going the adventure way. That will mean more epic travels for us!

Go Fishing

We like to fish but by no means are we professional or even skilled. Silas however loves to fish. It is in his blood. He never sits still, but if you put a fishing pole in his hands he will stand by the water for hours contemplating the deep things in a 9-year olds life (like Legos). For Christmas we got him a new fishing pole and he wants to take it with us wherever we go. We are looking forward to slowing down by going fishing with him.

Drink More Water

One of our best friends in the world used to always say “you’re not sick, you’re thirsty” (he read a book with that title). He gave us compelling evidence as to why that is true and when we are drinking water we are definitely healthier. This year we want to stay hydrated, that will help us in a lot of other ways.

Be Challenged With Food

I (Justin) am an incredibly picky eater. When we got married there were very few things that I would eat. Megan has opened my eyes to so many different foods and tastes and my palate has definitely grown. As we have traveled we have both loved trying new foods and being stretched in the tastebuds. Some of our choices have been pretty bad, but others have been awesome and have led to a lifelong love affair with certain foods. We are looking forward to more tastebud expansion in the new year.

Cross the Swinging Bridge

We hate to admit this but we have never been to the swinging bridge at Grandfather Mountain. We have been to the state park and hiked miles and miles of trails there. However, we have never been to the Grandfather Mountain attraction that charges an additional fee. We are both native North Carolinians and know that this is almost blasphemous, so this year we are going to do something about it! We are going on that mile-high swinging bridge. Of course, this will be tough for me (Justin) because of my fear of heights, but I get to do this – I don’t have to!

Renovate a Bus

Our friends recently got married and turned a school bus into a Skoolie. You can check out their work on Instagram @finnthebus. They sold it and moved back home for a job. The hope is to work with them to make two more. One for them and one for us. It is a crazy weird goal, but one that we are hoping will lead to more chances to get away during 2020 and beyond.

Make $1 on the Blog

So, we love the blog, it is a labor of love and we truly do enjoy it. We are not trying to quit our jobs or anything like that. However, we would love to make at least $1 this year on the blog. We are looking into ways that we can do that and we honestly think that it is doable. It is a lot of work, something that will take consistency and quality – but we think we are ready for that next step.

Connect With New People

One of the things that we love about traveling, blogging, and Instagram is we can meet and interact with so many new and amazing people. We love the conversations we have with people face to face or over the Internet. We have learned so much about others and ourselves through these conversations and look forward to continuing that in 2020. So, if you see us on the trails or at a park say hello – or continue the conversation on social media or the blog comments. It is so cool how travel brings people together. Looking forward to finding those places to connect this year.

Be More Active

We are not inactive or unfit people, but we definitely could grow in this area. Every year we are getting older (obviously) and it is super important for us to be able to go on hikes, canoe trips, bike rides, or anything else for the next several decades. we don’t want to get lazy or lose our passion for being outdoors. We know that happens as people start to get out of shape or get winded after a couple of mile hike. We want to be able to work hard and sweat – and get up and do it all over again the next day. In order for us to do that we will have to be active year around – especially when we are at the house.

Use our Annual Pass

In 2019 we were able to finish up going to all of the North Carolina State Parks. The awesome people who run the parks sent us an annual pass to say thank you and congratulate us. This pass is good for the whole year of 2020. The majority of North Carolina State Parks do not charge admission, but this pass allows us to get into all of the ones that do for free (these are mainly the recreational areas). In addition to that, the pass allows us free usage of canoes at any park where this is available, free swimming in the various swimming areas, and even four-wheel drive access at some parks. We are definitely planning on taking advantage of this awesome gift!

Take People With Us

We absolutely love traveling together as a family of three. It is an awesome way to connect and grow together. However, some of our favorite times traveling have been when we were able to go with other family members and friends. It is awesome to be able to spend an extended period of time together with people we love. The conversation flows more freely and the memories are sweeter when you are able to travel together. So, whether it is for a day hike or a weekend away we want to spend more time traveling with the ones we love this year.

Sleep Under the Stars

Megan and I used to camp a lot but we have gotten away from that over time. It isn’t that we are against camping out, we just had a really terrible experience of nearly dying when a freak snowstorm dumped 24 inches of snow on us on the Appalachian Trail. It was the worst storm they had in decades and came out of nowhere. It also got to negative 35 windchill that night. When we got to our vehicle we were literally crying tears of joy. As Silas has gotten older he has been asking more and more to go camping. We are looking forward to sleeping outside over the next year (just not in winter).

Go on Longer Drives

We are a driving family. Some of the best conversations we have had are on the road. At the same time we can also sit in silence and think about life for hours on end. We love the open road and love looking at America’s beautiful landscape go by. We have been on some incredible road trips in our lives and have been on some of the most famous roads out there. We want to do more of that, put more miles on the car, log more hours of drive time. We want to stop at the lesser known places and meet people who aren’t used to having outsiders stop in.

Go To Disney World

We love Disney World. We have been annual pass holders for three years. Unfortunately, Disney raised their prices a ridiculous amount last year so when it was time to renew our passes we decided not to do it. Honestly, we probably wouldn’t have done it any way because we are wanting to travel other places, but we do want to visit the World for at least a couple of days this year. There are a ton of new things opening up and we want to check them out. Also, Disney World holds a pretty special place in our hearts. Our kid grew up there and it was a really great place for us as a family to refresh and rest during a pretty crazy five-year period of our lives.

Check Out a New Stadium

We have a goal to visit every Major League Baseball stadium in the league. We have been to Fenway, Citi Field, Camden Yards, and Nationals Park together so far. We really need to pick this up if we are going to do this. We need to make sure we hit one up, though ideally we will check out 3-4. This one is not that difficult, we just have to make some time for it. Who knows, maybe we can visit some National Parks while we are at it?

No Debt Travel

We are not a fan of debt (who is!?!). In 2019 we ended up $400 in the whole and we don’t want that again. There were two main reasons for that – (1) we ended our year with a pretty big road trip between Christmas and New Year’s and (2) we are squirreling away as much money as we can for the bus and we thought we might be buying one early in January. We don’t like to live beyond our means and will quickly pay that $400 off, but we want to make sure that 2021 won’t start the same way. Hopefully we can make that $1 on the blog and we will be ok!

Get More Rest

Rest is something that we were made for. We really believe that. A lot of people rest from their work. We like to work out of our rest. Traveling gives us that rest. Some people like to rest by being on a beach all day. We get rest by being active. As we rest through travel we are more productive in our day-to-day lives. Our hope this year is that we are able to find rest on the road and as we do that we will be able to live more effective lives daily.

We are looking forward to seeing how this year unfolds. We are hoping and dreaming that we reach these goals. Follow along with us this year and see how many of these we are able to reach. It will be fun to look back in December to see which ones we were able to accomplish. What are some of the travel goals that you have for 2020? What trips do you have in the books and what adventures are you planning? Here’s to 2020 and to going the Adventure Way!

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