I’m here to help you travel to some awesome places.
Hey my name is Will!
First off, thank you for visiting Going Awesome Places. You know what the crazy thing is? 4 years ago, I never would have imagined that I’d be doing this travel blogging thing full time but here I am.
My goal from day one has been to write honestly and genuinely about inspiring others to travel. Through inspiration, I wanted to give my readers the tools and guidance to have similar, if not better experiences of their own. The only way I know how to do that is to share stories, educate, and leaving no detail behind.
My Story
Electrical engineer turned business consultant and now full time blogger.
Out of school, I pursued a career in consulting. I was pretty happy with the job but at the same time I realized that over time that my passion for it had waned and what I was learning was starting to taper off. On top of that the living-out-of-my-suitcase life I was living was really wearing me out. Fast forward 4 years to December 2011. I had started to evaluate what I wanted to do and I started to draw out an exit-strategy. A lot of that involved when would be the best time to leave my company, the start of planning my trip to Asia, and devising the best ways to use up the rest of my vacation days.
Come April 2012, I had everything figured out and handed in my 2 weeks resignation. April 13, 2012 was my last day and what a relief it was! The only thing holding me back from leaving was my friend’s wedding was May 19, 2012 so I used the days leading up to prep, pack and meet old friends.
One of those meetings led to the question of whether I was going to be blogging about my experiences while I was away. The idea intrigued me but the truth is I had never thought about it before then. I went home that night and quickly did some research before ultimately purchasing this domain, getting WordPress set up, and creating my first blog post. Keep in mind that this was with only 3 days left at home. The wedding happened and then I was out of Toronto by May 21.
For the next 3 months I roamed around Asia and was lucky enough to have friends travel with me for segments of it. I had no idea what I was doing but I blogged about my experiences day to day. I treated it kind of like a diary and it was really all about letting my friends and family know what I was up to.
It was an adventure of a lifetime and truly put a perspective on the important things in life. It was something that profoundly changed my core and gave me a renewed sense of direction.
When I eventually came back at the end of August, I reviewed the blog and how it was doing. To my surprise, I started seeing traffic come in from places I wasn’t expecting. This is when the lightbulb clicked inside and I realized that may there was more to all of this than a glorified online diary.
Since then, it’s been a rollercoaster journey of building up the site whether it be content, social media, the brand, readership, and so much more. The big thing I realized was that blogging isn’t a sprint, it really is a marathon. Bit by bit, I kept learning and improving and all that work has culminated into what you’re seeing today.
Today, I have a full time job and continue to live the dream!
I look forward to helping you on your travel adventures.
How To Reach Me
You can reach me through my contact page or you can find me on the numerous social media platforms that I’m in such as Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
My Stuff
I get a lot of questions about what I use or recommend. Well I got pretty good at answering those questions over the years and eventually I thought it’d be a good idea to put it all together in a resources page that has everything from what I use to plan my trip to what you’ll find in my camera bag.