About Your Email Won’t Find Me

Hi, I’m Jonathan — former nine-to-fiver, turned full-time traveler and founder of Your Email Won’t Find Me. Having traveled to around 40 countries across six continents, I have a wealth of knowledge and experiences from years of traveling that I can’t wait to share with you.

But I didn’t just build Your Email Won’t Find Me to talk about my day-to-day. You can follow me on Instagram for that. I really started Your Email Won’t Find Me to share travel tips, hacks, and guides to help you plan your next trip!

Speaking of planning trips, interested in learning the ins and outs of traveling for free? I’ve been travel hacking (booking free travel with points and miles) for 15 years now, and have an encyclopedia full of tips and tricks to share with you!

I’m currently on a year-long solo trip across Southeast Asia, pumping out as much new content as I can. But Your Email Won’t Find Me is still brand new. I really appreciate your patience, and here’s a bit about me in the meantime.

How Did I End Up Here?

I spent most of my adult life maximizing my vacation days to go on as many trips as I could. When one trip ended, I would start counting down the days until the next. That is until August 2023, when I left my corporate job to chase my dreams of traveling full-time and writing about it!

After a decade of living in and around Boston, MA, I moved to Manhattan Beach, CA in 2020 for a job opportunity. Looking back, it probably wasn’t the best time to plan a cross-country move with the pandemic raging on… But this move was the beginning of a chain of events that led me here.

First, I sold my Boston area house and used the equity to pay off my remaining student loan debt. Then, after the move, I went through a divorce. I found myself in my mid-30s, with no debt, no relationship, and no strong ties to a particular location. It felt like I was in a “now or never” situation if I wanted to experience long-term solo travel. All that was left, was to create my plan, quit my job, sell everything I owned, and book my one-way flight.

Now here I am, traveling around Southeast Asia with nothing but a suitcase full of clothes and a backpack with my camera gear. I haven’t booked a return flight and I’m unsure when I’ll return. Maybe I’ll head to South America or Eastern Europe next? That’s the beauty of long-term without a plan. I have no idea where life will take me and I love it!

What’s With the Blog Name Anyway?

Ok, so what’s up with the name of this travel blog? If you’ve ever held a corporate or sales job, I’m sure at one point in life you’ve received an email that opened with “I hope this email finds you well.” Maybe it’s less common now after all the memes during the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic. But like those memes, most emails weren’t always finding me very well over the past few years.

Between the pandemic lockdowns and the divorce, I was already going through it as it was. On top of that, I was also finding myself feeling less and less happy at work. Don’t get me wrong, I had a great job working for a great company, but I just felt like I wasn’t growing anymore and didn’t feel the same fire I used to. It felt like time and life were just passing me by and I needed a change, a big change… So, I sold nearly everything I owned, quit my job, and booked a one-way flight.

I’m not entirely sure how long I plan to travel full-time. I made a full-year commitment to only volunteer and not work outside of this travel blog. Thankfully, I had put these plans in place over a year before I actually left. So, I had plenty of time to ramp up my savings, plus I picked a pretty cheap place to travel.

For now, I’ll be exploring new destinations, meeting new people, and dedicating my time to volunteering and this blog. Your email won’t find me well, nor will it find me unwell, because Your Email Won’t Find Me at all! Unless you need to contact me about this blog or anything travel-related… All of those emails are still welcome ha!

Travel Wasn’t Always a Part of Me

I grew up in North Providence, Rhode Island — the second smallest town in the smallest state in the US. It’s the kind of place where everyone knows everyone, and nobody really leaves. If they do leave, it’s for one of the neighboring towns. I went to college 45 minutes away from the house I grew up in, and this was considered going away. Far enough away for my mother to bawl her eyes out when dropping me off on the first day.

Growing up, my family didn’t travel much. Nearly all of our summer vacations were road trips to New Hampshire and Maine. A Disney trip at age 14 was the only time I had been on a plane before becoming an adult. I didn’t even leave the country until the summer after my sophomore year of undergrad. But a trip to Cancun with friends, where the only times we left the pool bars at the all-inclusive resort were to go to more bars nearby, isn’t REALLY travel.

Catching the Travel Bug

It’s hard to pinpoint the moment I caught the travel bug, but I can trace it back to studying abroad in London when I was 20. I had only left the country once prior for that Cancun trip. But this trip was different. I was going to another continent, alone, and for an extended period of time.

Yes, I know, I took the “easy” route by picking a country that spoke English. But believe me, there was still plenty to adapt to, like navigating public transportation for the first time, meeting new people, and learning local customs. Probably aging myself here, but I think it’s important to remind you that there were no smartphones back then! I was navigating the London Tube with printed maps and popping into whatever restaurant looked good from the outside. And let me also remind you that London is a MASSIVE city, and I’m from a REALLY small one.

But it wasn’t just London that made me fall in love with travel. I spent one of my long weekends traveling to Rome with a few friends I had made. Now today, I have somewhat mixed feelings about Rome. While full of history and delicious food, it’s also kind of a big tourist trap. But back then, Rome and Vatican City had completely captivated me! Walking around the Coliseum and having flashbacks to Gladiator movie scenes. Sneaking in a picture of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. Being confused by paying for water while wine was free with my pizza and pasta. Those four days in Rome had me hooked. I was ready to see the world!

Discovering Travel Hacking

Fast forward a couple of years after my experience in London, and I was listening to a coworker brag about “paying” for his entire honeymoon in Italy with points and miles he and his wife accrued through both business travel and credit card spend. Having a job that required frequent domestic travel, I HAD to learn everything I could about this! I don’t know about you, but I live by the saying, “If it’s free, it’s for me.”

I signed up for my first cobranded airline credit card, an American Airlines Citi card, and started chipping away at my sign-up bonus spending requirement. At that time, the signup bonus was equivalent to round-trip airfare anywhere in the US. When those points hit my account, it was like a drug. Or maybe what a gambling addict feels when they hit the jackpot on the slots. All the brain chemicals were flowing, and I was hooked!

Over the years, I’ve perfected the free travel game. My proudest travel hack was booking two round-trip business class flights on the world-renowned Qatar Airways to Maldives where I stayed five nights at the bucket list-worthy W Maldives all for next to nothing! The airfare and five nights would have cost over $20,000, but all I paid were some taxes and fees. It might have gotten a little more complicated lately (thanks inflation!), but I can still help you book epic trips like this for next to nothing!

My Brand of Travel

I’m not just here to talk about travel hacking though… As of today, I’ve been to over 40 countries across four continents (plus Oceania) and I expect to be around 50 countries by the end of 2024. I would probably characterize my style of travel as “adventure travel,” but I’ve done a little bit of everything from trekking with mountain gorillas in Uganda to tasting some of the world’s best wine in Bordeaux. I’ve stayed in $10 homestays in Bali to $1,100 overwater bungalows in Bora Bora. I’ve sampled some of Tokyo’s famous street food to seven-course meals in small Tuscan villages.

What I’m saying, is I know a thing or two about all sorts of travel, from adventure to luxury, and I’m excited to share all of my tips, tricks, recommendations, and guides with you to help you make the most of your trips!