I'm writing to you from Peru, where I just landed in one of the highest inhabited places on Earth: Cusco.
This town of about 500k residents sits at an altitude of 3,399 meters / 11,152 feet. My body is feeling the effects.
So far, the dreaded soroche, or altitude sickness, has manifested in an ongoing splitting headache. I'm sipping coca tea and taking it easy today, reflecting on this trip.
I left Chicago exactly six weeks ago.
In that time, I traveled from Kazakhstan's mountainous Almaty and the vast flat steppes of the southern regions in Central Asia to the sea and mountains of the Peloponnese peninsula in Greece, to Peru and the Inca Trail, which we're about to start walking this week.
The amount of experiences, stories, and emotions I've gathered in this time would last for a whole year.
Someone ought to do a brain study on people who move through the world like this. I'm betting our brains are filled with freshly-formed neural pathways, skilled in neuroplasticity.
At the same time, what I'm craving now is stillness. Moving less, and ample time to absorb and process all that has happened in the last six weeks is the plan for the next few months.
xx Yulia
🏠 Inside Going Places
No episode last week
Our podcast editor is going through a difficult personal time, and between her challenges and my travels last week, we missed our scheduled episode. Our interview with Lindsey Danis will come out this Wednesday.
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Partner with us this summer
This summer, we're running a series of reportage based in Chile, and we're currently looking for presenting partners for this package.
We'll be reporting eight stories total, shared on our platform and social media over the course of eight weeks.
Our presenting partner will be mentioned in every story and social post, plus we'll run a full-length feature on their work.
If you work for a brand or a travel company that wants to put its work in front of people who care about traveling consciously, reply to this email for details – or email me at hello@goingplacesmedia.com.
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🌍 In The World
During our goodbye dinner in Greece, I received a wonderful surprise: meeting a member of Going Places.
Forum Parekh is an architect-turned-travel writer based in Germany.
Forum was on the same ATTA trip I was on in the Peloponnese, but we didn't meet until the last day because two groups were traveling in the region, and we reunited only in the end.
Forum told me that I (and this newsletter) were the reason she was in Greece. She saw my announcement, applied at the last chance, and got it!
It was so wonderful to meet someone who follows my work IRL and it reinforced my intentions: more in-person Going Places events this year.
Radostina Boseva is our Founding Member
Radostina Boseva is a film wedding photographer with an editorial flair based in San Francisco.
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