John and Anel Ryan Sold Everything and Hit the Road: An Introduction to the Creators of the Barefoot Diary

John and Anel Ryan's Big Adventure

In 2017, John and Anel Ryan sold everything they owned to travel the world as house sitters. Barefoot Diary chronicles how they did it, things they got right, things they screwed up, and the ongoing adventures that occur daily along the journey. Photos are by John. Words are by Anel.

So begins The Barefoot Diary, a very different variation of Kerouac's On the Road or Che Guevara's Motorcycle Diaries. John and Anel (pronounced "uh"-Nell) decided to hit the road after John--an engineer, marketer and entrepreneur--got laid off. They took an early retirement and headed South.

I met Anel via Medium where she self-describes as "Writer, cartoonist, comedienne, blogger and Wonder Woman with a doo rag. In addition to the BarefootDiary.com which she shares with John, she also has two other sites: BlabberTales.com and Wimpygirl.com.

Upon exploring her writing and other creative expressions, I felt a kindred spirit of sorts and wanted to share what they were doing. Part of the attraction for me was seeing that they had lived in Puerto Rico as well as Mexico, two countries I likewise called home for a year each.

Maybe you've been "offered" an early retirement (or were pushed) and hadn't realized there are more options out there than you previously recognized. The world has some pretty vast horizons. Here's Anel's story.

EN: You've certainly been following an atypical life path at this point. Please share how you got here and what you and John have been doing. At some point I hope to circle back and take a deeper dive, but this is a great place to begin.

Anel Ryan: In 2008, my husband John and I started a web development /marketing company called Results 2 Profit, LLC, which had a "sub" company called Connect 2 Clubs. We did websites and marketing for clubs and non-profits all over the United States and Canada. Car clubs, garden clubs, sailing clubs, etc. John had been a medical engineer and a new company lured him back to the medical research field with an offer that we couldn't refuse in 2014. It left me stuck with the company, but hey, he was helping to cure cancer!

He traveled quite a bit. His company paid for me to accompany him wherever he was when it was an extended project. All I needed was a good Internet connection and it was business as usual for me. So this period of our lives got us used to being on the road and the travel bug bit us.

Then three things happened.

John's company downsized and he was the new guy, so he got laid off. I was completely burned out from running the web company all by myself, and the 2016 election happened. (I refuse to talk politics, but we figured the U.S. was in for some "confusing" times, and we didn't want to be in the middle of it.)

So, we sold the company, took early retirement and decided to move to a tropical climate... somewhere.

Mexico

We thought, at first, that we would manage or buy into a boutique hotel or bed and breakfast. We traveled to and were offered jobs with three of them. But we decided that we were finally FREE from our work details, and didn't want to be tied to one place. So that's when we found out about house sitting. It's a sweet deal because home owners get free reliable care for their homes and pets while they are away, and house sitters get to travel the world, have a place to stay rent-free, and experience places and cultures in a way that traveling as tourists doesn't allow.

And, I wanted to write our story. You were in the marketing business, you know what I'm talking about. I had, for years made other people and companies "shine" with my words and graphics. And, John is a photographer who never really had the opportunity, or time, to really delve into what he wanted to do with his photography art, so it was our turn. In 2017, we sold out...our home, cars, business, and everything we owned to be nomads. We have our retirement, and some savings, but other than that, we have no safety net. And you know what? It's very liberating. We started our blog, Barefoot Diary, with John taking the photos and me writing the stories.

 Mexico

Our very first house sit was on the island of Vieques, Puerto Rico. John is originally from New Orleans, and as we were looking at places, he said we absolutely shouldn't be in the hurricane belt during hurricane season. I'm from Dallas, Texas. I thought hurricanes were just tornadoes that came from the ocean. I didn't know.

Colors of the day.

Between us, we took the house sit on Vieques thinking, "....what are the odds...what's the worst that could happen...." Well, the odds were not in our favor, and the worst did happen in the form of Hurricanes Irma and Maria. We had no running water, power, cell, Internet, etc. for over 2 months until we left to do our next house sit.

You've done mission work in PR, so you know what amazing people live there. We loaded food (when it finally arrived), helped clear properties, and basically did what we could to help. It was almost a year before the people of Vieques got electricity back. They are amazing. So that's why we returned for 2 house sits this past September until last week. When you go through something like a hurricane, you are bound to the people who experienced it with you in a very, very special way.

Why did the toucan cross the road? (Photo: Costa Rica)

We had just started our blog, Barefoot Diary, when the hurricanes hit. The stories of what we went through with the disasters helped to bring attention to our efforts. Our goal, with our blog, is to prove that the world is not a scary place. There are phenomenal, safe places with amazing people doing incredible things all over the world. We don't talk politics or religion, but we do get a little "apey" with things like keeping the oceans clean and preserving endangered wildlife.

We feel that many people, especially in the United States, have a phobia about new places, races and countries and thus never venture far beyond their own back yard. Some can't afford to travel. Some have physical problems or family commitments that prevent them from venturing out. But most are just plain scared. So we write and snap pictures to show them what's out there. We haven't been out of the Americas yet, but it's on the agenda for 2021.

We would never have been able to afford to experience the world in this special way, without house sitting. We like to stay in a place at least 2 months to really get to know the place and the people.

Ed, last week we were in a shack in the Vieques jungle that had never been finished out after the hurricanes. This week we are in a mansion in Cancun. Our lives are never dull. And we love it.

And... I'm a cartoonist...sorta.

I'm a 64 year old walking/running/water aerobics enthusiast, getting ready to launch my cartoon Wimpy Girl on Medium. The message she promotes is that no matter what your age or athletic ability happens to be, if you just show up and do SOMETHING to improve yourself, you are a super hero. We'll see what happens....eek!

I also wrote a series of stories 20+ years ago called BlabberTales about growing up in the 60s. A few were published in magazines, but I retained the rights. I'm just now starting to illustrate them. I'm hoping to make them into a comic book, graphic story series. They are "Picture Stories for Grownup Kids"

Actually I really don't know what I'm doing with either Wimpy Girl or BlabberTales, but I'm just tossing them out there, like spaghetti on the refrigerator. Maybe someday they will stick.


Related Links
http://barefootdiary.com/
Throwback Thursday: Cuernavaca

All photos courtesy John & Anel. See more of John's work at the Barefoot Diary.