and still keep your full-time job!

In one of my blog articles last month, I discussed how I was able to travel to 4 countries within 4 months and still maintained my full-time job in a BPO company. I’m writing this entry as a second part of that blog post.

Seldom do people know that apart from those 4 countries, I also traveled to 8 local destinations in a span of 8 months. It started in August of 2010 and ended during the first week of March 2011.

“Ed, I have a question; have you resigned from Company X”?

Friends and former colleagues would ask me this question because it seemed like every Facebook status message that I posted within those months, I’d point out that I was in a different place. Even I couldn’t believe the feat that I just achieved.

In the previous article, I talked about Booking Ahead, Filing for Vacation Leave, Planning your Itinerary and Saving Money. Here are some more travel tips you might find useful.

How to Travel to 4 Countries and 8 Local Destinations within 8 Months
and still keep your full-time job:

• Combine your Vacation Leaves with Your Days Off. Given that I only have an average number of vacation and sick leaves every year, it would be crazy to think that all the days that I went out were filed using my VLs. Simple mathematics would show that the number of days is not enough to cover for the acquired spots. That’s why it would be wise to use your rest days together with your vacation leaves. If it’s possible, holidays can also be combined. Let me summarize my travels during those instances:

August 2010
3 days – Bohol (August 21-23)

September 2010
9 days – Hong Kong and Macau (September 1-9)
3 days – Boracay (September 11-13)

October 2010
4 days – Manila (October 1-4)
4 days – Malaysia (October 16-20)

November 2010
5 days – Iloilo and Guimaras (November 25-29)

December 2010
Was just spent in Cebu.

January 2011
8 days – Thailand and Cambodia (January 18-25)
4 days – Davao

February 2011
4 days – Zambales (February 28-21)

March 2011
5 days – Sagada (March 2-7)

Pretty extreme, is it not? If you manage your leaves, you’ll have longer time to travel.

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I received another email from the Philippine Blog Awards team saying that I was chosen as a finalist of the Travel Category for the Main Division. I was surprised again because I did not expect to be part of a list of very notable bloggers. I mean this blog used to be just a personal one, I never knew it would evolve into a Travel Blog. But when it did, I started embracing it which now got me hooked!

It’s nice when you get to help out other people by sharing your experiences of the places you’ve been to. In my own way, I hope to inspire people to get out of that comfort zone and start travelling! I am also honored to be lined up with very good travel bloggers. There are also other travel bloggers not listed but are great and these are people I admire. I’ll probably join the wagon and create my own series of interviews of them so I can learn more about the people behind these blogs.

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November 28, 2010
University of the Philippines – Visayas - Miag-ao Campus

You want to take a break from your homework, school projects or even from your professor? Most students chill in hangout places for booze or rest under a shade of a tree. City ones go to malls and watch the latest movie flick or get some ice cold treat from the nearest vendors inside the campus.

Now what can the students in UP Miag-ao do? They can simply head to the beach that’s located beside their campus.

Oble on the side

It was a Sunday afternoon, a long weekend because of the Monday being a holiday. We just finished checking out the Miag-ao church (a UNESCO World Heritage Site) when Julie, Edwin’s friend and former classmate, took us on a short tour of their campus in this part of the Visayas.

feeling Oble on another

The thought of a body of water that was so accessible was enough for me to shed some clothes and hurriedly take a dip in the salty sea.

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SoloflightEd will be going on a lot of trips from August, September, October and November this year! Also, I'll be having a few more on January, February and March next year.

One big problem -- where to find some money? I booked different flights due to Cebu Pacific's promo fares in different occasions and offerings but one thing is for sure, the discounts didn't cost me much. Only now I have to look for some cash for my budget. Here are my travels.

This Year:
August - Bohol
September - Hongkong, Macau
October - Manila, Kota Kinabalu, Singapore
November - Iloilo

Next Year:
January - Davao
February - Manila
March - Clark

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I will be attending the Visayas Blogging Summit 2010 in Iloilo! I booked a flight online and I’m excited to know what will happen on this blogging event which will happen on November 27 to 28, 2010.

The Visayas Blog Summit 2010 will take place in Iloilo as well as the Visayas Blog Awards. I wasn’t able to join the Philippine Blog Awards 2009 Visayas last year because I was completely inactive in the blogging atmosphere and it was already late when I realized that such an event existed at the Cebu City Sports Complex. Now, I have to travel to a different region here in order to partake in this year’s activity. In any case, I’m glad to travel to a different region since I have something to blog while doing so.

We were at the Cofifi Cafe when we checked Cebu Pac online.

We used my friend’s remaining credits on her bank to book the flights online using Cebu Pacific Air’s promotion. It’s a good thing that there were promos available cause I’m already way off my budget. In any case, I didn’t want to miss this blogging summit so I will eat and drink SkyFlakes and water for the remaining days in order to compensate for the money that was spent for this blogging community affair. hehe.

Anyway, now I have the ticket; all I have to do is file for leave – I don’t even know if I still have remaining VL credits left. hehe.

See you in Iloilo for the Visayas Blog Summit 2010 and the Philippine Blog Awards 2010 – Visayas Leg

If there will be problems in the future, my friends and I are still planning to tour this part of Visayas in order to see what the place can offer us. This will be a good event to meet people in the blog community.

Check out the FaceBook site of the event here: Visayas Blog Summit 2010