Curate Your Life: Adventures in Hiking & Global House Sitting

# Belinda Coker

[00:00:06] **Howard** [00:00:00] Hello, everyone. This is Howard Fox, and welcome back for another episode of the Outdoor Adventure Series,

[00:00:13] **Howard** Belinda Coker is our guest today. Coming to us from Scotland, Belinda is a hiker, writer, educator, and house-sitter. She helps women and others, I would imagine- ... build confidence, through practical adventure and responsible travel, and she teaches how to structure trust and responsibly create genuine freedom and stability in life. Belinda, it's a pleasure to finally get you on the podcast. Welcome.

[00:00:44] **Belinda:** Thank you, Howard. It's lovely to be here.

[00:00:47] **Howard** Fantastic. Now, you and I have been trying to have this podcast for quite a while. we met through our friends at Podmatch. Mm. And so here you are. And first off, when I mentioned Scotland, there was a little bit of [00:01:00] a, I don't know, a, a-

[00:01:02] **Howard** comfort in my heart because I have such fond memories of Scotland. I have a couple friends that are, Scottish, and they are up there. but fir- first off, why are you in Scotland right now?

[00:01:13] **Belinda:** Okay. So I'm in Scotland because I decided, to leave the corporate world and travel around the world hiking, because I took an, I took an early retirement. I, I'm 60 years old, and I thought, "Well, I only have 20, maybe 25-" Active years left. That, that's how, that's how many I guessed I had left. So I thought, "Right, okay, I'm going to make the most of my life.

[00:01:39] **Belinda:** For the rest of my life, I am going to embrace it and do as much as I can." So my children had all left school, and, and,they, they were in their final, final years of university, and everyone was in a safe and secure place. A- a- all the, all my young adult children were in a safe and secure place.

[00:01:57] **Belinda:** So I, I left and [00:02:00] started hiking around the world, and I... W- when you're in Australia or New Zealand, 'cause I'm obviously not Scottish. You can tell by my accent. I'm,

[00:02:08] **Belinda:** I, I got the

[00:02:09] **Howard** accent, but that was about it.

[00:02:11] **Belinda:** Yeah. So I'm dual nationality, Australia and New Zealand. So, but when you're all the way down under, it's a long way to go back up to the top.

[00:02:21] **Belinda:** So, I made a decision with my, with my partner that we would, we would base ourselves up in the Northern Hemisphere for, 10, 8, 10, 10 months of the year, and we base ourselves up here, and then we can move freely and go, and, and, and go across to Europe, 'cause as we can do that quite cheaply, and cross to Europe, do, do a great hike.

[00:02:44] **Belinda:** Like, for example, the Tour du Mont Blanc or, the, w- where are we going? next, next, next week we are heading to Greece for six weeks of hiking. And, and so then we, we decided, right, where would our, where would our Northern Hemisphere base be? And, we both [00:03:00] have S- Scottish ancestry.

[00:03:02] **Belinda:** We both love Scotland. Scotland's great. It's, it's actually not expensive to live here, and, it's free, free... For us, it's free medical, and there's prescriptions. All prescriptions are free. So you basic- you basically turn up at the doctor and you say, "Right, okay, I've got a little shopping list here," and your whole hiking medical kit gets, included in the, in it.

[00:03:22] **Belinda:** It's, it's quite funny. Yeah. No, but it's a great place to live. It really is. Yeah.

[00:03:26] **Howard** I love it.

[00:03:27] **Belinda:** Yeah.

[00:03:28] **Howard** Yeah. I lived in the UK for a, a little while many years ago, and I recall, in fact, even here i- in the United States where I live, Australians, New Zealanders, you are the consummate travelers. I mean, you're always traveling somewhere. And so here you were, growing up, living Australia, New Zealand. Had you always had the travel bug in you, or was it really just, [00:04:00] "I'm done with work, I'm taking the early retirement, and we're just gonna go and explore"?

[00:04:05] **Belinda:** No. I actually t-- I, I actually took a, what, w-what I thought was going to be a gap year, straight after school before university. I said, "Right, okay." Like all of my friends, everybody, wanted the excitement of the northern hemisphere. Well, I actually wanted the excitement of Asia. So when I was, when I was 20, I actually straight after school, I ha- I had to work a year before I...

[00:04:29] **Belinda:** to, to save the money. And so I ended up, going to-- I was going to go to Asia for six months, and ended up going for two years. I, worked in Ladakh in northern India on a vol- in a vol-voluntary capacity on a solar power project, and this is right back in the 1980s. Like before... I had never heard of solar power back then, and I, and, and I, and it, I didn't actually hear about it again until probably about a decade later.

[00:04:55] **Belinda:** so and then I went back and did my university but, a-along with, many, [00:05:00] many other Australasians, everybody was sort of traveling a, a path that, you know, either straight after school or straight after university, and it was called... we called it out, the big OE. It, that, the big overseas experience because that's what you did, and you got it all out of your system, and then you came home and had a career and had babies and, and, and life went on.

[00:05:23] **Howard:** Life went on.

[00:05:24] **Howard** So, I'm curious, too, when, you went to, to school, and, what did you study,

[00:05:31] **Howard:** say

[00:05:32] **Howard** the point you l- you left school that, after the gap year, and you- Yeah

[00:05:36] **Howard** you're, you... And, and now here we are, you're sitting in a, in a home in Scotland.

[00:05:40] **Belinda:** Public relations.

[00:05:42] **Howard** Okay.

[00:05:43] **Belinda:** Yeah. So that's what I did at college. M- you mean, you mean,university? Yeah, yeah. So that's what, that was what I majored in is public relations. Funnily enough, I never used it. I mean, well, I, I probably did use it in my, in my vocation, but I didn't... I never did a public [00:06:00] relations role.

[00:06:00] **Belinda:** Maybe about six months, and

[00:06:02] **Howard** Okay ... that's

[00:06:02] **Belinda:** it.

[00:06:03] **Howard** Now, okay. Now, when you, pursued the retirement, where, had you, had this idea of traveling around the world, had it been kind of below the surface, below the radar, or had it been slowly bubbling up here and there? I'm kinda curious what that aha moment was for you, where, like, "Okay.

[00:06:26] **Howard** We're, we're gonna pack everything up, and we're just gonna live from, country to country, town to town."

[00:06:33] **Belinda:** Okay, so midlifers are going to love this one. So, it was actually in the year 2000, and I was 55 years old, and COVID had hit, and, I, I... We were, we were in a quite a good place during COVID. where, I had my whole family around me and, everything was pretty good. However, I looked in the mirror and I thought, what's become of you?

[00:06:54] **Belinda:** You haven't, you've lost your sense of adventure." You, I, I, for ye- for dec- for a couple of [00:07:00] decades, I'd been wearing a corporate hat, a mum hat, a, a partner hat, an ex-wife hat, all sorts of different hats, but I hadn't actually worn a Belinda hat. And I was overweight. I was probably drinking way too much wine than I, than, than, than I should have been, and I, I just wasn't in a good place.

[00:07:19] **Belinda:** I really was having, I call it midlescence, the, the hormonal, transition identities, all that sort of thing. And so then I decided, right, okay, I need to get out. I need to go and do something for myself. And so I joined a hiking group, and I hadn't worn a pair of hiking boots for 35 years.

[00:07:39] **Belinda:** Growing up in New Zealand, I had, been hiking all through school, all through university, so hiking wa- wa- was in my blood. New Zealand's got some of the best hikes in the world, by the way. and so then I, so I went on this hike and, it, it, it was through a meetup group, and I was the youngest.

[00:07:58] **Belinda:** Everybody else was 70 and [00:08:00] 80 years old, and it wasn't a long hike. It was probably about 12 miles, 17 kilometers, but it was down a steep gully and up the other side, and I struggled. And all these fit 70 and 80-year-olds were, they were just powering down and powering back up, and they were so... They w- they had this glow about them, and I looked at them and I thought, "I want that."

[00:08:24] **Belinda:** I, I wa- I want that. I, I don't want to be in this, m- middle a- middle age crash that I felt that I was in. And that was the start, start of it. it wa- that wasn't the start of me actually going off and traveling around the world, but it was the start of getting my hiking bag before I, before I started multi-day hikes.

[00:08:47] **Belinda:** yeah

[00:08:48] **Howard** I love it. I love it. Mm-hmm. Now, I am curious. when you are off on your multi-day hikes and you are in the locations, and we're gonna talk a little bit about the, the, the [00:09:00] house-sitting in a second.

[00:09:01] **Howard** Do you have a home base somewhere?

[00:09:04] **Belinda:** I don't at the moment, and, but this is,this, this is basically what my partner and I are saying, right? "Okay, we need to b- get something because we've been doing this now for two, nearly three years." And, it's just things like, I was applying for a VAT number with the, i- in, in the UK the other day, and I couldn't, because I, I've sold my property, and I couldn't, I couldn't, I couldn't, verify my, my address.

[00:09:32] **Belinda:** And all of a sudden, it really, really hit hard. it's not that we've, we're not, we... I'm technically homeless, but, but, and you say that. I say that to my kids. They're, "Mum, don't say that," because I'm not. I mean, I could, I could, go and, live somewhere whenever I wanted.

[00:09:46] **Belinda:** But, it- it's actually quite, it's quite an interesting concept, and I think that this is a problem that a lot of nomadic people are, are finding and because nomadic living at the moment is, is, is very popular, [00:10:00] not only

[00:10:00] **Howard** the rage. It's

[00:10:01] **Belinda:** the rage these days ... you

[00:10:02] **Belinda:** 30-year-olds, but also the retirees who are suddenly saying, "Well, we can retire here and sit here and turn the TV channels, over and over, and sit by the fire and eat tea and scones, or we can go out and enjoy ourselves."

[00:10:15] **Belinda:** So,

[00:10:17] **Belinda:** is

[00:10:18] **Belinda:** it a problem? it does become a problem every now and then, and so we are in the process of looking for somewhere to buy that, so that we can actually have somewhere where we call home, even if we're only there for two to three months a year.

[00:10:31] **Howard** Okay. No, I love that. Yeah. You could have a place two to three months a year and rent it out while you're gone- Yeah

[00:10:36] **Belinda:** Exactly. Exactly ...

[00:10:38] **Howard** w- as you have been traveling,

[00:10:41] **Howard:** traveling-

[00:10:43] **Howard** I imagine you d- do you, how do you, how are you deciding where you want to go? I m- and, and I ask this question knowing that you're going to Greece, because I love Greece. I have, friends that live there, and I've been there, been twice. I would love- Yeah

[00:10:59] **Howard** I've even thought [00:11:00] about packing everything up and, moving to somewhere in northern Greece right by the water. There was, cost of living, was very low, and I thought, "I could get, get a little studio apartment." The beauty of podcasting and coaching- Yeah ... is I can do it anywhere in the world. Yeah.

[00:11:16] **Howard** Doesn't matter. Yeah. It's just the time zone and internet connection.

[00:11:19] **Belinda:** Yeah.

[00:11:19] **Howard** But how are you deciding where you want to go? Right. And how are you then preparing for that?

[00:11:27] **Belinda:** Okay. So we have,s- so first of all, I have a bucket list of hikes and they, and there can be... I'd like to say there's only 50 on there, but it probably stretches to about 200,

[00:11:40] **Belinda:** know- Okay

[00:11:40] **Belinda:** by the time

[00:11:40] **Belinda:** I save all, save all the hikes that I'd like to do on Instagram. And more and more are coming up all the time.

[00:11:46] **Belinda:** So we house sit, and we'll, I know that we're gonna get into house sitting. We house sit four times a year for one month. So, and that's du- during the, during the quarters because the people that we house sit for, it's a regular house sit. They [00:12:00] go to, Thailand and we look after their house for a month.

[00:12:03] **Belinda:** So between that, we have two months where we can hike. Now, those two months are basically, winter, spring, summer, and fall. Okay? So we've got winter, spring, summer, and fall. So all the hikes in the world, you could, the, the, the optimum time to hike these hikes in the world are, are literally either spring, summer, fall, or winter.

[00:12:25] **Belinda:** Northern Hemisphere winter. So Northern Hemisphere winter or the ones down, down under will come under that chara- category.

[00:12:31] **Belinda:** So

[00:12:31] **Belinda:** if you... And then, and also, well, well, I thought the, the traverse through the Canaries would also come into that, but I ended up with hypothermia in, in January, but that's another

[00:12:41] **Howard** That's a whole

[00:12:42] **Belinda:** other

[00:12:42] **Belinda:** that's a whole other story. But, so, so when you ta- ta- take anywhere in the Mediterranean like, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Italy, all of, all that Mediterranean band, that is best hiked either in spring or, or fall. And so that [00:13:00] will come into the spring category. Then we've got summer. this summer we are, hiking the GR 10, which runs along the Pyrenees from right from the, west coast of, the border between f- Spain and Portug- sorry, Spain and France.

[00:13:17] **Belinda:** So the border between Spain and France runs along the Pyrenees, and this trail literally runs along the border in France from the west coast to the east coast, and it'll take eight weeks, and the optimum time to do that is summer. So we, we schedule that for summer. and then we also have a backup as well.

[00:13:36] **Belinda:** So we have, we usually have one or two backup hikes so that we can kind of slot them in if, if something goes wrong. For example, I would have loved to have done the Jordan Trail, this, this spring, but Middle East is kind of out of bounds at the

[00:13:51] **Howard** Not the best place. No. When, when you are house sitting, are [00:14:00] the, the homes that you are staying in, are these people that you know? Or how ha... And again, I know we're gonna talk a little more detail- Yeah ... but how have you arranged to- Get to know these folks, they trust you, you trust them. There's gotta be, that's both ways.

[00:14:18] **Belinda:** Yeah.

[00:14:18] **Howard** How do you dis- I- I- do these, are these the same homes every year, or are these folks that you have through your website or through just other sites where you're, you have the, I don't know, a, a professional house sitters, for the sake of better words. Right. How are you establishing that, that one month a year in four different locations?

[00:14:40] **Belinda:** Well, there's, Okay, so for starters, n- prior to this year, we were just, we were on, there's several apps, and on my website, I have a resource with all the, with all the house-sitting apps on there. So that's, so there's lots of apps, and you can, you can narrow it down to whichever, to the loca- to geographically where you [00:15:00] want to be.

[00:15:00] **Belinda:** whether you like dogs or cats or mice or rabbits or whatever, whatever the pet is. Usually it's dogs and cats. Dogs or cats or sometimes both. And, and so you, you, you basic- you apply to, you apply to go on them, and you also get rated. So I, we're, we're five-star house sitters, and, on some like, somewhere like TrustedHouseSitters you can also rate the, the homeowners as well.

[00:15:23] **Belinda:** So you can, see on a, some, some homeowners want someone to look after their dog, and you can have a look at their profile and go, "Ooh, I don't quite like your reviews." But the, that sort of thing. But I, we tend to get some very good, we get very good house sits. and we get long ones as well.

[00:15:38] **Belinda:** So prior to this, we were, we were filling in each of these quarters with house sits all over. We were doing, all over Spain. We've done, America, and we've done the UK and Canada as well. Now, when we did, we've, we looked after this one particular Labrador in Scotland for, twice, and they love us [00:16:00] so much they said, "Look, we'd really like you to do this on a regular basis."

[00:16:04] **Belinda:** they, they have to go over to Thailand four times a year, and so we said yes. So two months before we were scheduled to do it in March, they turned around and said, "Well, we're not g- we're not going anymore because of the, because,our flight goes through Dubai, and we're not sure about whether we're not going, we're going to be able to get back," and all sorts of things like that.

[00:16:24] **Belinda:** So we said, "Right, okay. Happy days. We will, find another house sit." And within two days we had filled up that three-week or three to four-week gap with other house sits.

[00:16:35] **Howard** Very nice.

[00:16:36] **Belinda:** am now. Yeah.

[00:16:37] **Howard** you go. I, I, I wanna, while I wanna go back to the hiking for, i- in a minute, I do w- want to ask about the house sitting again, is-

[00:16:50] **Howard:** what would be...

[00:16:51] **Howard** and I know you have a website, that we will in- introduce, and provide in our show notes.

[00:16:57] **Howard** the house- [00:17:00] housesittingcollective.com.

[00:17:00] **Belinda:** Yeah.

[00:17:01] **Howard** In addition to now you be- you and your partner being experienced house sitters, what's your... If there's, like, two or three, five pieces of advice for somebody to become a trusted house sitter, how would they go about doing that?

[00:17:19] **Belinda:** Okay. So one of the first things is, is that you really need to have a, you need to have a profile which will ac- wh- which will, which will sell you. Now, you need to also have, an element of trust. So you need to be trustworthy. you need to understand that when you are going into somebody's home, they're going away for an extended period, and it might be three weeks, it might be two weeks, it might be one week, whatever, and you're there to look after their most prized possessions or assets, which is their house and their dog and cat.

[00:17:51] **Belinda:** lo- lots of people, like, pet is, pets are now family for people. When, when I grew up, we used to throw the dog a bone out the kitchen window, but

[00:17:58] **Belinda:** it's a little bit

[00:17:59] **Belinda:** [00:18:00] it's a little bit more. But, so you need to understand that that's, that that's really important. At the, on the flip side, it is one of the most amazing ways to travel and not pay any rent, and also you have the use of a full kitchen, so your restaurant bills are next to nothing.

[00:18:18] **Belinda:** and you don't, you have a full kitchen. So, I think that knowing that you have to go, that you're going into a house sit and that your number one priority is that element of trust, and that is so, so important. And I go into that a lot in my, in my blogs and, my education and that sort of thing.

[00:18:36] **Belinda:** it, it is one of the, it is one of the most, it, it is one of the best ways to be able to travel. It really is, in my opinion. and I started it because I was working over here for a while, in the corporate space, and I needed to find an Airbnb. and I was looking at these damp

[00:18:57] **Belinda:** one-bedroom-

[00:18:59] **Belinda:** [00:19:00] apartments, and I was just like, "This is, this is ridiculous.

[00:19:03] **Belinda:** What am I doing? This is,this isn't going to be comfortable." And or, or I would be in a hotel, which was just, like a s- a small square box with a bed and maybe a chair in the corner and a desk which faced the TV. And, and it, but to be able to wa- to be in a house where you have the full movement f- I'm sitting in an office right now, or moving into a lounge room, kitchen, bathroom, And it, having that, having that flow is so important for you. And so that's why it's such a good, way to travel for retirees, people who are on, who are digital nomads, or even solo travelers, especially solo women travelers. It's very safe to be able to be in a house. Maybe you've got an alarm system, and if you've got a dog, you're ce- certainly going to have something that'll make a bit of noise if somebody knocks on the door.

[00:19:54] **Belinda:** I mean, having the mailman come every day is usually the most exciting thing that happens every day. [00:20:00] So, yeah.

[00:20:02] **Howard** I, so a question then. I, I'm a little self-serving, opportunistic I would, I would even say. M- my work as a, a, a, I am an executive coach. I coach- Yeah ... literally every day, four or five hours.

[00:20:17] **Howard** My podcasting is my, not so much a side hustle anymore. Yeah. But the key is I can do it anywhere.

[00:20:24] **Belinda:** Yeah.

[00:20:25] **Howard** Is that a, is this a possibility for someone like me who's single, unattached? I just need to be able to ha- I just need, need to be able to do the work while also- I guess taking care of the dog preferably Yeah I'm more of a dog person than a cat person

[00:20:42] **Belinda:** Yeah, ab- absolutely. so I, I did it probably for about, before I started this full-time hiking sort of lifestyle. I was doing it, probably for about s- for about six months at,six months at a time,

[00:20:59] **Belinda:** I was

[00:20:59] **Belinda:** able [00:21:00] to sort of save on the amount of money that I would've spent on hotels and BM- Airbnbs, and I was working all the time.

[00:21:07] **Belinda:** And then, of course, you'd want to take the dog out for a walk, maybe at mid-morning, maybe at 3:00, and it's a lovely way to, to take a break. It really is. Most of the houses, most of the people that you're going to be looking after,the houses have everything that you would need, including a fast internet, and that's one of my specula- stipulations is that I do have the fast internet.

[00:21:30] **Belinda:** as far as, being a single male, it's not a problem. All they want is someone who's trustworthy. if you're... And often, and, and I say this, but at the same time, there's a lot of young people doing it, but, older people really,s- really, kind of more appreciated in this space because you've looked after your own home.

[00:21:51] **Belinda:** You've, you've got that air of responsibility. You've had, you've had responsible positions in life, So, and, and, a lot of the [00:22:00] homeowners that I've met, we've actually become good friends with.

[00:22:03] **Howard** Nice. Nice

[00:22:04] **Belinda:** And, yeah, and we actually went away on holiday with, a couple that, we looked after their house in York, and we ended up, going down to Spain together.

[00:22:12] **Belinda:** So, you do. You make, we, y- you make great friends with it,

[00:22:15] **Howard** Yeah You're... I, I'm like, Belinda, you and I are gonna be, best friends. I hope your, your, your, partner, is okay with that- ... 'cause I'm gonna be like, "I need to, I wanna do this so badly." I, I was literally on a coaching call this week with a client, who's taking an early retirement, and we talked about what he would like to do next, and this idea of just traveling and taking people on hikes was just at, at the top of the list as opposed to having another J-O-B for the next five years.

[00:22:46] **Howard** Yeah. One quick question, and then I wanna go back. I, I do wanna visit your website, so perhaps we can do that i- in a second, 'cause I have some more questions regarding the hiking. But as for house sitting, [00:23:00] for somebody who's never done it before, would you recommend- that they perhaps try to house sit in their home country or maybe in a country they're very familiar with first before- Yeah

[00:23:14] **Howard** I don't see myself going to the Philippines or Thailand to- Yeah ... house sit. I mean, it's, it's one thing- Yeah ... not to be able to speak the language, but everything, the culture, the environment- Yeah ... the, the gaps in the, in the communication. Yeah. What would be your recommendation?

[00:23:29] **Belinda:** Well, I actually, I, the, I do quite a bit of this in my, in my course as well, in two of my courses. So, it's basically how to get trust, and,trust credentials without ever having done it before. And, so, a l- a lot of the time, a lot of your skills are transferrable, but you can also do what's known as a weekend sit hack, and this is to get a reference.

[00:23:53] **Belinda:** So, in a lot of the towns or the big cities, and this can be in your own city, wherever you live, a lot of [00:24:00] people are going away for the weekend for two days, and they need someone to look after, Rover or, Ginger the cat or whatever. And so, what you can go... And so, those two-day house sits, they're not that popular with the long-term experienced sitters.

[00:24:14] **Belinda:** They want the three-week, the one-month house sits. And so, you go and get, one or two of those, which are quite easy to pick up, and then, and that's a, and that's a great way to sort of try, start to get references. But also, house sitters will take, I mean, prospective homeowners will take,y- you can give, professional references.

[00:24:34] **Howard** You can get chara- give character references. whether or not it's the pastor from your church or your employer or your landlord or anyone like that, just to show that you're a res- responsible human being, and that's literally all you need. Because that's all they want. They just want someone who's gonna love their pet and look after their house, I, I love it. Yeah. I love it. And, I, it's funny, as we're, you're sharing this.

[00:24:58] **Howard** I, next week I was [00:25:00] actually asked to do some house sitting for my, my roommate's best friend. Right. One of her best friends, and I said yes, and then I realized, oh, that's the weekend I'm gonna go vi- going with some friends to visit a national park. Yeah. Sorry, I can't do it. But,'cause I, I had house sat for, this individual and their dog- Yeah

[00:25:20] **Howard** previously, so it was, it definitely wa- was available there. So listen, I am gonna go ahead and, and, share my screen. I wanna take a look at your website, and, perhaps if we can kinda navigate around a little bit.

[00:25:33] **Belinda:** Okay, so this is the hi- this is the hiking

[00:25:36] **Howard** Yes.

[00:25:37] **Belinda:** so just, just, I just wanna clarify with the listeners that we also have a house sitting collective website. This is the, this

[00:25:44] **Belinda:** the

[00:25:44] **Howard** hiking one. Well, we can, we'll do a quick visit over to the house sitting- Yeah ... as well.

[00:25:48] **Belinda:** Yep. No, that's fine. So, where are we going to go on this one?

[00:25:53] **Howard** So take us on a short tour.

[00:25:55] **Belinda:** Okay, so, s- here I have the homepage. This is me [00:26:00] crossing a river in, in New Zealand, down on the South Island, where some of the most beautiful hiking in the world. And then if we scroll a little bit down, I have the quick links. So here we have hiking guides. So this is all the places I've hiked.

[00:26:14] **Belinda:** Well, actually, it's not all the places I've hiked. I'm probab- I've probably got about 10 hikes that I, that are backed up that I still need to write about. So if we go into hiking trail guides... we can go in, go in there afterwards, but hiking trail guides is where you can find all the guides under particular countries, and I can, I can add another six countries to that at least.

[00:26:39] **Belinda:** And then you open those up, and all the hikes come in t- there. And now my hiking guides, I try to give everything, all the information like, the route, the, the best time to hike it, and everything that I can think of that, to include in, that you would need to know in this hiking guide. And I never do hiking [00:27:00] guides, for hikes that I haven't hiked.

[00:27:02] **Belinda:** I don't believe in that. It has to be one that I have actually hiked. And, and, do I use AI? Look, sometimes, but not to write that, not to write the guide. But sometimes you just kind of need, need a little, like, "Can you just help me with this sentence?" But honestly, if I, if I, if I took AI hiking, AI might, might ha- might be able to write it.

[00:27:22] **Belinda:** I might trust it with w- writing my guides. But no, not, not a, not a show at the moment. AI, AI is just so not, not good enough. Okay, so back to the homepage. if we just go back to the homepage.

[00:27:34] **Howard** By the way, I was gonna... I was tempted to click on Greenland-

[00:27:38] **Howard:** because

[00:27:39] **Howard** it is a property of Denmark, for our listeners Wanted to emphasize that, but I elected not to go there.

[00:27:46] **Howard** But we're back- Okay ... at the homepage.

[00:27:48] **Belinda:** Okay, no, we can go in there in a minute. okay, so then we've got, Oh, and then further down here with the, this is the same. Oh, so just go back u- up a, up a little bit. Sorry. Up, no, in between. Yeah. So [00:28:00] we've got the essential stuff. So the essential stuff is all sorts of things like how to go to the toilet when you're hiking, first aid for hiking, what the difference is between, Australian and American snakes, and there is a huge difference.

[00:28:15] **Belinda:** many ... So, Australian, Australian snakes, the most venomous snakes in the world, are also actually quite timid, or most of them are quite timid, and they bite into the lymphatic system. So our snakes bite into the lymphatic system, therefore our treatment of the snake bite is totally different to, say, a pit viper, which is the most common snake in America, which bites into the, into the blood, into the blood vessels.

[00:28:42] **Belinda:** now the, the other, the only snake which does, in America, which does bite into the lymphatic system is your coral snake, which I think you can find in the southern subur- in the southern,states. So, so the, the problem is, is that many Australians, we all carry our snake bite kit with them, which is a very [00:29:00] tight bandage, and we bi- and we, and it, it's, we, That's how we,manage a snake bite. If you did that with a pit viper, you'd probably lose the limb, and if you treated an Australian snake bite the same way you treated an American snake bite, you would die. So

[00:29:16] **Howard** good to be, culturally aware of- ... where you're going and what the, what the f- Yeah ... what the opportunities are, the experiences are, but are- Yeah ... perhaps what the dangers are. There was a book by Bill Bryson years ago. Yeah. He wrote, oh, God, about the Appala- it was-

[00:29:31] **Belinda:** Appalachian

[00:29:32] **Howard** Trail

[00:29:32] **Howard** Walk in the Woods, on the- Yeah ... Appalachian Trail. Yeah. And then he wrote a book, In a Sunburned Land, which was about Australia, and he w- he w- he made sure to emphasize that, like, 10 of the 12 top most dangerous, know, w- snakes, spiders, and, and- Yeah ... something else are in Australia, and I thought, "Well, that's great.

[00:29:53] **Howard** Thank you." I remember I was up in Keynes in the, Aboriginal Park. Right. And I was about ready to take the, the, the [00:30:00] tram down, and I looked behind me and there's this massive spider

[00:30:05] **Howard:** in

[00:30:05] **Howard** spider web. I thought, "Oh, dear God. I'm go- I'm, I'm outta here." Okay, I digress. so it looks like you've got a lot of,resources out here.

[00:30:14] **Howard** Yeah. I love the guides, the- Yeah ... the trails, the camping,

[00:30:18] **Belinda:** Yeah ...

[00:30:18] **Howard** I mean, I would love- I lo- when I moved from Chicago to Las Vegas, I wanted to get out to the desert. Mm. This time of the year we have scorpions, so we've gotta be careful. But- Yeah ... just getting out there, seeing the stars, I imagine just the, the sights and the sounds, the smells have h- had to have been amazing for you and your partner- Yeah, yeah

[00:30:38] **Howard** on these hikes. Absolutely. Is there one hike that really, you know, it just, it, it, it has a special place in your heart?

[00:30:46] **Belinda:** I think Greenland would be one of them. Green- the one in Greenland would be one of them, but the other one is the Larapinta Trail in, in, that went through the Red Desert in Australia. So the [00:31:00] Larapinta Trail is definitely one, but also Greenland. You can click on Greenland

[00:31:03] **Howard:** Okay,

[00:31:04] **Howard** click on Greenland. I was, was gonna go to Australia, but we'll click... W- for our me- for my, listening audience here in the United States, this is Greenland. Yeah. It's a, a part of Europe and Denmark, so just wanted to-

[00:31:15] **Howard:** for everybody to,

[00:31:16] **Howard** to be aware of that.

[00:31:18] **Belinda:** so the... It's called the Arctic Circle Trail, so it goes from the edge of the ice cap all the way over to the, to the sea, and I think... Look, it's around about 200, 220 or 230 kilometers, so I think it's about 170 miles, and, and it's, it's actually follows an Inuit, hunting route. So you get these, that little red hut that you can see that, in the main picture, you have those.

[00:31:47] **Belinda:** There's about, there's about 10 of those along, and you can actually stay in those. They're all free. They're rudimentary. They may, they've got a fire in them, and that's about it. So, And that, but it is [00:32:00] absolutely, it is one of the most beautiful hikes. And I actually did sleep in the huts. I don't usually sleep in huts.

[00:32:06] **Belinda:** I normally sleep in my tent because I prefer my tent, but because it was 24 hours daylight, it, I, there's no way. I couldn't sleep, so I had to go into the hut where at least we could, draw the curtains. Yeah. But that

[00:32:19] **Howard:** Hey,

[00:32:20] **Howard** why don't we, I'm gonna

[00:32:23] **Howard:** go to your,

[00:32:25] **Howard** the house sitting. Which shall we go to?

[00:32:27] **Belinda:** Hou- housesitting collective.

[00:32:34] **Howard** Hopefully it'll come up.

[00:32:35] **Belinda:** That's it, yep.

[00:32:36] **Howard** All right. I love technology.

[00:32:41] **Belinda:** Okay. So

[00:32:44] **Howard** you've got some courses. Excellent.

[00:32:47] **Belinda:** actually maybe if we just go onto the homepage. Sorry,

[00:32:50] **Howard** Oh, there okay.

[00:32:51] **Belinda:** Yeah.

[00:32:51] **Belinda:** If you hit the, if you hit the, Yep, if you hit that. Yes, there you go. That looks a bit better, doesn't it? Okay. So [00:33:00] basically, I've got a big thing about, blurb about here why house sitting, because house sitting is becoming more and more important as,sorry, more and more popular.

[00:33:08] **Belinda:** in fact, it's growing by 12% per annum. So more and more homeowners are saying, right, okay, so, so leaving Rover, the dog, in, in its own home, with caring, trusted people is so much more important and so much nicer than putting them in a place where, where it's almost like jail. like a, a kennel because,

[00:33:30] **Belinda:** know- Right ... they

[00:33:30] **Belinda:** don't have the same sort of love and all that sort of thing.

[00:33:33] **Belinda:** And that is basically why I j- I started this, because so many people, "Well, how do I do it? What do I do?" And lots of people are str- really struggling with their, with their profiles, with their applications. And then I've got the house sitting fundamentals, which, basically shows you what to do right from, right from the get-go.

[00:33:52] **Belinda:** Like how, how to, how to actually house sit, and what you need to do. and there's checklists in there and, all sorts of, all [00:34:00] sorts of great stuff. So

[00:34:01] **Howard:** love it.

[00:34:01] **Howard** I love it. it's funny, and, as I'm looking at the three courses, I mean, for less than $300 you have literally everything you need to prepare- Yeah ... to, to get up to speed- Well-

[00:34:12] **Howard** of what you need to do, and each one of these courses-

[00:34:15] **Belinda:** Yeah ...

[00:34:15] **Howard** has resources associated with it.

[00:34:17] **Belinda:** Yeah. Well, they're all... It's a bit like an onion skin. So if you start off with the young one, the, the smaller one, you'll get that discount if you take the next one. If you take, if you get the, the big one, you get discount if you've already taken the courses.

[00:34:30] **Howard:** I

[00:34:31] **Howard** that model. You, it's that very much that entrepreneurial, ... model. Just the, the lead magnet and then this and then this, Yeah ... very much.

[00:34:39] **Belinda:** Yeah.

[00:34:39] **Howard** Okay.

[00:34:40] **Belinda:** Yeah.

[00:34:40] **Howard** Very nice. Very nice. Well, we're gonna definitely provide the back links, to, the website. Now, I think you mentioned, as we're, I was preparing for the episode, you have an offer for our listeners.

[00:34:54] **Belinda:** Yes, certainly.

[00:34:55] **Belinda:** So it is HSTravel for 10% off. So that's [00:35:00] H for house, S for sitting, travel as in travel. and that is just all lower case, and that will give you 10% off all of our courses.

[00:35:10] **Howard** I love it. Thanks. So we will definitely have that in the show notes. Perfect. Excellent. Excellent. So I am going to stop sharing, and thank you for taking us on, on that tour of the websites.

[00:35:21] **Howard:** I was definitely spending a lot of time more on the,the

[00:35:25] **Howard** website because I just, the idea of- I, I st- y- I, I need to be able to put the word out, get the outdoor in the Outdoor Adventure Series- Definitely ... 'cause you can't do all the outdoor adventure from the safety of a, of a f- of a 12 by 12 room like I am in right now.

[00:35:42] **Howard** Yeah. As you look back

[00:35:47] **Howard:** on your journey, perhaps

[00:35:49] **Howard** people you meet, maybe the reactions from family, is there, is there an aha moment f- for you when you, perhaps you and your partner have said, "Wow, we get to [00:36:00] do this"?

[00:36:00] **Belinda:** I

[00:36:02] **Belinda:** I

[00:36:02] **Belinda:** think all the time, especially, a- and you really get it when you, when you post things on your Facebook, on your personal Facebook, 'cause I post things on my Fa- personal Facebook so, so people don't think that I've fallen off the, the edge of the planet. And, and everybody's like, "Oh my gosh, you're living the best life."

[00:36:21] **Belinda:** a- and, and we s- we kind of say, "Well, actually, we are." and I say to my kids, "Well, well, next week, next week, I, I'm leaving for Greece. so, I'm going to be intermittent for six weeks. But, and but I do have my Garmin with me, and every night I'll send, I'll ping you so you know where I am."

[00:36:42] **Belinda:** So w- we do, we do have that as well, especially when I'm out in the, in the wilderness. And, every- and even my kids are like, "Oh, wow." And it, it, it sometimes it re- you really have to sit back and go, "Yeah, we do have an awesome life." It, it, [00:37:00] and, sometimes I do take this for granted. I do, I do take this for granted.

[00:37:04] **Belinda:** And, people say, people might say to me, "Oh my gosh, you must have so much money." Well, actually, w- I spend probably about a quarter of what I did when I lived in a h- in a home.

[00:37:17] **Howard** Mm-hmm.

[00:37:17] **Belinda:** Okay. So, for example, when I'm, when I'm in a, in a, when I'm not hiking, we're house-sitting. So we have a, we have a, a grocery bill that we need to, buy.

[00:37:28] **Belinda:** Like certain sort of bits and pieces that we need to feed ourselves. we need hiking food. We might need new hiking gear every now and then, but we budget that in for our year. We also budget in our travel, to the various destinations, and we try to go as cheaply as possible. because we're not in a hurry, we can take the train or the bus, which is also good.

[00:37:50] **Belinda:** and also when you're on the trail, it doesn't cost a lot of money. We, we tend to try and, and, and camp. in America it's called backcountry camping. in the [00:38:00] UK it's called wild camping, or dispersed camping it's also called. and in Europe it might be called bivouacing. So we tend to sleep in our tent a lot more than that when,when we do need a shower or whatever, we will go and spend a night in a hotel.

[00:38:15] **Belinda:** But also when I was corporate traveling, I would stay in nice hotels. Okay. I don't, I don't need nice hotels anymore. Like a friendly guest house which might cost 50 euros or 50, $50 or something, that is fine by me. That really is fine by me.

[00:38:35] **Belinda:** agree

[00:38:35] **Howard** with that. I

[00:38:36] **Belinda:** agree with that ... we,

[00:38:37] **Belinda:** we live frugally. Like I cannot believe how, how, how my lifestyle has changed because for, for the first time in my life, I find joy now in the simple things.

[00:38:51] **Belinda:** Yeah, I really do.

[00:38:52] **Belinda:** Yeah.

[00:38:52] **Howard** I love it. One quick question, and I was thinking about this because you, you have the website, you are [00:39:00] writing-

[00:39:01] **Belinda:** Mm-hmm ...

[00:39:01] **Howard** creating content, whether it's about the experience or about the, the house-sitting. Mm-hmm.

[00:39:07] **Belinda:** Mm-hmm.

[00:39:08] **Howard** How are you creating your content when you are off on these hikes?

[00:39:14] **Howard** I mean, you've got the Garmin, I get that. Yeah. but when it comes to the c- capturing the experience, is, is it a notebook? Is it a, a, a recorder, a digital recorder with some rechargeable batteries? How are you doing that?

[00:39:31] **Howard:** Okay, this is where you find out that I'm really quite crap at this. Okay.

[00:39:36] **Belinda:** I'm probably about 10, about 10 guides behind, but I have made notes. I make, I make notes in my, in my note. I'll do a lot of voice things, and, voice just sort of voice notifications to myself, photos with timestamps. and if-- and I'll put photos in various folders, that, to remind myself to actually talk about a [00:40:00] particular event or whatever.

[00:40:01] **Belinda:** We have just started filming ourselves, and we're a- one-- soon we will do our, our YouTube. it just seems like there's not a lot of other sort of a couple of old people, running around the world hiking everywhere. So, some- so hopefully somebody watches our YouTube. And, yeah, so it's-- that's basically, that's basically how I do it.

[00:40:23] **Belinda:** But, I don't, I don't work when I'm on the trail. I do work, but, we take, we take film, and we take lots of photos and, and notes and all that sort of thing. But, for a couple of times I have tried to take my laptop, and it just, it just doesn't work. I'm always scared that it's gonna get, ruined or, or something like that.

[00:40:44] **Belinda:** And

[00:40:44] **Belinda:** so- Yeah.

[00:40:44] **Howard** Okay

[00:40:45] **Belinda:** yeah. So I, I, I literally have to work 24/7 when, when-- during my downtime.

[00:40:52] **Howard:** Gotcha.

[00:40:52] **Howard** Excellent. Very good. Yeah. Well, I, I really appreciate you sharing, a, a s- a huge slice of your life, with our [00:41:00] listeners, today. Belinda, I'm so glad we met, via Podmatch, and finally we get to have this- Yeah

[00:41:06] **Howard** wonderful conversation and learn more about the hiking and the, and the house-sitting and the way you have combined these two. And it's, it's, it's, it's inspiring, especially for somebody like me, who age-wise is, is there. Yeah.

[00:41:25] **Howard:** you

[00:41:25] **Howard** I don't wanna spend the rest of my life i- in a room doing what I do.

[00:41:28] **Howard** Yeah. I'd love just to be out there- Yeah ... exploring. And even if it's house-sitting, and on the weekends- Come over ... do some day hikes.

[00:41:36] **Belinda:** over. Come over.

[00:41:37] **Howard** I love it. I love it. I love it. Listen, we're gonna provide, back links, to, the websites. so, I was just looking at that. Soul Treader.

[00:41:48] **Howard** Okay. I'm gonna do that one more time. Three, two, one. Now we're gonna provide back links, to your website, Belinda, soultreader.com, as well as to the House Sitting Collective, [00:42:00] which we have just shown to our listeners, and it'll be up on YouTube as well. But are... What social sites, would you like us to, link to in our show notes?

[00:42:10] **Belinda:** well, Instagram and, Instagram and,

[00:42:13] **Howard** s, sorry. I'll say that again. Instagram and Facebook for both. but the House Sitting Collective, the Instagram and Facebook is, the partner site Housesitting101. So, Excellent

[00:42:24] **Belinda:** yeah.

[00:42:25] **Howard** And we will also provide- It's good ... a back link- Hope I did that right ... to the,to the gift, for our listeners.

[00:42:30] **Howard** And I, I know of... I, I'm gonna take advantage of it, and it's just 'cause i- I just want to get out... I love travel. I just wanna get out and do more of it. And- Yeah ... it's inspiring to hear some of your stories on how you've accomplished it. And in some ways too, I imagine your kids are a little bit envious.

[00:42:47] **Howard** Like, "Mom, can we come meet you somewhere?" And I imagine they've done that.

[00:42:51] **Belinda:** They have.

[00:42:52] **Belinda:** was, and if anybody is wondering, well, how did I, how do I do that with kids that are, that are still not, they're, they're [00:43:00] young adults, is before I left, I said to them, "Right, okay. I'm going to fly you over to wherever I, I am twice a year." And by doing that, we spend two weeks or one week, quality time together.

[00:43:14] **Belinda:** Like, and, and that is, it's real quality time. If I went home and spent, say, a month at home, they've got university, they've got part-time jobs, they've got their friends, and they're in and out of the house. I probably wouldn't see them that much. I, y- of course I'd see them, but, this is what we call our quality time together

[00:43:33] **Belinda:** and-

[00:43:34] **Howard** I love it

[00:43:35] **Belinda:** family time.

[00:43:36] **Belinda:** Yeah. Yeah.

[00:43:37] **Howard:** Excellent.

[00:43:37] **Howard** is fantastic. Well, Belinda, again, thank you so much for spending time. And-

[00:43:42] **Belinda:** Yeah ...

[00:43:42] **Howard** go have a, Well, I think right now it's probably late afternoon in Scotland, and,if the sun hasn't set, go enjoy the sunset.

[00:43:50] **Howard** Go have some good food. And, I, I've gotta get back to Scotland, but... And then- And again, h- have fun in Greece. it's one of

[00:43:57] **Howard:** of my

[00:43:58] **Howard** favorite places in the whole world. It's [00:44:00] lovely. And just brings back so many fond memories. So- Yeah ... thank you again for spending time with us.

[00:44:05] **Belinda:** Wonderful. Thank you, Harold. It's a pleasure.

[00:44:07] **Howard** All right. Listen, stay on the line. We're gonna do a quick close, and you and I can then have a final chat. Okay? All right, folks, we have just been chatting with Belinda Coker. She's a hiker, a writer, educator, house-sitter. what a wonderful journey, going from corporate America, Did I just say corporate America?

[00:44:28] **Howard** I just said- Yeah ... going from corporate life. What a wonderful journey, going from corporate life to really combining this love of the, of exploring, being outdoors, being healthy through hiking, and also house-sitting. And the way th- she and her partner have incorporated this lifestyle together, it allows them to go around the globe, for that matter, not only to h- be on some great hikes, but also provide a service, to others who need somebody to come into their home to [00:45:00] house-sit, for the dog, the cat.

[00:45:01] **Howard** Preferably the dog, for me. but just what a great story in how that has been accomplished. And w- we're gonna provide back links to both websites, soultreader, .com, so you can learn more about the tra- the travel side, as well as to The House-Sitting Collective so that you can also learn about what it takes to become a house-sitter.

[00:45:23] **Howard** and you can, again, as Belinda said, you can do that anywhere in the world lit- literally. it's about relationships and trust, and building those, gradually so eventually you too can house-sit for weeks or months at a time. Now, we're gonna also provide back links to both sites,B- and Bit Operations', social sites on Facebook and Instagram.

[00:45:45] **Howard** And of course, you can find our episode with, the, in the show notes and all the back links on our website, outdooradventureseries.com. We're also on Facebook and LinkedIn. The YouTube of this episode will be, up on our Outdoor Adventure [00:46:00] Series page. And of course, you can listen to this episode wherever you get your podcasts from.

[00:46:05] **Howard** Okay, folks, wherever you are, whatever you're doing, go out there, have a fantastic day, and we look forward to having you join us on a future episode of the Outdoor Adventure Series podcast. Take care now.