digital nomad – Josh Trips

Hotel Review: Conrad Bora Bora Nui

May 25, 2022September 19, 2022Tagged bora bora, conrad, digital nomad, french polynesia, hilton, luxury travel, Remote Work, Travel, wanderlustLeave a comment

A few days before boarding my flight to the Conrad Bora Bora Nui, I knew that I was about to experience something truly special.

My personal butler reached out to introduce himself and to find out more about me – he wanted to know if I was celebrating a special occasion, what type of activities I was interested in while on the island, and even asked me about my favorite fruit and drink to make sure both were waiting for me when I arrived.

While there are many luxury properties to choose from on Bora Bora, and in French Polynesia in general, the butler’s personal touch assured me that I picked the right resort for me.

About the Conrad Bora Bora Nui

The Conrad Bora Bora Nui is located on the southwest end of Motu To’opua, a private island with views of Mount Otemanu.

While the resort feels entirely remote – at times as if you and the hotel’s guests and gracious staff are the only people on all of Bora Bora – the hotel is only a 10-minute boat ride from the airport and about the same distance from the mainland.

Accommodations

The Conrad Bora Bora Nui offers a variety of suites and villas, both overwater and on land for those who would prefer a more traditional stay. Many of the villas offer private infinity pools and, if your budget allows, it’s worth the indulgence – some of my most memorable moments were by myself in my own pool, staring at the crystal-clear blue water across the way.

Each room comes with a Bluetooth sound system that you can easily pair with your phone, so you can listen to your favorite music while you soak up the sun, enjoy coffee from your room’s complimentary Nespresso machine, or soak in your oversized bathtub washing off the sand that you’ve no doubt accumulated on your body throughout the day.

Although every villa and suite is designed for comfort, if you’re looking for a truly luxurious experience be sure to inquire about the hotel’s Presidential Overwater Villa – French Polynesia’s only 2-story overwater villa and a frequent accommodation for celebrities.

Resort Grounds

Although you may be tempted to spend most of your day in your lavish suite or villa (and there were a few days where I did just that!), when you do leave your room you’ll be rewarded. The Conrad Bora Bora Nui’s property, through its picture-perfect architecture and lush tropical landscaping, is designed to give guests a feeling of bliss and relaxation.

At the center of the resort is an infinity pool that at times matches the blue of the ocean it looks out into. While water, be it the ocean or the resort’s many pools, takes center stage at the Conrad Bora Bora Nui, there are also many on-land amenities for guests – including tennis, biking paths, a state-of-the-art gym, and a hiking trail up to the luxurious Hina Spa.

Food and Drink

The hotel has 3 restaurants: Iriatai, an innovative take on French cuisine with a breakfast buffet each morning; Banyan, elevated Chinese food under the hotel’s banyan tree; and Tamure Beach Grill, offering all-day casual dining.

In addition to these restaurants, the hotel offers around-the-clock room service, which you can get either by calling or texting your butler, the latter being especially helpful if you’d like to order food while on your way back from an excursion.

If you’re looking for a drink, the hotel has 2 dedicated bars – the Upa Upa Lounge Bar, which has glass floors so you can enjoy views of the majestic coral reef while you sip your locally-inspired cocktail, and the Tarvara Pool Bar which guests can swim up to while enjoying the resort’s infinity pool.

Your butler will also let you know each day when there’s a special dining experience, such as a fire show or a ukulele player with traditional dancers.

Activities

The resort offers a host of activities that you can book through your butler or the concierge, including:

Private sunset champagne boat ride.
Jet-skiing.
Swimming with manta rays and sharks.
Paddleboarding.
Snorkeling and scuba diving.
Hiking.
Sailing.
Romantic private island lunches and dinner.

While you might think that an isolated tropical island could be a bit sleepy without much to do, after 9 days I barely cracked the surface of everything that I wanted to experience.

The Service

What stands out most about the Conrad Bora Bora Nui is the service you’ll receive from the dedicated staff. From the moment you arrive, you’re greeted by members of the staff singing and welcoming you to the resort and making you feel right at home – and that feeling sticks with you for the entire trip.

No ask is too big or too small for the staff, and they go out of their way to anticipate your needs.

To give you an idea of how attentive the staff is, when my butler asked me my plans for the first night and I told him I wanted to watch a movie but forgot my HDMI cable, he dropped by with his own cord for me to use. Another example is when I booked a private sunset champagne boat excursion but the weather wasn’t cooperating – when I went to the concierge to rebook it for the next day, she told me that she already had and even looked into the next day’s forecast to ensure that I’d have a wonderful view of the sunset.

By anticipating my needs and going out of their way, and always with a friendly smile, the staff turned an already incredible experience into something truly remarkable.

The bottom line

How can I say for certain that the Conrad Bora Bora Nui is a magical property that offers its guests world-class service, top-notch restaurants, and unforgettable experiences? I booked another stay while on the boat ride back to the airport.

Traveling to my 50th country

October 4, 2019April 20, 2022Tagged digital nomad, Travel, wanderlust2 Comments

As I write this blog post, I’m waiting at the airport about to accomplish something that I never thought I would – traveling to my 50th country.

Although I’m traveling what feels like all the time now – and almost always internationally – I didn’t get my first passport until the end of 2007. I come from a very modest background, and so it wasn’t until after my first year of law school, after completing a lucrative summer associate position, that I was able to afford one.

Even though I wasn’t able to travel much before then, I was always obsessed with travel. As a kid, I would memorize the Sunday travel section in the Philadelphia Inquirer (my local paper) and recite the prices of flights to my annoyed parents. I would spend time on most weekends checking out the latest brochures at the travel agency down the street and would order every free vacation video that I could (you used to be able to call Disney World and request VHS promotional videos).

My parents picked up on this, and they got me a subscription to Condé Nast Traveler for my 10th birthday. My aesthetic was always warm, tropical places. There was no place that I wanted to go more than the Turks and Caicos (something I accomplished in 2016!), though there was no place that I didn’t want to visit.

Picture taken in Turks and Caicos with a tropical storm off the coast (the storm largely stayed off the coast and I got some amazing shots!)

When I first got my passport, I went to some pretty typical destinations for Americans – Jamaica, Amsterdam, Paris, and Brussels were my first trips. I was based in Philadelphia at the time, so I went to Europe and the Caribbean the most, although I also went to Morocco (which was way outside of my bubble at the time).

After law school, I moved to Guam, and that opened up a whole new set of destinations for me. All of a sudden, Japan, Australia, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Thailand, Singapore, Indonesia, and more were all in easy reach. I definitely took advantage of this, which helped add to my country count.

When I moved to San Francisco, I still had the travel bug but didn’t have as much free time as I was working at law firms (I was still able to visit a few new countries, including Bosnia, Argentina, Italy, Germany, Chile, and Norway, but it was over the course of a few years). In fact, there was even a year where I didn’t take a single international flight.

Things changed dramatically when, in February 2016, I decided to pursue my own law firm full-time. Before that, I was running my law firm as a side-hustle, with a full-time (albeit, remote) job in-house at a startup.

One of the founding principals of my firm was that I wanted it to be entirely remote. Because of this, even though some of my work included litigation, I gave up that part of my practice since it would require me to show up in-person to court.

Around that same time, I got a pretty bad infection in my leg and had a pretty serious health scare. I was told that if the infection spread that I would need to go to the hospital, and that in an extreme worst-case scenario, the infection could sometimes lead to amputation (luckily, it never got that far – the antibiotics I was given cleared it up after about a week of bed rest).

This health scare made me realize that I needed to take advantage of my freedom and good health, because either could be taken away from me at any time. So, I decided to have a goal of visiting one amazing location every month and, with exceptions, I’ve kept that promise to myself until now.

So with that as a background, I wanted to post a list of the countries I’ve visited so far. Note that my definition of country may be a little loose — there are some destinations on here that some readers my disagree with (such as Turks and Caicos, which is a British overseas territory). But for my purposes, I considered places with different passport stamps and cultures to be separate countries.

For my list, I’ve also included these symbols: an asterisk (*) means that I’ve visited a country twice and two asterisks (**) means that visited a country more than twice.

U.S.**
Mexico**
Canada*
Bermuda
The Bahamas
Jamaica
Aruba
Barbados
Dominica
St. Lucia
Antigua
St. Kitts
Honduras
Belize*
Costa Rica
Chile*
Argentina
Morocco
France*
England*
Spain**
Switzerland*
Belgium
The Netherlands**
Italy
Austria*
Germany**
Denmark
Norway
Croatia
Bosnia and Herzegovina
The Philippines**
Singapore
Thailand
Australia**
Japan*
Korea
Fiji
Hong Kong**
Indonesia*
Colombia**
Turks and Caicos
Portugal
Vietnam
South Africa
French Polynesia
New Zealand
Hungary
Czech Republic
Cayman Islands

Close calls: Peru (slept in the airport for 1 night), Liechtenstein (train ride through).

I’m thrilled with what I’ve seen so far, and can’t wait to see more. In fact, I already have 3 new countries that I’ll be visiting by April 2020 – Qatar, the Maldives, and United Arab Emirates.

Also, I do realize it’s a little faux pas to count countries — many in the travel community think that counting countries discounts the actual value of travel; that by trying to “collect” countries, you are missing the actual experiences. I do understand this mindset and subscribe in part, but part of my goal is to see as much as possible and that involves going to different countries with entirely different cultures (and it’s fun for me to keep tabs!).

Anyway, I’m off to enjoy the Cayman Islands and the big 5-0!

Digital nomads: What to do if your parent is facing a terminal illness

October 17, 2018October 17, 2018Tagged cancer, digital nomad, Freelancing, Remote WorkLeave a comment

I started this travel blog, in part, to counter the sad and depressing stories that were overwhelming my news feed. Because of that, I’ve been hesitant to write about some pretty intense stuff that I’ve been dealing with over the last year – mainly, my father being diagnosed with a terminal, aggressive form of cancer.

It’s, of course, never easy when a parent receives a diagnosis like this. And while a lot of your energy may go to helping your parent and other family members out, it’s also completely normal to be concerned about how a diagnosis like this could affect your work.

For digital nomads, there are unique concerns. For example, some digital nomads only plan on living that lifestyle temporarily before having a family and settling down, so even taking a year or two away from that could change their career trajectory and life experiences entirely.

Below is a list, based on my experience, of some tips that I hope will help fellow digital nomads who have a parent that is facing a terminal illness diagnosis:

1) Talk openly about it with your parents and family members

Because you are able to work from anywhere in the world, you may decide that it’s best to move back home to help take care of your parent. Alternatively, the freedom to work wherever you want may make you feel even more guilty about not returning home.

For those who want to continue traveling, the truth is that it’s unlikely that your parent would want you to stop living your life because of a diagnosis like this. It’s worthwhile to have an open, honest conversation with your parent about your plans, get their thoughts, and also discuss it with other family members who may be helping provide care for your parent. It’s also important to think about if you’d regret not spending the limited time with your parent.

Based on the conversations you have, and your own personal reflections, you can update your travel schedule accordingly.

2) Make the city your parent is based a travel hub

My father lived in Philadelphia, which is where I grew up and went to law school. Before my dad was diagnosed with cancer, my plan was to never visit Philly again. But with the diagnosis and my dad’s limited ability to travel, that plan went out the window.

One positive that came from flying to Philly often was being able to use it as a travel hub, particularly as it’s a big American hub and I had a significant number of miles to spend. As I’m based in San Francisco, traveling to Philly made Europe much more accessible, and there was even a direct flight to Budapest from there.

Despite all the bad stuff that was going on, I was able to go on some adventures that I otherwise would have missed thanks to using the city as a travel hub.

3) Set clear limits on when you’ll be working when you go back to visit

Some people assume that being a digital nomad is the same thing as being on a permanent vacation. But the reality is that digital nomads, particularly those with a side hustle, are often always working.

This presumption that digital nomads don’t really work can make visiting a parent more difficult. If you are freelancing, it’s important to explain to your parent that you don’t have paid time off, and that you need to ensure you’ll maintain a steady income. If you are an employee with PTO, it’s still okay to let your parent know that while you’re in town, there are days that you will be working and times that you won’t be available.

4) Book refundable tickets and hotel rooms

If the prognosis is bad, you may need the ability to change your travel plans on a whim. As a result, when looking into airfare and lodging, you may want to prioritize reservations that are fully refundable, or that can be changed for a small fee.

With the airfare, because refundable tickets can be quite expensive, the best thing to do is to book travel using miles, which can usually be redeposited into your account for a fee (ranging from $50-$200+).

For lodging, there are tons of hotels and Airbnb’s that have very reasonable cancellation policies.

5) Use points for business class flights to visit

I hate, hate, hate spending points on domestic travel. For most airlines, the redemption value on domestic flights is very low, particularly compared to international awards. So, it goes without saying that I especially hate using my hard-earned points to book domestic business class flights.

That said, traveling home to visit a dying relative is very stressful on its own, so if you have enough points, it’s definitely worth considering using them to book business class flights home, to make the journey a bit less stressful.

San Francisco Trip Deal: $332 round-trip from SFO to Rome, Italy on United

January 22, 2018Tagged digital nomad, italy, rome, Travel, travel deals, United Airlines, wanderlustLeave a comment

There’s an awesome deal from San Francisco to Rome, Italy right now on United that you can’t find on Google Flights or related travel searches. Some itineraries are both United and other Star Alliances members, such as Brussels Airlines, Swiss Air, Air Canada, and Lufthansa.

The flights are very limited, with departure dates of either March 12th or March 13th, and returning either March 20th, 21st, 23rd, or 26th.

You can find the flights through momondo search engine (I’ve linked to a March 13-26 itinerary where you can find the $332 price).

I’ve booked a number of amazing flight deals this way, but note that you’ll have to book with a separate travel agency, which can add a layer of complication if you need to change your travel reservations. That said, this ticket price is hard to beat!

H/T: Secret Flying