Well, we hinted at this trip in our newsletter (Are you part of that? If not sign up here! We’d love to have you on board, and it’s free!). Now the time has come! In just a couple days we’ll hope on a plane with our two little boys, and fly south to Costa Rica!
It’s been over a year since we took a big trip, so we were itching to get back out there, and let Oliver have his first taste of international travel. We have loved South America, but haven’t yet checked out Central America. After hearing so much great stuff about Costa Rica, we pretty much just picked a spot, bought the tickets, and planned the trip in a few short weeks. No sense dilly dallying right?
So here’s what we’re going to get up to!
Taking It Easy. But Not.
This trip will be more of an adventure/work trip than a vacation, but we’re keeping our itinerary practically empty. Here’s why.
Firstly, this will be our first major excursion with two small kids (Max is 3.5 years and Ollie is 10 months, so we’re talking quite young!). We’ve done quite a bit of travel with Max (around Canada, Seattle, Brazil, and Hawaii), so we have some experience travelling with kids. But now the number of children has doubled, including the amount of stuff to bring. Add to that the fact that Oliver is seriously walking at 10 months old (by seriously walking I mean that he’s not just taking a few steps. The kid just goes and goes and goes.) Well, we have a bit of a challenge ahead of us. Suffice it to say I’ve been more than a little anxious about this.
In the past we’ve tried to pack a ton stuff into a trip, and wound up spending most of the time driving from place to place. Some of our best times in Hawaii were when we just pulled off to the side of the road, hopped out and explored the beach. So we decided to try that. The beach. That’s pretty much all we have planned. Seriously.
We also have a bunch of work goals we want to accomplish. See, blending work and travel has been our dream since the very very start. It was on a trip around Europe that we fell in love with photography, and since then we have been trying our darndest to figure out how to make traveling a bigger part of what we do. With kids. It remains a mystery to us, but we are determined to keep trying. Keeping our schedule empty is one way we’re hoping to get closer. We won’t be moving around the country. We’re parking ourselves in one small town right on the beach, and staying put. Less time traveling while in country means more time to explore and shoot.
Testing Stuff (Really Cool Stuff)
While on this trip we’re looking to put some gear to the test. We love trying out new gear, but we especially love taking it for a serious spin with a big, juicy field test. What better place than an adventure to Costa Rica to see how something holds up?
First up, Rob will be testing his new Phantom 4 drone. He’s been interested obsessed with drones for a couple years now, and finally bought one for himself. He’s really interested to test out the new autonomous flight features (i.e. the drone can fly itself in some ways). They should make it easier than ever to get great shots. He’s been doing a ton of testing at home here before going, and has found that it is certainly harder than it looks. But he’s improving quickly, and I think there will be some great work to come out of this trip! (It certainly will be prettier than the gray, dreary landscape we have right now in Edmonton!)
And I’ll be giving the brand new Fujifilm X-Pro2 a whirl! Yep, I got my hands on what seems to be one of the buzziest cameras du jour, and will be giving it a seriously exciting test. It’s the newest mirrorless camera from Fujifilm, and has a big upgrade to the sensor, making it 24.3MP. With a rangefinder style body, and some super nice glass, this camera is really intriguing for those who are looking for high quality images out of a camera that’s more portable than a DSLR. So far it’s been producing some really beautiful shots in my early testing. I’m very interested to see if I’ll get used to the quirky features with more time shooting it (like a mechanical ISO dial, so retro!).
Documentary & Stock Shooting
Beyond the field testing, we’ll be documenting the trip as we usually do. Rob might attempt to shoot a bunch of video, while I’ll be looking to add to our stock library. And when I say stock library, I mean photos for us to use (not to put on stock photography sites).
If you follow our blog, are part of our newsletter, or have checked out any of our tutorials, you may have noticed that we use a LOT of photos! Makes sense for a photography blog, right? Those photos are the result of many years of travel and shooting. We’re always adding more, and this trip will hopefully be just as fruitful as the others! We have yet to get paid to travel anywhere, but coming home with a bunch of new photos to use for our site certainly makes these trips pretty worthwhile for us, and we feel pretty lucky for that setup.
Any Questions?
So, now I ask you: do you have any questions you’d like us to try to tackle while on our trip? Things you’re curious about? Topics for us to cover in future blog posts? Please leave us a comment and help us plan out what we’re going to focus on for this trip! We love when our readers are a part of the adventure!
Follow Along!
I don’t know if we’ll get much blogging done while on the trip, but we’ll be trying to share some photos on Instagram! You can follow us here! (Make sure to say hi!)
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