Far From Home

My friend Rosi from Australia contacts my brother and me to invite us to join her on an 11,000 mile road trip this summer across Europe and Asia, and we weigh the risks, challenges, and …

Another full episode is coming out next week, but in the meantime, here’s an excerpt of a recent interview I did about my trip on my friend and …

When my brother and I told our friends and family that we were planning an 11,000 mile road trip across Europe and Asia, one of the first questions …

After reading a hilarious, cringe-worthy article about the “culinary horrors of Mongolia,” we were curious what us two pescatarians would eat in the …

I fly to London to make final preparations before our road trip to Mongolia and find myself dealing with one logistical and bureaucratic nightmare …

Our road trip from London to Mongolia is sure to be a fun and crazy adventure, but we’re also doing it for a good cause. On this episode of the …

After nearly a year of planning, we descend upon the Goodwood Raceway in southern England to begin our road trip to Mongolia as part of the Mongol …

We leave southern England and set out on our road trip to Mongolia, overcoming some of our fears and throwing our plans out the window while we drive …

The first few days of our trip across Europe were mostly smooth sailing and uneventful, but things were about to change. On this episode, as we cross …

First there were a series of terrorist attacks in Istanbul and Ankara and a threat from Kurdish separatists vowing to target Turkey’s tourism …

Our eighteen country road trip across Europe and Asia last summer left us with a wealth of memorable stories and experiences. But if you asked me to name the single most fascinating and …

“Honestly, most Americans — when they think of Iran — probably think of 3 things,” my brother said. “Desert, oil, and nuclear capabilities.” And it was true. Before our road trip across …

We visit the hermit kingdom of Turkmenistan — one of the most reclusive and authoritarian nations in the world — and we see why some visitors describe its capital city of Ashgabat as a …

While I continue to work on the next regular show, here’s a short bonus episode of some conversations I had with some other Mongol Rally teams during …

Driving a small, crappy car was a prerequisite for anyone participating in the Mongol Rally. The point was to make the journey more exciting and …

When it comes to welcoming foreign tourists, Turkmenistan is close to the bottom of the list. It was hard enough to get visas in the first place, and when we did, they were only good for 5 …

In the three weeks since we started our journey, we’d broken down about 4 times, been to half a dozen mechanics, and tried all sorts of stop-gap …

When we first learned that it would take a week for our car to get repaired, we figured we’d have some time to relax and explore the historic city of …

Our car was running once again, but now we faced a handful of new mechanical issues, just as we were about to embark on the roughest part of our …

The mountainous Pamir Highway in Tajikistan was precisely the type of terrain that our 1-liter Nissan Micra hatchback was not suited to handle. One of our friends had described it as a car …

We were in an extremely remote section of eastern Tajikistan, and we’d just received news that our car’s engine might not last much longer. Left with …

When my brother and I told friends we’d be driving across Kazakhstan, we got plenty of jokes about Borat, but we were about to find out that the …

After getting stuck driving across a shallow river in Mongolia, my brother and I make the fateful decision to veer off the main path onto another …

After a series of bad decisions, my brother and I had ended up stranded with our friends at the bottom of an incredibly steep and rocky hill in a …

We’d spent 7 weeks driving nearly 11,000 miles across Europe and Asia, and although we were nearing the end of our journey, we still had a series of challenges ahead. Our route in the …

After driving 11,000 miles over the course of seven weeks, we finally reached the finish line of the Mongol Rally, and everything was suddenly over. …

People often say it’s a small world, but there are giant parts of the planet that most people never think about and billions of stories they’ve never heard. On Far From Home, award-winning …

If you’ve seen or heard about the recent HBO dramatic miniseries about Chernobyl, you might have wondered what it’s really like there today. I take a trip to the abandoned villages …

For more than 80 years, Tokyo, Japan’s Tsukiji fish market had a reputation for supplying some of the freshest and best quality seafood anywhere. But over the decades, it had become …

Throat singing is one of the world’s oldest forms of music. It’s practiced by indigenous groups in several parts of the world, including South Africa …

In 1998, political leaders in Northern Ireland signed a peace agreement they hoped would end the Troubles, a 30 year period of armed conflict between …

Lucho is a traditional medicine man who describes himself as a "curandero," or someone who heals. Using medicinal herbs, archeological relics, and …

In the previous episode of Far From Home, I visited Lima, Peru, where I met a traditional medicine man named Lucho. This time, I accompany him to a healing ceremony where he uses a …

I feel like several of the trips I’ve taken in recent years have been to places people have urged me to go while I still can, or at least before things change. On today’s show, I visit …

When he was growing up in Southern California, Addi Somekh wasn't quite sure what to do with his life. But he knew from a young age that he wanted to "spread warmth" and make other people …

This upcoming January marks the tenth anniversary of the massive earthquake in Haiti. It came on a Tuesday afternoon, 12 days into the new year, and destroyed or severely damaged a quarter …

This week’s episode is a bit different from what I normally do on the show. I’ve been getting a lot of questions and comments from listeners recently, so I thought I’d spend some time today …

While driving across Russia on my way home from the Mongol Rally (the story I documented on the first season of this podcast), I had several …

The historical accounts are a bit fuzzy, but the way the story is commonly told, Caribbean slaves in the 18th century gained a day of freedom two …

In light of the recent political developments that briefly brought the US and Iran to the brink of war, I’m re-releasing an excerpt of a story I …

While Far From Home is on a break between seasons, I’m popping into your feed from time to time to share segments from other shows I’ve enjoyed that I think all of you might like as well. …

With a global pandemic, canceled flights, and closed borders, many travelers suddenly found themselves trapped in foreign countries, trying to figure out how to get home, even if they …

As the world is consumed by COVID-19, I check in with author and American expat Tiffany Parks, who lives on the outskirts of Rome, to get a sense of what things are like in Italy right now. …

As COVID-19 continues to spread around the world, I speak with Istanbul-based author and journalist Fariba Nawa about what the situation is like …

In light of the recent protests for racial justice across the United States and around the world, I chat with two African American friends about what it’s like to travel as a Black person, …

If you were forced to quarantine as a result of COVID-19 and could only hang out with members of one other household, who would you choose? On the …

From the 1930s to the 1960s, Black motorists driving across the United States and Canada often brought along a copy of The Negro Travelers’ Green Book, which was a sort of AAA guide that …

If you want to build a house on the Caribbean island of Barbuda, you can just put up a fence wherever you want, and have it. You don’t pay for it. You don’t sign for anything. You just have …

On this episode of Far From Home, I’m beginning an occasional series where I’m checking in with friends and colleagues around the world to get a …

You probably missed it amid everything else going on in the world recently, but last week was the 15th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, so on this episode, we’re staying within the U.S. …

On this episode of Far From Home, I continue my series where I’m checking in with friends and colleagues around the world to get a sense of the many …

While Americans were celebrating Halloween and heading to the polls, Peruvians were busy commemorating El Dia de los Defuntos, the day at the …

COVID-19 may have forced most of us to take a break from traveling for the foreseeable future, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t some really cool …

On this final episode of Season 3, I return to where I began 2020 in Puerto Rico, on the last trip I took prior to the pandemic. I join my friend Rob at a parranda — the Puerto Rican …

Having hiked the Appalachian Trail, Justin and Patrice La Vigne thought they knew what they were getting into when they decided to embark on Te Araroa, a 2000 mile path across New Zealand. …

Over the past year, COVID-19 has had all sorts of ripple effects that most of us never imagined: Air pollution plummeted as people stopped flying. …

Over the past week, violence has once again broken out in Northern Ireland. During one skirmish in Belfast last Wednesday, rioters threw Molotov …

Each year on April 19th, residents of Oklahoma City commemorate the anniversary of the 1995 bombing in their city, which prior to September 11th bore the distinction of being the deadliest …

April 26, 2021 marks the 35th anniversary of the 1986 disaster at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in the former USSR — which remains the worst nuclear accident in history — so I’m …

On this episode of Far From Home, I continue my series where I’m checking in with friends and colleagues around the world to get a sense of the many …

COVID-19 has closed borders and made travel difficult if not impossible for many of us over the past year-and-a-half. But radio signals don't need …

When you travel – especially if you’re in a distant and unfamiliar place – it’s inevitable that sooner or later, things will happen that are beyond …

July 17th, 2021 marked the fifth anniversary of the day my brother Drew and I — along with our friends Jane and Rosi — set out from southern England …

Knowing the rules and being able to navigate them can be a big part of feeling safe in any city. On this episode of Far From Home, I share an episode …

In the immediate aftermath of the September 11th terrorist attacks, President Bush vowed revenge against the perpetrators, but not everyone found his words comforting. Around this time, a …

When you travel, it’s inevitable that you’ll occasionally have weird or random experiences, where you might have certain expectations before you arrive at a place, but then you’re totally …

Having grown up just outside of New York City, I visited most of the big tourist attractions like the Statue of Liberty, the Empire State Building, and Rockefeller Center when I was a kid. …

Nearly 2 years into the Covid-19 pandemic, new waves of infection continue to spread around the world, and the Omicron variant is causing renewed fears in places that previously thought …

Take Santa Claus. Then ditch the red suit and the flying reindeer, and you’ve got a guy who’s all about giving. On this last episode of my third season, I tell the story of the time my dad …

Central Asia is not a place that most Westerners know or think about very often. But now that I’ve been there, my ears perk up on the rare instances when it makes the news, as was the case …

On this episode, I speak to Savelli and Olexander, two Ukrainians who’ve suddenly had their lives upended after the Russian military invaded their country.

————-

On Far From Home, …

Over the past 2 months, more than 5 million people have left Ukraine, and another 6-and-a-half-million have fled their homes and are now displaced elsewhere within their own country, making …

While I’ve been hunkered down these past few years, avoiding traveling and staying home while I rode out the pandemic, I’ve been incredibly lucky that I’ve had a safe and comfortable place …

I’m always open to listener feedback on Far From Home, and I heard from someone recently who’s given me a new perspective on one of my past stories and forced me to see things in a new …

A few months ago, a friend of mine named Oraz who runs an autobody repair shop in Turkmenistan came across a kind of puzzle. A new vehicle had just arrived on his lot. A white Lexus SUV. He …

As you may have seen in my feed, I recently teamed up with my colleagues at NPR’s Planet Money economic podcast to report a story that prominently …

Last winter during the pandemic, Jack Boswell started to reevaluate his place in life and realize that at the age of 31, he still hadn’t chased his …

From the age of 24 until she was 37, Jamie Yuenger lived in New York City. While she started out having a complicated relationship with the city, she grew over time to love her adopted …

Two decades ago, I was just starting out as a public radio reporter, applying for literally every radio job opening I saw, and somehow I ended up getting hired by a small station in Norman, …