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Last week I finally experienced a goal that I’ve been thinking about and wanting for over ten years.

It might sound a little weird to you as a big, exciting goal to have, but to me it is the pinnacle of five flags, international redundancy, and location independence on an international scale.

The goal was simple: To fly from one country to another, where I’m going to spend many months away, with just a single little laptop bag and literally nothing else.

Not a backpack, not a laptop bag plus another bag.

No, no. I’m talking about literally walking onto the plane with no checked bags just carrying one laptop-sized bag and that’s it, for a flight of over 14 hours, to stay in this second country for five months.

And that’s exactly what I did last week.

Even with the 15-hour flight, hotel airport layover, and the jet lag (I fly business class, so that helps), it felt wonderful.

I’m accustomed to traveling with my big backpack (Tortuga) packed to the fucking gills. For extra-long trips, there are even times when I’ve had to travel with the backpack plus my jam-packed laptop bag on top of that.

But those days are officially over.

Last week, I left Dubai with just a single laptop bag and flew to my second home in Asunción, Paraguay, where I will remain for five months.

I’m able to do this because I have a fully-stocked, year-round home in Paraguay that I don’t rent out to anyone while I’m gone.

This apartment has literally everything I need to live, down to details like the brand of deodorant I like, the water filtration systems I use, and my testosterone syringes. Every little item has been 100% duplicated in Paraguay from my primary home in Dubai. I wrote several articles about how I did this on my blogs last year.

The only thing I had to transport with me was my laptop, my Muse meditation headband, and a handful of items I had in Dubai that I know I can’t easily buy in Paraguay, like some of my favorite 4-ingredient fruit bars I like (and that aid in my current fasting diet).

Also, on this particular trip, I had to pack just one night’s worth of some basic bathroom items because the Dubai-Asunción trip unfortunately requires me to spend the night at the airport hotel in São Paulo on the way to Paraguay.

For the future, I’m actually looking at how I can avoid packing even those things for this trip that I will do twice a year. Maybe I just don’t shave for 2 days, then buy the bare minimum bathroom stuff I need at the airport, then throw it all away as soon as I wake up the next morning to board the final flight. I might feel a little gross for 2 days of travel… but who the hell cares?

At some point, and I’m not sure how I’m going to do this yet, I’d like to travel between my two homes without even my laptop.

For example, I could buy a second laptop of the exact same make and model, have one in Dubai and one in Paraguay, and set them both up to access my cloud-based apps. For any items I use that aren’t on the cloud, I could just travel with one of my 8-terabyte SSD USB portable hard drives that fit in my pocket.

The one downside is that I would have no way to watch my movies/TV shows (pre-2018 of course) during the long flight, which would be a problem. (Maybe I could travel with a really small tablet? But then, why not just have a laptop? Like I said, I haven’t quite figured this out yet… but I will.)

The thought of me flying between Dubai and Paraguay with NO BAG WHATSOVER, just walking into the plane wearing my sweats with nothing in my hands or on my back, a big dumb smile on my face, and just sitting down and relaxing in my business class seat… man, that gets me really excited.

This kind of stuff is international mobility on steroids. It combines the protection and freedom of five flags with massive amounts of convenience and 100% stress-free and easy travel.

I remember when this thought first entered my little monkey brain.

Years ago, I saw a YouTube video of a guy who was going on a 7-week trip to various countries in Africa and Europe with no bag, literally traveling with nothing in his hands or on his back.

Instead, he just wore a pair of cargo pants with lots of pockets, a shirt with lots of pockets, and a big jacket with lots of pockets. Then he proceeded to fill all of the pockets with the minimal items he needed for his trip.

He looked a little hilarious, sort of like the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man when he boarded his plane, but he made it work.

Of course, the ideal scenario is to not have to pack anything at all, or next to nothing, regardless of whether it goes into pockets, a bag, or a backpack.

This is doable if you have fully-stocked homes or a storage unit full of all the stuff you need in all of your regular destinations. In addition to my fully stocked homes in Dubai and Paraguay, I also have storage units in Guadalajara in Mexico, Phoenix in Arizona (Pink Firefly’s apartment), Portland in Oregon, and Hong Kong. So I can travel to all of these locations without needing to pack anything except my laptop (more or less).

One thing you might be wondering is what I do if I have to go on a trip somewhere while I’m in Paraguay, i.e., a quick trip up to elsewhere in South America, or Mexico, or even the Collapsing USA and then return back to Paraguay.

This is why one of the items I threw into my little laptop bag was a small bag of travel-sized bathroom liquids for just such a trip. Now I have a quick bug-out bag of travel items for a short trip both in Dubai and Paraguay.

Indeed, I am going on a trip while I’m here in Paraguay; I’m going to be one of the coaches and speakers at Billie’s big event in Cancun in early September (and you should join us; it’s going to be awesome). So my little travel pack is exactly what I’ll use on that trip. I’ll probably be in Cancún 4-5 days or so, then return to Asunción.

Best part about that trip? There’s only a two-hour time zone difference between Asunción and Cancun, so I won’t have any jet lag. Awesome.

The last logistical item I need to be aware of is the small number of items I need to throw back in my laptop when I return to Dubai in October. No problem, I’ve already made a list of those items, so I’ll be good to go and won’t have to remember what they are in five months.

If you’re curious, it’s mostly my testosterone stuff (that I’ll pick up in Cancun from Billie or someone else who brings them from the USA) and some pharmaceutical items I always buy in Paraguay because pharma stuff is so ridiculously cheap (and non-prescription) here, cheaper even than I can get in Dubai, which itself is way cheaper pharmaceuticals in the Collapsing USA.

(I’d love to throw in some Don Vito empanadas in my bag also since they’re fucking amazing and you can’t get them in any country in the world except Paraguay, but fresh empanadas wouldn’t travel well.)

My original goal was to have not two homes, but three. My plan a few years ago was to have one home in North or South America (I was targeting Paraguay, Panama, or Colombia), my primary home in Dubai, and a third home in Asia (targeting Hong Kong, Cambodia, or Vietnam). That way I would have a home in each of the three sectors of the planet earth (west, middle, and east).

Then I would cycle between my three homes, spending around 3-5 months per year in each home.

However, the older I get the more I desire simplicity and ease, not complexity or flexing. So a few years ago I scrapped the third home idea and doubled-down on Dubai and Paraguay as my two and only two long-term homes. I’m very happy about this decision for a myriad of reasons.

Having two fully-stocked, fully livable homes on opposite sides of the planet, in two countries that perfectly complement each other’s differences financially, economically, logistically, personally, with the weather and the culture, has become one of my the greatest joys in my life.

That’s high praise considering my life is full of joys already.

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