When the story of the brave couple that quit their day jobs to become world travellers first came out in March this year, it was absorbed by readers around the world and inspired people to seek a life beyond their desks. In fact, some of you might even know the couple who hail from Johannesburg.

Chanel Cartell and Stevo Dirnberger’s concept for the journey – being in the creative field of advertising and all – was to see how far they could get and aptly named their adventure ‘How Far From Home’. They wanted to challenge the notion of relying on a monthly salary, so they sold most of their belongings and said their goodbyes to the City of Gold. 

If you happen to be one of the 70k+ followers of their Instagram account, you might be victim to the green-eyed monster, envious of their yoga beach missions, endless seaside pics and their ability to tick off their ‘wanderlist‘. The chalk board in every pic represents how many km’s they have travelled.

The couple, who logged on to Workaway (A company that allows travellers to do odd jobs with hosts in different countries who provide the traveler with food and accommodations in exchange) to complete their penniless mission and do things they had listed, has had their story shared on sites such as Design Taxi, Adweek and even Cosmopolitan.

And it hasn’t been so easy. Although the highly creative couple have taken every chance to illustrate, photograph, film and design on their mission, they have had to take up the most menial jobs to get by. In their most recent blog post, the couple gives away how much of a tough time the trip has actually been.

You see, to come from the luxuries we left behind in Johannesburg, to the brutal truth of volunteer work, we are now on the opposite end of the scale. We’re toilet cleaners, dog poop scoopers, grocery store merchandisers, and rock shovelers.

But it hasn’t killed their vibe.

But even though we probably have more greys than when we started, dirt under our nails despite long showers, and cheap snack food as a main form of nutrition, this crazy lifestyle allows us to enjoy the freedom of exploring rich Swedish forests, never-ending Nordic fjords, Italian cobbled alleyways, and cosmopolitan cities. We have time to brainstorm our own ideas, and push our own creative experiments. It’s like heaven for us. Sure, wood needs to be stacked, and garbage needs to be taken out (it’s our version of a shit sandwich, as Mark Manson put it), but once that’s done, we’re free to explore, wander and be one with our meandering thoughts. You work under your own schedule, using (a lot of) spare time to jog around mirrored lakes, craft inspired creations and breathe the Arctic air. There’s nothing quite like swopping million rand advertising budgets for toilet scrubbing to teach you about humility, life and the importance of living each day as if it were your last.

Just tell me you don’t have itchy feet.

[source: buzzfeed]