I've met SO MANY people that are like.. "Dude, I worked my youth away and I regret it. Now I have all this money, I can't really do the things that I want because I'm old" etc. The world IS very big and I have a huge list of things to do and locations to photograph before I die. The pics I post are mix of recent or old. If they're old, I just haven't gotten around to uploading them etc. If you truly want to visit those places then definitely go for it. A lot of ppl think that travelling is expensive but it really isn't. With rent being $1,000 and a couple hundred dollars a month in groceries, spending a month in a place like Malaysia or thailand, you could live like a king for $15 a day.
Money, Time, and Energy. Pick two eh? When we're young we have time and energy to travel, but no money. When you're working you have Money and Energy, but no time. When you're retired, you have all the money and time in the world, but you're too damn old. So the best time to do it is now
On my list of near-future to do's is:
-Roadtrip the Australian Outback and New Zealand
-Visit South Korea and Japan and eat their delicious foods
-Road Trip the non-touristy islands of Hawaii and Camp and Bike
-West Coast Trail
Hopefully I can show you guys some cool pictures when those happen.
To be honest, I kinda used to be like you, lusting after material objects and stuff. You might not be able to 'touch' a memory, but you can't really use all your lens at the same time. The act of taking a photo is preserving a memory so there is some inherent value in memories.
One day if I had grandkids, and they asked me about something cool I did, I'd rather tell them about some crazy adventure I had, then show them a few photos, than telling them about how I worked my ass off to save for some blinging L-lensthat I picked up.
Hey didn't you do a road trip to Tulameen and visited some things? Did you enjoy that?
I'm confused when you said you hate travelling, but you have many places int he world you'd like to go to? Doesn't that contradict? Or do you mean you hate the process of getting from A to B, but enjoy the actual destination itself?
Do you have a huge collection of lenses? We really are polar opposites... I'm always trying to think of the perfect combo of 2-3lens MAX to own, whereas you are probably an epic collector.