The Story So Far...
Born and raised in Kent, United Kingdom. I went to University to study Computer Science and found the best part was the software development, excluding the partying and nights out with only £5 in my pocket.
Straight out of Uni I found I was woefully unprepared for any actual career. Luckily a friend introduced me to the FDM Group who took me on and provided training to get my programming skills up to their clients expectations.
After two years with FDM, I moved onto Tribal Worldwide London digital advertising agency, working with some great people, and I think it's here where I truly flourished as a software developer, being provided with knowledgeable and patient mentors, and some projects to sink my teeth into.
This is all well and good but what's this got to do with backpacking… I’m getting there. Back in 2013 I found myself with a summer with friends busy and nothing to do. By this point my view of a good holiday was getting a bunch of mates together, flying out to Spain, and enjoying the beach in the daytime and the bars at nighttime. With this crutch taken away from me, my choice was to forego the annual trip away or do something by myself - the horror.
At the time I felt a little embarrassed about the idea of going on holiday by myself, in my mind it seemed to insinuate I didn't have enough friends or that I was a larry loner. But I’m truly glad that I took the plunge. The first time was an organised trip to Andorra, hiking and other activities in the Pyrenees. Then the next year, 2014, I was a little more adventurous doing a Contiki tour to Vietnam, this was my first taste of a substantially different culture and from then on I caught the backpacking bug. 2015 was my first unorganised backpacking trip, freewheeling my way across Australia, New Zealand and South East Asia, and I've not looked back since, balancing work then either short or extended trips away.
My Travel Style
Solo travel has always been my starting point. Although that seems a bit disingenuous, you meet people nearly everyday. Maybe it's just a conversation, or you spend the day with them, or a week or three.
My first self organised trip I planned heavily, only once I was out there, I didn't follow it at all. These days it's a one way ticket and let's find out what there is to do when we land. Besides, with all the people you meet, you start off with the same general conversation, where have you been? and where are you going? You get to know the things to do quickly.
As I get older my tastes have changed, my trips tend to skew towards hiking trails and spending time in mountainous remote areas. In modern life there are a lot of distractions, and putting yourself in the middle of nowhere is a good way of removing them from your path.
Where's Obee Blog
Ultimately this is me peacocking my software development skills. I've mostly done backend development, with frontend work being mostly functional dashboards using Bootstrap.
JavaScript frameworks in the past have scared me a little, it seemed like the landscape was constantly shifting, with no clear frontrunner for industry use. There's always been plenty to learn, but investing time into learning something that was going to be obsolete in a few years seemed less than ideal.
That seems to imply that I think React JS and Next JS are here to stay, who can say. But I was overdue to improve my frontend skills. Java apps are great but the use case for web apps is a nonstarter considering the functionality now provided by modern JavaScript frameworks.
This blog ultimately is a portfolio showcasing my development skills. However, during my travels I've been terrible at keeping track of the things that I've done. I've got thousands of photos, but some of the experiences are less clear to me now. I hope in creating this blog I can document my experiences and provide insight into my own thoughts and feelings for my future self, and if you've found this blog then I hope that they help and inform you too.
Acknowledgements
This blog is my first experience of using React JS/Next JS, at this point in my career I'm confident with time and interest I can turn my hand to most things. That being said, I know what good design and UX looks like but I lack any real experience in this area. So a massive shout out to Pete R. who runs Bucketlisty Blog whom I discovered through his stellar videography and continue to follow his photography and travels. Anyone who checks out his blog can see I’ve absolutely ripped off his design. This blog is an ongoing learning experience for me and I hope to continue developing it and finding my own design style.