Hi there, thanks for stopping by! My name is John Syrcle and Syrcle the World is my personal blog and photo gallery. Road Trips, destination cities, national parks, wildlife refuges, photography, travel hacking, birding/wildlife, hotels, yummy food, music, festivals and concerts are some of the subjects I’ll be covering.

I currently live in Washington State, which is an amazing area with a ton of beauty I hope to share with you. I take trips all over Washington between my bigger trips and often get to Oregon and the British Columbia region of Canada as well. So while I hope to share adventures from all over the World, the Pacific Northwest of the USA and Canada will be heavily featured.

If any of these topics interest you, I hope you find value in this site and maybe some inspiration for your own adventures.

How did Syrcle the World start?

The idea for Syrcle the World sprang into existence while working from home during the Covid19 pandemic. Like many, I used the increase in alone time to reflect on life and what I really wanted. The pandemic made me take a deeper acknowledgement that you never know what tomorrow will bring and that it isn’t even guaranteed. Every day is a gift. With that realization, I decided to make travel and exploring the world a priority and not just something I talked about doing someday.

I spent much of the pandemic learning various methods of travel hacking and reading up on destinations. 2021 came and went and during that year I had amassed a substantial amount of travel points as well as knowledge on how to travel on an extreme budget.

Early in 2022, with the worst of the pandemic having past, I decided it was go time. I purchased a new camera, packed the car up and on April 23rd 2022 embarked on a road trip that would span 2 months and 6 states. 50 of the 60 nights I stayed in hotels that had been booked on points. I spent under $3000 on the entire trip (and it could have been less!), including lodging, gas, food and a few concerts.

This trip was life altering. I’ll save the full details for a future post but my biggest realization was that traveling full time really didn’t have to cost that much. While I’m not yet ready to make travel a full time thing myself, I definitely now see how it is possible. I understand that for many of you, full time travel will not be the goal. In many ways, that makes travel hacking even more valuable. You can easily add 2-4 weeks of “free” travel to your life without spending any more than you currently do. I look forward to sharing all of this with you.

So what’s next?

I’m not totally sure where this is going to go, but I think that is good. I want this to evolve as I evolve. I briefly mentioned it above, but I also completely fell in love with photography on this trip. Photography is going to be a big part of my path going forward. The vast majority of pictures on this site will be my own. I hope you will join me on my journey and find some value and entertainment here.