Hiking with Trishul Patel

[00:00:00] Hi, my name is Trishul Patel with Investing Forever Advisory and my Unexpected Hobby is Hiking.

[00:00:09] Welcome to Unexpected Hobbies of Financial Advisors, the podcast where we interview fellow

[00:00:14] financial advisors about their pursuits and pastimes beyond their professional persona,

[00:00:19] some of which may be surprising to their colleagues and clients. We're interested in

[00:00:23] what makes them tick and how their unexpected hobbies might or might not relate to their

[00:00:28] everyday lives. Here's our discussion with this week's guest. Welcome to the Unexpected Hobbies

[00:00:38] of Financial Advisors podcast. I'm Brian Wright with Fiduciary CFO alongside, as always, my co-host

[00:00:44] and fellow financial advisor, John Shua Walker. You get grander and grander each time and I do not.

[00:00:52] Well, I get more comfortable every time I do this. I do too, but I'm still... You want something stiff

[00:00:57] and uncomfortable? Then go back and watch the first episode and you will see... Oh man, we've come a long

[00:01:02] way. We have come a long way. We have come a long way. And we have another guest this week. We do.

[00:01:09] We do. It'd be a pretty weird podcast if we had no guest. Just for you and me. Nobody's signing up for

[00:01:13] that. Speaking of going a long way. Yeah, nobody wants that. So this week, we're talking with Trishul

[00:01:18] about his unexpected hobby. Is it unexpected though? I mean, it depends if you know him. I guess if you

[00:01:23] know him, it could be unexpected. It's unexpected is in the eye of the beholder too, right? Trishul,

[00:01:28] you look like such a couch potato. You actually get on your feet sometimes. You go hiking? It's

[00:01:32] amazing. Yeah. Thanks for joining us. Tell us all about this unexpected hobby or not. For the record,

[00:01:41] for the listeners, he does not look like a couch potato. He looks like a normal financial advisor,

[00:01:44] non-couch potato status, but he's going to talk to us about hiking. About hiking. Yes. Thanks for

[00:01:48] joining us. You know, I'll probably play on the notion that it's not necessarily unexpected to

[00:01:53] an extreme level, but I think it's underrated. So maybe that might be a way to play on that.

[00:01:59] We'll go with that. Sure. Okay. So for how long have you been doing hiking? Is this something you

[00:02:04] picked up in adulthood during the pandemic or did your parents put you in hiking boots and give you a

[00:02:08] walking staff at the age of two and push into the canyon? It started organically. So I went to school

[00:02:14] in upstate New York, plenty of opportunity for hiking. I did undergrad in Ithaca. I was in Ithaca and

[00:02:22] four years I didn't do any hiking whatsoever. College. I didn't even see anything beyond the

[00:02:30] inside of the engineering lab, but I ended up sticking around for grad school. And in that program,

[00:02:37] I had more free time. I started exploring the actual city and I realized, oh geez, there's a lot

[00:02:42] more going on outside of the campus. And at that point I had a car, I could drive a little bit

[00:02:47] further. And I found out, yeah, there's amazing trails around all over the place. I was in Cornell

[00:02:55] University and they're known for these gorges, right? That they are big waterfalls where you're on your way

[00:03:01] to class and you walk over a bridge and it's literally like 200 feet down. And it's really

[00:03:06] amazing, but you just have your blinders on when you're a student sometimes. You don't even bother

[00:03:12] looking. But beyond that, even in the surrounding two or three mile radius, there's so many natural

[00:03:19] parks and recreational places. And what I realized, you know, as a grad student, I would just go out

[00:03:25] there and nobody would be there. And I'd just be walking around in the middle of this gigantic forest,

[00:03:31] this state park. And it's basically my own. And I thought, wow. And there were some places where

[00:03:38] I'd see a new vista and I'm like, this looks like it's out of the Lord of the Rings. Like it could

[00:03:44] literally be in some fantasy movie on another planet. It's really incredible. Yeah. So it opened my

[00:03:52] mind, my eyes to something that I completely wasn't expecting. Was the Indiana State campus in Terre Haute

[00:04:00] particularly scenic? Because going to Purdue, we made fun of you guys for even by Indiana standards,

[00:04:04] Terre Haute is like, but yeah. Scenic?

[00:04:08] Mm.

[00:04:08] Mm.

[00:04:10] If you know where to go.

[00:04:11] They had, they had a lot of the, we called them the tuna trees. It's the, like the tulip poplar or

[00:04:16] the Bradford pear, which was the ones that were real pungent when they bloom.

[00:04:19] Yeah. The Bradford pear.

[00:04:21] The Bradford pear have a certain aroma.

[00:04:22] Yeah. So there would be, you know, a week or so in the spring where it just smelled,

[00:04:26] which was different from the normal smell at the time of the paper mill that was on the Wabash

[00:04:29] River. So yeah, yes, it was scenic and picturesque. Should have gone to Cornell, I guess. I guess,

[00:04:34] I guess you should have. So what, so what about, you know, so you're sitting on campus and you have

[00:04:40] a car and you're like, now I can get away from campus. Was this, was this adventure kind of your,

[00:04:44] your first couple that you went on, was this to really as an exercise? Like I need to get out,

[00:04:49] I need to breathe some fresh air and get some exercise. Or was this a, wow, class is really tough.

[00:04:55] I need to decompress. I'm stressed out. I'm going to go do that or a little bit both.

[00:04:59] It was, yeah, let's try something different. It actually started on campus because on the campus,

[00:05:05] there are different, it's a large campus and there are different colleges within the university,

[00:05:10] each specializing in different areas. And there's an agricultural school, which has its own,

[00:05:16] you know, wide campus. And I started hanging out on there. I think I maybe had some friends who

[00:05:22] were in that college. So I kind of escaped the engineering facilities. It's known as like the

[00:05:28] dungeons, like the campus. They stick us in like, you know, the basement of all the halls and stuff

[00:05:34] like that. We don't really need light. Just throw down pizza and Fritos and we'll be fine.

[00:05:39] But beyond that, yeah, we noticed that the ag school, wait, they had something we didn't have.

[00:05:46] They had these manicured lawns with like trees. They had something called a laboratorium,

[00:05:52] which is basically a manicured country club of random collections of plants and trees

[00:05:59] where you had the students maintaining and helping develop and stuff like that.

[00:06:06] And you can literally just go there.

[00:06:08] Yeah. And you can literally go there during a weekday. And again, it's empty. And I realized,

[00:06:14] oh my God, I have a country club to myself that nobody else is utilizing. And I can just hang out

[00:06:19] here, bring a laptop and do some work. And it just made me think, okay, I don't need to be stuck in

[00:06:26] a basement. I don't need to follow the conventional, have to work around all of these other students.

[00:06:32] I can choose my own journey.

[00:06:34] And when you made this discovery, were you, did you so prize the solitude that you kept the secret

[00:06:39] to yourself? Or did you go back to the dungeon and say, hey, hey guys, guys, there's a sky up there

[00:06:43] and you can go and take your computer and work out there and breathe air.

[00:06:46] I did. I brought a few friends and we used to have like picnics there. Like,

[00:06:50] you know, you don't think of that.

[00:06:53] You know, just starting off, you think about the random or the more obvious college things like,

[00:06:58] yeah, we'll hit up the bars and then we'll go to get pizza and then we'll have a late night ramen.

[00:07:03] But wait, there's more to that that you can take advantage of.

[00:07:08] And is this something that you were able to do year round? How, I've been in Syracuse in February

[00:07:13] and you wanted to stay indoors. Is it similar over at Cornell that there's certain times a year that

[00:07:18] you couldn't enjoy?

[00:07:19] Well, that was also part of it. So, you know, as an undergrad, you're there most of the year

[00:07:25] and it's cold from like October till May. You could literally be shivering all those months.

[00:07:32] But I actually stayed that summer. You know, I mentioned I started grad school right after

[00:07:36] undergrad and I stayed that summer. And it was that summer where I had more free time.

[00:07:40] It opened my eyes to all of these other options. I had like a summer job.

[00:07:45] Actually, that was in the ag school. So that's how I learned about, you know,

[00:07:51] that even didn't occur to me how I ended up out there just now. Like, oh yeah, I was actually

[00:07:57] working.

[00:07:57] I worked.

[00:07:59] Friends.

[00:08:00] Yeah, well, I was building websites for nonprofits up there.

[00:08:04] Okay.

[00:08:05] Okay.

[00:08:05] Yeah, that's kind of what got you going.

[00:08:07] You caught the bug and then obviously you didn't stay in upstate New York forever.

[00:08:11] Where did you end up next? And did you seek out hiking or is it something that you had to

[00:08:15] rediscover after getting your first job?

[00:08:17] I had to rediscover. So I started working in New Jersey, did a consulting gig, really nothing

[00:08:22] too crazy hiking oriented then. But then I went back to business school, to Ithaca, got my MBA

[00:08:28] and finance. That's how I ended up in this type of role. But when I was up there, I knew now,

[00:08:36] I know there's more beyond the campus. So I did actually explore even more and I doubled down and

[00:08:43] I started volunteering on a farm up there and things like that. So it gave me the opportunity

[00:08:47] to really get a lot more closer to the natural side of the community.

[00:08:52] Yeah. What sort of farm was it?

[00:08:54] It was just like a nonprofit farm.

[00:08:58] We weren't really growing things for an industrialist.

[00:09:01] Yeah.

[00:09:01] We had a goat.

[00:09:02] We had chickens.

[00:09:03] We had things like that.

[00:09:05] And there was like a nature preserve right next door. I could volunteer there as well. So

[00:09:10] that just all these different things that you don't kind of see.

[00:09:14] Yeah. The reason I asked about the farm stuff is I'm a career changer and dairy is my previous

[00:09:18] background and certainly plenty of that up there.

[00:09:21] We did not have a cow.

[00:09:23] They come by the hundred and you don't want to go hiking near them. And so now you're no

[00:09:28] longer in New Jersey, New York, that area. You're in Florida. So inverse. Now there's a

[00:09:34] different time of year when you may not want to be outside. Is hiking year round for you

[00:09:37] or do you have to curtail it during the summer?

[00:09:40] No, it's year round. So actually there was a bit of a detour between being in the Northeast

[00:09:46] and ending up in Florida. I actually, after graduating from business school, I packed my

[00:09:51] bags and went out to Southeast Asia for a few years.

[00:09:53] No kidding.

[00:09:54] Yeah. So that was quite neat. And when I was out there, the CEO of the firm, I was doing

[00:10:00] options trading. It had nothing to do with hiking. But the CEO was super adventurous.

[00:10:04] And he like, when I first got out there after a few weeks, he's like, why don't you come

[00:10:08] with me on this weekend camping trip? And it turned out to be jungle trekking with army

[00:10:14] commandos.

[00:10:16] Oh.

[00:10:17] Yeah. So here we are in the middle of the Malaysian jungle, like open air, no tents and trekking

[00:10:25] through the wilderness and trying to pick up survival techniques and things like that.

[00:10:30] A bunch of special forces and an options trader.

[00:10:34] It was like a beginning of a joke.

[00:10:37] Yeah. Okay.

[00:10:38] Yeah.

[00:10:39] So you survived.

[00:10:40] Yeah, I survived. So a few years out there, it got me the opportunity to explore all of

[00:10:45] these other different countries that had obviously opportunities for hiking.

[00:10:50] Yeah. Was that a tropical climate consistently or was there enough elevation that you had chills

[00:10:55] as well?

[00:10:56] Oh, no, no. It would be balmy and hot every day, all day.

[00:11:03] 365.

[00:11:04] Unrelenting sweat. Yeah. Okay. So special gear that you would need in that situation. I know

[00:11:08] you can go real crazy with sweat wicking, whatever. Was that something that if you've gotten into

[00:11:13] the gear of hiking, especially out there where it's so warm?

[00:11:15] It was silly. Like, I remember that first trip, we did like maybe four or five different trips

[00:11:21] like that with my boss. And then separately on our own, we did a bunch of others. But that

[00:11:27] first trip stands out to be because I think I wore jeans.

[00:11:30] Oh.

[00:11:32] Once.

[00:11:34] How?

[00:11:34] Once. And then, you know, you're up to your feet and there's like mud and like leeches

[00:11:39] and all of these things are like, okay, you got to be more prepared. Yeah.

[00:11:44] Did you say leeches?

[00:11:45] I did say leeches. Yeah.

[00:11:47] Oh, man. Is that something you just saw at a distance or saw on your person?

[00:11:51] Oh, this is not the best example because I'm married now and I was dating my wife at

[00:11:58] the time and I asked her to come with me on that trip.

[00:12:01] And so we were open air camping, meaning no tent, right? We just had like a little canopy

[00:12:09] above us, middle of the jungle. Every couple of hours, the commandos would like throw off

[00:12:16] these little explosives to scare the wild boar away because you don't want them getting

[00:12:20] too close to your encampment. And yeah, when my wife got up, she had a small leech on her

[00:12:27] that had crawled, you know, from the underbrush onto her.

[00:12:31] Oh.

[00:12:31] And then, yeah, as we were trekking, they would show up on your ankles and stuff like that.

[00:12:36] I always associated leeches with being purely aquatic, but they cover ground as well.

[00:12:42] Well, it's a very wet, damp environment. It's swampy. It's, yeah, it's not dry by any means.

[00:12:50] Okay. You have cleared the threshold for being unexpected. This is so gross. Okay. Okay. And

[00:12:56] the canopy, is that supposed to keep out the bugs? Did it do enough or were you being

[00:13:00] Oh, it's just a tarp of our head.

[00:13:02] It's a shade for the leeches.

[00:13:03] For the leeches, yes.

[00:13:04] Yeah, it's making sure they don't get too warm. If they dry out, then we suffer too.

[00:13:11] Oh gosh. Okay. Okay. And so what did she make of that? She didn't run screaming. She's still with you.

[00:13:17] I think my CEO said, if you can bring somebody and they actually stay for this whole weekend,

[00:13:23] you found someone special. She's a keeper. Okay.

[00:13:28] Was the honeymoon in a location that was just the antithesis of that trip?

[00:13:33] Oh, that was in Thailand. So we did some scuba diving and backpacking. There was certainly hiking too.

[00:13:40] Wow.

[00:13:40] I think we stayed in a tree house.

[00:13:43] Okay. So when you were at Cornell, I'm guessing it was mostly day trips and these were overnight trips.

[00:13:50] Yeah.

[00:13:51] One of the things my wife, I tell her what we're going to be asking and she said, okay, make sure you find out from somebody who takes it seriously.

[00:13:57] What's the difference between a hike and a walk? Like, are we just going to go on a walk in the woods with a dog?

[00:14:02] Is it rise to the level of hiking? How serious does it have to be before it's considered capital H hiking?

[00:14:08] I mean, I'm sure everybody has their own definition. For me, if you're bringing a water bottle and something survival related, like some extra food or rations, I think that crosses the bridge and be a hike.

[00:14:22] Okay. Okay.

[00:14:23] Yeah. Like for me, I have my backpack. And I know if I'm going for a walk, I just pick the backpack. I know there's water in there. I know there's, you know, like a granola bar or two. I know there's sunscreen and, you know, spray and a change of socks, right? Just the basics.

[00:14:39] Yeah. Okay. Okay. So when we go to our local state park with the dog, well, he's a black lab, all black coats. We take water for him, but that counts, but no socks. So maybe it doesn't count.

[00:14:51] It depends on the climate. Climate is specific.

[00:14:54] Yeah. Yeah. And so do you still do overnight trips for the purpose of hiking or is that part of your past?

[00:15:00] We do. Okay. So the next shift was I moved here to West Palm Beach, right? So I ended up working here at a hedge fund for a couple of years and I did literally zero hiking. This was way too busy. It was a startup hedge fund.

[00:15:15] Yeah.

[00:15:15] Yeah. But what happened is around 2017, the year my daughter was born, that's where I left the industry. I just kind of retired. And the notion there was we had reached this period where we had enough passive income coming in. So we're like, okay, let's change our mindset, change our career path and just focus on having fun with the family and the small kid.

[00:15:39] So we rented a house here and we hit the road. We had just started traveling, doing hiking and RVing and we bought us, we rented a small place on the West coast of Florida.

[00:15:50] Okay.

[00:15:51] So East coast, West coast, very different. East coast of Florida, very developed West coast, very rural. So the city we ended up in basically had a population of a few thousand, but it could support 10 times that amount.

[00:16:04] Although it didn't yet, meaning it was just getting off the ground and just nature everywhere. So when my daughter was first born, she, we realized that she didn't want to sit still and literally she couldn't walk.

[00:16:19] We had to pick her up and hold her and just walk around with her. And we noticed also if we put her on grass, she would just calm down.

[00:16:28] Like she'd just be very calm. So part of what we started to do is every day we'd go for a hike and she'd just be very calm and things would be relaxed with her. And she just enjoy the scenery. We obviously got one of those baby carriers where she could face forward.

[00:16:44] And we just started picking out trails. So then, you know, call this like phase three of my hiking journey where we, it gave us the ability to really explore day hiking trips.

[00:16:56] And we literally just did it every day because we realized this works. This keeps her entertained. We get our exercise and we're exploring all these neat areas.

[00:17:07] Several episodes ago, we had a gother up from Washington doing rucking talking about getting a weighted backpack and going out on a walk. And we were talking about like rocks, slabs of iron, but anybody human in a backpack and carry them around.

[00:17:20] That's account. Now you're rucking. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But I'm guessing now that she's seven, she's responsible for her own locomotion.

[00:17:27] Yeah, she's, but she, she loves that. She loves being outdoors. I think just having her outdoors that young, it just builds up that, that, that desire.

[00:17:37] This is what we do. This is normal. Yeah. This is a good thing to do. Okay. Right.

[00:17:41] So do you, are you constrained now by the academic year that if she's in school 180 days that do you, uh, you're having to plane, you're hiking around first grade?

[00:17:51] Yeah. So it was very interesting. So, um, I have a lifestyle business, meaning I only work like part-time anyway.

[00:17:58] Sure.

[00:17:58] But what ended up happening is my daughter had her daycare in town here, but then her teacher moved 45 miles away and we really liked the teachers.

[00:18:08] They were like, Oh boy, what do we do? So we literally started driving 45 miles.

[00:18:14] So quickly, you know, some back of the knocking mats realizes that's three to four hours a day of driving. If you're dropping, you're coming back, dropping, you're coming back.

[00:18:22] Right.

[00:18:23] So what we, what I ended up doing is I would do, you know, two days, my wife would do three days. And for my two days, I would drive up, drop her off at the school, go to the local park.

[00:18:35] They have wifi, they have benches, work there for an hour or two. And then yeah, I'd go on a hike for the rest of the day and then pick her up.

[00:18:43] Yeah.

[00:18:45] So if you're doing midday hikes, sunscreen hat, how do you defend yourself against the glare of the sun down there at 25 degrees North latitude?

[00:18:54] Right. So you, you learn quickly what works and what doesn't. And interestingly enough, once you pass September, once you're in October, he isn't that big of an issue.

[00:19:04] Once you're in the, like in the canopy, it's not really canopy. It's like a loosely dense forest.

[00:19:09] Yeah.

[00:19:09] Yeah.

[00:19:10] In the shade. And look, there, there are trails too. It's not like it's super dense underbrush and you have a machete to like walk your way through it.

[00:19:18] So, so, but there are vast amounts of hiking opportunities. Like that's one thing we kind of learned where even if you're living within a municipality, there is likely a dozen hiking opportunities within a few mile radius.

[00:19:34] Literally just right on the side of the road, you know, on your local commute, there's probably a few trails.

[00:19:41] Yeah. Yeah. Municipalities seem to want to have at least some level of green space, stretcher, like this kind of thing.

[00:19:48] Right. Yeah. You know, I, I didn't jump over something that we also did in Southeast Asia. There's something known as geocaching. Are you guys familiar with that?

[00:19:57] Just in case there's some listeners that, that don't know, run us through the basics.

[00:20:01] Okay. So, you know, when we first started doing this, it used to be just like a glorified website where people would say, Hey, I hid this thing in this obscure location. Here's some details. See if you can find it.

[00:20:13] And then all of a sudden there's a whole message board of these things. And then there's dozens and hundreds and thousands and so on. And now there's like an app, right? You can just say, here's my location. Tell me where the, these geocaches are.

[00:20:26] And then you can actually search for them in your local area. Some of them may be in the actual city space and a lot of them will be in the nature space.

[00:20:36] So, yeah. When we were in Southeast Asia, that gave us the opportunity. If we fly to like a new country to explore an area that you wouldn't quite be able to explore.

[00:20:46] If you're following the standard top three tourist, you know, sites for that particular city. Right. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:20:52] So it gets you off the beaten path and it shows you things that you wouldn't see. And it's a little bit of a treasure hunt. Right. Choose your own adventure type of thing.

[00:21:02] So, yeah. And we did that in Southeast Asia. We do that here. Right. And there's opportunities to explore that way.

[00:21:09] The geocaching pastime is a globalized phenomenon, right? That's not just something that.

[00:21:14] Yeah, it was. And again, we learned about it in Southeast Asia. So, and this was over 10 years ago.

[00:21:21] Yeah. And is that the sort of thing that people will do like streaming Twitch, Facebook Live?

[00:21:26] I'm sure at this point. I'm really sure. Again, it was so ghetto into this was before like smartphones when we were doing it.

[00:21:34] So we would have to like look it up on our phone. I mean, our compute laptop, write down the stuff and scratch out a piece of paper.

[00:21:42] Then now you're in the middle of nowhere. Like, wait, what did that say? What was?

[00:21:46] Yeah. Up a creek. Yeah. OK. Yeah. I'm sure we do it now. And yeah, you got the phone and it tells you you're 10 feet away.

[00:21:53] Turn right. You know, you have the GPS. It's a little different.

[00:21:56] Yeah. Like Pokemon Go. Right. Yeah.

[00:21:58] But my daughter loves it because sometimes there's a literal treasure box. Like what kid wouldn't love going through some trail and having to find a literal treasure box with a code and you open it up and there's all these crazy things inside.

[00:22:12] So it's pretty neat.

[00:22:14] Yeah. Sort of like an escape room, but yeah.

[00:22:16] Nothing you need to escape from. You got to get in because you're outdoors.

[00:22:18] Yeah. So do you have the opportunity to just to walk out of your front door and go on a hike or all of your hiking destinations somewhere you have to get in the car and drive to?

[00:22:29] Yeah. It's the former. It's crazy enough. There's a nature preserve right across the street from here.

[00:22:35] And it's it's again that silly thing where I can go, you know, in an hour and nobody will be there.

[00:22:42] Like you have. A hundred acres. Just go nuts.

[00:22:46] Just say it. It's all to yourself. You know, I'm I am frankly more of an introvert and I like these types of things.

[00:22:53] I don't mind going by myself. But, you know, I can bring my wife, bring my kid. That's fine, too.

[00:22:58] Is this a daily activity now?

[00:23:00] Well, so what basically happened is last last last two years, my daughter, again, was pretty far away with her her school.

[00:23:09] Now she's in first grade. She's a lot closer.

[00:23:10] So for those two years, Mondays and Fridays would be the days where I do my hiking.

[00:23:16] Yeah. Your day to drive, your day to work in the woods and then hike.

[00:23:19] Exactly. Yeah.

[00:23:22] All right. So into our standard question format, are there lessons that you've learned from your hobby that have translated over to the work you do and the lifestyle practice that you've built?

[00:23:32] What's what's translatable?

[00:23:33] What I always like to encourage is it's not really about financial freedom, right? It's about time freedom.

[00:23:40] It's about being able to do the things that are important to you and prioritizing it.

[00:23:45] So certainly you can engineer your life to give priority to these things.

[00:23:53] And, you know, with the lifestyle business I have, of course, it gives me plenty of freedom to be able to choose when I do this.

[00:24:00] And I'm very open to that with my clients.

[00:24:02] I say, I'm doing this because I enjoy it.

[00:24:05] I'll meet with you, you know, three days a week.

[00:24:07] The other two, I'll be doing other things like hiking.

[00:24:11] Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

[00:24:13] It sounds like you had many, many opportunities to form special memories.

[00:24:17] But are there any that you think that when you're in your last days, you'll look back with special fondness on?

[00:24:23] You know, it's always the experiences that you'll remember, right?

[00:24:30] It's certainly not going to be the balance of the bank account and how much you have performed in the market.

[00:24:37] So all of these, you know, I was looking through a few pictures, you know, over the past week or so.

[00:24:44] And I realized, wow, these are some great times.

[00:24:48] And it's not that each one has to stand out because of some special thing, but just being out there.

[00:24:54] It really provides this level of serenity, some comfort.

[00:24:58] For me, sometimes it's hours at a time where I just get to disconnect from electronics.

[00:25:03] And even that in itself is the best vacation.

[00:25:07] Sure.

[00:25:08] This is something I don't want to assume, but you anticipate doing this as long as you are upright and ambulatory deep into your old age that there's no time limit on this hobby.

[00:25:18] Yeah. Yeah.

[00:25:19] So I'm not a big runner per se, right?

[00:25:22] Sure.

[00:25:22] And I do hiking because it's a great complement to my other exercise habit.

[00:25:29] I'm strength training, so it's a good complement.

[00:25:33] It allows me to get my steps, get some exercise, get some fresh air.

[00:25:38] Again, just disconnect from all of the electronics.

[00:25:42] So it's something that why not?

[00:25:45] Why not continue until I can't walk anymore?

[00:25:48] If part of the value is disconnecting from electronics, then have you eschewed the MapMyRun, Strava, StepCounters?

[00:25:56] How connected are you as far as logging and recording your activity?

[00:26:00] Or is that, hey, keep that away from my special time?

[00:26:03] Yeah.

[00:26:04] Well, there's a few pro tips.

[00:26:06] Like there's an app called AllTrails.

[00:26:08] Again, maybe you guys are familiar with that.

[00:26:11] Not yet.

[00:26:12] But now we are.

[00:26:12] Hiking app, there's a free version.

[00:26:14] There's a subscription version like all apps.

[00:26:16] But essentially that allows you to, if you have your GPS on, it'll literally track your path through the woods.

[00:26:25] And obviously if you get lost, it's good to have two.

[00:26:29] Yeah.

[00:26:29] But yeah, and if you're in a new city, it'll help you discover new trails that you wouldn't know about.

[00:26:34] So that's my default for tracking.

[00:26:37] And then I have an app that tracks after the hike.

[00:26:41] I just pull into something called MyFitnessPal, which tracks my exercise routine.

[00:26:46] Okay.

[00:26:47] Okay.

[00:26:47] Yeah.

[00:26:48] Any, we've talked about some wildlife encounters with wild bullers and leeches, but in the United States, any alarming or special wildlife encounters that you've had that you recall?

[00:27:00] Well, you know, there's alligators here.

[00:27:02] You can't escape that.

[00:27:03] Yeah.

[00:27:04] So it was crazy.

[00:27:05] There was this one time I was hiking out there and I didn't see somebody for like an hour or two.

[00:27:10] And then all of a sudden there's this guy sitting on a stump in the middle of nowhere.

[00:27:15] And, you know, I just come across him and we start talking for like 10, 15 minutes.

[00:27:20] And then inevitably the alligator question comes up.

[00:27:25] Have you seen any blah, blah, blah?

[00:27:26] He's like, you know, he's this elderly man.

[00:27:30] And he's like, I grew up in this area.

[00:27:32] I know these woods, like the back of my hand.

[00:27:34] I've done it, you know, been out here for dozens of years.

[00:27:38] And actually two weeks ago, there was an alligator incident where this elderly man in his 50s was on his mountain bike or whatever.

[00:27:50] His off-road bike.

[00:27:52] He hit a rock, went flying straight into an alligator.

[00:27:56] And luckily somebody found him and had to take him out.

[00:28:01] And I'm like, wait, how often does this happen?

[00:28:04] Two weeks ago, what am I doing?

[00:28:05] Yeah.

[00:28:06] He's like, that's the only story that I know.

[00:28:10] But yeah, I've seen gators a bunch of times.

[00:28:13] Yeah.

[00:28:14] What magnitude?

[00:28:15] Like the baby six-footers or 12, 14?

[00:28:19] We have a little lake behind us.

[00:28:21] And again, I mentioned we have the nature preserve.

[00:28:23] So in the wet season, there's just so much water that the gators come over this size, this way.

[00:28:29] So we'll see like four to six-foot gators quite, you know, every month or two.

[00:28:34] But I remember one hiking time where it must have been 10 feet.

[00:28:38] And basically there's like little streams and small channels and stuff like that.

[00:28:46] Everywhere, yeah.

[00:28:47] Right next to me, you know, just in the channel.

[00:28:49] And I had to obviously cross the path like, you know, parallel to it.

[00:28:53] And I sprinted.

[00:28:56] I know it's sitting there.

[00:28:58] I'm going to keep my eyes on it.

[00:28:59] I'm just going to go.

[00:29:02] Is there a safety protocol?

[00:29:03] Like is it better to walk past them close and slowly so you don't get their attention?

[00:29:07] Or do you antagonize them by running?

[00:29:10] My daughter knows this.

[00:29:11] What you do is you run zigzag.

[00:29:13] Because they can't change directions quickly.

[00:29:17] So you just go like zigzag.

[00:29:20] That's what you got to do.

[00:29:22] Yeah, sure.

[00:29:22] In general, alligators are a lot more tame than crocodiles, which are also in Florida.

[00:29:30] But I haven't seen any.

[00:29:32] But alligators will generally leave you alone.

[00:29:35] Mostly.

[00:29:37] I remember we were kayaking in the bayou and literally just alligators all over the place, like five, ten feet away.

[00:29:46] It would be like half a dozen.

[00:29:48] And this went on for like an hour or two.

[00:29:51] And we're like, are you sure this is okay?

[00:29:53] They're like, yeah, we do this every day.

[00:29:55] Did you lose a bet or are you doing this for fun?

[00:29:57] This was a guided kayaking trip.

[00:30:01] So this was somebody's job to do this every day.

[00:30:03] Yeah, they brought us out there.

[00:30:05] There were a dozen other people with us.

[00:30:07] And we're like, okay, we'll go along with this.

[00:30:10] Okay.

[00:30:12] Yeah, when we go to Orlando, we do Gator World.

[00:30:14] And there's thousands of gators, but they're on the other side of the fence.

[00:30:17] And yeah, they're magnificent creatures, but over there.

[00:30:21] And I don't know if I'd be in a kayak seeing one up close and thinking, oh, this is lovely.

[00:30:27] Yeah.

[00:30:28] As long as a kayak guide has all his limbs, that's probably.

[00:30:30] That's your first sign.

[00:30:31] It's like a shop teacher without a thumb.

[00:30:32] And you're not even traveling with special forces and they're explosives to keep you safe.

[00:30:38] All right.

[00:30:38] So is your client base local enough that if you wanted to, you could say, hey, let's go on a hike and talk about what's going on with you?

[00:30:45] Or are you purely virtual or do not want your clients with you out there?

[00:30:49] Yeah.

[00:30:50] I'd say a third of my clients are within my local community.

[00:30:54] Two thirds spread geographically across the U.S.

[00:30:57] But I tell all my clients up front, we're probably never going to meet.

[00:31:02] Unless it's just by random luck.

[00:31:04] It's 100% virtual business.

[00:31:07] And yeah, that's just kind of how it is.

[00:31:10] I do have friends who are clients as well.

[00:31:14] Obviously, we meet, but that's because we were friends.

[00:31:18] Friends first.

[00:31:19] Yeah.

[00:31:19] We're cutting you off now that you're a client.

[00:31:21] Yeah.

[00:31:21] Okay.

[00:31:22] And do you do hikes with people outside of the family these days?

[00:31:26] You have a crew that you go out with sometimes?

[00:31:28] Oh, he's an introvert.

[00:31:29] Maybe.

[00:31:31] Yeah.

[00:31:32] And it's a bit more family oriented just because of timing.

[00:31:36] And honestly, probably the majority of my hikes, I'm just by myself because not a lot of people are hiking at 2 p.m. on a Monday.

[00:31:47] My boss is not giving me the side eye, so I do that on a regular basis.

[00:31:51] It's fine.

[00:31:53] That's fine.

[00:31:54] Okay.

[00:31:55] Good.

[00:31:55] Good.

[00:31:55] Good.

[00:31:56] So I'm guessing then that some people have hobbies.

[00:32:00] They get involved in the community.

[00:32:01] Somebody discovers that they're a financial planner and clients come their way simply because they've met people and gotten to know people.

[00:32:07] I'm sort of guessing between the lines that that's not something that is happening very often for you.

[00:32:12] Yeah, not terribly.

[00:32:14] And, you know, again, it's a lifestyle business, so I'm not really looking to expand beyond here either.

[00:32:20] Sure.

[00:32:20] Sure.

[00:32:20] Yeah.

[00:32:21] Are there any, like, bucket list hiking locations like the Appalachian Trail or anything like that that you've yet to do that's still circled on your one-day list?

[00:32:32] I think so.

[00:32:33] You know, I grew up in the Catskills.

[00:32:37] And, you know, there are those memories of just going out there and hitting up some of those trails.

[00:32:43] But, you know, it's something you can do anywhere.

[00:32:46] Like, so it's not something like I don't think I'm going to get enough of it or I need to scout out a specific hiking destination.

[00:32:53] It's just whenever we end up somewhere, it's on the table as an option for something to consider.

[00:33:00] And I think it pairs very well with whatever else we're doing.

[00:33:03] I mentioned we do, like, kayaking and stuff like that.

[00:33:07] So we might break out the kayak and go down the river a bit and then, you know, beach somewhere and go on a hike for a little bit, right?

[00:33:15] And it's come back to the kayak and come back to our port.

[00:33:19] You've hiked many, many interesting places.

[00:33:22] Your daughter is seven.

[00:33:23] Is she – is it – are you – have as much priority for her to get her hiking passport stamped?

[00:33:28] Or is it just about the togetherness and the activity and she doesn't necessarily need to see Thailand the way that you have?

[00:33:35] Well, so, of course, she's probably come out with us to Southeast – to, like, Malaysia and, like, Hong Kong and stuff like that.

[00:33:44] And there's probably been some opportunity there.

[00:33:46] But at the same time, again, so basically what happened is 2017 I left my career.

[00:33:54] 2018 we did tons of hiking.

[00:33:56] And same thing with 2019.

[00:33:58] And then 2020, things changed.

[00:34:01] But she got a lot in those first two years of her life.

[00:34:04] So I think it's so ingrained.

[00:34:06] Like, even when she steps out the door now, she doesn't even put on shoes.

[00:34:09] She's just, like, running straight out the door.

[00:34:11] Like, what about shoes?

[00:34:13] Like, no, it's okay.

[00:34:14] I want to feel the grass between my toes.

[00:34:17] That's her natural state of being.

[00:34:19] You ever done any desert hiking?

[00:34:21] Out west, arches, Grand Canyon, any of that?

[00:34:24] Or are you strictly going where the leeches are?

[00:34:26] Yeah, so not terribly recently.

[00:34:29] Interestingly enough, though, there are different types of environments here in Florida even.

[00:34:34] For example, there's hiking with the forest and stuff.

[00:34:37] But there's also hiking that's closer to the coast.

[00:34:39] And it's just all sand.

[00:34:41] So it feels like a desert.

[00:34:44] But it's obviously not a desert.

[00:34:45] But it's a different atmosphere.

[00:34:46] It feels like a different city, a state, frankly.

[00:34:50] So you take off your shoes and you're walking, you know, on the sand through the forest.

[00:34:55] Or through, air quotes, forest.

[00:34:57] Right, right.

[00:34:58] When you head down to see the family on the Space Coast, is hiking on the agenda?

[00:35:02] No.

[00:35:03] No.

[00:35:03] No.

[00:35:04] We'll build a fire on the beach.

[00:35:05] You need a permit for that, I learned.

[00:35:07] The hard way?

[00:35:08] No, not the hard way.

[00:35:09] You just said, we're going to do a fire on the beach?

[00:35:11] Sure, that's awesome.

[00:35:12] Yeah, well, we got to go get a permit.

[00:35:13] Yeah.

[00:35:14] Okay.

[00:35:15] There's some nice trails there.

[00:35:16] There's even a park where you get up close to the water, and there's bioluminescence in the ocean right near Cape Vernaval.

[00:35:27] Yeah.

[00:35:27] Yeah.

[00:35:28] Yeah.

[00:35:28] Yeah.

[00:35:29] So that's going to be an after dark thing.

[00:35:31] Do you still do occasionally after dark hiking?

[00:35:34] Well, this was a specific trip that we had planned out to see the bioluminescence.

[00:35:39] So we had like the nighttime kayaks and stuff like that.

[00:35:42] Oh, not just on shore, but out in the water.

[00:35:45] Yeah.

[00:35:45] Yeah, yeah.

[00:35:46] Yeah.

[00:35:47] And then you just kind of wait around there.

[00:35:50] Yeah.

[00:35:51] If somebody never left their engineering dungeon days behind them and is hearing you and getting inspired,

[00:35:58] then where should they start?

[00:36:00] They just strap on their sneakers and head for the nearest park or boots?

[00:36:05] What's the right way for somebody to get their toes wet in the world of hiking if they know anything?

[00:36:09] Yeah.

[00:36:10] Download the AllTrails app, right?

[00:36:12] And then just it will know your location, you know, turn off, turn on the location, whatever.

[00:36:17] And it'll tell you, here are the four nearest closest trails and it'll rank them easy, medium, hard.

[00:36:23] Just pick an easy one and just strap on the hiking shoes and start walking.

[00:36:29] Yeah.

[00:36:29] Okay.

[00:36:30] Okay.

[00:36:30] Cool.

[00:36:32] So, and that would be, is there a community engagement part of that app as well?

[00:36:38] Or is it simply ranked trails?

[00:36:40] Yeah, yeah.

[00:36:41] Of course.

[00:36:41] Yeah.

[00:36:42] You know, you can share the picture of your hike.

[00:36:45] People like to share, oh, this trail is too muddy, you know, this time of year or watch out for this bridge.

[00:36:50] It's a little rickety.

[00:36:51] So, and you know, you can contribute to that community as well because a lot of times you'll find something that is important for somebody to know that you're not going to be able to cross three miles in because it's all swamped out.

[00:37:04] Yeah.

[00:37:05] It's like waves for the woods.

[00:37:06] Yeah.

[00:37:06] Exactly.

[00:37:07] Yeah.

[00:37:07] Watch out for the hidden cop behind the third tree.

[00:37:12] Yeah.

[00:37:13] So on that note then, do you ever have incidents with mountain bikes and bicycle people on the trail?

[00:37:17] Because we have to be careful which direction we hike our trails because the bikes are supposed to go one way.

[00:37:21] Are they coming back to your face?

[00:37:22] Are they sneaking up behind you?

[00:37:23] That happens.

[00:37:24] Yeah.

[00:37:25] It's one of those things.

[00:37:26] It's there.

[00:37:26] And the tricky part is in some of the trails, in the beginning of the trail, they'll be very clear that this is mountain bikes.

[00:37:34] This is, you know, for walking.

[00:37:36] It's interesting.

[00:37:37] And eventually things get so intertwined, you don't know what's left or right.

[00:37:40] They can't possibly completely segregate both.

[00:37:44] You got to be aware, essentially.

[00:37:46] Yeah.

[00:37:47] It's a good point.

[00:37:47] It took us a little while to get our dog to understand that, no, you have to get to the side of the trail, sit down, get your tail out of the way.

[00:37:54] Yeah.

[00:37:55] And she goes, bump, bump.

[00:37:56] Yeah.

[00:37:56] Exactly.

[00:37:58] My daughter's go-to is, or she knows this, you stand on the side, you wave to them.

[00:38:03] Thanks.

[00:38:04] They see you.

[00:38:06] Until they pass, then you can start marooning again.

[00:38:09] Yeah.

[00:38:10] Yeah.

[00:38:10] There's three of us.

[00:38:11] Don't miss us.

[00:38:11] Yeah.

[00:38:12] Or don't hit us.

[00:38:12] Right.

[00:38:13] All right.

[00:38:13] Well, Brian, did you have any further thoughts and questions for Jashul today?

[00:38:19] No.

[00:38:20] I'm interested in downloading that app to see what trails are nearby, like the little 10-acre woods across the way.

[00:38:27] I wonder if that's too small.

[00:38:29] There are some trails in there.

[00:38:30] Well, if you wanted to start small, what would you consider a short hike and what's a long hike?

[00:38:35] You know, I just, they're typically an hour to start and then a long one.

[00:38:39] And I literally drop my daughter off, go for a hike, and then pick her up at the end.

[00:38:44] Just bring her a sandwich, bring some rations, you know, kind of get to go.

[00:38:48] Yeah.

[00:38:48] Yeah.

[00:38:48] Okay.

[00:38:49] So I've seen on the maps the place across the street from here.

[00:38:53] Oh.

[00:38:54] All right.

[00:38:54] Yeah.

[00:38:54] You could probably get a couple of miles in before you started to recognize I've been here before.

[00:38:59] Yeah.

[00:38:59] And you could walk there from here because-

[00:39:01] We can.

[00:39:01] Yeah.

[00:39:01] It's very close.

[00:39:02] Yeah.

[00:39:03] Yeah.

[00:39:03] Okay.

[00:39:03] Well, if people wanted to find out more about your professional life and the work that you do

[00:39:07] when you're not hiking, where would they go to find out more about you and your practice?

[00:39:11] Well, I got the business, investingforever.com.

[00:39:16] And then I have a podcast too.

[00:39:17] It's called mindmoneyspectrum.com.

[00:39:20] Okay.

[00:39:21] And investing forever, what's the story behind that name?

[00:39:24] Well, so I had this notion where if you think about investing as a long-term thing,

[00:39:30] money doesn't really get destroyed.

[00:39:31] It just gets kind of recycled and it actually grows over time, meaning civilization started

[00:39:36] with zero and now there's Trurians and it's just going to keep expanding.

[00:39:40] So if you have this long-term mentality of investing, you can create something that survives

[00:39:46] indefinitely.

[00:39:48] Sure.

[00:39:48] Sure.

[00:39:48] Yeah.

[00:39:49] Well beyond our own lifespans.

[00:39:51] Yeah.

[00:39:52] Yeah.

[00:39:53] All right.

[00:39:53] Well, I mangled your name once, but Trishal, thanks for being here today on the podcast.

[00:39:57] And sometimes a person comes on and you see free diving with sharks and you think, okay,

[00:40:02] yes, that's unexpected.

[00:40:03] But even if something that looked mundane on the surface, I'm glad we found some real interesting

[00:40:07] angles to explore.

[00:40:08] Yeah.

[00:40:08] Maybe we titled this episode, Hiking with Leeches.

[00:40:12] He did his intro.

[00:40:14] It's just hiking.

[00:40:14] Okay.

[00:40:15] He gave it to us.

[00:40:15] Perfect.

[00:40:16] That's fine.

[00:40:16] No, that is.

[00:40:17] And it is.

[00:40:18] And this is interesting.

[00:40:20] Let people be surprised by the leeches.

[00:40:22] Yes.

[00:40:23] As you were.

[00:40:24] Or surprised by your reaction to the leeches, which was my favorite part.

[00:40:27] Part of the story.

[00:40:28] Well, my first exposure to leeches, and I say exposure in a book, I read, you know, The

[00:40:32] Little House in the Prairie series and the way those young ladies by the banks of Plum

[00:40:36] Creek reacted to leeches, you would have thought they were just the worst thing that ever happened.

[00:40:40] But yeah, leeches never recovered from reading that passage.

[00:40:44] But it sounds like they are survivable.

[00:40:45] Yes, they are.

[00:40:46] They are.

[00:40:46] They are.

[00:40:47] And maybe romantic even.

[00:40:50] Spawned a great love story, right?

[00:40:54] Anyway, that's a different episode, right?

[00:40:56] Right.

[00:40:57] Trishal, thank you so much for being on the podcast.

[00:40:59] I love to hear your story and wish you many more hiking adventures in the future.

[00:41:05] Thanks, guys.

[00:41:06] This was great.

[00:41:06] Take care.

[00:41:37] Thanks for being a fan of the show.

[00:41:38] If you were listening and thought to yourself, hey, I know somebody they need to have on

[00:41:42] the show, you can do something about that.

[00:41:45] Go to unexpectedhobbies.com slash nominate and tell us who they are and what they do that's

[00:41:51] so interesting and unexpected.

[00:41:53] If we agree, we'll send them an invitation and we'll hope they say yes.

[00:41:57] It's unexpectedhobbies.com slash nominate.

[00:42:00] Let's take a look.

[00:42:00] What?

[00:42:01] Wow.

[00:42:01] This is an invitation.

[00:42:01] Thank you.