Vincent Tamayo possesses a passion for traveling and seeing the world. After being transferred from Carlsbad High School, he is now helping to fill in an open space in the Sage Creek history department. This year, he will be able to apply real-life experience to his curriculum after a trip around the world.

Mr. Tamayo was able to travel the world after graduating college, but last year he took the whole school year off to go see eastern Europe and other countries again. “Teaching about other places tends to drive me to other places. The Cold War is my favorite unit and I had never been to Russia, so I knew I needed to go.” When deciding to travel the world again, Tamayo had some factors to consider. “I’m not a fan of traveling in the summer because it’s too hot, too crowded, and expensive.”

Mr. Tamayo is not a big fan of planning, especially for vacations. He likes to wander and he does this to heighten his experience. “Places that I stumbled into were Saint Petersburg, Moscow, Volgograd and Crimea.” Crimea is not a typical vacation destination since it currently has both Russian and Ukrainian military forces there and even Tamayo remarked that “it was never in [his] plans and no one wants to go somewhere under conflict.”

Even though the main part of his time was spent in Russia, Mr. Tamayo then ventured to Southeast Asia, Myanmar, and the Philippines once the winter came around. After the Philippines, he returned to Europe to see Greece and Turkey, as well as the Holy Lands in Israel. Traveling the world wasn’t completely a smooth ride for Tamayo, however.

He “didn’t expect that [he] couldn’t use [his] credit card and arrived with very little money.” Luckily, he was able stretch his money and make due.

Some of his students agree that his traveling has helped. “I think Mr. Tamayo being able to travel has helped his teaching. He can give us a better view on some of these places because he has been able to travel to them,” said sophomore Nolan Barry.

Traveling for Mr. Tamayo “means more to me than anything, it’s the satisfaction of arriving to a city alone and lost, then later leaving that place and knowing so much more.”