With the state of the country after this most recent election, navigating white spaces throughout our travels is front of mind more than ever. I think by now most of us understand the US for what it is, but there's nothing like updated statistics as a reminder that Black Americans have quite the unique experience in the country we call home. This week I'm joined by Anthony and Marlie Love to discuss how they use their platform Traveling While Black (CHECK THEM OUT ON FOX SOUL!!) to highlight Black history (or the lack there of) and their current experiences as Black travelers in the Pacific Northwest and beyond. They use practical metrics such as the number of Black people seen, visibility of signs of inclusion, quality of the drive, and overall comfortability for Black people in a destination to inform viewers of what they can expect should they venture to visit. Tune in.

Inspired to take a roadtrip of your own? Travel N Sh!t has you covered! Check out our New England or Eastcoast Itinerary packs! Each have clickable links for food, accommodations and things to do, packing lists, a pre-trip car checklist to help you arrive safely and applicable Travel N Sh!t episodes with even more info for you to reference. Take the stress of planning and packing off the table and focus on the road. https://travelnshitpodcast.com/travel-resources/roadtrip

Want a behind the scenes look at how I choose episode topics? Join my Substack! Every week, I give extra context to the topic at hand and share the inspiration behind the message. https://substack.com/@dcarrie

If you enjoyed this week or any week’s episode, please take a second to subscribe and rate Travel N Sh!t on the platform you listen. If you’re REALLY feeling froggy, please take this quick listener survey so I can get to know you better! https://travelnshitpodcast.com/listenersurvey

Guest: Anthony & Marlie Love https://www.youtube.com/@TravelingWhileBlack1

travelingwhileblackseattle.com

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Show: http://www.instagram.com/travelnsh_t

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Email: dcarrie@travelnshitpodcast.com

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And then I give you guys the alley -oop for you guys to introduce yourselves as you both feel comfortable I find that people introduce themselves better than I would ever introduce them so that'll be quite obvious You'll see the alley -oop, and then we'll just go into conversation. That's pretty much it. I don't do interviews It is too many points of planning for me personally, but I like to talk shit and roll my mouth about travel also So that's basically what we're here to do today Okay, great

Sounds good. Sounds good.

Salutations and shit folks. Welcome, welcome, welcome back to another episode of Travel and Shit where I, your host, D. Carrie, have an experiential conversation about the nuanced ways that travel intersects with regular life. So as I like to remind you guys, anytime there are extra faces on the screen, the podcast is also available on the YouTubes so that you guys can also see my beautiful guest's face. To my beautiful guests jumping right in, thank you so much for joining me.

Welcome and please introduce yourselves.

Thank you to Carrie for having us. so excited to be here. We're Marlee and Anthony Love. We run a show called Traveling While Black or TWB. So basically we travel to different destinations weekly, monthly, and rate our experiences on three criteria. It's how good the drive was or travel if we fly by plane, how much fun we have in each destination, and then also how comfortable we feel as Black people visiting for the first time. So we kind of call it like a modern day green book.

First of all, y 'all are so adorable and shout out to your YouTube pillow behind you. We will definitely have the links to all of that in the bio, but I want to jump in and say, first of all, I enjoy your content because I feel like you guys generally touch on the things that I personally like to visit when I go different places. So black history is always seemingly present or prevalent. Well, it's the topic of the channel. So it's going to be there obvious, right?

Subscribe, subscribe.

But the fact that you guys actively look for it, which as a sidebar, we'll probably loop back around to it at a different point. But I hate that we have to actively work so hard. So that's why I specifically enjoy content such as yours, so that you make it easy for us. It is unfortunate that we have to do a lot of the searching for that information on our own. And shout out to, what do they call it?

the city's board of tourism. Some cities have decent boards of tourism where they will make that information plain to you. And I find National Park Service also has a pretty decent reservoir of information. But still, I have to say, your content has all the points that I personally look for. So thank you for that. As creators, it is much appreciated. And y 'all did a really great job of it, because getting the information is one thing, but you guys put it in really digestible.

you

Thank you.

and easy to process information. So kudos to you guys. I wanted to make sure I started with you guys getting your flowers. Go for it.

No, we appreciate that. really appreciate that. That means a lot to us hearing that because that's what really keeps us going, knowing we provide value to people. And also hearing you really enjoy the history because that's really big to us. Like you said, some places it's harder to find than others. But being able to bring those stories, especially some of the stories we don't get to hear about as often is really big joy for us as well. So thank you.

Yeah.

Not a you for doing the work. But how do you guys generally find your information? Because if there's something, because I know you guys are, is that considered the Pacific Northwest in Washington? Yeah, like the Pacific Northwest. So you guys are in that general area. So it's not as if the search engines or anything are different, right? But how do you generally find information about these destinations that you visit? What's your process?

Yep. Yep. Yep.

yeah, absolutely too. I say it's like sort of twofold. Occasionally we do work with a lot of, like you said, the tourism boards. So when we go in working with them, they help us with a lot of the attractions or we might just explicitly ask them, hey, do you have any black historical points of emphasis? And what's interesting about those conversations a lot of times is if they don't have anything already, it'd be their first time just thinking about it. And so from there it's cool to see how they build after even working with us.

Yeah.

But the other way is simply just Google search. Start at Google, ask the question, and then from there, we find ourselves going on little sort of, I guess, rabbit trails, if you will, and put together. Yeah. That's really a big way. No, I would say that, especially the destination or Google. And then if we find someone on Google, we might reach out to them that are in that.

It's okay.

side quests and rabbit holes and...

Okay.

So it's like maybe a historian or someone that's done an interview maybe as well, because 2020 was big for the black movement in a way. And so there are like some articles there where people have contributed to sometimes we'll reach out to them and say, hey, do you have anything more or what do you think about this too? Something just came to mind our most recent episode we just released on a city called Edmonds, Washington up here in North Seattle.

Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm.

Yeah.

Mm -hmm.

Okay.

we asked everybody, we interviewed, black and other BIPOC individuals living within Edmonds, if there is any black history, or anything connected just to the black experience. Nobody could tell us anything. We actually found out that the city and you know, it's kind of black history, not really black history, but it's connected to our black experience. We found out that the city was actually named after a Senator who was really a staunch advocate for black civil rights during the week.

Wow.

So you know what I mean? So it's just something we are able to kind of share with individuals who are living there. It was pretty dope. That's very interesting.

Right, right.

is why a lot of information stays hidden until you look for it. Because it's like, you don't know what you don't know, but then it's like the mat, it just takes a certain type of person or a certain person to just be curious enough to be curious about the things that they don't know to ask the questions that turn into the right questions that get you the information that you need. It's a fun little.

That's it.

Yeah.

Side quest if you will to go on Okay, so if you guys could describe your rating system, I love the improved the the ten points the ten system I Recently rewatched the video about how you rate everything and chef's kiss it makes it also it's just another another feather in your cap

They are wrong.

Your website is also very well organized. And it is organized well for a person who thinks a million thoughts at one time, like having your itineraries here. Then you've got your blog posts here. You've got your episodes. I'm like, you're making this easy for me. So thank you for that. So it is also very easily accessible information. Some people will have beautiful pictures, beautiful pictures. Where's the info? A lot of people.

I don't need to watch a video for everything. Sometimes I can read a lot faster than I can listen for you to get to the point. So I love that you also have the blogs. That's something that I'm trying to incorporate, but it is a lot of work. And so that's why I specifically wanted to point it out. Thank you for that. As someone who enjoys multiple mediums of getting the same information. Well, please.

Yeah.

That makes it awesome. No, thank you for saying that because I'm a blog reader as well, even though we do videos, I like to read things. It makes it a little bit easier. So I'm like, you got to start doing the blogs, but it is hard to get those blogs in the videos and everything out. So that's my motivation.

Mm -hmm.

Yup.

It is. It is. Because like, as a creator point of content, it's like, I see in like what you guys are doing, what I don't have the energy to do is and it is. And so I know how much effort it takes. And it's also after doing all of the research. You feel me? So it's just like. Y 'all deserve it.

Yeah, we appreciate that. And to be fair to you, it is a little bit, I guess, it's still a lot of work to say, but it's a little bit easier it being two of us, you know what Yeah. And that whole website thing, that's all Marley. Like Marley took a lot of pride in making sure it is, like you said, it's sort of easy to be consumed. But no, it's a lot of work, like you said, it's a little bit easier for both of us, but you obviously have love for it just like us and that's what it keeps us.

Yes, yes.

Mm -hmm.

Well done.

Mm

Mm -hmm.

on it and keep doing it. So just wanted to be sure. Yeah. our ratings, thank you. Yeah. So we just incorporated this rating system once we had our road trip. So before it was just a five point system. So now it's at 10 points. Very subjective. Yeah. It's just like how we feel. realize, people are different from us and they might weigh different things.

So if you could go over your rating system, the Genius Rating System.

Mm

We'll start with our comfortability for black people rating. And we have it down here just so we remember like exactly. So I look down is because I want to make sure I get it all right. so the first one is amount of black people seen. how, like while we're in the area, how many black people do we see around? Because as we all know, when you see people that kind of look like you feel a little bit more comfortable in general. we kind of weigh that. Exactly. Yes. and then we go with the areas black population numbers, like at that.

Mm -hmm.

Yeah, I'm not the first one you've seen today kind of energy when you get to the groceries.

point. some cities might have like one or two percent black population, but you still see a lot of black people around and people might not care if the black population numbers aren't big, but we just want people to know or people might care. So we want information always there. Sometimes it's like a sort of a way we see the score can kind of balance itself out, you know, that makes sense. Meaning like we go into places where it has a very low black population, but we actually see a lot of black people, you know, and vice versa.

Mm

Mm -hmm. Right.

Mmm.

Yeah, so it seems like they're all in the same area is the point. It's like, okay, so if you want to find them, maybe go to exactly where you're telling them to go. -huh. Right, right, right, right.

Absolutely. Yes. Yeah, yeah. At least there's a place you can find community. And everybody's mingling together peacefully. It's not like weird. We love that. We did prevalence of Black history, like we say, because a lot of times we were going these places, we were trying to find the Black history. And now we realize it is important. we also like Anthony said earlier, when we work with destination marketing organizations and we ask them about like,

Mm -hmm. Right.

Mm

Where is, where's the black history? You guys talking about it and they're like, we're not. So we want to make this an emphasis that it is important to talk about that history either on their website or at the history museum. Are you guys putting things out there as well? thank you. You know, we've heard it said that, you know, one of the best ways to really understand how a place is, is to understand its history. And so being a show where we're sort of, you know, kind of grading these places on a feeling of, really understanding it, that history is big and especially our

Yeah.

black history, even just the general history. Yeah. And the next part is our visibilities of signs, visibility of signs and artifacts of inclusion. So, you know, we're from Missouri originally. And coming up to Seattle, we saw a lot of like Black Lives Matter signs, lot of pride flags, and we never really saw that in Missouri so frequently. And it kind of even those black populations, like 7 % in Seattle.

DCarrie (11:29.302)

Mm -hmm.

Okay.

It still makes you feel a little more comfortable where you're like, I walk in this establishment. I feel good, you know, so.

Yeah, allies present. And it's funny you mention that because we did a road trip, my partner and I, to Johnson, Vermont. And Vermont is white as fuck.

So it was giving like, all right, and we were staying in a cabin on like somebody's 22 acre property. So like, this was absolutely front and present of mind. Like, and I didn't necessarily have words for it, but just signs of inclusion. We saw a ton of Black Lives Matter signs, but we saw maybe two black people. And it was like, okay, so we're good. It's giving ally. But then at the same time, it had me thinking like, why, but

I don't know.

Yes.

you

Hmm

Yeah

Is this performative? And if so, who are you performing for? Like Black Lives Matter, but they're not here. So is it that you want to fuck with your neighbor? So then I had all these other questions running. But for the most part, we didn't do town too much. it was kind of when we went to Burlington, Vermont. There you can kind of feel more ecology town. They had a lot of pride.

Yes. Yes.

signage and I think there was like one of the streets because again this was in I think 2020 and to your point it was during that summer of inclusion and so there was like you know how a lot of the major cities had done like streets for pride or black lives matter we had driven through that so it's like okay and then you know people just smiling at you walking down the street and I'm from New York so it's not like it it doesn't happen it does but it doesn't you know what I mean it hmm so people being visibly kind to you and just greeting

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

you is just always, I'm seeing this. I noticed this because it's not as normal for me. But having the words for that signs of inclusion was just like, okay, and thank you for writing this on the point system. Please continue.

Yeah, is. you said, Washington is so was, you know, it's diverse with a lot of different communities, but it's just not a lot of black people. And so you will walk into a spot where you're like, I don't see any black people, but there's the flags and people are smiling and you feel a little welcome. So when people know that. Our Bellingham, we just did a three episodes ago, another city here in North Seattle.

Mmm. Okay.

yeah.

Bellingham's just like that. It's got like a less, I think the pop black population is one percent, but the whole city is full of black lives matter, like pride songs. It's just really embedded within their like city. So going in there, we also kind of had that question, is it performative? And so, you know, as we broke it down, this was dope about our scale. Going back to our scale was that the score that it got accurately sort of like

Okay.

Mm -hmm.

reflected our experience within that city. And the last one is just our personal feelings during the visit. So we get points for that. Like we said before, we were giving five points for our personal experience and realize like we're different people. So we might have a great time, but if you go, you know, you might not, will not, you might not. We're just talking about how we feel.

okay. okay, cool.

Okay.

Mm

Yeah.

Mm -hmm. Yeah. It makes it less subjective when you add other tiers or considerations to the score.

Exactly, exactly. So that's our comfortability for black people rating score that we love. Now our drive grade one, which is fun too. We do views like, you know, we live in Washington state now. So the views are very important to us, like seeing mountains and lakes and oceans and stuff. Roadside amenities. That's like, what's like when you can get off the road. Yeah. It's like gas stations, a lot of gas stations in between a lot of restaurants.

story for you.

Did alright.

Yeah, it's a fun story. And that was another reason why I was so excited to have you guys, because I can see a lot of what you guys cover in your content as just being personal points of experience. So we love a good road trip. I think he did the numbers. I think we've done like 17 road trips or so in like the last almost four years.

Yeah.

Yeah.

One of them was, think, I feel like this is the one where we were coming, like we called it a Rust Belt trip. We did Detroit, we did Toronto, Buffalo, and that drive from Buffalo, New York, back down to the city, it brings, you're going a little more Western New York, which is like, there's downstate, the city, five boroughs, gang gang, right? Then you've got Northern New York.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yep.

to a totally different world.

I got a family in Rochester and we made that drive from St. Louis to Rochester. So I see everything that you talking about.

Yeah.

Yes!

so west like that western New York and it was like we went through so much of the state and it's like you're looking at like two o 'clock in the morning for gas and you don't realize that a lot of like a lot of that drive was like through I don't even know what road it was but it was like we're driving through farms we're driving through like this is private property on either side how far so we get to an actual interstate and then you get to the interstate and it's not like 95 or it's not like 85 going to Montreal from here and so it's like where the

Marlie And Anthony Love/TWB (16:45.758)

Yeah.

the fuck is the gas? This is closed. Or you get off at the exit and you got to drive two, three exits through no lights trying to find gas and then that one's closed. I almost lost my shit. so that for me, again, personal experience reflected in your content is another reason why I appreciate that rating scale in it because it matters. And I know it matters because I have experienced it. And it is definitely something.

Yeah

Yes.

point to those that are still looking for tips, like to pay attention to those things along your route. But please, continue.

So important. Yeah, no doubt. No, you're so right about that. By the way, we have to get like your recommendations for East Coast Road Trip. want to do an East Coast Road Trip next year. don't let us. there we go. We're good. We're to talk after this.

actually have an itinerary pack for you guys. Description for that will be in the... Yeah, I'd definitely send that to you guys. But go ahead with your rating.

yeah. Sorry. What else do you want to keep going? Yeah, we won't go too deep into them because, we don't want to, you know, but basically drive very, like Mar said, views, roadside amenities, on the gas stations and stuff on the roads, the road. Difficulty to route. Is the route sort of like just a straight shot? Do you have to jump on different interstates, different highways? Is there a lot of traffic on the route? Then we look at roadside attractions, which is like

Yeah.

Alright.

you know, is there cool like landmarks on the way? And that's some of the things we hit on our cross country road trip. And then finally, this one's like kind of personal for me, because I'm kind of cheapskate, but parking, you know, I hate paying for parking. You know, it's a thing you got to consider. we do put points into that. So that's basically our drive grade. Yeah. And then we get into level of fun. What are the quality of activities around? Is it a lot of things to do? You know,

No, it's a big deal. Yes.

Mm -hmm.

Yeah.

Then the affordability. How affordable is it? You know, is it expensive city? You know, demographic applicability. This is how, you know what I mean? So is it a place for young folks, older folks, couples, singles? We kind of try to gauge that with that. Finally, quality of restaurants because food is important. I love a good restaurant. I love going out to eat.

Mm -hmm. Yeah, yeah.

I loved that one.

Absolutely. We will eat our way through trips. We will actually choose our accommodations based on where we know we're going to eat,

yes. Very smart. And finally, special events. Is it like a lot of things going on during our visit? Is it a special event that people come to annually? That's basically that. That's level of fun.

So what went into you guys choosing the items that you decided on for the rating system? Because it's clearly very intentional and well thought out. So what was your production process with that? What went behind that?

Yeah, so I think like, before when we were doing our five point scale, we realized like it was, you we would just do it on our own personal feelings. And we realized like that's doing a disservice to people, to everyone that's watching. Cause in the end we want to be a resource to everyone. So we said, how can we be that resource? And what's like those major points that we do hit within our episodes already and how can we break those down? So we kind of rewatched our old episodes and said, we always talk about restaurants.

we always talk about we had fun, but we don't know if these other people might have fun at this place. So that's kind of the main. And we will say that we're still, we're always sort of, you know, improving it and changing it. For instance, those scales are going to look different when we do like our hiking episodes. So we're going to be releasing the video to where we explain our outdoor, we call our outdoor scales. And then also like overseas and international that looks different, right? Because for instance, comfortability for black people.

Mmm.

Okay.

Yeah.

we recognize that not all of our folks recognize ourselves as black overseas. So we kind of add another layer to it, know, black or Afro individuals, say, and just different aspects. there will be, it's still changing forever changing. But like Marley said, initially just sitting down and thinking about what was really important to us in context, and then trying to use it as sort of a first starting point.

Yeah. Mm -hmm.

this springboard with a cross country series that we did. And that was our first time using it. And we use it for all of our episodes now.

Okay.

So back to a more generic question, what was the inspiration for the channel? Why did you guys decide to actually start making this content?

yeah, it's a story. you don't tell me. I feel like I'm talking the whole time. So, like I said, we were from Missouri and we moved up to Seattle in 2019. I think that was about May. It was April 30th. So we're always like April, May. We don't know what day we get. Yeah, it's like very hard. So when we came up here, like we had people come visit us in May.

You guys are both doing great.

I feel you. That would bother me too. It's cool.

June, July and August. And in Seattle, you it gets dark and rainy in the fall and winter. And we said, you know, we have to get out and be accountable because otherwise we're going to be sad, depressed, and people aren't coming to visit us. So we took a day trip up to Vancouver, British Columbia, and we were driving back and we realized like before we went up there, we were Googling like, are there black people in Canada? We don't know. And then we realized like, wow, this is really fun. We just did a quick day trip.

Yeah.

Mm

up to Vancouver, we said, how can we keep ourselves accountable? And Anthony was like, why don't we do like a YouTube channel? And then once we were asking ourselves, like, what should we do the YouTube channel about? That's again, why I was like, we talked about like, there black people in Canada? What's this like? We were in this long customs line getting back into Washington and we had no idea that was a thing because we had never driven up there before. And we're like, this could be a resource that people like us that are transients.

moving to the Pacific Northwest and we can help them get out and explore and we can do the same as well. then we thought about also we thought about sort of a Mars Mars don't like me to tell a story sometime, we found a original copy of the Green Book years ago at our grandparents house. And so we thought that came to mind like, shoot, there was also this Green Book. So it's kind of got that, you know, sort of feel to it as well. So.

I'm

That really, that gave us a big inspiration as well to really keep moving forward to it because it made sense that, know, he reasons why he was doing it back then are still relevant today. So from that trip, just marked it on the napkin, outlined it on a nap. Yeah. So let's do it. And I remember, you know, again, we're from Missouri. Even though we grew up in Missouri, there are still places we knew.

Yeah.

Sadly.

Hehehehe

we're not really gonna go because we know there's no black people there still a little uncomfortable but we weren't we didn't know what those places were in marchington so yeah you're not the only one yeah we're from the st louis area we both grew up in the same area yeah yeah of st louis yeah yeah flyover think of the flyover states as well but you know there's some nice -ish things yeah we got the arch the arch nelly

Okay.

in Missouri, like you're both from Missouri. I don't know a damn thing about Missouri. I'm gonna hold you.

Okay. I've flown over that before.

Yeah, I promise you, like no disrespect. promise it. But like, St. Lunatics and the Arch are pretty much all that I can say that if I were caught on the street, mic to my face, we going down, down for ABO Street in the rain. That's all I would have. Yeah.

No, yeah.

you

God,

There you go.

Yeah.

Look, all of us was bored with one of the coolest cities in the world.

And you know, sadly, it makes you not appreciate it. you have your moments of appreciation, but I'm like, there's so much here. And every couple of weeks, I'm like, there's so much more that you could be doing. And the way you guys are being a resource for Seattle, I'm like, I have so much stuff here at my disposal. There's no reason why I don't pocket it on the website someplace. So thank you for turning that screw in the back of my brain. But.

Yeah.

What is Missouri like? And what made you guys leave Missouri? How long, did you guys do school there? Did you work there? Were you young when you left? Because then that's a different experience, right? You grow up in an area, but then when you move by 20, it's like your developmental life now gets to be simple. Not just your developmental, but a big part of developmental, adult developmental. You know what I mean.

No, yeah, no, we were born and raised in Missouri. So we went to college, like mine was two hours south of my hometown. Yours was two hours north of the hometown. I think that's, again, being in those south and north Missouri, I think that's another reason why I started the show, because it was a little sketchy around there for Black folks at times. And so that, yeah, Missouri is just a Midwestern state.

Mm

Okay.

Mm -hmm.

Okay.

Okay.

Now, what were your college experiences like? Because I know some people, so I grew up in a black neighborhood. But then when I went to high school, and I went to a very black elementary and junior high, and we had black teachers, I had my first black teacher. And my first teacher was a black teacher. But in high school, it was mostly white kids. And then college, I went to a PWI. We had probably,

Mm.

maybe 10 % black kids on campus, but I would think that it would be like a, would have to look it up. It didn't feel like it was that many of us there, but in fairness, I'm sure there were a lot more of us. So my experience, like I know what that was like for me, like going further out into like very white, rich Long Island and not feeling safe there. Like I felt safer on a sketch block than I did like on these tall manicured, you know, million dollar home streets, because I'm like, if I needed help.

Would anyone help me? And that's what made me feel unsafe. What was your college experience being in Missouri and saying how there are kind of disparate areas where there are black people in certain areas? Not so much. know some of my friends and cousins had British U. I think FAMU, or was it no? Not Shanti. Somebody went someplace and they were like.

There's no black people here, so we don't go out. Everything has to be on campus, because we're not safe off campus. What was it like for you guys in Missouri?

Thank you.

Wow.

I was totally different experiences. Definitely. Like for instance, my school, it was majority white, definitely. But the thing about it, it was basically an AI school. So a lot of the students that were there were basically there on like sports scholarships. So because of that fact, there was a lot of other like black students.

Interesting.

Okay.

So what was interesting was that the college experience was because we were all had sports and that kind of made this kind of brotherhood, if you will. We felt safer in places, whereas if we didn't have sports, we wouldn't be in those places. so that's another thing. I definitely personally got out of situations that a young black man would not have got out of without a record.

Copy.

but also you guys are more valuable.

Y -y -yeah

unless he played a sport, know, just stupid stuff, right? Not that crazy, but exactly. A learning situation, Yeah. But, but no, so it was, was totally different. And I will say that was very interesting to me that when I looked back during those moments, it was not really a thought to me. wasn't a concern.

Yeah, things that you should get away with, but unfortunately, situationally, youthful discretion is you, your brain ain't right. You know what mean? You working on it. You're doing your best with what you got. Fuck. Right.

Mm.

But the election of like 2016 sort of made me realize a little bit of like, shoot, it wasn't as safe as I thought it was. You know what I'm saying? So that was sort of my experience. I know - Yeah, I know. I think the same. Because even growing up in school from elementary, middle, high school, college, I think there was probably like five to 10 black kids in my grade or even in school. So it was very -

Mmm, yeah.

Mm

not very diverse at all. Like the college I went to was bigger. So I think it had like 10 ,000 in general, but probably like 2 % black students. yeah, yeah, exactly. Exactly. So it wasn't very like diverse at all. And that's what's crazy. Like even coming to Seattle with a 7 % black population, I feel like it could be just as diverse as where we grew up, you know, compared to like,

Okay.

Y 'all knew each other basically.

Mm

Okay.

maybe like even like the city of St. Louis and like Kansas City. absolutely. Absolutely. It's for us growing up there. We were able when our parents kept us around our community. Yes. Like because it was enough like down at Kansas City is I think has the most collection of black people or not collection. Sorry population of black people in Missouri. Yeah. This St. Louis has a lot of black folks. St. Louis is very segregated. But we you know, we are around each other. Yeah. And so for

Mm

Okay.

Yeah, and we have family. And we have family and stuff. So that felt like home. That felt comfortable for us. And when we came out here and the numbers say it's sort of similar, it didn't feel similar. But I think that's the reason why we're able to really do our show comfortably and maneuver in these spaces where we're allowed to be open for opportunity that a good experience can be had despite what it looks like on the surface. And I think that's where everybody should get to.

Mm.

Yeah.

Nothing should prevent us in this world from experiencing some of the dope stuff this world has to offer to travel. Yeah, so

Yeah, we're global citizens. as segregated and these are all like manmade lines. know what mean? Like if I was put here, what's the difference with me being put there? I should be able to pull up there and eat pasta there, pull up there and eat some beans there. Like whatever, like we should be able to feel comfortable everywhere just because of the nature of what the land is. It's no one's land and everybody's land, you know?

Cool,

Right. Right.

Hippie -dippy, wish everything I wish there were more fucking hippies in the world man. Does everybody just be easy? You know me just So what projects are you guys working on what do you have coming next down the pipeline?

That's sick!

Yeah, that's up.

So next, I'm like, what do we have? We want to check out the Oregon coast. So a lot of our subscribers, we asked, hey, what should our next series be about? A lot of folks want to see the Oregon coast. By the way, have you ever been up here to the Pacific Northwest? no way. Hey.

Ooh.

Mm

have been to Seattle. I have been to Seattle and it is actually one of the funnier stories. So I booked an Airbnb in Tequila and I pulled up and they were like, they had the most incredible fucking view. It was nuts. And I was literally in a house with like senior citizen hippies. Like I think like the youngest person that was there, cause this was back when I was still okay now.

could almost never, but I used to do more like shared spaces. And so I had like a room inside a house that had like a bunch of different roommates. And it was like the retirement house. I don't know if you're familiar with that social media account with like these adorable seniors and they do all kinds of like really cool content. It felt like that, but not as cool. And so they were nice, but it was like.

Yeah.

okay.

yes! yes! Yes! yes!

Yeah.

This one woman, God bless her, she was a city engineer and I was so intrigued and I would have loved to talk to her about that, but she was so insistent on me taking the bus down to Seattle. And I was like, yeah, I'm good on the bus. Like I gotta take the bus at home. I will not take the bus on vacation. It's like I saved for the Ubers. And she's like, no, but you should. And I was like, okay, she's making me a little sketch. Funny enough, one of my best friend's brothers is out there in medical school.

Yeah! Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!

DCarrie (33:02.506)

And so she's like, call Rob, just fucking call Rob. And I'm like, girl, Rob is your brother. You're my friend and Rob is your brother. And she's like, fucking call Rob. I'll fucking call Rob. And he's like, all right, I'll come get you. We can go hang out. But if I come get you, I'm not going back out there. feel like I'm not doing three trips. So you're either going to come in, I'm going to drop you off or I'm going to come pick you up. And then you're going to stay here. But if you're going to stay here, bring your shit now. And then he was explaining how the traffic patterns there, like Nike or Amazon or somebody came out there.

That's my dad.

Yes.

Yeah!

That was it.

And like all of these people are working here, but the cities weren't exactly designed to have this many people. So you've got these beautiful new houses and like the communities look great, but like the traffic is nuts because they're just not necessarily designed for that. And we had a good old time. We had like all of his friends own bars. So like we just were at the best live music. I was floored, but Robbie also is in a band.

That's crazy.

So like he had the plug for like all the really cool shit. So I was drinking, had beers and bites, live music. I had a good old time in Seattle. It was great.

Yeah!

Seattle was fun. yeah, and I got my favorite tattoo in Seattle. Yeah. Yeah, I got a travel sleeve and that one was, that was a good one. I got it near Pike Place or Pike Street, wherever it is, wherever that main street is. I made the left to where the tattoo shops are, not to where the Starbucks is apparently. That's all I remember.

nice!

We know.

I didn't know exactly what tattoo that shop is. Starbucks down there, like right down. Just know exactly where it is. Nice. Yeah. Hey, look, that sounds like a dope time. That does sound If you come out again, we're going to show you some like even more like watch this stage. Like it's some. Yeah.

Yeah, it was a good time. Seattle was fun.

What?

That would be cool because I really want to do a road trip. That's one of my, we almost booked it like a couple months ago, but I would love to fly into Reno from Reno drive to like, I think we decided on like Santa Monica. I don't know. We drive someplace in California, drive the coast to California, some like his, my boyfriend's uncle was saying that the Northern drive is spectacular. So we were going to drive up.

you

Okay.

Mmm.

I actually read this book series, Detective Jackson book series, and they're all based in Eugene, Oregon. And when I figured out Eugene is a real place, I'm like, fuck, I want to be out there. I want to see. And then I always would say, because one of the main newspapers is like the Willamette. And then I was listening to a podcast, Park Predators. It's on like the audio platform. It's one of Ashley Flowers' babies. Absolutely love it. So if you love crime,

Hahaha!

Yes.

crime drama and those kinds of podcasts, highly recommend. People die in national parks. And that's basically what the fucking show is about. It's so good. Missing and murdered people in national parks. Fantastic show. But, I learned I was pronouncing it wrong. It's not, I think it's Willamette. And I'm like, who the fuck would have said Willamette? And so little things. I wanted to drive up there and then,

boy.

yeah.

Do Portland, then Seattle, or whichever comes first. I think Seattle comes first, right? And then Portland, or is it Portland and then Seattle? Okay, yeah, because Oregon, then Washington. Stop in Portland, and then, because I've never been to that Portland, then do Seattle, and then we wanted to do BC. We wanted to do Vancouver, and then fly home. So that was, that's the plan, but it's just a big plan. yeah.

That's right, Portland, it's Portland and it's, yeah. Portland and North. Yeah.

Who's who?

Yeah, yeah, That's a big one. get it. Well, before you go, especially Portland, check out our two episodes on Portland, because there's some dope places in Portland that we didn't even think that was in that city. And they some best food in Portland. Best food, yeah. yes.

Wow. because even Portland, Maine is good for food too. They've got incredible seafood because they're right on the border. So you got all that brackish water, the oysters.

Really?

Thank

You got the Portland Bay as the That's one of the spots up in.

The most expensive oysters on, now our favorite spot out there is called The Shop. So if you go to Portland, Maine to eat, go to The Shop. The most expensive oyster, and they of course have like the menu of like four, six different types of oysters, because they're right there. Two, like $2 .95.

Right this.

Yeah.

$2 .95 or in one.

Yes, that rock. Yeah, like that was the most expensive. You had like $1 .75 and then like $2 .95 was the most expensive oyster. That was back when we went in maybe 2022. I'd say.

Okay, so he more like... Yeah, that is cool.

2022, 2023, we're going back in a couple of weeks. So I'll report back and make sure that I'm just the same price. But when I saw how cheap they were, because down here in New York, you could find great oysters, but you're going to spend like $6 on the certain breeds, the kind or whatever. you can get your little happy hour oysters. I have my spots. And you could get them for $1, $3, whatever. But they were all very inexpensive. like,

I have this idea.

Yeah

Quality different flavor profiles you could get them dressed they had like crab like dungeon is crab claw with like it So good, so good Mm -hmm

that sounds crazy. Question, question, because based on your expertise and your experience, because when you were in Seattle, you ate seafood, I imagine, right?

Actually, no. I know. I mostly ate bar food. That's literally all we did. All we did was, I only did beer wings. All I did was beer wings and chocolate. There was a chocolate, I don't know what you call like a chocolate factory or whatever. And I'm not really a chocolate girl, but like they were making the chocolate and they had all the different types and the flavors and I was intrigued and it was delicious.

WHAT?!

That's That's on the group.

Yeah.

While you're there, it wasn't in Rome, right? But yeah, so I apologize. All I had was beer and wings. It was like four days of beer and wings, and it was fucking fantastic.

Yeah

Okay, so... We gave you... Sounds like a good question. Nah, we're just interested on like, how would you rate to pair the seafood with guava? Yeah, yeah. I love seafood.

Mm -hmm. Damn. the only other place on the West I've been is, like, LA for a day, two days, and Joshua Tree for, a week. And I definitely didn't do seafood there. But yeah, I'd have to give you guys your just do and not comment on something that... Keep it cute and not, like, speak before I know what I'm talking about.

Mm. Yeah.

Yeah.

But where have you guys found that your experiences have made for the most personally impactful? Like where you were most surprised and kind of had to get out of your own thought process. Cause a lot of times you go into locations thinking your own thing, right? You feel like, okay, based on this set of information or based on what I found, I'm expecting this. Are there any places that you guys feel like my bad wasn't familiar with your game? What would you guys say that would be?

school.

definitely. I would probably say Portland, Oregon in general, because know, Oregon has the lash laws, like really bad, like, black history. exclusionary life. I can't say that word very well, so I didn't want to say it. So, you know, it's very, very white state in general. But we went to Portland, I was like, how are we going to feel? And the first time we went, I was like, okay. And then went down again and

Okay.

Okay, all right, bye, bye.

We really connected with the black community and got to see so much of it. And I was like, my gosh, I love Portland now. I would move there if I wanted to. That says really rich black history too. Exactly. Albina music movement. Check that out. That's a pretty dope story. like the black history, probably of Yeah. Yeah, black history of Portland. I did hear that. Yeah.

Actually, I think I watched that video.

Mm -hmm that was really it was like go freakin figure was it like not up was it like not the Harlem Renaissance that they had out there or something? What was it?

It was like a musical movement that was basically... It was more so like pop. Yeah, you're thinking about Differ. That was crazy too. The Harlem Northwest. Yeah, that was crazy too. Yeah, no doubt.

No, not Billings.

Yep, okay. Cause I'm like there was something that she was saying was the Harlem of someplace. Okay.

What was that one like? Did you guys do cold weather experiences while you were in Denver? Was it cold Denver that you experienced? like, okay, okay, okay. Because that's one of the places I think of when people think of winter vacations. Because I'm thinking Colorado, Aspen, and all of that. we're going to the skis, to the slopes, and all that. But I'm like, all right, bitch, have fun.

April sounds like spring.

Yeah. Yes.

What kind of outdoor activities also are you guys into? Besides hiking, do you guys do like cold weather activities?

so we went skiing for the first time in Bend, Oregon. What was that last? This, hold on, we're in 2024? Yeah, we're in 2024. Is that February of this year? Yeah, February. It was the first time skiing. That was pretty cool. I'm a little baby when it comes to some types of things, like heights. I was like, just the bunny ramps or bunny trails, whatever it's called. was like, I'm not getting up on those like slow things.

Ooh!

I feel you. I'm not 31 anymore. The very, very adventurous me, we have laid her to rest. There are certain things I'm just not interested in anymore.

Yeah, yeah. That's exactly why I say I'm like, I don't want to do it. And I'm not going to. No, no, Yeah. Yeah. So maybe next time. I'll try it. So skiing. We did snowmobiling before. Actually camping. So that was actually going to be one of those moments like you were talking about that was like, we're doing this or we wasn't expecting this was when we were camping on the side of

It's not there. Did you do the lift? That is the most terrifying thing to me. Okay.

Mount St. Helens. that was like our first time camping. It was crazy because I think like, you we were camping, we had to borrow a tent, we had to like borrow a bunch of gear. But they had like this ranger helping us, we set up the tent. And you know, we were in such the process of like filming it and stuff like that. It wasn't until like late at night, and it's probably like two o 'clock in the morning that I wake up and I open my tent and I see the moon just like.

What was that?

Okay.

big, like you can reach out and touch it. And it just lit up the whole place we were surrounded by. And I think in that moment I realized, my gosh, right? The stars and all that. And so I think, so I think I want to give camping another try. Yeah, we probably need to go out there and do that again. What else do we do? kayaking.

that's beautiful. i love everything night sky. yeah. yeah.

Ooh!

Listen, we kayaked, but it wasn't the best experience. I don't think we got our left right as well as we should. And we were in like the Puget Sound. I'm looking to the left. There's like big old ferries coming for us. And then another fast ferry. And I'm just like, we're running into other people's kayaks. said, want to, Aunt can do it. I don't think I want to. It was wild. It was definitely.

Maybe not again? Okay.

DCarrie (44:19.318)

I feel you.

crazy introduction. It was like a partnership so we had to do it. yeah. And so we were like... We had to mute all the audio. Because they like, can we get a few of those videos? I'm like, take the sound off. Because I'm like screaming, laugh, It was not good. But that's what we... So we tried, we tried everything and then we like we decided if we'll do it ever again.

Okay.

Yeah.

A fair fade, you know what mean? Like I gave it my best. Sometimes your best ain't enough. And, but I did it now. I know I am confident in knowing I won't be trying that anytime soon, or I'll try it with more guardrails. You know what I mean? I'll put more barriers in place to ensure my comfort. I now know that if I'm going to do camping again, I'm absolutely bringing like an inflatable bed. The inflatable bed will go inside this constructed tent. Like I can do a tent, but I don't think I can do the ground. That where...

Yeah

and then we're doing it again.

Here we go.

Yeah.

Yeah

Yes. That's the hard part. good.

Like up here I can but like my body my back I feel like that would be like the despairing difference now the follow -up question for you would be then are there any places that you were very disappointed in were there any places where you actually felt unsafe like the there's always great fun there's you know positive to report on but also

That's really good.

Not even as like a slight to a particular city or to the people of a city But it's more of a safety concern for a lot of us unfortunately For whether or not if I'm a spend $1 on a nice little vacation where I'm trying to you know have a good time I Would like to enjoy myself, you know, so there any places where you guys feel like yeah, we're not gonna do that again Or we would need more bumpers more barriers in place to maybe ensure our comfort

Really?

Yeah, definitely. So one place probably stands out obviously for us is a Forks Washington and Forks Washington is on like the coast of Washington state. They call it the Olympic Peninsula. Beautiful area. There's a beautiful rainforest up there called the whole rainforest.

So we went there because basically it's known as Twilight Town. So the Twilight book series, the vampires and the movies. Yes. Right, right. We'll go check it out. But those people are extremely racist. And so it was like we went there for one experience, a cool kind of fantasy type world type thing. And then what we got was hit with the reality that

That's why it was because I'm like, I feel like I've heard of it. But I know nothing about it. Okay

Washington state, even with liberal Seattle, is a place where a lot of white supremacy still resides. And we saw that in the Forks of Washington. Yeah. So we gave it a one out of five. And then we did some research after we went. Cause I think we went in January of 2021. And then in June, we researched it cause we're like, my God, this was horrible experience. Are we crazy? Right. And June, 2020, Mixed Race family was camping out there and the town basically

Yeah.

Actually, you're good at telling the story. Go ahead. No, this is what actually made us start doing research beforehand. But what we found was after our experience was that back in June of the previous year, there was a mixed race family who went out there to go camping. And basically they went to the same diner we went in. So it had a crazy threatening experience. Basically, they went to the camping spot.

and they heard like just basically people shooting guns around them, heckling them. It was really bad, almost like terrorizing this family. So they tried to leave like in the middle of the night. And when they hit the road, there's only one road coming into the forks really. When they tried to hit the road, there's this tree that was cut down, blocking the road. And they said somehow luckily just some high schoolers, local high schoolers had to be out and about and they got them to cut it up.

Yeah.

in Lennon Way. That was one of a couple of other experiences that happened just before that. And so when we put this experience out, it was amazing how many people responded to our video. Up until our road trip series, that was our most popular video on our YouTube channel, that experience. But how many other people said that they had similar experiences, not just Black people, know, just similar experiences because they were different out there in the courts.

Mm

And they were like, I think the Chamber of Commerce and Forrest was like, you guys want to come back out? We said, there's no way. We're not coming back out that way. There's not that many people in that town, right? Exactly. It's a very small town.

No. Absolutely not.

Mm.

That enables a lot of that. Why would we change? It's the same 15 of us in the grocery store every Sunday at 12.

Exactly.

Exactly. And it speaks to the value of travel. This being the travel show, it speaks to the value of travel. Those individuals are probably more than likely folks who never traveled or ventured that far out from where they're at right now to change their mind. Exactly. It was scary. We stayed there overnight and we put our chair up against the door because that's how nervous we felt. I think it was 5 a we woke up.

Mm -hmm.

Mm -hmm.

packed our bags and we said, let's go. didn't even like, I don't think we even got gas. Or I think we got gas. We realized it was weird. So we were like, let's get gas before we go to sleep. Just in case. Fill it up. All we had to do was like, peace out as soon as possible and got in that car and said, we're heading back home. Cause it was, it was very weird. Yeah, that's why. And then the other only spot that was kind of weird though was Billings Montana. yeah. Yeah. But that, that was more so like a just.

Y 'all smart. I like that.

Okay.

the people like no shade to Billions people. Billions people did kind of confirm this for what we're about to say. But Billions people are just kind of not just the Montana people overall, just sort of like people who like seclusion and are like closed off. You know what I mean? So it was more so. Yeah. Yeah. So. You're right.

Don't try to like stay away kind of like, what are you doing over here? Bro, I just needed a banana. It's a gas station. I just wanted some order. Damn.

Right. So that was a little, I think that was kind of like maybe one of the worst experience, not like in terms of like racism. was just very like, I don't think I'll ever go back there. comfortable, it's like a welcoming standpoint. Yeah. And it's just biggest city in Billings. I mean, in Montana, Billings is the biggest city in Montana. So we thought that going to the biggest city in Montana would be like a little more, a little different.

Yeah. People would be a little more well, so it sounds like they just were kind of, okay, so this is a good question. Maybe you guys notice or feel the difference. There's a level of, I'm ignoring you because I'm doing something else.

Mm -hmm.

And then like passive, ignoring, right? But then there's active, ignoring. When I know you know I'm here, but you are actively making me feel invisible right now. And I can always feel the difference. Which if either, what are we feeling on Billings? Is it giving active, ignoring? Or is it giving they just were outright nasty? Were they just one word answers or?

Mm

Yeah

Yeah.

No, I think it was more so just like what you're saying, like more so, I guess, actively ignoring just because, again, that's just their culture, like a word. Let me say this. This is kind of like, this is kind of like a justice position, right? Seattle is passive, aggressive, capital of the world. They call it the Seattle freeze. Everybody in, like you said, Seattle was a very liberal city. see Black Lives Matter signs everywhere. So you know it's not a race thing.

Okay.

It's just a people thing. They're just tunnel vision. Don't like to make plans, whatever. know, don't really, ain't really say, hey, how you doing on the street, whatever. It's always dark up here. It's in your house. That's it. But if you meet them, if you do break that shell, they're nice people, right? When they're like three friend group. You know I'm saying? You know what mean? So Billing is like Seattle people that lack the visibility of inclusion.

Okay. Okay.

Yeah, okay, okay, okay. I can see that. I get what you mean.

Got it. Got it.

You know what I mean? So like they didn't have any of those signs. It was this old Western signs that do back to old Western times where black people want.

That's like being in the South with Confederate flags, because y 'all don't have those out there, I would assume. I I'm assuming maybe a transplant or two. God bless them. No, smother fuck them. Not God bless them. But that's what our very sign of exclusion is, seeing all the Confederate flags along your route or outside of the different stores and in people's windows.

No, no, no. Yeah, right. Right, right.

Yeah.

2016's or the Trump, you know, all the different Trump signs that we would drive past and it's just,

Yeah

Yeah. That's how you know.

I get it. Okay. I'm getting billings for you. So how can we support you guys? Where do we find you and how can we show support to you guys?

Yeah.

Well, again, Dakeri, thank you for having us. We're so excited to be here again. But you can find us on YouTube at Traveling While Black. Our website is travelingwhileblackseattle .com. All of our socials are Traveling While BLK. As of right now, we might switch them up. So if you just Google Traveling While Black Marlene Anthony.

All of our stuff should pop up for the most part. And also if you do go to the website, subscribe to our newsletter because we're gonna, we just started our newsletter. We share dope tips and also basically what we're gonna be up to and also links to our latest episodes. So definitely if you can subscribe to our newsletter.

Yes.

Mm

Marley Anthony, The Loves, which is such a cool last name. Like, I've only ever met one person named Love. Shout out to Scott Love. He was a dope dude. But thank you.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Thank you so much for joining me. I appreciate you guys' input and your expertise. And again, kudos to you guys on the incredible content. You do very well with it. You are informative, digestible, and spot on with all of the markers that people actively search for. And by people, I mean me. And you also remind us that travel is so much more than vacation. Travel also gives you that opportunity to tap in culturally.

Because one of the things that we were actually talking about earlier today is how a lot of times Europeans will say, Americans are so untraveled and y 'all don't go nowhere. But the United States is huge. It is huge. We can go 45 minutes an hour and still be in the same city, let alone the same state. in certain places in Europe, you can go an hour and be in two, three different countries. So yeah, y 'all are going to travel more if you're leaving any place for maybe two hours.

right

Mm.

You know, here we've got so many just regional differences. went, we were just talking about random regional differences in different states. Louisiana has so many different cultures. South Carolina has so many different cultures and it's just one state in an entire country of things. And so with your content, it just gives you that opportunity to view travel through a different lens. It's not always about going to a beach. It's not always about going to

Mm

you know, oops, oops, a lot. I really don't feel like my listeners are that demographic anyway, but you know, there's so much more than vacation. And thank you for highlighting a lot of different ways that many of us view our world through travel. was a pleasure to have you guys and I look forward to following you guys' content, especially that road trip content. As a road tripper myself, I'm definitely going to further dive into that so that I can keep a couple of different back pocket ideas of ways to look for information. So.

Yeah.

Thank you for joining me. And of course, all the links and the resources will be in the description box. And I will see you guys next week. Bye.