All episodes
Digital nomadism [bonus]: How technology has changed the way we travel
Van Life before #VanLife (encore): Revisiting a classic USA road trip
Tales from the vagabonding trail: Discussing “Marco Polo Didn’t Go There”
Vagabonding audio companion: Travel brainstorming, with Ari Shaffir
Maintaining creative fitness: How my podcast augments my writing career
Finding the best places to live: Searching for home in America [encore]
Travel writing in the “Mad Men” era: The myth and legacy of Holiday Magazine
The Olympics started out as a travel fest: All about the ancient Greek Games
Experiencing Japan the slow way (on the 750-mile Shikoku Pilgrimage)
Vagabonding audio companion: How your earliest journeys transform you
Digital nomadism: A history and future (from a documentary film in progress)
Travel in the “Mad Men” era: Stewardess work at the dawn of the Jet Age
The curious case of a con-man who infiltrated the world of elite travelers
Memories you didn’t know you remembered: A deeper dive into nostalgia
What a 20th century monk can teach us about living (with Sophfronia Scott)
Life changing travel experiences: Epiphanies of expatriate life in Korea
Paul Theroux on the necessary obstacles of immersive slow travel [encore]
Triumph in the middle of nowhere: The most 1980s underdog story of the 1980s
On the road with the superstars of Negro League baseball, 100 years on
Notes on the philosophy (and deeper meaning) of travel, with Emily Thomas
Pam Houston on home, and the beauty of our pared-down lives [encore]
Long-distance hiking at home: The art of journeying out of your own back door
Pico Iyer on the creative task of travel across the world and deep within [encore]
What it’s like to take your kids on a three-month journey in the Himalayas
The joys and idiosyncrasies of global train travel (with Monisha Rajesh)
Five Travel Lessons You Can Use at Home (a road-trip intro to Deviate Season 4)
Life changing travel experiences (with Ari Shaffir): Walking across Israel
How to write a travel memoir (and how failure is the best teacher)
Strategies and arguments for the simple life (from an off-grid perspective)
American Pilgrim: Revisiting Rolf’s lost Travel Channel Thanksgiving special
Solo travel: Celebrating the pleasures of (and strategies for) journeying alone
Vagabonding audio companion: Time Wealth and the spiritual texture of travel
Coming-of-age on the road as a dirtbag backpacker (with Pam Mandel)
On penis theft, creepy clowns, anxiety, and how culture tells us what is real
Pandemic love, cheating death, & cassette tapes: A personal history of nostalgia
A folk history of Satanic Panic, backmasking, and rock music in the 1980s
What it’s like to travel 37 countries (and counting) in a wheelchair
20 lessons learned from 20 years as a travel writer: A TravelCon keynote
Sex, travel, and the art of being a better bad tourist (with Suzanne Roberts)
Drunk in China: A vicarious Middle Kingdom adventure via its favorite booze
Growing up racially diverse: A not-so-politically-correct roundtable
Eric Weiner’s journey into the ways philosophy compels us to live better
Life changing travel experiences: The best hostel ever (in Cairo)
Brian Koppelman on the intimacy of podcasting and the genius of Iron Maiden
Vagabonding pioneer Ed Buryn on what indie travel was like in the 1960s
Kevin Kelly on how travel has changed over the past 50 years [rebroadcast]
Remembering Bettina Gilois (and what writers can learn from her work)
Talking with my parents about how to handle it when your parents die
Bonus: Unpacking the mission of travel-writing in the 21st century
What the world’s last subsistence hunters can teach us about humanity
Revisiting The Great Gatsby, high-school-style, in quarantine
Why travelers visit museums (in places like Iceland), and what they find there
Life changing travel experiences: Jumping freight trains in the Pacific NW
Kate Harris on the way travel can lead us into deeper questions about the universe
Andrew McCarthy on the Proust Questionnaire (and Brat Pack legacy)
How to balance creative success with business success: An open chat
How underground exploration is the perennial frontier of adventure travel
Honeymoon without her husband: Maggie Downs’ uncommon world journey
The win-win of being a mentor, with Cal Fussman and Alex Banayan
Why a “Shelter in Place Film Festival” beats bingeing video right now
Using your travel skills to make quarantine life better: An open chat
Reports from my travels in quarantine: A Deviate Season Two coda
Life changing travel experiences, quarantine edition: Paris and Prague
How COVID-19 will transform the business of long-term world travel
What fear is, how it works, and how to manage it (with Eva Holland)
On losing one’s parents to COVID-19: A traveler-report addendum
How COVID-19 will transform airports (and other pandemic considerations)
Why the way we discuss (and interpret information about) COVID-19 matters
What it’s like to travel during COVID-19: Reports from around the world
How Nomadic Matt got COVID-19. Plus: Reports from stranded travelers
How to make sense of health data in a time of pandemic (and beyond)
How to enhance your career by becoming a better public speaker and reader
On sabbaticals: How to take a career break without breaking your career
Ari Shaffir and Rolf do a deep-dive on the finer points of indie travel
Remembering Nirvana, and how music can frame experience (and memory)
How music affects you when you’re young (or, the joys of Jane’s Addiction)
Life-changing travel experiences: China and Mongolia with my parents
Why dinosaurs matter (also: Rolf fact-checks the dino book he wrote at age 7)
What Matt Green discovered by walking every single street in New York City
A personal history of being a lifelong pro-sports fan (Super Bowl special)
The power of small choices across decades: The Sgt. John Monk story
Chris Guillebeau on goals, writing books, and travel as alt-university
How to balance a life of artistic ambition with sanity and happiness
Indonesia: An argument for (and essential tips on) traveling the archipelago
Why Noah Baumbach’s “Kicking & Screaming” might be the best movie ever
Deviate Christmas Special: Celebrating the Sears Wish Book [Rebroadcast]
Bonus: On the therapeutic uses of reading classic literature and scripture
What narrative therapy is, and how it can make your life feel more coherent
America’s most solemn historical sites rarely offer an honest take on history
Author Alex Banayan on seeking mentors for life (and writing) guidance
On the under-appreciated reality of revelry, sex, and misadventure in travel
The world’s cheapest destinations, and why (besides savings) they’re great
Paul Theroux on aging, slow travel, and the inherent complexity of Mexico
Bonus: Storytelling for the screen: A lecture from the Paris Writing Workshop
Benjamin Percy on how comics and movies teach the best lessons about telling stories
Why travel guidebooks still matter (and how to best use them on the road)
An insider’s guide to traveling America’s National Parks in the 21st century
Van Life before #VanLife: Rolf unpacks his very first vagabonding journey
Ryan Holiday on how to conceive, research, and write a “Big Idea” book
“American Beauty” has not aged well: Reconsidering the film, 20 years on