Deviate

“Even the briefest trip into a tunnel or a cave can feel like an escape into a parallel reality, the way characters in children’s books vanish through portals into secret worlds.”  –Will Hunt In this episode of Deviate, Rolf and Will talk about our imaginative relationship with underground places, and how it often starts in childhood (4:30); the concept of “urban exploration” in the industrial spaces underneath cities, and Will’s fascination with a NYC graffiti artist named REVS (11:00); the catacombs of Paris, how easy it is to get lost underground, and how hard it is to map underground passages (26:15); going underground as a form of time travel, the microbes that live underground, and the relics that can be found underground (40:00); the spiritual aspect of spending time underground in the dark zone of a cave (51:00); and how and why to get started exploring underground (59:00). Will Hunt’s (@willhunt__) writing, photography, and audio storytelling have appeared in The Economist, the Paris Review Daily, The Atavist, The Guardian, Discover, Audible Originals, and Outside, among other places. He is currently a visiting scholar at the NYU Institute for Public Knowledge. Underground is his first book. More about Will at: https://www.willhunt.net/ Notable Links: Salt Cathedral of Zipaquirá (underground church in Colombia) Mount of the Temptation (hill in the Judean Desert) Panoptikum (labyrinth in Budapest) Freedom Tunnel (railway tunnel in NYC) Urban exploration (exploration of abandoned places in cities) Revs (graffiti artist) Catacombs of Paris (tunnel network) Philibert Aspairt (man who died in the Paris catacombs in 1793) Cataphiles (urban explorers who illegally tour the Mines of Paris) Metro-2 (purported secret underground metro system in Moscow) How Getting Lost in a Cave Affects the Brain (article) Strataca (salt-mine museum in Kansas) Lakota Wind Cave (site in South Dakota) Homestake Mine (deep South Dakota gold mine) Gregory of Nyssa (Christian saint) This episode of Deviate is brought to you by Tortuga Backpacks, which set the standard for the best, most durable, organized, and comfortable travel backpacks. Tortuga products also include daypacks, duffels, and other travel accessories, which are all made with the traveler in mind and have been featured by Wirecutter, The New York Times, Travel + Leisure, Business Insider, Carryology, and many other industry outlets. This episode is also brought to you by AirTreks, an industry leader in multi-stop international travel. If you’ve ever planned a trip with multiple stops, you know that finding the right flights can be difficult. Between balancing travel logistics and cost, it often becomes impossible to build an itinerary that matches your travel goals.  AirTreks is a distributed travel company with employees working from all corners of the world to help with your flight planning, specializing in complex routes with up to 25 stops. The AirTreks website offers suggested pre-planned travel itineraries to help you get started, but can customize to fit your journey. The Deviate theme music comes from the title track of Cedar Van Tassel’s 2017 album Lumber. Note: We don’t host a “comments” section, but we’re happy to hear your questions and insights via email, at deviate@rolfpotts.com.

“You need to create your own life, and gather memories while you still can. There are no guarantees that you will have a ‘next year’ or a ‘ten years from now’ or even a tomorrow.” –Maggie Downs In this episode of Deviate, Rolf and Maggie discuss how she started traveling (3:00); “trying on” different versions of yourself during travel (17:00); and travel as a way to reflect on your life (37:00). Maggie Downs (@downsanddirty) is an award-winning writer whose work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, and Lonely Planet’s True Stories From the World’s Best Writers and Best Women’s Travel Writing. She is the author of Braver Than You Think. This episode is also brought to you by AirTreks, an industry leader in multi-stop international travel, specializing in complex routes with up to 25 stops. The AirTreks website offers suggested pre-planned travel itineraries to help you get started, but can customize to fit your journey. The Deviate theme music comes from the title track of Cedar Van Tassel’s 2017 album Lumber.  Note: We don’t host a “comments” section, but we’re happy to hear your questions and insights via email, at deviate@rolfpotts.com.

“I reached out to dozens of potential mentors. The two that that changed my life are the ones who didn’t give me advice upon first meeting me, but asked me questions..” –Alex Banayan In this episode of Deviate, Rolf, Cal, and Alex discuss how Alex realized he desperately he needed help in writing his book The Third Door, how Cal Fussman came to help him with the project, and why asking questions is as essential of a mentor as is giving advice (5:30); why the vulnerability and tension of good storytelling is more essential than conveying dry facts in writing a business book, and how Cal encouraged Alex to recount a humiliating story about sending a single shoe to Warren Buffet at the behest of a bad-faith mentor (23:00); what happens when a would-be mentor gives the mentee advice out of narcissism or bad faith, and how to know when not to heed the advice of a mentor (35:00); how to find and recount the most vulnerable and appealing part of your own life-narrative, and how Cal taught himself how to tell good stories (42:00); what Cal and Alex’s mentoring sessions looked like, in terms of what Cal was trying to get Alex to understand (51:00); what Cal learned from Alex as his mentor, how Alex’s insights improved his career, and what older people in general can learn from younger people (56:30); and what kinds of advice Cal and Alex have for people seeking to discover and fine-tune mentor-mentee relationships (1:02:00). Cal Fussman (@calfussman) is a journalist, author, and Writer at Large for Esquire Magazine, where he has interviewed the likes of Muhammad Ali, Mikhail Gorbachev, Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson, Robert DeNiro and hundreds of others who’ve shaped the last half-century. Alex Banayan (@AlexBanayan) was named to Forbes’ 30 Under 30, and Business Insider’s “Most Powerful People Under 30” lists. He is the author of the international bestseller The Third Door. For more about Cal and Alex, check out their websites, https://www.calfussman.com and https://thirddoorbook.com. Notable Links: Larry King (television host) Warren Buffett (American investor) Reid Hoffman (American internet entrepreneur) Nelson Mandela (former President of South Africa) Muhammad Ali (boxer) Gary Vaynerchuk (entrepreneur) Elliot Bisnow (entrepreneur) Tim Ferriss on how to create a successful podcast (Deviate episode) The Alchemist, by Paulo Coelho (book) Sonia Sotomayor (Supreme Court Justice) Charles Dickens (writer) Fyodor Dostoevsky (author) O. Henry (writer) Sugar Ray Leonard (boxer) Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer (SNL sketch) @lukeoakvt (TikTok account) This episode of Deviate is brought to you by Tortuga Backpacks, which set the standard for the best, most durable, organized, and comfortable travel backpacks. Tortuga products also include daypacks, duffels, and other travel accessories, which are all made with the traveler in mind and have been featured by Wirecutter, the New York Times, Travel + Leisure, Business Insider, Carryology, and many other industry outlets. The Deviate theme music comes from the title track of Cedar Van Tassel’s 2017 album Lumber.  Note: We don’t host a “comments” section, but we’re happy to hear your questions and insights via email, at deviate@rolfpotts.com.

“Binge watching is designed to make time disappear. A home film festival is designed to be time well spent.”  –Kevin Smokler Kevin Smokler (@weegee) is a writer, public speaker, critic, and author of Brat Pack America and Practical Classics. He speaks on the future of media and culture and his written work has appeared in such publications as the Los Angeles Times, Buzzfeed, and Vulture. He previously appeared as a guest on Episode 33 of Deviate, Why 1980s coming-of-age movies matter, and Episode 60, “Celebrating the best travel movies ever.” In this episode of Deviate, Rolf and Kevin explain how to organize and execute a Shelter in Place Film Festival as an alternative to bingeing video during a time of pandemic. Kevin hosts a full guide online at his website, but here’s an outline version: Notes on creating a Shelter in Place Film Festival Establish a time-constraint An afternoon? A day? A weekend? Film Festivals are inherently a time-bound activity. It may seem counterintuitive to begin planning with how much time you wish to spend watching movies rather than how many or what movies you wish to see. But you can always add movies if everyone’s having a great time, or cut the lineup short if everyone’s falling asleep. Setting a time-limit also creates reasonable expectations. Watching eleven movies in a day is not going to happen. Watching three over a week might seem anti-climactic, something you’d do anyway instead of creating an event. Film festivals are about maximizing quality for each hour spent watching, not about watching until you and your guests physically can’t anymore. Establish who will be a part of it A film festival for just you and your loved ones at home is the easiest way to do this. Level up by inviting friends or another family to join: Everyone watches the movies in their own home then signs on to Zoom or Google Hangout afterward at a designated time to talk about the movie you just saw. If you’re making it a truly virtual film festival, it’s a bit more important to stick to a schedule so all participants know when they should be watching and when they should be talking with each other. Choose a leader and delegate responsibilities You can either designate a leader who picks all the movies, or you can create a list based on a theme (see next) and vote. A designated leader, like dictatorship, is more efficient. Democracy, as Oscar Wilde said, “is great but takes up a lot of weeknights.” If you’re the leader, do your own research and come up with the program or poll your own electorate of family and friends for both a theme or movies that fit it. But remember, this kind of film festival is designed to entertain the guests, not show what sort of genius you were for coming up with the event in the first place. Film festivals benefit from a strong leader so the movies are well chosen and hang together. Someone who is a leader, but listens to those he/she has invited to the festival. Pick a theme or organizing principle Festivals have themes to distinguish themselves from binge watching. The idea is many movies creatively grouped in a interesting way. Half the joy is coming up with that creative list rather than just hitting “next” on the remote control. A Vertical Festival is usually organized around the body of work of a creative person (all of Denzel Washington’s pre-Oscar movies, all movies directed by Ava Duvernay). The purpose of a Vertical Festival is to notice commonalities (Michael Douglas never plays a working-class person) and evolutions (Laura Dern often played quiet characters in her 20s and loud characters in her 40s and 50s). A Horizontal Festival is organized around something non-people-related that all the chosen movies have in common (movies who all have “Star” in their name, movies that take place in Chicago).  The purpose of a Horizontal Film Festival — because you have declared the thing they have in common up front — is to notice differences (look how many different kinds of movies took place only at night). A Spring-Cleaning Festival is a conscious attempt to see movies that have languished on your to-be-watched list for too long. A Spring-Cleaning Festival is better reserved for a my-family-only kind of festival where everyone’s had a hand in the queue to be cleaned out in the first place. A Hall of Fame Festival is usually grouped around the perceived “best” movies in a genre (Romantic Comedies) or a given time period (the 1990s). A Hall of Fame Festival will inspire debate and discussion b/c “best” is a subjective criterion. A Hub and Spoke Festival will begin with a beloved, well known film, then move on to ancillary movies (another movie by that director, a remake, another movie featuring a jazz soundtrack) and material (short films from that director, a documentary about the hub film’s subject) from there.  A Hub and Spoke Festival usually needs a strong leader to push the spokes out far enough from the hub so the movies at this festival feel different enough from one another. Choose which movies you will watch Whether you go with one leader or a group vote, start by collectively making a first draft list of movies that fit your theme. Most likely it will be longer than the time you have. If it is, either the group votes or the leader should choose using their best judgment. Failing either of those, go with the movies highest rated on Rotten Tomatoes (unless you are really into watching bad movies). Choose a method for watching the movies It is best to have either hard copies of your chosen films, either on DVD or digital download. Streaming services are notorious for removing movies from their library without telling anybody and you don’t want to depend on a movie being available service on day of your festival because there’s no promise of that. Create a schedule and film-order Unless your theme requires you to go in a specific order, start with a short fun, banger of a film to whet everyone’s appetites. End on a movie with uplift because if you end with a horribly depressing movie, the audience will not only feel depressed about the movie, but the festival itself (and most likely you as well). In between, you generally want to alternative between heavy and light emotional tones, between short and long run-times. Mix things up when it’s over After your festival do something completely different, like go for a hike or call someone. Watching a bunch of movies in a row can be a mostly forgettable activity if it’s all swallowing and no digesting. The Deviate theme music comes from the title track of Cedar Van Tassel’s 2017 album Lumber.  Note: We don’t host a “comments” section, but we’re happy to hear your questions and insights via email, at deviate@rolfpotts.com.

“Give yourself the luxury of unplugging from the news cycle. Like travel, this will allow you to reconnect with an older way of being human.”  –Rolf Potts To celebrate the launch of Deviate Season 3, Rolf gets the tables turned on him as he is interviewed by Konrad Waliszewski as part of TripScout’s #TravelFromHome initiative. Discussion topics include how travel skills apply to quarantine life at home, and how to engage in creative new habits a familiar environment (3:00); how to find serendipity and spontaneity at home when you can’t travel (12:00); hopes and advice for “getting travel right” once we’re able to travel again (17:30); how to engage in the spirit of long-term travel when you have a more traditional life, such as kids or a place-based job (26:00); which travel books Rolf recommends right now, why he started the Deviate podcast, and which projects he plans to tackle in the near-future (31:00); and how Rolf plans his journeys, what inspired his early travels, and how he seeks to go vagabonding in places close to home (43:00). Konrad Waliszewski (@goKonrad) is the CEO and co-founder of TripScout, a travel entertainment platform and app that provides a portal for visual discovery by featuring the best articles and videos from top publishers and local influencers for each destination. Prior to TripScout, he was the COO of Speek as well as a consultant for private equity firms and Fortune 500 companies. Notable Links: Bocce (ball game) An African in Greenland, by Tété-Michel Kpomassie (book) Song of the Open Road, by Walt Whitman (poem) Leaves of Grass, by Walt Whitman (poetry collection) Annie Dillard (author) Video Night in Kathmandu, by Pico Iyer (book) Barbarian Days, by William Finnegan (book) On Photography, by Susan Sontag (essay collection) Still Processing (podcast) The Ringer (website) Go Viral Festival & Network (festival) How being travel-influential differs from being an travel “influencer” Van Life before #VanLife (Deviate episode) Walking every single street in New York City (Deviate episode) Punk icon Ian MacKaye (Deviate episode) Deviate Super Bowl special (podcast episode) Narrative therapy can make life feel more coherent (Deviate episode) Luke Van Tassel’s TikTok (Rolf’s nephew’s social-media stories) The Deviate theme music comes from the title track of Cedar Van Tassel’s 2017 album Lumber.  Note: We don’t host a “comments” section, but we’re happy to hear your questions and insights via email, at deviate@rolfpotts.com.

“The pandemic might be a pretext to reinvent travel writing in a way that actually reports on the nuances of a complicated world rather than just framing vacation experiences.” –Rolf Potts In this episode of Deviate, Rolf reports solo from his quarantine to talk about the end of his second podcast season, and the misconceptions people have about his home state of Kansas (0:50); what travel might look like once we are no longer in quarantine, the ethical issues surrounding the consumer rituals of the travel industry, and the shortcomings of commercial travel media and travel writing (9:00); how vagabonding travel skills, habits, instincts can help make pandemic quarantine easier and more dynamic, including reading books (16:00); a recap of the most interesting and unique episodes of Deviate Season Two, including movie episodes (20:40); what to expect from Season Three of Deviate, including episodes about travel, travel writing, nostalgia, and racial diversity (25:10); and what life is like for Rolf in quarantine in Kansas (30:00). ​The episode also includes songs from Cedar Van Tassel’s album Lumber, including “USD 306,” “Turkey Vulture Sky,” and “Lumber.”​ Notable Links: Deviate theme music: Cedars in Violent Territory Lumber album 13 Podcasts for Wandering Souls (New York Times article) Van Life before #VanLife (Deviate episode 79) Holiday (travel magazine published from 1946-1977) Abroad: British Literary Traveling between the Wars, by Paul Fussell (book) Spanish influenza (1918-1920 flu pandemic) Ari Shaffir on the finer points of indie travel (Deviate episode 103) On keeping a travel journal (Deviate episode 71) My Struggle, Karl Ove Knausgård (autobiographical series of novels) Seneca the Younger (Stoic philosopher) Ari Shaffir and Rolf on doing psychedelics (Deviate episode 53) The power of small choices across decades (Deviate episode 96) Why dinosaurs matter (Deviate episode 99) Leonardo DiCaprio’s The Beach, 20 years later (Deviate episode 59) Why Do the Right Thing remains a classic (Deviate episode 76) Wesley Morris (journalist and critic) Remembering Anthony Bourdain (Deviate episode 34) Travel and health in the age of COVID-19 (Deviate episode series) Rolf’s pandemic book readings and suggestions: The Art of Memoir, by Mary Karr Native Stranger, by Eddy L. Harris The Way of the World, by Nicholas Bouvier A Field Guide to Getting Lost, by Rebecca Solnit Leaves of Grass, by Walt Whitman Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, by Annie Dillard Jesus’ Son, by Denis Johnson Cannery Row, by John Steinbeck The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, by Sherman Alexie Barbarian Days, by William Finnegan Vida, by Patricia Engel On the Plain of Snakes, by Paul Theroux Columbine, by Dave Cullen Why Dinosaurs Matter, by Kenneth Lacovara The Deviate theme music comes from the title track of Cedar Van Tassel’s 2017 album Lumber.  Note: We don’t host a “comments” section, but we’re happy to hear your questions and insights via email, at deviate@rolfpotts.com.

“This is another thing that travel teaches you: It reminds you that you have to live now, and travel is a way of living now.” – Rolf Potts In this episode of Deviate, Rolf and his parents convene in quarantine to reminisce about their old trip to Paris and Prague together, and how it deepened their memories, their understanding of Europe, and their relationship with each other. They begin by talking about why exactly they went to Paris and Prague (8:00); what sights they saw in Paris, both intentional and accidental, and how they remember their experience there (13:00); how in some ways travel to other cultures is a form of “time travel” (18:00); how travel has a way of reverting travelers into a childlike awareness of their surroundings (24:00); why Père Lachaise Cemetery is a fascinating place to visit in Paris (30:00); how a hostel made for a good place from which to base an exploration of Prague, and what they found in the city by walking everywhere (36:00); the joy of taking public transport into unfamiliar neighborhoods and finding Corvette rallies and street performers and old citadels (43:00); and what their strongest memories of the travel experience were (52:00). George and Alice Potts are retired schoolteachers based in Kansas. Alice taught second graders in the Wichita public schools for more than 30 years. In 1994 her classes succeed in promoting legislation to declare the barred tiger salamander the Kansas State Amphibian. George taught science at various Wichita high schools, as well as at Friends University, where he pioneered graduate-level programs in Zoo Science and Environmental Studies. He also helped facilitate the Outdoor Wildlife Learning Sites (OWLS) program for the Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks. Notable Links: 2020 COVID-19 pandemic (global viral outbreak) The Decameron (novellas collection by Giovanni Boccaccio) Black Death (14th century pandemic) China and Mongolia with my parents (Deviate episode) Paris Writing Workshop (summer creative writing class) SkyEurope (defunct budget airline) Souvenir, by Rolf Potts (book) Jardin des Plantes (botanical garden in Paris) Sainte-Chapelle (Gothic chapel in Paris) Palace of Versailles (old French royal residence outside of Paris) Père Lachaise Cemetery (largest cemetery in Paris) Frédéric Chopin (Polish composer) Jim Morrison (American rock singer) Abelard and Héloïse (French lovers) Czech Inn (hostel in Prague) Prague astronomical clock (medieval clock) House of the Black Madonna (Cubist building in Prague) Dancing House (Vlado Milunić/Frank Gehry building in Prague) Chevrolet Corvette (classic American sports car model) Výstaviště Praha (exhibition ground in Prague) Defenestrations of Prague (historical incidents) Charles Bridge (historic bridge over the Vltava river) This episode of Deviate is also brought to you by Tortuga Backpacks, which set the standard for the best, most durable, organized, and comfortable travel backpacks, and AirTreks, an industry leader in multi-stop international travel. The AirTreks website offers suggested pre-planned travel itineraries to help you get started, and can customize the route to fit your journey. The Deviate theme music comes from the title track of Cedar Van Tassel’s 2017 album Lumber. Note: We don’t host a “comments” section, but we’re happy to hear your questions and insights via email, at deviate@rolfpotts.com.

“What will travel look like after the pandemic? In material ways it will probably change more than it did post-9/11.” –Sean Keener In this episode of Deviate, Rolf and Sean talk about how fast the assumptions surrounding international travel have changed in recent weeks, and how that has transformed the assumptions of the travel industry (4:15); making sense of the current uncertainty about how travel has been altered by the COVID-19 pandemic (9;30); distinguishing facts from stories while information about travel keeps changing (16:00); and what travel possibilities and travel ideals might look like in the near future (21:00). Sean Keener (@SEKeener) is the Cofounder and CEO of the BootsnAll Travel Network, a travel media network focused on planning complex, multi-stop, round-the-world travel. He is also the Chairman of AirTreks, a travel network specializing in multi-stop international travel. Notable Links: 2020 COVID-19 pandemic (global viral outbreak) Travel pros reflect on being grounded (Washington Post article) How COVID-19 will transform airports (Deviate episode) What it’s like to travel during COVID-19 (Deviate episode) How to make sense of pandemic health data (Deviate episode) 5 ways indie travel has changed since 1999 (Deviate episode) Monte Carlo simulation (predictive algorithm) Indie Travel Manifesto (travel-values initiative) The Deviate theme music comes from the title track of Cedar Van Tassel’s 2017 album Lumber. COVID-19 episode art was created by Luke Van Tassel. More of his art online here. Note: We don’t host a “comments” section, but we’re happy to hear your questions and insights via email, at deviate@rolfpotts.com.

“Imagine you wake up and you get this call telling you that your father died three days after your mother. How do you think I felt? I couldn’t even cry any more. ” –Marco Ferrarese This episode of Deviate, Rolf summarizes the pandemic-travel reports he’s been getting from travelers is places like London, Turkey, Mexico, India, and Macau (2:00); then the episode transitions into Marco Ferrarese’s report about his travel-writing excursion in Peru, and what it’s like to be locked down in the Peruvian mountain town of Cabanaconde (4:45); how he heard that Tundra and Maurizio, his parents back home in the Lombardy region Italy, had become sick, and why the virus was still spreading in that part of the country (6:45); how his parents’ illness was initially misdiagnosed, and how things changed when they were admitted to the hospital (11:40); how it was difficult to interpret the news that was being passed along from the hospital as his parents’ conditioned worsened, and how he found out that his mother, and later his father, had died (14:00); and how seriously we need to take the warnings we hear about COVID-19 (21:00). Marco Ferrarese is an independent researcher and freelance writer. He is author of Nazi Goreng, and Banana Punk Rawk Trails: A Euro-Fool’s Metal Punk Journeys in Malaysia, Borneo and Indonesia, and has reported from all over Asia for a number of international publications including BBC, CNN and National Geographic Traveller. His other projects include Penang Insider and Monkey Rock World: Untamed Travel on Asia’s Hidden Roads. Episode art shows Marco Ferrarese’s parents, Tundra and Maurizio, visiting the southern Italian town of Matera in 2015. The Deviate theme music comes from the title track of Cedar Van Tassel’s 2017 album Lumber.  Note: We don’t host a “comments” section, but we’re happy to hear your questions and insights via email, at deviate@rolfpotts.com.

“Epidemiologists have found that you can slow a pandemic tremendously by focusing public hygiene efforts on three key global airports.” –Dr. JP Santiago In this episode of Deviate, Rolf and Dr. JP Santiago talk about how the COVID-19 pandemic will change global air travel moving forward (2:00); the prescience of the 2011 movie Contagion, what the scientific data says right now about how long COVID-19 can contaminate various surfaces (13:30); what to make of certain “folk cures” for COVID-19, as well as whether or not it’s safe to take medicines like ibuprofen to treat symptoms (20:00); the future of post-traditional medical treatment approaches, such a telemedicine (29:30); what other pandemics, such as H1N1 can (or cannot) teach us about how to respond to COVID-19 (34:00); and when “normal” life might return, given pandemic concerns, and what that might look like (42:00). JP Santiago has been a family medicine physician in private practice in Dallas/Fort Worth for nearly 20 years. He earned his medical degree in 1997 from the University of Texas Southwestern in Dallas, and did his residency training and was chief resident at the University of Kansas Medical Center before returning to Texas. He will be retiring from private practice in April to work for the Indian Health Service to provide medical care to Native American reservations as a traveling physician. His wife is a physician as well and he has four children. He maintains an aviation magazine online at: https://theavgeeks.com/ Notable Links: World Health Organization COVID-19 updates (website) JP’s updates on the COVID-19 pandemic (Facebook posts) 2020 COVID-19 pandemic (global viral outbreak) 2020 coronavirus pandemic in Iceland Airport security repercussions due to the September 11 attacks Contagion (2011 Steven Soderbergh film) The New England Journal of Medicine (medical journal) 2003 SARS outbreak (global viral outbreak) Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness (TV show) 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic (global viral outbreak) 2009 H1N1 flu pandemic (global viral outbreak) Antibody (protein utilized by the immune system) This episode is also brought to you by AirTreks, an industry leader in multi-stop international travel. AirTreks is a distributed travel company with employees working from all corners of the world to help with your flight planning, specializing in complex routes with up to 25 stops. The AirTreks website offers suggested pre-planned travel itineraries to help you get started, but can customize to fit your journey. The Deviate theme music comes from the title track of Cedar Van Tassel’s 2017 album Lumber. COVID-19 episode art was created by Luke Van Tassel. More of his art is online here. Note: We don’t host a “comments” section, but we’re happy to hear your questions and insights via email, at deviate@rolfpotts.com.