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A
Welcome back to the what are you made of? Podcast. We're here with my guy, Chris Christensen, and he is also known as the amateur traveler, has a podcast, and obviously he's traveled quite a bit. It seems like millions of views on his content and obviously doing something right. So we're going to get into it today, find out what he's made of. Chris, welcome to the show.
B
Thanks for having me.
A
My pleasure, brother. My pleasure, man. First of all, I got to ask you the question, what are you made of, Chris?
B
So I obviously had to think about this before I came in the show. I think curiosity is probably the one thing that is kind of been defining throughout my entire arc. It's just I don't like not knowing stuff. I don't like being ignorant on things. And of course, once you know stuff, you. You gotta tell somebody else, right? Hey, you know, Joan, my wife's name. You know, I heard on a podcast that. Whatever. And that plays out right now in blogging and podcasting. But, you know, throughout a career in high tech that was also driven by I just want to know stuff. I want to learn new stuff. You don't get into that field if you don't like learning new stuff, because everything you learned in school is obsolete by the time you're out of school for 10 years or something like that.
A
Yeah, yeah, of course. And the answer that you gave is perfect. Perfectly aligned with what you do. You know, curiosity and, you know, curiosity leads to learning, observation, and curiosity. And the people that know everything think they know everything. That's what they fail to do, fail to be curious.
B
They really annoy those of us who. Can I tell you that?
A
Yeah, yeah, they fail to be curious and observe and annoy us.
B
So you.
A
You had a background in tech. Is that. Is that the career?
B
Yeah. So I was in high tech the last 20, almost 30 years in web development at companies both very large and very small. So 20 years in startup companies, but also worked at HP and IBM and American Express and TripAdvisor. So did a variety of things in high tech, starting in IC design tools and then moving into the web when the web was still Steam driven, basically.
A
Yeah. And how that's changed over the years? I mean.
B
Yeah, well, no. So I was at a group in HP early on in my career. So I got out of college in 84 with a degree in computer and systems engineering. And I was at hp and there was a group there that was looking at hypertext and how information could be connected and all of the studies that were being done at that time. So the web came out and was like, oh yeah, this is the stuff we were talking about years ago.
A
How much of this stuff?
B
And I was on the Internet before the web, which a lot of people don't remember, that there was a time the Internet is older than the web and I was on doing FTP and file transfer servers and archives of software hidden on various servers all over the Internet and things like that before the World Wide Webcam. So that put me in good stead. That curiosity of all this stuff put me in good stead, that when this stuff came out, it's like, okay, I know what this is. I know what we're going to do with it to some degree, to the extent that anybody did at that point. I mean.
A
Yeah, but how much of the stuff that you learned when in the 80s and all that do you think is obsolete nowadays?
B
Yeah, well, every, every programming language you learned, you know, as a programmer, which is what I've spent most of my tech career doing. Every language you lear in the 80s, you never saw again for years. But in terms of the basics of programming and things like that, that stays the same in terms of databases and getting things out that evolved over time. I was involved in a project at IBM, for instance, my first paid job, real paid job for the summer that turned into a lot of the technologies that we use for accessing databases to this day.
A
Yeah, and then how about with AI? AI, you said you stay.
B
So I took an AI.
A
Yeah, I was gonna say, do you.
B
Stay up to date with.
A
You stay up to date with it?
B
Well, I, you know, to the extent anyone can these days. So I use it on a daily basis in terms of large language models and chat, GPT and things like that. But I took an AI course in 84.
A
Okay.
B
So, you know, AI has changed a lot from expert systems and fuzzy sets, which is what we were talking about back in the 80s.
A
So basically it's based on algorithms. And it was based on algorithms back then, right?
B
Yes, but. So for instance, you know, fuzzy sets was this idea that things are not true or false, they're true ish and false ish and that you can model certain systems better using that type of logic. And then expert systems was more hard, hard coded programming, where today a lot of the things with large language models are more like neural nets where they, where the people who have, you know, you always have these things with people are surprised that they get this result. Well, the people who. I want to, I want to say program the model, but that's the wrong term. Who trained the model? They can't exactly tell you what the model thinks. And thinks is not at all the right technical term there. But you have to, you have to sort of ask it to see what it trained to do because it's less deterministic than it was using the, the kind of 1980s expert systems where you would literally get the information from an expert and you would try and figure out a way of encoding that information. And that's just not the way it works.
A
Yeah, I get it. And so before we get into the travel stuff, what, what do you, what do you see happening going forward? What do you. With AI and the evolution of everything and how fast things are moving?
B
They continue to move fast. It will permeate more and more things in our life, for better and worse. Both in a combination of both. You know, it's the, the joke is that you wanted your computer to be able to do, you know, all of the grunt tasks in your life, like mow the lawn and do the dishes and so you could. To spend your time in the creative task. And now, you know, your AI is doing the creative task, so you've got time to do the dishes and mow the lawn, which isn't quite where, you know, we thought we were heading with the, the Jetsons and things like that.
A
Yeah, you would think that we would start with robots first to get rid of the low leverage tasks and things and then go to.
B
It's a little harder to do. So it's, it's just a matter of figuring out. Yeah. And then large language models are fascinating from a, from a technical point of view in terms of how they work. And, and it's just kind of amazing that they work at all when you look at. It's just a big probability model. It's basically if you think of, you know, we didn't have any problems when they were doing completion. You know, I'm typing a word and they go and figure out statistically if you've typed C, H, R, O, N, what is it? How is that word likely to finish? And you know, that's sort of what AI does except, or large language models do, except that they are, aren't completing a word. They're basically all they're doing is predicting the next word based on the last 1,000, 12,000 words that you've said. And that buffer size has changed over time. And it, you know, it's fascinating that you can do so many things with them, given that that's really the, the core technology is that. And now people are building around that. They're, they're basically doing more. We'll see more and more where people are tackling specific problems where when you get into the AI and you start asking this question, it's going to go to a more custom algorithm. The algorithm is not quite the right term more custom model than if you ask this question because you a generic model can't answer specific things as well as some of the specific models can. Like am I doing programming or am I doing writing, am I creating pictures or am I trying to predict the stock market? Those are all very different tasks. And it's amazing. The generic models can mimic the, the idea of creativity very well and, and productively they're useful. I find them useful on a daily basis.
A
Generic, you mean just going into chat GPT for example and working with it.
B
Yeah.
A
Versus building something around it.
B
First first generation models were generic models. They, they had one model that did everything and now more and more they're not the more it's being specified, they.
A
Get more specified on a problem.
B
They get more task more complicated. Yeah, yeah.
A
And, and, and thoughts on.
B
And that also lets them be more efficient, more cost effic aren't burning as much coal or whatever you're using to power your engine.
A
Yeah. You know, I think the next big thing that somebody can break through and make a lot of money on is figuring out how to run these models with a different energy source, a renewable energy source.
B
Well, it's mostly the training. The training is the most expensive part. From an energy point of view, it's even more expensive than using the model. And so they've talked about you don't have to train them 24 hours. You could train them, you know, hooked up to hydroelectric power someplace cheap and then move the answer, you know, the trained model basically someplace into your data center that's running off of natural gas. And we're seeing them do things like that.
A
So the data centers are eating up.
B
A lot of energy.
A
Right.
B
And that data centers are eating up a lot of energy and are going to be eating more.
A
Data centers are for training mainly.
B
No, data centers are both. You can have a data, you can train in a data center. Data centers are just where you hold your computers.
A
Gotcha, gotcha.
B
And whether you own them or our Amazon owns them, that's basically data centers hold computers.
A
Okay, but do you see that happening? Eventually somebody's going to come up with a way that's going to be really sustainable. And, and then the concern the electric is not going to be as I.
B
Would say more sustainable is, is the goal. Sustainable is a relative term. When you hear the projections of how much power we'll need. I think we'll also need some breakthroughs in terms of. And we're seeing some, we're seeing some come out. For instance, the Chinese model that came out with is a lower cost of training and things like that. And I'm not an expert. Yeah, I'm just in that area. I just follow it like, you know, I like a person who's curious.
A
Me too. That's why I just, you know, I think when you have conversations about these things, you get different perspectives and you learn a lot.
B
Yeah, yeah.
A
And the other thing is thinking about, you know, the technology that's out there, that, that's not to get in conspiracies, but you got to know that there's, got to know that there's technology out there that hasn't been shared with the world yet because it could affect oil companies, for example, it could affect energy companies that are out there now, and it could affect really the overall economy if they came out with something that was just like electromagnetic.
B
Yeah, I'm a little less, I'm a little less conspiratorial that way. The companies that are coming up with the models are bigger companies than the oil companies at this point. So if you. So I don't think the old companies are as, as powerful as they used to be. That's a good point.
A
Yeah. That's why I have conversations like this, because I didn't look at it that way. You know, man, thank you for, thank you for sharing that because it totally gives me a different perspective. All right, so quantum.
B
The richest guys in the world aren't, aren't oil guys.
A
Yeah. How about quantum computing? Do you look at any of that?
B
I haven't looked a lot at quantum computing. I mean, it's somewhat related. Remember when I talked about fuzzy sets in the 80s, that things are, you know, true ish and false ish, that, that there are different states and such. Quantum is vaguely related to that. But I know I haven't really looked at the quantum computing stuff. Haven't spent. Yeah.
A
So your curiosity hasn't led you down that rabbit hole yet, huh?
B
There's just only so much time in the world at that point. I'm going to fall down a, a history rabbit hole learning more about, you know, how the, something happened in World War II or something like that before. I'm going to fall into the quantum.
A
All right. And then the travel thing. Did you travel As a kid, did the family take you on trips or, like, how did the travel obsession start?
B
Thank you for.
A
We're back, I think. Yeah, we're back. We had a little technical difficulty.
B
We're back.
A
So how did it travel? When did you travel a lot as a kid? Did your parents take you on trips? How did the travel obsession start?
B
So I traveled a lot as a kid, but domestically. Basically, our way of traveling as a kid was hook up the little tiny trailer behind the car and see how many miles you could put on the odometer. Mostly driving to national parks in the western US Doing some other trips, you know, by the time I hit college, I'd probably been to 35 states, but only Canada as a. As a foreign country, even when I started the podcast. So I do a travel podcast now for 20 and a half years, and I think I'd been to about a dozen countries when I started the podcast, which, you know, is. Is kind of chutzpah is what it seems like to me now, because I hadn't been to. I'd been to more countries than a lot of people I knew. But, you know, now I know people have been to every country. So I've been. As time goes on, I've been to fewer and fewer countries compared to my peers, because my peers have changed.
A
Yeah. Yeah. Well, 20 years is a while, you know, two decades. And I gotta be honest, it's been a while. Gotta be honest, I've done over 2,000 podcast guesting and hosting in the last five years, and I didn't know what a podcast was six or seven years ago. So, yeah, it's 20 years.
B
It was pretty impressive. I started in the first year of podcasting. Podcasting started September of 04, and I started in July of 05 and thought I was late to podcasting.
A
Honestly, people think they're late now, and they're still.
B
You know, it's been going on for months by the time I started.
A
Months is nothing, though. People think they're. Think they're late now getting started, and they're really not because. Yeah, the way I look at it, Chris, is that we're all different. We all have different personalities, different obsessions and passions, and. And each of us are unique. So when we come out with a podcast, it's not everybody's got a podcast. No, no. This is a podcast about this, and I'm the host, so there's nothing like it. Right. Unless you're imitating someone.
B
Well, you know, the two best dates to start a podcast, I would say now one is 20 years ago, and the other one's tomorrow.
A
Yeah, you thought you were late 20 years ago. That's so crazy.
B
Yeah.
A
And what led you to starting a podcast?
B
So I got in early because one of the tech shows I was listening to there was a show called Call for Help that was originally on tech TV and then went up to Canada and then got shut down by their network. And they said, well, we're going to turn it into a podcast. And that became the this Week in Tech podcast, which is now 21 years old. And so I started listening to. You know, that was my what's a podcast? Moment. Everybody has, you know, who's listening to podcasts had their moment. Mine was. Mine was 21 years ago and started listening to that and then started, you know, finding other podcasts that I liked in other genres and thought, oh, I have to do this. I have to start a podcast. Thought about starting a tech podcast because, you know, I'm a nerd and. But I was a Mac nerd. And Adam Christiansen, not the same spelling, but, you know, brother, another mother had already started the Mac cast at that point. So, oh, we don't need another Mac show. Like, which, you know, now, of course, there's. I don't know how many different Mac tech shows. And then thought about starting a religious show. Did actually a year later. But we had all the friends come over for Memorial Day. All the best stories were travel stories. And so the original idea is I'm going to do a show about my travel, which was a really stupid idea because I was working full time. I was traveling four weeks a year and podcasting 48 weeks a year. And that math doesn't work. And so sometime in that first year, I started talking to other people about their travels and found I loved interviewing people about places I'd never been or places that I'd been to. Over time, as I went to more and more places and the show largely turned into that. The amateur traveler show.
A
Yeah.
B
Yeah.
A
Well, back then, when you started the podcast, it was on the ipods, and you could only download them on the ipods. Right.
B
Well. Or other MP3 players. There were MP3 players before the ipods that we were using that I can't even remember the names of that I was listening to podcasts on. But, yeah, then it was. Then it was ipods and ipod nanos and things like that. And you had to connect your computer to the, you know, to the Internet, download your show, and then connect it to your ipod and upload things to that, no, the iPhone was a real. That's one of the only real curves in the podcast growth curve was when the iPhone came out. There was a real knee in that curve. And really adoption went up a lot at that point.
A
To think that you have to download.
B
But I remember being nine months into podcasting and getting 200 downloads per show and thinking that was amazing. That would be very disappointing to me now to get 200 downloads for show. Yeah.
A
But the thing would be how much of a pain in the ass that would be. Have to download every podcast you listen to. We're so spoiled nowadays.
B
Yeah, yeah.
A
You know, streaming capabilities, this is. It's wild.
B
Well, we also have. We have bigger pipes too, so we can download a lot faster than we could.
A
Bigger highways. Data highways. All right. And then, and then you started to travel because you noticed that, you know, at the parties and things that the best stories with travel. And did you, did you start intentionally traveling more for the blog and for the, for the podcast or how did that all shake up?
B
Not at first. In fact, it was so, it was, gosh, about five years after I started the show until somebody said, would you like to come to our destination because you have a travel podcast. And so that has led to, over time, to a lot more travel, especially as I retired from the day job, from the high tech job in June of 2024. Then I've been traveling like, like a madman. Basically. Last year I was away from home 180 nights and traveled 120,000. And you know, and a lot of that was hosted travel was people saying, would you like to come to China? Would you like to do a walking tour in Japan or raft down the Grand Canyon or do on a cruise in the Amazon or a cruise in Patagonia or whatever. So that has led to a lot of opportunities. And that's one of the reasons I retired a little early was it was getting tired of saying no. When somebody asks you that question, there's an answer you want to give. And the answer, yeah, of course.
A
And the major of the time, would they like have some kind of guidelines where you had to write a blog about it and have a show about it or how did that agreement work?
B
I mean, yeah, usually there's an understanding of what kind of content I would produce. Sometimes less so. Sometimes it's, we know you will produce content. So we don't have any sort of agreement or we don't have any written agreement is quite common these days. But I'll just say this is, this is the kind of Content I did for a similar trip. You know, gifts send that out to people so they have an idea what to expect. Yeah.
A
And then did you take video content and pictures as well and share them somewhere in the blogs?
B
Always taking pictures because that's something that I love to do as a photographer in terms of doing like short form video. I've really leaned into that more in the last year when I was working a full time job and doing two podcasts and two blogs on top of that. There wasn't time. There just wasn't time. So I'm doing more of that this year even though I bought another website, another blog. So, you know, it keeps me a little busy but. And then so yeah, I'm doing more short form video now just this year, both destination videos, but also sort of short how tos tech and travel minute. For instance, here's an app and how to use it. Here's a, here's a technology device. I travel with me those sort of things on Instagram, TikTok and all the socials.
A
What's your favorite platform.
B
For consumption? Probably Instagram is the most sticky for me or YouTube are the ones that I'm most likely to, you know, get, get involved in the infinite school. How about. And kill time. Well, for the podcast is still my cornerstone. Content by far, both in terms of where my audience is and also in terms of where I make money these days is in podcast advertising. That and podcast syndication. So Amateur Traveler was on seven, eight different airlines last year in 2025, syndicated seat top, you know, in entertainment.
A
That's awesome, man.
B
Congrats. Yeah, that's pretty cool.
A
I mean, to think about starting a podcast and all of a sudden now you're on airlines. I mean that's just, that's just amazing.
B
Have you taken it's things you couldn't predict. It's not even necessarily the weirdest thing that has happened through podcasting. I got invited to the White House. I was paparazzi for the Pope for a day in Jordan. And if you go to get a job with a Thailand foreign ministry, you'll be required to listen to two episodes of Amateur Traveler and graded on your English comprehension. So I mean there's been a lot of weird things that have come out of this 20 years of podcast.
A
Have you taken time to assess and look back at how far you've come? Most people don't.
B
Oh, I think about it all the time. Just I'm sitting here in front of a podcast hall of fame award, which I still blows my mind. I don't understand that.
A
That's just amazing. And not only that you've done something that is really awesome is that when you've accomplished something, you've gone to the next thing. Okay, what's the next thing? Not that you're not pleased with what you've accomplished, but what's the next thing? How can I keep evolving? And I admire that in you. That's pretty awesome.
B
Well, thank you.
A
So what's your favorite place you visited?
B
That's an impossibly hard question, but probably top three, off the top of my head would be Egypt, because I'm history buff. You know, it's that curiosity thing. And when you're someplace where they tell you that, here's, you know, look at the great pyramids, you know, the only one of the seven wonders of the ancient world that's still standing. And the people who built this, their civilization was conquered by the sea. People we don't know a lot about, but they had an unfair advantage because they had the wheel. And you're like, excuse me. It's like, what are you talking about? So, you know, just amazing history there. Botswana for the wildlife. Botswana, the Okavango Delta, when I was on a. So you're. You're in southern Africa and went on a wildlife safari where we were chasing after wild dogs on the hunt. Just, you know, a singular moment. And then probably one of my favorite cities is Istanbul. Again, for the history. The. Just the depth of the history there is. Is pretty amazing.
A
Yeah.
B
Yeah.
A
Wow, man. Food's good, too, but is it really Turkey? Turkish food?
B
Oh, love Turkish food.
A
Is it kind of like a lot of.
B
Lot of fresh ingredients, similar to similar Creek. You know, there was a lot of shared history between the two. More, more, more. What are we trying to say? Not persimmon sauces, but curry.
A
No, not curry.
B
No, no, no, no, no. You're not. You're not in curry land yet. You're. You're too far away from that.
A
Yeah, I didn't mean that.
B
I'm thinking a lot of fresh. A lot of fresh vegetables, a lot of olives, a lot of yogurt. Yeah.
A
Wow, man. All right, and then. And then from there. How long into the podcast did you start to be able to monetize it?
B
In the first six months. In the first six months. I sold my first ad, I think around December, and there was an early network that didn't last long called fruitcast that I hosted with that were inserting ads into podcasts way back in 2005. But unfortunately, they went out of business in 2006 or something like that.
A
So early on, and then you.
B
And the numbers were a lot smaller. So you know, it wasn't a lot of money at that point.
A
And then now when you get somebody that comes to you that I guess they approach you about this just like the travel. Do you.
B
Do you. Yeah, except I've. I've got a guy.
A
You gotta.
B
Basically I've got a. I've got a network that's. It's outside ads on Amateur Traveler.
A
That's a, That's a great way to do it. When you're scaling, you're, you know, delegating.
B
I hate selling. I hate to pick it up the phone and selling stuff. That's. That is not my jam. Yeah. And then my, my son has a YouTube show and he worked in Hollywood for a while as an assistant. His first week he just like picked up the phone and sold five ads. And you know, he's got that skill I don't like.
A
Right, right.
B
I'd rather split the. Split the fee with somebody else and let them deal with it.
A
Yeah, I agree. I agree. If you, you know, it's maybe when you first starting out, but at some point and I've scaled several businesses and you got to delegate. You got to get stuff off your plate so you can stay in the mode. It's your genius. And. Yeah. So. All right, now you mentioned something about thinking about starting a religion podcast. I'm a man of faith. I love to hear people's testimony and thoughts on that.
B
So, yeah, I've done the Bible study podcast now since 2006. So that is. That is also at 900 some episodes. Wow. Very different feedback for the two shows. You got a letter from somebody in Bible Study Podcast recently. You literally saved my life. Did not elaborate. Don't know what that means, but. But you know, very, very different experience doing that. And that is a solo monologue show, short form, 1012 minute show versus amateur traveler, which is a long form interview show, 40 minutes to an hour somewhere. So different shows.
A
And then the Traveler one. Do you have guests on?
B
Yeah. Amateur Traveler is almost always an interview show. A little less so this last year as I did more trips that I was talking about. But that. Well, I'd say if I did eight episodes that were my own travels, I'd be surprised. So the rest of the. I did 50 episodes last year plus four bonus episodes. So I did 54 weekly episodes last year. Most of those would have been interviews.
A
Gotcha, Gotcha. Okay. And then the Bible. How do you come up with the topic of the day. Do you just go through whatever you're studying?
B
I'm walking through a book.
A
Okay, okay.
B
Yeah. I'm literally. Right now we're walking through the book of Luke. And so I, I start up where I left off and I get as far as I get.
A
Okay, gotcha.
B
So some days we cover a whole chapter. And right now in Luke, I probably do a third of a chapter. Just a little longer chapters, a little more meaty information.
A
Does it follow your studying, your personal study of the books?
B
No, because I'm trying to read a chapter a day. And so I will usually have gone through that book again recently. But right now, for instance, I'm teaching on Luke and I'm reading through second chronicles. Okay, so gotcha.
A
Yeah, I just finished the New Testament. I've read the Bible front to back, you know, I don't know how many times now, but I just finished the New Testament again. Every time I go back, there's something else that comes out and talks to.
B
Yeah, yeah. This is the only time I've taught a book twice. I actually went back to Luke because it had been a while since I'd done one of the Gospels and just felt like, you know, it's been 10 years. It's not the same people who are listening now that we're listening, then. Yeah, it's okay if I cover it again.
A
Do you find.
B
And it's.
A
You find that you pick different things useful for people? Do you find you pick different things up?
B
Sure. Oh yeah. Oh, yeah. You're in different place, you're listening differently. Yeah, absolutely.
A
It's gonna be different how the, how the word speaks to you. It's just, it's just people.
B
Oh yeah.
A
People don't get it that, don't try it. Just. I just listen. Even if you're not a Christian, go to. Just read it, just look at it and just, just read it from a secular point of view for a minute and just, just look at it first, maybe even as a history, but just. It'll start speaking to you, man. It's pretty, pretty amazing. And you know, I, I've been really incorporating more and more that I've learned in it and really developed a deeper relationship with, with Jesus and God through this.
B
Very cool.
A
Through this focusing on, you know, studying, like you said, a chapter a day. And I've all. I don't know if you've used it or not, but I go to AI and I don't trust AI with everything. I make sure I, I filter it, but I go back and talk to AI about what I'm reading and then apply.
B
I don't.
A
Yeah, well, let me just share this and then I'll hear your take on it, because I want to hear. Yeah, I go back to how I can apply it to leadership, how I can apply it to relationships, running a business, and just get different introspects from it. What are your thoughts on that? And you don't do that, but what are your thoughts on that?
B
No, I've occasionally gone in and said, I mean, so what AI is doing when you do that is it's summarizing all the people who've written about that everywhere that they've, you know, that they've scanned and trained into this study. And so I will sometimes go in and ask a specific question about, you know, who. Tell me more about who the Nabataeans were, just to make sure that my, you know, understanding is a little up to date. Or, you know, what. What do Bible study scholars say about this particular thing? Because I'm having a little trouble with this, figuring out how to explain this parable or things like that. I've done that occasionally, not so much. But, you know, I'm also older than you, so I've had chance to read through a few more times. So.
A
Yeah, well, listen, man, I love what you're doing, Chris. It's amazing. And you're in your, you know, in your genius and your flame and, you know, to live a life that you could do that and still make a living is. Is pretty admirable, you know, so congratulations.
B
Well, my wife's still working, so, you know, I'm cheating right now. I'm a kept man.
A
So they can go to check out and go deeper with you. The Amateur traveler dot com. Anywhere else you want to send them, Chris.
B
So, yeah, amateur traveler.com or thebiblestudypodcast.com is the other podcast. And then I do a hotel review site Also, which is hotel-scoop.com. awesome. If you're interested in traveling. Awesome.
A
Well, thank you for your time today, man. Appreciate everything you're doing.
B
Well, thanks for having me.
A
Right, my pleasure. Hang tight while I wrap this up, folks. That's this episode of the what do you made of show with your boy C Rock, here with Chris Christensen, sharing what he's made of. Make sure you hit the subscribe follow button to top of your favorite podcast platform. Tell your friends, keep coming back and be that one.
Episode: Exploring the World and the Web: Chris Christensen on Travel, Technology, and Podcasting Legacy
Date: January 12, 2026
Guest: Chris Christensen (Amateur Traveler, Bible Study Podcast)
In this episode, Mike "C-Roc" Ciorrocco interviews Chris Christensen, a pioneering travel podcaster and technology veteran. The conversation dives into curiosity as a driving force, the evolution of technology and artificial intelligence, the origins and growth of podcasting, and the life-changing effects of a passion for travel. Chris also briefly discusses his faith and second podcast, revealing what motivates his ongoing projects.
This episode illustrates the importance of curiosity, adaptability, and passion—whether in tech, travel, podcasting, or faith—and how leaning into your “genius” can create both impact and extraordinary opportunities.