Long-term travel: How it's going so far
Eight months in babyyyyyy!
Over eight months and 13 countries* ago we quit our jobs to start this adventure. In addition to witty banter and delightful fun facts about the places we’ve traveled, I think a lot of people are curious about what it’s actually like to travel full-time, and how it’s really going so far.
It is great. Obviously. Every day I see something cool or do something amazing. Even our relatively chill days are still interesting — for example, on a day I “didn’t really do anything” I explored a Peruvian market, ate the best pollo a la brassa I’ve ever had, and stumbled upon three marching band parades.
That being said, doing cool stuff every day actually requires a ton of work. I know it’s not Work work, but still, researching and planning and figuring out and arranging it all is not nothing. We’re very intentional about where we go, what we want to see or do there, and how much time we need in each place. Most nights we’re back in our room by 9 pm, taking advantage of the wifi to look up what to do the next day (using blogs, travel websites, google image search, and Lonely Planet), often with a to-do list of longer-term logistics. Even though we could spend weeks or even months in one place, we are addicted to Seeing All The Things and highly aware that this extended time off is a privilege we may not have again for a long time. So we move pretty quickly — sometimes spending just one or two nights in a city or town. (My packing efficiency and backpack organization is on point.) A year is a long time, but the world is so big!
It can be exhausting; packing and unpacking every night, laundry in the hotel sink, long bus rides, hoarding napkins (if you know you know), and wearing the same outfit four days in a row. I am somehow never the right temperature. Sometimes all I want is an American-sized cup of coffee. But overall the shine of it all hasn’t worn off. Sure, I like some days more than others, but it’s not a linear progression. I may have one day that I’m just not feeling it (“Why can’t things work?!” I shout at an uncooperative bus booking app or cold shower), but then the next day I’m on a small boat zooming through the Bornean rainforest and it’s all amazing again. Absolutely never have I thought “I’d rather be working.”
We wake up each morning and mostly put on the same clothes we wore the day before. Anyone who has seen my pictures has probably noticed that I have two pairs of pants, three t-shirts, and a couple tank tops in my primary rotation — it is so easy to get dressed! We just went back to the US for a wedding and it was completely overwhelming to try to remember all my clothes and how to dress like real person! (I’m happy to share more packing details if that’s of interest.)
We try to book guesthouses (almost always in advance using Booking.com**) with breakfast included, so usually we eat a lot at the hotel before heading out for the day (minimizing the need for a lunch stop). The dinner situation depends on the country. In India every guesthouse has a restaurant (going out again into the streets of India once you’re “home” can be daunting), in Greece restaurants were more expensive so we mostly got gyros (3 euro) or Greek salad (6 euro) to-go and ate in our room. In Egypt it’s almost impossible to find a restaurant, and in Malaysia there are so many it’s too overwhelming to make a choice. Sometimes you want a dinner experience—we usually do one splurge meal in each country—but sometimes you just want something easy.
We don’t have international data, so everywhere we go the first thing we ask for is the wifi password. Luckily wifi is pretty ubiquitous — all guesthouses and most restaurants have it, and some countries even have open networks in their city centers. I navigate by screenshots and following the little blue Google Maps dot, and all plans and research need to be done before leaving the hotel. Ah the convenience of wondering something and looking it up immediately! I miss that. We make a lot of notes to ourselves “to Google later.”
Do we miss our families and friends? Of course! But we do a very good job of staying in touch through social media and group texts and occasional Zoom hangs. It is a lot of time between just the two of us, but COVID conditioned us well for that, and I’m happy to report that we still like each other. :) We never split up, except for the occasional convenience store run (someone’s gotta go get the ice creams!), and that works for us. We’ve been happy to make a few friends along the way too!
And finally the elephant in the room — how are we paying for all this??? First of all, it’s not as expensive as you probably think. Our average spending is around $120 per day total, which includes everything: flights, insurance, hotels, food, and activities for both of us. (FWIW, we could definitely do it a lot cheaper!) Second of all, obviously we have a lot of privilege. We’re renting out our one-bedroom condo in DC, which covers more than half our monthly expenses, and the rest is savings. (Chris also did a 10-day consultancy in Egypt, which was unplanned but a great way to make some extra cash.) Keep in mind we’ve been planning this trip for six years.
Finally finally, when does our trip end? We don’t know! The original plan was a year, so that would bring us to October, but I have a feeling we’ll go longer. It also depends a lot on how quickly we get jobs once we start applying, which will be sometime in the fall (we’re not on an official sabbatical, we’re just unemployed). We’ll see!
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* Nepal, India, Sri Lanka, Maldives, Lebanon, Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Turkey, Greece, Peru, Singapore, Malaysia
** This isn’t an ad, I just like this app.