If you should know one thing about me as a Millennial Mom, you should know about my obsession with travel; and more importantly my dedication to sharing such experiences with my children. If you’re a close friend or family member, you can probably recall the number of times that I said (in the past) that my dream was to stay at home with my children and travel the world with them. And would you look at that, that dream is exactly the dream I am living today. So many people ask us how we travel the way we do, assume that we are “rich”, or comment that we are “lucky” (hah… I don’t recall much of anything that happened in my life being as a result of luck lol). However, I can assure you that what we do is no thanks to any stashed fortune or luck. So I write today to share just how we are able to travel for extended periods as a family. At present, “family” meaning me and my two littles as hubby has stayed behind to work during our recent adventures. I hope my practices inspire someone to try it too. (If you’re looking for more content on this topic, check out my blog post on Budget Travel.)
Me and my “littles” A’Bree (9) and A’Brahm (8-months) 💙💓
Now before I jump into any of the logistical stuff regarding how we travel, I must first highlight the two overall reasons we are able to make this dream life our reality. Reason one is… WE ARE BLESSED. Plain and simple! We would not be able to live this dream without the man above hearing my countless prayers, seeing my heart, and putting opportunities in my path. Call me crazy for believing in this way but I see no other way. I am blessed that my energy has guided my family and I to places that give us just what we need in terms of healing, peace, and balance. We rarely travel to places that we are familiar, or where we know people. We always venture out in search of the things I’ve just mentioned. And this is a part of the reason why meditation has become a big part of our world. But I won’t get too deep into this subject just yet. It’s a topic for a future post. Just understand that in a nutshell, we are blessed and I’m a mama very much in-tune with the universe.
Not only are we blessed to live this life, but we are RESOURCEFUL. We have learned to seek out the things that help make our dream life possible. Two of the things we sought out prior to taking on this traveling lifestyle were my job which is remote and a homeschooling routine for “mini me”. Being able to work and school from home makes this dream life doable while keeping up with the two things we must do; work and study. Prior to traveling and as we travel, there are a few things that we do which allow us to keep traveling and spending extended time away from home. To start, we…
1. Plan Ahead
We plan ahead as much as possible prior to traveling for the purpose of budgeting, saving, and planning out our school and work schedules. If we were last minute travelers, we probably would not be able to continue traveling as frequently as we do. I have a book that I call my “life journal” which has a section dedicated solely to travel. This journal helps me with planning trips, noting wish list destinations, comparing travel costs, and tracking the best places to travel based on cost/season. Inside, there are trips organized as far as one year in advance. I have an old journal just for travel which I now look back on to see how I mapped out our long-term international trip. In that journal, I made a savings plan, made to/do lists, highlighted things to be purchased liked backpacks and travel insurance (Allianz Global), and tracked my planning weekly and monthly. It has become a resource for me and brings back great memories when reading through it. I encourage anyone looking to take on any big venture to get a journal dedicated to keeping track of your goal(s) as it is extremely helpful and motivating.
I recently planned an upcoming surprise trip for my mama’s birthday in a span of six months, where we will live like “royalty” for one week. There will be 6-8 of us traveling together. The planning time for this trip allowed me to secure travel and accommodation options for everyone within a very inexpensive budget (under $3k to be exact). The accommodation that I found would cost me a fortune if I waited to book it, so planning ahead was essential for planning this surprise trip and saving. Now there are occasions where I plan last minute trips. During these instances, I simply research multiple sites for airfare and look into different types of accommodation before booking anything. Which brings me to my next point…
2. Shop Around
We never book the first thing that we see. We research plane tickets on multiple sites prior to booking them and roll with whatever is more affordable. Sometimes that means booking from an airline directly. Other times it means booking through our favorite sites like Momondo, CheapOair, Skyscanner, Priceline, or Orbitz. There are occasions when we book roundtrip flights and other times that we book one way options. Sometimes booking a one way flight saves you a ton of cash so it’s important to look prior to just rolling with a round-trip ticket. Again, we always go with what’s more affordable.
- In regards to accommodation, we choose between hotels, Airbnb-s, and VRBO-s (Vacation Rentals by Owner ). Most times we rock with Airbnb-s (sign up using my link at the end of this post, to earn $40 to use towards your first stay). With this type of accommodation, we like that we get to rent nice spaces that feel like home, and love that such places have kitchens where I can cook. This saves us money when it comes to dining and we typically choose to eat out for only one meal which is lunch/dinner. While traveling out of the states, securing inexpensive accommodation is pretty easy; simply by walking around and communicating with locals or booking online through the platforms I’ve just shared. One perk we found while booking hotels and hostels abroad, was that breakfast was almost always included. And the low cost of living in different countries allowed us to dine at tons of restaurants for a fraction of what it would cost at home in NYC. Now on to my next point….
3. Budget, Work, and Save
After booking trips, we come up with a budget of what we anticipate we will spend for the time that we will be away. I come up with an estimated budget based on what activities we will do and considering the area we will be in. The website Numbeo helps me greatly with budgeting. “Mini me” is typically responsible for coming up with the itinerary of things to do. This is mainly because we always connect travel and homeschooling (aka “worldschooling”). I like for my daughter to find things to do related to her interests/studies and I guide her when needed. (If you’re interested in learning more about how we school at home, check out my post Our Home… Her School.) After coming up with an anticipated budget, we then work and save. Not for the upcoming trip, but for future trips. We have funds allocated to travel and after we tap into our fund for a trip, we work to replenish it. Now when I say “work”, it’s not just my job that brings in income for travel. We save:
- Money that “Mini me” earns from collecting bottles
- Cash back rewards from shopping and credit cards
- Money we make from selling our gently/unworn clothing (check out my Poshmark closet for some chic finds).
Our earnings from these hobbies are never a lot but they do add up. The biggest earnings we made came after we cleared out our apartment in Brooklyn, NY by selling everything. We used the funds we made to pay for a good portion of our South/Central American adventures. When it comes to saving, my goal is always to save at least half of the amount that I anticipate we will spend on a trip before we depart. Sometimes things go according to plan and other times not so much but it’s always good to have a goal. And whenever we are about to get on the road, my stress levels are low so I’m not too overwhelmed if I don’t meet my goal. The last thing that we do to make it so we can keep traveling is…
4. To Continue Traveling
Lol! So long as we continue to roam and fall in love with new places, new foods/cultures, and new people, the desire to travel will always be there for us. Since the day that Bree and I got the travel bug about five years ago, we have found that traveling only feeds that bug more. And since that time, we have continued to travel as often as we can. We make it our number one priority to always seek out places that work within our budget. While we travel, we practice a few habits that allow us to keep costs low on our trips which include:
- Cooking at least one meal in our accommodation
- Packing snacks to take on outings
- Filling our itinerary with free and low cost activities (botanical gardens, museums, national parks, libraries, beaches, etc)
- Walking places whenever possible
- Limiting our shopping and collection of items to take back home
However, much of the savings come with choosing the right destination based on the cost/season and shopping around for airfare. We use a number of resources to help us budget and know when and where to travel. For our international trip, we heavily utilized author & blogger Matthew Kepnes’ site Nomadic Matt to help choose travel destinations, create an itinerary, and decide when to travel. The website Rome2Rio is my go to, to learn the best/most affordable ways to get around. As I previously mentioned, Numbeo.com helps me budget travel domestically and internationally. This site breaks down the cost of living in any region down to how much you can anticipate to pay for eggs lol. I pray that the day will come when I will be able to eliminate this form of planning prior to taking a trip. But for now, as long as we remain a lower middle-class family trying to make ends meet in one of the most expensive cities in the world, while still trying to follow our hearts and dreams, this is what we must do.
I hope someone found this read inspirational, interesting, and helpful. Travel is big on our agenda for 2019 and I cannot wait to finish our two series “Oh the Places We’ve Been” and “Oh the Places We’ll Go”, to share with our readers. In addition, I will soon be blogging about remote work options and things to make money before/while traveling ; as I know many people are mostly interested in finding income to sustain travel. We are currently on a fun adventure in the Florida Keys, and have one upcoming trip at the end of the month. I won’t spoil our future blog posts by sharing any details now, so stay tuned! Until next time…
Xoxo,
Millennial Mom
Not down with Airbnb yet and looking for more than a hotel stay while traveling away from home? Sign up using my link and earn $40 to use towards your first booking:
Are you also a nomad with tips to share? Are you a parent interested in trying out travel with your little(s)? Do you like to travel but need to learn how to be more resourceful or want to use my skills? Drop a comment below or message me!
Millennial Mom 