9 Tips for Long Term Travel

1. Don’t beat yourself up over the clothes you pack

They won’t be perfect. There’s no way. Especially if it’s your first time traveling long term. They either can’t take the workload of constantly being packed and unpacked, the climate or landscape are too rough on them, or they just don’t look right, breathe right, or make you feel comfortable. Notice what’s working, what people in your current environment are wearing, and what makes sense to add to your essentially-capsule wardrobe. Buy new clothes as needed as you go, and you’ll have functional souvenirs. Or some good options to donate because you’re more sick of those clothes by the end of your trip than you’ve ever been of anything else in your life!

YOU CAN CHECK OUT SHARI’S REVISED PACKING LIST HERE

2. Embrace uncertainty

We’re planners and preparers. We like to know what’s in store for us, but when you’re traveling for more than a month at a time, it’s pretty difficult to preplan all your accommodations, activities, and transportation. Even if you do, things are likely to change. An Airbnb host will cancel your booking, a flight will be way delayed, a bed is just too uncomfortable to sleep in another night. We had all of these happen in just the first month of our year-long trip. Instead of freaking out and getting all stressy about it, breathe, formulate a plan, and hop on the interwebs to get plan B in place. Additionally, when you preplan everything, you’re leaving very little room for spontaneity. Some of our best days have been when we just set off to explore with no real goal in mind and meander towards those ooooh-shiny things or start chatting with someone we meet and wind up hanging with them til way too late in the night.

3. Remember you’re not on holiday

It’s super easy to get swept up in the vacationer mindset (especially when you’re in a vacationy kind of destination), eating out every meal, indulging in ice cream three times a day, drinking every night, and not exercising even a little bit. But that’s a surefire way to gain about 300 pounds and go broke even faster. We tried to stick to a rule of eating at least one meal a day from groceries, not splurging on fancy dinners too often (maybe two – three times per country), and exercising at least a little bit every day. Luckily, a lot of worthwhile spots involve some form of hiking, so that makes the exercise part fairly easy!

4. Smile

Traveling for an extended period seems glamorous and enviable, but it’s also tiring and exhausting and difficult. When you’re sweaty and tired and hungry and have been carrying around your luggage for several hours, the last thing you want to do is be friendly. But it helps you maintain a positive attitude (fake it til you make it, right?), and it can also endear you to people from whom you need help (you catch more flies with honey, yeah?).

5. Build in catch-up days

If you pack your schedule full of adventuring every single day, not only will you be exhausted, but you’ll be way behind on and stressed about all the real life stuff you’re ignoring. We tried to spend at minimum one week in each destination. And during that week, we needed at least one day (sometimes two, especially if the internet was shite) to hunker down in our room and bust out some computer time. That involved catching up on email and dealing with any bills that needed to be paid, editing and backing up photos we’d snapping during all the adventuring, doing some actual work (since we both had a bit of that while traveling), writing blog posts, and editing video. We also needed to spend time researching the next destination and making accommodation bookings if we haden’t already done so. And all of it takes more time than you think it will. Trust us on this one!

6. Track your spending

This one is no fun at all, but makes a world of difference. You may think you’re eating cheap and not spending a lot, but until you have it all recorded and added up, you have no idea. If you’re not on top of your money, your trip may end a lot earlier than you had planned. During the first half of our time in Greece, we were eating out a ton and drinking all the healthy juices – because health. And everything was so cheap. But we were also there in the high season and just sort of brushed under the rug the fact that our lodging was not so cheap. Once we did some totals, we realized we were waaaayyy over budget, and spent the second half of our time there cooking a lot of spaghetti dinners to get back on track. Moral being, even if you make a mistake, as long as you’re aware of where you stand financially, you can correct it. (G.I. Joe voice:) Knowing is half the battle.

CHECK OUT THE COST OF TRAVELING THE WORLD FOR ONE YEAR HERE

7. Bring what will make your life better

Even if it’s not on the typical packing list. Are you a hardcore yogi? Don’t leave out a yoga mat because it’s bulky. Do you love playing games? Bring some bite-size versions. Random things we brought along that aren’t on any bloggers’ packing lists: a lacrosse ball for rolling sore feet over or using to work out muscle kinks, a few spices for helping out with meals in accommodations that are literally no frills, and slippers because I can only deal with so much bare feet on bare floors

8. Pay attention

There’s so many aspect to this. Look at what’s around you and notice what’s different and what’s the same, learn about what you’re experiencing and where you are so you can grow and better yourself, and listen to people you meet along the way for great tips on what else to do and see and where to go, as well as different perspectives and insights into other ways of life.

9. Remember how lucky you are

You’re getting to travel long term and see the world. As mentioned in Tip #4, yes, there are hardships and frustrations, but so much more goodness to counter that. There’s not many people who have the opportunity to do this crazy thing, and you should never take that for granted. Appreciate your damn good luck and hold on to it.

All images TM & © 2019 Josh Meister Photo and Shari Margolin (unless otherwise stated). Please don’t steal or “borrow” – just be cool, be cool.