Ask HN: Those who quit their jobs to travel the world, how did it go?

I've travelled a lot, and worked as a travel blogger, but never 'quit my job to travel.' It's a lot cheaper than you'd expect. You could probably do it for $10-$20k a year.

I think it's hard in that it's hard to get good at, but there's not a very sharp learning curve. You need to learn how to find deals, and how to meet people when you're tired, and how to not get ripped off, and so on. But mostly, extensive solo travel isn't that difficult. It's just about amassing common sense.

In early 1999 I'd been working as a contractor at a major Australian bank, writing VBScript, building an Intranet site. A three month contract became nine. By then I'd managed to pay off my student debt and put aside a decent amount. I quit and traveled.

Three months in southern Africa and three months in the United Kingdom.

It was my second trip to southern Africa and I enjoyed it thoroughly. Different the second time around. While I was exploring different areas, I had a much better sense of what to expect from each situation.

My first trip to the UK. I wasted a lot of time in those three months, which could have been better spent. I did see quite a lot, but generally I treated it mostly as a tools down and relaxation period. I did return to Australia, but 12 months later, I was back in the UK and lived there for a further 13 years.

Returning to Australia, it was straightforward enough to find work. I think I was offered something on my third interview. This just happened to be with a company which would go on to become a dotcom giant, survive the crash and continues to do reasonably well today. Everything worked out well enough.

I would certainly do it all again. If I had the choice to do things differently, I probably would have cut short the UK period and seen more of Europe, although I did a lot of that in subsequent years.

In short, I would encourage people to do something like this. I don't think breaks of even up to 12 months in a career should be a concern, especially if explained easily enough. The experiences are worth a great deal.

It is often cheaper to travel that sit at home in your western apt. If you can sublet or give up your place, costs are not exorbitant.

1) Find an itinerary using http://www.airtreks.com/ they are amazing. Seattle -> New Zealand -> Australia -> Malaysia -> Nepal -> Turkey was about 3300 USD.

2) Get a nice place for when you land, like 3 days. Use that time to find lower cost habitation.

3) Don't over plan. Don't over spend. Talk to everyone. Read people, find good people and befriend them. Be nice. Not everyone is out to hustle you, locals often live on $5 a day. Don't flaunt your western wealth.

Total cost for 9 month trip, including the above flight and the crazy expensive flight home, 15k. I should have done this 20 years ago, experience would have been very different, more raw. As you age, the senses dull, our wealth bludgeons any immediacy and hardship (both good and bad). You are shaped by what you see and do, so see and do early.

In 2004 I spent most of a year travelling around South and Central America. I met my wife on that trip (she was also travelling) and now we have two awesome children.

Travelling refreshes the mind. It breaks bad habits and it frees your soul. Sounds like mumbo jumbo I know but I can't recommend it enough.

Give yourself at least 3 months. Take eery opportunity and trust your gut. It can be dangerous out there if your mind isn't aware of what is going on around you. A bit of common sense and you're fine. Also get to meet the locals. Sticking around the hostels with other backpackers can drive you potty in the end.

Best thing I ever did. Finding contract work when I got back was easy due to great old contacts who hooked me up.

Didn't quit the job (working remotely), on my 3rd around-the-world already. Feels perfect

I've been a "digital nomad" for the last year. I left my full-time job in Australia & headed for Berlin & just picked up a few casual consulting gigs via Dribbble (I'm a designer).

I quickly realized that I really enjoy slow traveling - staying in places for 2-3 months & trying to keep a normal routine. I work full-time now, pretty crazy hours, but I generally move somewhere new every 3 months. I spend a few months of each year in SF & the rest in Europe. I'm heading from SF to Split, Croatia in 3 weeks for most of the summer.

As a final note, there are many different ways to travel. You never really understand how cheap it is until you actually do it. Before I left, everyone told me that I would need a liquid $50k to spend a year in Europe & I remember being worried that I only had about half that - very funny to me now. I've saved more traveling than what I have paying rent somewhere in Australia.

TIPS: * Try & get paid an SFBA salary & live in cities that have a very low cost of living in comparison. * Re trying to get a remote job - move to the job for 3 months first, work your ass off & prove your worth, THEN ask to move remote. * Sell everything. Forget about clothes, shoes, books, records. If you can't pack light at first, believe me, you will learn on the road!

Has anyone done this with their professional spouse? How did it go?

I traveled for about two years. I was able to work remotely, so I didn't have to worry too much about a tight budget or finding employment upon return.

It was a great experience, and here's what I'd change:

- spend more time in fewer places; be less of a tourist. (bonus: for the most part, the less you move around, the less expensive it is.) I would particularly try to do this in places that aren't typical tourist destinations. Think of stops of 1-3 months (perhaps with side trips) rather than 1-2 weeks.

- if you're traveling with someone else (particularly a significant other): (a) be really, really confident that you want to travel together for that long; (b) do whatever you can to find destinations that you both are interested in; (c) explicitly acknowledge that you will want to spend time apart during your travels; and (d) expect the relationship to get rocky at times even if you do all of the above perfectly. It's hard.

- Plan to return to your current home, if at all possible. I didn't do this, and re-adjusting to 'normal' life was much more difficult without an existing set of family and friends around. Even if you do go back 'home', re-entry won't be seamless. One of my friends spent two years in Japan and claims that she was more homesick upon returning home (USA) than she ever was in Japan.

In May 2012 my wife and I did this. It went well, but little went to our initial plan.

The experience was far more stressful than either of us expected. Constantly having to find food, a place to sleep, and figure out where/what is next, was tiresome. However, we really enjoyed the experience and found some places off the beaten path that we really loved. We found out that we love hiking and that we wanted travel more in the future.

I can't remember how we ended up settling on a budget, we targeted $80/day for two people. We saved 60k for the trip which from what I can remember was somewhat arbitrary. We also saved 20k as a 'return fund' to ensure that we had ample runway to find jobs. Returning home was incredibly expensive, we sold everything we owned before we left, make sure you budget accordingly.

Finding work after traveling was simple for me, a bit harder for my wife. I had two job offers, both from people I worked with prior to leaving, before I'd been home for more than a couple weeks. My wife wanted to change where she worked, so it took her a bit longer. None of this was to plan, we had planned to move to the west coast, the sway of a job was too strong.

If we did it again... that is hard to say. Both of us wish it was planned a bit more completely, but I see no way to actually accomplish this. I might say stay in one place a bit longer that we did (maybe a week/city). My wife says she would blog less, and I think I agree, documenting the trip was a lot of work. We did it for ourselves and our family, but it was more work than anticipated.

In the end we finished traveling after only (sorry I know "only" sounds ridiculous) 8 months. We thought we would travel for 1.5 years or more. We spent way more time in South America than initially planned and took a boat to Antarctica which was entirely unplanned. It was really amazing.

If you have questions I'm happy to address them further, I tried to keep this short as I can talk about this for hours.

I quit college to travel for 2 years and played online poker as a means of income. There are parts of it I regret, like being a bit callous with money and not really knowing what I would do afterwards, but I was young (20) and having disposable income (which I regret not saving) can affect you as a kid. It should be noted that dropping out of college is NOT something I regret. I think that may have been one of the best decisions I made when I was younger.

1. By leaving school, I ended up teaching myself by traveling and experiencing different cultures, living on my own outside of my comfort zone, and meeting smart, successful people around the world. It's hard to replicate that sort of education in an institutionalized environment (not to mention how expensive a degree is).

2. I sucked at budgeting. Nowadays there are a lot of good resources online for budgeting[1] and nomading[2] that I wish I had access to back then.

3. I didn't like thinking too far into the future at the time but I didn't really have any backup plans after poker. I just assumed I would make enough to eventually invest in some other venture. I did, but that venture didn't work out too well. I eventually taught myself how to code and I've been working as a dev in SF for the past few years.

4. I would follow the nomad lifestyle[2]. Knowing which areas maximized life happiness + low cost of living would have really helped. I think anyone who has a craft that can be monetized online and doesn't have significant responsibilities (family/kids) should try work-traveling for some time.

[1] http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/

[2] https://nomadlist.com/

I quit my job for a year and did this with my wife. We didn't work while traveling -- it would have been too hard / distracting. This might sound odd, but traveling takes as much time as a real job -- the amount you spend just figuring out where to go next and what to do is significant. If you want to work while travel then your best bet is to taking a break from travel and live somewhere for a little while. It's not a bad way to go but it's not what we did.

One interesting thing is the amount we spent for a year of travel was slightly less than the amount we spent simply living at home. If have saved enough where you can spend a year without salary then you can afford to do it.

A few recommendations -- don't plan ahead. You can't. Just plan the first place you want to go to and go from there. You'll have ample time to figure things out and be open to changes in plan. A corollary to this is that if you plan on spending less than 5 months traveling then you may not be able to travel quite that way. It takes a few months just to get into the swing of things.

Lastly, don't stretch your budget thin just to hit an arbitrary length of time. Spend what you need to and leave a few months earlier. You won't enjoy yourself if you have to scrounge for every dime. I'd see people stay in super nasty places for $5-10 / night in places that had simple, clean, and comfortable places for $15 / night.

I quit my job and travelled for almost year in South America. I later spent 2 years in grad school (studying social science) as part of an extended "break" to figure out what I wanted to do. I had no grand plans, goals nor did I become enlightened from it. I did learned Spanish and met my wife during my trip, so personally, it had a big impact in my life.

Definitely, had some regrets about grad school as it was a fairly academic program. I went straight back to coding/software after graduation.

My advice is, if you know what you want to do, just do it. There is no need to travel the world or go on any journey. But if you don't, or if you haven't travelled yet, then yes, it does wonders to expand your experiences.

Best decision of my whole life so far. It requires attaining an incredible amount of humility, selling everything, even that couch you like. You probably won't be back and storage costs a fortune, basically get rid of all of your material possessions. That's really by far the hardest part then take the smallest amount with you that you can.

And... suddenly, life seems brighter. I left north america probably 5 years ago, wasn't satisfied with the uk though. I don't need to spend all of my money financing a stressful lifestyle. Most places outside of na make it easy to rent a furnished apartment. Life outside of na is largely much cheaper when compared to large na cities. And life outside of na is much more interesting because it's there due to longer than 250 years of history.

Feels great man.

If you're a software engineer, you can basically work anywhere.

I'm a high school teacher. After four years of teaching, I quit my job and spent 13 months living on a bicycle. I went Seattle > Maine > Florida > California > Alaska.

I'd do it again in a heartbeat. It's nearing 20 years since I started that trip, and that experience still keeps me grounded today. I plan to bicycle across the continent again in my 50's or 60's to see how much has changed, and how much has stayed the same.

I got laid off from a job I was at for four years. Always wanted to travel but with school and work never had a chance for any extensive travel. I took two trips on my time off.

USA Road Trip. 14 days. 17 states (NJ, PA, MD, VA, TN, NC, MS, LA, TX, NM, CO, KS, MO, IL, IN, KY, WV). 6,000 miles. Total for two people: $2750. Per person: $1375. Per person per day: $98.

http://jbutewicz.com/usa-road-trip-video-concluding-remarks/

European Road Trip. 44 days. 14 countries (Italy, Vatican City, Monaco, France, Spain, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Austria, Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, Norway). 12,000 miles of driving. Approximate total for two people: $12,000. Per person: $6,000. Per person per day: $133.

http://jbutewicz.com/europe-trip-video-concluding-remarks/

My blog has much more in depth detail if you are interested.

A few years ago I quit my job with the idea that I had three projects I wanted to work on, I could do them from anywhere, and probably one would pan out into my next startup. TLDR: it worked, one did, and I had an awesome four-month trip in the process.

I subletted my room in NYC for a bit more than I paid, bought a plane ticket to Goa, and started there. It was the right decision insofar as it's a very soft landing in India, which can be a fairly difficult place for a lot of people. After two weeks and some research. I moved on and spent time in a bunch of different cities in India and Nepal; most days I would simply sit and write code in whatever hostel or home stay I was at, eat cheap street food for lunch, and generally be really, really productive. When I felt like it, I'd go take a walk or see something cool in the area or take a couple days and go on a short vacation somewhere else (e.g. I would never have wanted to spend much time in Agra, but it's a short overnight trip from Jaipur to go catch the taj mahal at dawn and then explore agra fort and take a walk before getting on a bus back).

It's actually the perfect vacation -- traveling can be really stressful, always trying to get to the next place, cram in all the stuff you have to see, etc. You wind up doing crazy things like exhausting yourself taking overnight buses to save time and hostel costs. But I spaced out what could have been a 3-4 week trip across four months, and it was relaxing, productive, interesting, and fun. I got pretty well into each of my projects (all of which involved acquiring new skill sets), figured out the one that had legs and was right for me, and turned it into my next startup.

The toughest part was in Kathmandu, where at the time power cuts were 14 hours a day, and of the 10 hours with power, they were mostly at night. But it was actually nice -- I got up early every morning with a charged laptop, worked until the thing was nearly dead after the power had gone out, went to a rooftop cafe to read for a while, went back and worked/charged again for a while, went for a long walk, and got back with enough charge left to last until the power came back on.

Overall, a pretty great life.

I quit my job at Amazon and went on a 4 month long bike tour through South East Asia... it was kind of a sporadic decision, but basically it was a gut feeling that I needed to get out there and mentally reset.

Great experience and would definitely do it again, especially bike touring. You kind of get into this rhythym of: wake up at sunrise, eat breakfast, decide on route, cycle as much as you feel like, go swimming, talk to people, find a place to camp/sleep, fix bike, go to bed. Every week or so you'll hit a major tourist centre where you can get a western meal/talk to other English speakers... then you're back on the road!

If you're burnt out/are looking for a reset, I'd avoid trying to work and travel at the same time, if you can afford it.

Budget: I think it worked out to about $15/day over the 4 month period, which may have included a flight home too.

I came back feeling energized, optimistic, and found a job at a great startup within a month of being back!

I spent the last four years doing web development while on playing drums in multiple touring bands. I got to travel abroad for free, and meet great people through it.

Unfortunately I remember very little of this time because I was taking on freelance projects to make side money and using mobile broadband to work in the van. It was incredibly stressful and one of the worst ideas. Multitasking the two jobs just burned me out quicker.

I wish I had planned it all out better so I could actually enjoy it fully. If you're going to travel, make sure you have the time to actually experience it.

I quit my job making video games and cycled across the country for fifteen months.. I worked a bit in the last 8 months from my tent (40-60 hours a month).

It was epic! I would definitely do it all over again.

After spending a couple of years traveling on and off after quitting a job, there are a few things I wish I'd known/asked myself beforehand.

1. In your daily life, are you typically happy/comfortable not having a schedule? You might say "I'm traveling to get away from daily life," but longer-term travel is not like taking a vacation. It's much more like daily living. If you're happy not having a schedule in your normal life, don't plan much when you travel. I didn't even ask that question before I went traveling, but by nature I have a hard time not having a plan so I planned the s* out of my travels (I picked destinations around the planet, bought plane tickets to a chunk of the first destinations, planned activities/goals along the way and even had future destinations in mind (zoom out on Google Maps and just dream/lust after places! You'll almost immediately have a plan even if you don't like planning!). Anyway, I'm super stoked I planned the trip. I would've been a bit bummed if I hadn't, but as some posters here have said, planning isn't for everyone and you have to know what you like. And of course you can have a bit of both. Doesn't need to be "no plan" vs "plan every day," but structure, if you enjoy structure, is key. If you are too structured and are traveling to change yourself, of course ignore this advice.

2. Do you feel a need to accomplish things? I'm just going to go out on a limb since you're asking this on HN that you like "getting stuff done." You might be an "enjoy the journey more than the destination" person, but a big part of the journey is progressing/growing and so, again, related to schedule, plan on actually accomplishing some things while traveling. My partner and I, though not particularly outdoorsy, took advantage of several months of traveling to do some short, but serious (for us) hiking and I have to say that absent those events during our travels we wouldn't have enjoyed it nearly as much. It's awesome seeing the world, and talking to the people who inhabit it, but the desire for accomplishment doesn't go away when you do longer-term travel. Like I said, it's not like a vacation (though of course we were happy to find ourselves on nice beaches after pushing ourselves to reach "the top of the mountain." And your mountain can be hiking, learning a language, building an app, volunteering, etc. We just happened to want to see some epic nature)

3. Does my partner "love" me enough to not kill me if we're on top of each other for months on end (and vice versa)? You can only ask this, of course, if you're planning on traveling with a partner. You can always take breaks from each other, which is likely easier if you're traveling with a friend instead of a romantic partner, but I think saying upfront what you're both comfortable with is important

Apologies for the long post. Not sure if you, the OP, will read it, but if you want a spreadsheet with an around-the-world budget, hit me up and I'll share a Google one with you. I think I still have it. The single longest trip we did during the 2 years was three months (far shorter than a bunch of the folks who commented), but I/we stayed almost right on budget the whole time, which is actually much easier than you might think because as long as you have some flexibility timing-wise you can always save money on the big-bucket items (air/travel, lodging, food).

Oh, one last comment... If you love travel, and have dreamed of doing it more extensively and think you can pull it off, just do it. The only frustrating thing about traveling (for people who really enjoy it!) is not being able to do more of it.

I did the digital nomad thing for 5 years and 9 months, across 70 countries: http://www.trott.in/accounts/1/worldmap

It was incredible, and I would recommend it to anyone.

And, it's never been easier to do ... if you haven't got much tying you down then give it a shot, take as long as it still feels rewarding. You'll know when it's time to go home.

I've now settled back in Australia this past year (much to my surprise) and am equally enjoying having a fixed address, a great friendship group and relationship, and having time to really focus on my startup. I wouldn't change a thing.

I've done a few 3-4 month trips in the past. I was fortunate to be earning a good day rate as a freelancer before I left and I was young, with no responsibilities and no need for a life plan. It was easy to quickly save up a little money, and travel can be really cheap, especially when you don't care about sleeping in a nice bed.

The first couple of times I travelled a lot. Too much. Moving on every day or two. Seeing the various famous sites to see along the way. It was a great adventure, but I didn't learn that much.

One day I was talking to someone on my daily train commute out of london and she was telling me about a friend of hers that was travelling the world by boat. I thought it sounded amazing, and I always wanted to sail, so I booked myself in to do a leg of the Clipper Ventures [0] yacht race - from Liverpool (England) to Brazil (took about 4 weeks).

When I arrived in Brazil I didn't have a plan at all. I booked in to learn Portuguese while stating with a local family. The 4 weeks I lived there changed the way I look at travelling. I learned about the local culture, made friends, and learned a lot about myself in the process.

In a lot of ways tourism is a much easier route than immersing yourself in a culture. Being totally alone in a country where you can't speak the language is pretty soul expanding.

I've only managed one (big) trip since then (with my now wife) through Central America. We stayed with a family in Nicaragua for a couple of weeks at the start to learn Spanish. We loved it. The hosts are always amazing (we ended up doing it a few times during the trip). Also, it's really cheap. I think we paid $100 / week for accommodation, food and school (for both of us).

So my main bit of advice would be, try to be a local, not a tourist. It's scary, but incredibly rewarding.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=effh9W_xHSg

With clothes and computer, and pretty much at the drop of a dime, I started traveling abroad and have done so for the past several years, around S. America & Europe, staying in places for at least a few months each. When you find a few overseas places that feel like "home", you can go back and forth between them when needed. Luckily, I knew some people with startups in the US who needed part-time VAs and thus this is what I've done this whole time. I've literally spent between US$400-600/mo since deciding to live overseas. Since my work is part-time, and at times sporadic, I often don't make much more than what I spend.

So on one side, it's totally doable to live in tons of cool places on the cheap (it's become a game of sorts to live frugally). On the other hand, when you travel w/o extra funds, you cannot do an about-face when you need to (ie, you cannot retreat from a bad situation) so you then have to find ways to stick it out, which can easily mean enduring odd living quarters, strange neighborhoods, shady people, etc. I've had thousands of both amazing and not-so-amazing experiences I would not have had, had I stayed in the States doing the same ol', same ol'. My hope is that I continue to have thousands more such experiences and most importantly, to do it wisely now that time has taught me what not to do (and now that my job responsibilities are gradually increasing).

I've always wanted to travel the world but haven't done it yet. The way I see it, right now the market is doing amazing, unemployment is low. As an employee, you have leverage (negotiate for higher pay or choose another place that offers you more pay). My plan is to work hard and make/save as much money as I can in this economy. There will be a recession one day and rather than fighting with everybody else for a job with shitty pay, that will be the time I travel and enjoy the world.

After 20 odd years as a programmer, I quit my job with the intention of spending 1 year teaching English in Japan. My main reason for doing it was that I wanted to learn Japanese and I felt that there weren't enough hours in the day to do it in Canada. I'm very risk averse, so I wanted to make sure that I had a job and a place to live. I was accepted into the JET Programme (I was 39 at the time -- the cut off age!). At the time, I had all the trappings of a successful developer: car, house, mountains of things in the house. I packed a backpack and let some friends live in my house rent free so that there was someone to look after it.

After 3 months in Japan, I knew I never wanted to go back to Canada. Eventually, I asked one of my friends to sell my house (that's one hell of a favour!) and got them to give away all my worldly possessions. I loved teaching English, although I was completely unqualified for it and it took me a few years before I was at all competent. My job was only 35 hours a week so I had lots of time to write code in my spare time and I did so almost every day. I learned Japanese fluently and even got married to a Japanese woman who didn't speak much English at the time. I stayed there for the entire 5 years that was available on my teaching contract.

After that, my wife wanted to go somewhere so that she could learn English. I was feeling quite a bit more confident at this point that the moving thing would work out... somehow, but I'm still very risk averse ;-) I managed to get an entry permit for myself and my wife through my English ancestry which allowed us to work in the country and we just went. We budgeted $30K for a year and in the case that I couldn't find a programming job I had a startup plan. I didn't have to worry as I found a job within a month.

Before we left, I warned my wife that it might turn out like it did when I went to Japan: that we would live in England for ever. We went with that view in mind and gave away/sold the things we had in Japan (except for a few things which we left at her mother's house). I, especially, was down to again owning nothing that I couldn't carry by myself. We stayed for 2 years (to the day!), but eventually decided to return to Japan to help look after my wife's mother who is getting older. I am now working remotely on contract for the same company that I was working for in London. We are very happy in Japan and don't plan to move again, but who knows.

For advice: You probably don't need to be as risk averse as me. Things will probably "just work out... somehow". I really, really liked staying in the 2 places for years on end. I have to say that I don't like travelling, per se, but I have really enjoyed living and becoming part of a community in another place in the world. Also, spending the time to learn Japanese and to learn a new trade has completely changed my life for the better. And I got married (which is actually a bit of a miracle to be honest).

In the 5 years that I was away from a programming job, things changed in the industry quite a bit. Also, getting a programming job in a new part of the world meant that I didn't have any contacts and the popular technology was quite different. Even though I programmed every day on my own, my technical level dropped by a fair bit. I had one especially bad job interview where I am sure I looked like a complete idiot because I couldn't do anything. But I ended up with a great job, probably precisely because I found someone who was willing to give me a chance to prove myself.

One of the responses here says to "plan to return". As you can see, I went the other way. I planned not to return. Either way can be good, but I agree whole heartedly that you need a plan because it can be an emotional roller coaster ride. If you plan to return, realize that your friends will have moved on in their lives, your job probably won't be there waiting for you, and you<...