“And travel–particularly extended international travel–is expensive.”

Actually, we have found just the opposite true. We are a family about ready to enter our 4th year of an open ended world tour & we live large on a total cost of 25K a year for a family of 3. Travel is NOT expensive, maintaining stuff is.

We find it much cheaper to travel the world than to live at home & we have spent much of our time in “expensive” Europe. We have been to 4 continents, 29 countries & traveled over 86,000 miles so far ( mostly over land) using everything from cargo ships to camels. The key is slow, green travel, immersing deeply and living like a native.

We have found it the best possible education for our child as a global citizen of the 21st century & that was our main motivation. Not only is the travel spectacular for education, but so are the unlimited innovative educational opportunities online.

We started traveling with our daughter when she was just 2 weeks old, but we waited until she was 5 and a fluent reader before we did international travel so that she might remember it and get the most out of it. She will soon be 9 and the opportunities have astounded us.

In today’s world one can work and school anywhere. 70% of families dream of doing extended world travel together. We are living proof that it can be done by ordinary families. If there is a will , there is always a way & today it is easier than ever.

it is cheaper, easier & more rewarding than most people realize. With free webcam calls one can also stay in touch regular touch with family & friends at home, while immersing in new cultures.

I say, go for it!!

For me traveling, and more importantly living abroad, has really forced me to question all my assumptions about what work and life is.

It is easy to blindly follow the lives and careers of our families and peers without really considering whether there is another way or not.

Traveling lets you see that our own way of living is merely a construct. Our society, corporations and television have sold us an idea of how to live. There is no reason that we have to be bound by that single idea. We have the freedom and opportunity to create any life we want.

Travel has helped me to understand that fact. It is sad to hear stories of people who have rarely ventured out of their own city, never mind going to another country.

I do think it gives her a wider perspective than a lot of her peers who have never left the country. It has also given her a level of maturity (through sheer accumulation of experiences, I think!) that is surprising for someone who has just become a teenager. She understands that not all people in the world live and do the things that she and her friends might do, and she appreciates that there are vast differences in how people view and interpret the world.

I whole-heartedly believe that she knows these things because she has lived them. “Children learn what they live…” is a quote I remember from somewhere. Nothing is more true! I hope that your first few years of parenthood are wonderous and magical and that you are able to give your child the gift of wonder that comes from travel to foreign places!