Life on the road...

We are still working, for a couple more years at least but have been travelling since the 80's. Usually we target an area & don't waste too much time getting there to spend as much time exploring that area.
Would love to slow down but have always been restricted by annual/long service leave. Yet we have been right around this country a few times over the years & don't regret a single moment. Taking your kids is probably some of the best education you can give them.
I must say I am looking forward to retiring & spending months on end travelling with no deadline to return but I think having a base to return to every now & then will suit us.
Either way, all I can say is get out there & do it......... Lifes too short & we have one amazing country to explore.
Cheers
Paul

That’s some quality journalism right there....did they proof read that article at all before hitting submit?...lol.
Good on those for getting out there and traveling. There’s so many people out there now traveling full time, just look on YouTube to see all the channels of some of those doing it. I recall back in 2006 we had our 3 year old daughter with us up at Cape York, we didn’t really see to many other kids on that trip for her to play with, i reckon these days she’d find someone to play with pretty quickly with the amount of families hitting the road either full time or atleast on family holidays out of school holiday periods.

My brain hurts after reading that. We both work full time and have 2 kids in high school. This school hols we have been on the road for a week already (Qld private schools get 3 weeks June hols), and are in Jerroa (Kiama),heading south down the beaches to green cape, up to the snow, and home to Brisbane via the New England. Walking away from jobs and schools full time isn’t an option for us and that’s ok. Who knows what the future holds.

Being retired I find that going away at the drop of a hat with no particular place to go suits me, As I live on the beach in paradise, I find that going bush is a change for me, and having spoken to a lot of travellers who sold up to explore this land after dreaming about it for so long only to find that one of them doesn't like it, one, in particular, comes to mind, man gets out of his bus "and what a bus it was" dragged out the genny and parked it next to me 10 meters from his bus, I sat there thinking that it was a lot of bus for one person "it looked brand new and was full size" anyway he came over to talk after he set up, he wasn't alone his wife was on the bus but refused to come out, she didn't like all the dust, the bus was new, yes they sold the house to live in the bus and had no base to return to, he said he was at his wits end, I felt so sorry for him as I slid into my swag that night.

I am travelling at the moment and am seeing lots of young families out and about. I agree that it is an enlightening experience for children to see their own country and live to a routine where sharing camping duties is also a learning experience in the social era.

However, the details left out in that article are the ones that worry me.
- How do these young ones finance a long trip? Work, is the obvious answer but more detail would be interesting.
- Kids who are going back into school life need to keep up with the curriculum. It is very frightening for kids to go into school and find their skills are behind.
- Social interaction for all, especially for kids, is a big personal development experience and adults have to be aware of how their kids are developing.

But, enough!! Hope they enjoy themselves.

bill

I so look forward to being on the road more, will probably leave for a trip within one week from retirement lol.
We took almost 4 months off using my LSL and holidays owing. It was a blast and we looooved it.
Given that we have done it (albeit for 4 months) I am in a position to wonder how others do it for longer before retirement;. Reasons are:
1) finances. If it wasn't for me having paid leave we would not have been able to afford it.
2) retirement funds. There is no way I could take unpaid leave for a year, find a job again, without a significant dent in my super contributions which I will need if I want to be a funded retiree.
3) schooling for kids: We were lucky with our 11 y.o. as the teachers were supporting to learn from the "open university". For all subjects they gave us simple task request; one example was English where the curriculum was to write a travel publication. She was simply asked to do up her own with the freedom of using a destination topic of her experience. BUT for maths we had to keep up. My wife being a teacher that was no problem, but proved to actually be quite time consuming. Imagine having to do that for all subjects - not possible in my opinion it seems to me to be a full time job in itself!