How to Live a Life of Travel: 15 Tips to Get You Started
Sick of staring at your travel mood board? This is your year to finally pack it all up and live the life of travel you’ve been dreaming of. If you’re hesitating to take the leap, we’ve got you. These are the top tips to kickstart your location-independent lifestyle.
How to live a life centered around long-term travel
Ditching the 9-to-5 for a life centered around travel used to be reserved for the rich and famous. But now it’s easier than ever to live an always-on-the-go, globe-trotting lifestyle. (Still hard to snag a private plane, though.) If you’ve been dreaming of going location-independent and traveling long-term, this is your sign: It’s time to take the leap.
1. Downsize your life
The first step to living a life of long-term travel is to trim some of that material fat. After all, there’s only so much you can bring with you on the road—and whatever you don’t take with you, you have to pay to put in storage. So roll up your sleeves and take inventory of everything you own. What’s worth packing? What’s worth storing? And what’s on its way out? Downsizing is also a great way to boost your travel budget by host.
2. Meticulously track expenses and your budget
A life of long-term travel is different than your annual, one-week vacation where you might feel comfortable making it rain every night at the bar. In order to make long-term travel sustainable and affordable, you need a system to keep track of your spending and stay on a budget. You can go old school with a notebook, flex your Excel skills with a spreadsheet, or turn to programs like Mint to manage it all for you. But don’t skip this step! A healthy budget = a healthy life.
3. Embrace minimalism
Whether you’re committing to a checked bag or you’re going footloose and fancy-free with just a travel backpack and a carry-on, at the end of the day, there’s only so much you can bring with you on a plane. TLDR; you’ve got to be cut-throat with your packing list. And while it may be hard in the beginning to do away with your assortment of sun hats and your extensive skincare routine, once you start living with less, you’ll realize you never needed that much to begin with. If you’re having a hard time transitioning to minimalism, here’s a pro tip: Pack a suitcase and live out of it at home for a week. This way, you’ll learn what you really can’t live without and what is really just dead weight in your bag.
4. Learn to pack efficiently
Packing a suitcase is a true art form—and like anything, practice makes perfect. The more you travel, the better you’ll get at trimming your packing list, organizing your toiletries, and Tetris-ing a cute but functional wardrobe into a carry-on. The first step in learning to pack efficiently is finding your ride-or-die suitcase. (Psst! These are the best luggage and suitcase brands for this year.) Next, packing cubes help you stay organized on the go, no matter how behind you are on laundry. And there’s no underestimating a good toiletry bag to keep you organized and TSA-compliant.
5. Determine your travel priorities
There are a lot of different ways to live a location-independent lifestyle. Instead of copy-and-pasting someone else’s experience, sit down and have a conversation with yourself to understand what YOU really want. What kind of travel experiences do you seek? What do you not want to do on your travels? Do you want to hit up hostels? Stay in hotels? Rent out Airbnbs? Do you want to crisscross the country or fly across the pond? How often do you want to change location? Of course, you can adjust your travel itinerary along the way, but asking yourself these questions beforehand will help you prioritize your bucket list and stay true to yourself so you have the best journey possible.
6. Travel during the off-season
If you’re getting ready to embark on long-term travel, congratulations! You’ve not only freed yourself from the 9-to-5 with your location-independent lifestyle; you’ve also freed yourself from living for the weekend. Next time you search for travel tickets, consider flying on a Tuesday or Wednesday—the cheapest days for domestic air travel. Also, try to plan your travel hopping during the off-season (i.e., November to February in the Northern Hemisphere and June to August in the Southern Hemisphere). Not only will you ditch the tourists and the crowds, but you’ll also score cheaper rates on hotels and other amenities.
7. Connect with other travelers
One of the hardest parts of committing to a long-term travel lifestyle is making new friends. Let’s be honest, it can be really hard to make new friends as an adult! And that challenge is amplified when you don’t go to an office every day or stay in one place for very long. To stay one step ahead of the solo travel blues, make the effort to connect with other travelers on the road BEFORE you get lonely. Join digital nomad Facebook groups. Look for location-independent travel groups online. And go to expat or traveler meet-ups whenever you can. Remember, as we get older, we often have to treat friendship like dating: You need to be willing to put yourself out there and deal with some duds to find real, lasting friendships.
8. Create a fitness plan
When you’re always on the road, it’s all too easy to forget about your fitness regime. But in order to transform travel from a short-term fling to a long-term lifestyle, you need to take steps to introduce a sense of normalcy and routine to your daily life. (Plus, you know it’s the right thing to do for your health.) If you don’t want to pay expensive gym fees every time you change locations, there are other options! There are plenty of workout programs you can subscribe to online and follow along with your laptop—not to mention all the free videos on YouTube. If working out with a laptop isn’t your thing, just head outside! Jog, bike, do yoga in the park—just make sure to move!
9. Use a VPN
Home or abroad, safety is sexy—and that means Internet safety, too! Especially if you’re booting up your laptop on a daily basis to work in coffee shops and connect to public WiFi networks, you need to make sure you’re using a VPN. A VPN encrypts your data and masks your IP address to protect you from bad actors while you’re surfing the web. Plus, a VPN lets you browse your favorite sites just like you would at home, even if you’re halfway across the world (i.e., no problem accessing a U.S. website or your go-to streaming services if you're traveling internationally). Check out our list of the best VPNs for travel to help you find one that works best for you.
10. Check out travel rewards programs
Hold up. We’re not saying you should go out there and apply for every travel rewards credit card you can get your hands on. But if you’re committing to a lifestyle of long-term travel, it’s worth looking into programs that can help you save money on the road. For example, many credit cards let you rack up points that you can use to pay for flights or other travel expenses. And while budget airlines can definitely be a girl’s best friend, it may be worth your while as a frequent traveler to pay a little extra and commit to an airline alliance so you can start collecting miles to cash in later.
11. Research your travel destinations
We’re all for spontaneity and going with the flow, but sometimes being a little Type A can come in handy. Hear us out: You don’t have to design a complete travel itinerary of everywhere you want to go for the next couple of years (unless that's your thing, in which case, you do you). But it IS a good idea to do a little research on each travel destination before you arrive. For example, checking out safety tips and rough neighborhoods to avoid (especially if you’re traveling solo) is always a good idea. Also, if there’s a country you want to visit for which you’ll need a visa, it’s definitely good to know that information ahead of time so you can fill out any necessary paperwork calmly and stress-free.
12. Build a travel resource toolkit
There’s no such thing as being overly prepared! Whether you’re setting off for a year of travel or you’re fully committing to the location-independent lifestyle, it’s good to have a set of go-to travel resources to help you along the way. For example, following travel blogs, subscribing to relevant travel newsletters, and joining online travel communities will help you stay clued into the location-independent industry so you can get a steady stream of travel tips, product recommendations, and other resources to help you navigate new countries, find travel deals, meet new people, and overall have the best long-term travel experience possible.
13. Embrace slow travel
A life centered around travel is a marathon, not a sprint. Especially for newbies, it’s easy to forget that a location-independent lifestyle does not mean you’re forever on vacation (although it can feel like that sometimes!). But if you party every day like you’re on an all-star vacation and change countries every weekend, you’re going to burn out fast. Instead, try to embrace slow travel. Not only will you save money by staying in one spot for longer, but you’ll get to more deeply learn about and experience your new environment—and pace yourself for months or even years to come of living a location-independent life.
14. Start with baby steps
If you want to live a life centered around travel but you haven’t done much traveling yet, we get that it can all be a little overwhelming. And that’s okay—don’t push yourself! Rather than going from zero to 60 and heading off for a 100% remote year on the other side of the world, it’s also cool to start small. Maybe for your first trip, you just want to do a week away. Or maybe you’ll stay in an Airbnb for a month just a few hours from home to get a taste of something different. There’s no one golden location-independent lifestyle; instead, experiment with what feels right for you. (Spoiler: There are no wrong answers.)
15. Face your travel fears
No matter how seasoned of a traveler you are, there are always little hiccups and snags that will crop up along the way and stress us out. After all, it’s a big, wide world out there, and while traveling is definitely a fun experience, it can be scary sometimes. Before you start traveling, consider taking the time to write down what fears you have and what stresses you out about traveling. This way, you can come up with strategies to help you tackle these sticky situations should they ever come up so you’ll feel prepared, safe, and ready to move forward.
16. Take the leap!
This one is for all the researchers, the planners, and the preparers. (Yes, we realize we just told you to stop and take the time to prepare.) But while we’re definitely advocates for travel research and travel planning, at some point, you’ve just got to pull the trigger and do it. So get out there and book your first trip! Commit to a travel date and make the booking arrangements. It’s easy to get caught up in the planning phase and wait until what feels like the perfect moment to embark on long-term travel. But there are no perfect moments. The best way to start living your dreams is to just start—today.
Wrapping up
Your big dreams of visiting 30 countries, taking a cooking class in Mexico, and finally snagging a picture in front of the Eiffel Tower? They’re all possible. If you want to live a life centered around travel and freedom, we’re your gals to help you figure out how to get started. For more tips on living a location-independent life, subscribe to the SiteSee newsletter here.
