We love to travel, our respective jobs at the time allowed us to leave for only 5 weeks and a few long weekends , thanks to the many French public holidays.
I lived in the Netherlands for a year thanks to the Erasmus project. With Matthieu, we had been talking for a long time about going to work abroad.
One day, a co -worker quit to go on a world tour . At first, I found this project completely crazy. Leaving for a year without working, how is that possible?
Then after several exchanges with Matthieu and research on the internet, reading blogs, we said to ourselves “why not us? ! _ A year and a half after our first discussions on this subject, we took off, with tears in our eyes of happiness, for the Sao Paulo carnival . This is the project we are most proud of to date. We got to know each other better and we never regretted this choice.
Through this blog, we hope to inspire other adventure-starved journeys !
Planning a round-the-world itinerary: our technique 2
Summary
When to go and for how long?
What budget? How to save money?
The main items of expenditure
Method for planning a route
Our one-year itinerary
When to go and for how long?
What period of his life to leave?
This is obviously a very personal decision .
For our part, Matthieu, 28, was an entrepreneur before our departure. He was therefore able to close his business before leaving.
For my part, 27 years old, as an employee, I decided to resign in order to be able to leave at the time that suited us. I even turned down a long-awaited promotion for this project. Today I absolutely do not regret this choice.
Generally the long-term travelers we met were between 25 and 30 years old and had professional experience behind them which allowed them to make some savings.
Planning a round-the-world itinerary: our technique 3
What is the average duration of a trip around the world?
According to the survey by the tourdumondiste site , 45% of world tours last between 6 and 12 months . For our part, we left for 12 months because we bought our plane ticket through an agency, we had to return a maximum of one year after our departure. We have obviously chosen the maximum authorized duration!
Planning a round-the-world itinerary: our technique 4
What budget? How to save money?
The average budget for a one-year world tour
The average budget for a one-year world tour is €15,000. This is what we found by talking with other travelers we met along the way and browsing many blogs.
Obviously this budget can vary enormously from one project to another. For example, if you don’t want to fly, you’ll save between €3,000 – €4,000 on your overall budget. If you travel to Asia for a year, your budget will also be significantly lower.
Conversely, if you wish to visit all the continents , this will increase your plane budget. If you stay in the most expensive countries, United States, Australia, New Zealand, Canada or the islands your budget will increase considerably.
We explain below how to obtain the average budget by country.
Planning a round-the-world itinerary: our technique 5
How to save money to travel around the world?
Take stock of your expenses: we have manually listed all our expenses for the last 3 months on Excel then we have categorized them: rent, taxes, subscriptions (internet, telephone, Netflix, etc.), supermarket food, clothing, leisure food (restaurants/ bars), and trips/weekends.
Quickly I realized that I was spending almost 15% of my budget on clothing . I had only been working for a few years, I had become a real shopping addict … I didn’t think I would spend such a sum on a few shopping sprees.
About a year and a half before our departure, I completely changed my habits to save this amount for our trip.
If you don’t want to bother processing your bank data by hand (in excel) you can download a budget management application such as Nestor, Linxo, etc.
Reduce leisure expenses: we went away about once a month for a long weekend in France or abroad, then we also went abroad for 3 weeks a year. Knowing that a trip of one awaited us, we naturally decided to reduce our pace.
For example, we spent time with our families during our holidays the year before departure. We have also favored carpooling, which is much more economical.
We thus saved the money of a trip and several weekends!
3.Sell your stuff: we lived in a Parisian 40m2 full of stuff that we didn’t use (electronics, clothes, books…).
As you can guess, the good corner has become our best friend! About 6 months before our departure, we sorted our belongings and then posted our ads on the site.
Planning a round-the-world itinerary: our technique 6
Focus on shopping for the trip: do not renew your wardrobe before you leave. If you want a new pair of shoes some time before the scheduled departure date, try to reason with yourself! You are leaving in a few months, if you don’t plan to take it with you, wait for your return to change it.
Your belongings will be stored during your trip, so they may deteriorate, we found some clothes with moth holes.
Rent your apartment on a platform like Airbnb: for this, of course, you have to be an owner. Unfortunately we were unable to do so. We met travelers who were able to earn a few hundred euros for the trip.
Our advice and accommodation
– Selling your stuff:
The good corner that we don’t even present anymore is the ideal. We have sold many goods (clothing, electronics, books, etc.)
Momox for books, by scanning the bar code of your books the site will tell you its buyback price. You will drop off your package at a relay point. The site bears the shipping costs. The advantage is that you will sell several books at the same time.
Vinted which specializes in clothing, this site did not exist it seems to me at the time. Today I use it to sell business. If you want to take a look, my username is: morissetfloriane.
– Use a cashback site:
Igraal: we love this site, it will allow you to earn money thanks to the purchases you make. As soon as you make a purchase from one of the partner sites (about 1400 sites) you get a commission (money). For example, we used it for the purchase of our washing machine at Darty. By following this link, you will earn €3 welcome and we will also earn €3!
– Accommodation:
Airbnb: If you are an owner, you can offer your accommodation on Airbnb , the site will tell you the amount of your potential earnings!
Planning a round-the-world itinerary: our technique 7
3.The main items of expenditure
For our part, we spent €15,000 per person. You will find below our main items of expenditure.
We don’t have a vaccine budget because our mutual insurance company paid for them. We were happy when we discovered this good surprise, because the bill was 500€/person .
We also don’t have an equipment budget because we managed to get almost all of our equipment offered to us on our birthday and Christmas preceding the trip. We also had a good part already in our possession since we had invested during previous trips. You can easily count around 1000€ per person.
Our detailed budget for our one-year world tour
4.ethod for planning a route
Building your travel itinerary is no small feat. In any case, you will not be able to do everything or see everything. And you know what ? Well it doesn’t matter during your trip you will see a lot of things while passing through 1 or 15 countries.