“OMG! Are y’all going to Italy?! You should totally go to Italy!”
The number one question people ask us when we tell them about the Radical Sabbatical ™ is “OMG, are you going to X country?! You have to go to X country, it’s my favorite!”
Typically, we have to tell them “no, we’re not going to x country” which inevitably sends us down the rabbit hole of….
If you’re not going to X, where are you even going?
How did you decide to go there?
How did you decide on 15 months?
The short answer is obvious – we decided based on practicality and money. The long answer is more nuanced.
📅 we knew we wanted to take an extended period of time off, that allowed us to get to hard to reach places, with enough time to see more than one region of the world. We settled on a year because it’s a typical measure of time that's easy for people to comprehend. So, check done, we settled on a year (to be revisited).
🌎so we have a year…where are we going? In my mind it was settled – half the year in Latin America, half the year in the Middle East. Asked, answered, and essentially booked, babes. In the spirit of being an accommodating partner I asked Quintin to make a list of countries he would be really sad to miss to ensure we were aligned. His answer?!
“New Zealand, Vietnam, Germany, Japan, with the caveat that we go to places that are a hassle to get to since we have the time”
Thrilled I asked as that little caveat essentially takes half of Latin America off the table. Dream, thwarted.
Knowing my vision of a half Latin America, half Middle East trip was no longer going to fly, I sat down and attempted to open my mind. If the sky really was the limit, what would I like to experience outside of Latin America and the Middle East?
Ethiopia, Sri Lanka, Japan, and to see a gorilla in the wild.
After both Quintin and I partook in this exercise, we had a honking list of countries. More than one could possibly visit in a year, even two.
With our master list in hand, I did a few things:
Spent a truly astronomical amount of time on Google Maps working to understand what was practical from a geography perspective.
Spent an equally astronomical amount of time reading & watching travel blogs to understand what was feasible from a budgetary perspective.
Spent admittedly less time on .gov websites making sure there weren’t travel or visa restrictions that would prohibit us from entering any counties on our list.
❌ During this process, we lost several countries. Sri Lanka bit the dust – given the other countries on our list, geographically it didn’t make sense. Bhutan also fell off as there is a Sustainable Development Fee of $200 USD per day, per person to be a tourist in the country. For the type of trip we’re doing, and operating on a fixed income, this wasn’t feasible. Nowhere fell off due to entry requirements, because a US passport is a blessing.
With a “whittled down” list of countries the real work started. When do we start this trip, where do we start this trip, what’s our route and really how long do we need?!
After spending approximately 400 billion hours on Audley Travel pouring over their month-by-month, country-by-country, region-by-region breakdown of the best time to visit each destination on our list, I assembled a plan.
If we started in New Zealand in February, we could work our way back east, following the sun, hitting each continent during either the high or shoulder season.
Ultimately, this information highlighted how many weeks we’ll want on each continent before we need to head to the next continent so as to not miss the ideal time to partake in the experiences we want to have. Armed with this knowledge, the timeline built itself (read: I built the timeline).
(5) weeks in New Zealand before we need to be in South East/East Asia for spring!
(10) weeks in South East/ East Asia before we needed to be in Europe for summer!
(10) weeks in Europe before we need to be in Africa for the dry season!
(20) weeks until we need to be in South America for summer. Referring back to the countries we want to visit, and the experiences we want to have, we’re targeting (17) weeks in Africa and (3) weeks in Oman!
Finally, we have (15) weeks in South America, which brings us to (60) weeks even!
💕Through this process I realized this is much more of a “continent by season” game, rather than a “country per month” game. This affords us so much more flexibility. While we still have a hit list of countries we’re invested in visiting, we’re much more intent on having the flexibility to go where the experience takes us, rather than the rigidity of “we have to be in Japan by May 5”
But because y’all are annoying and love a plan, below is the list of countries we anticipate visiting, in order of how we will move back east.
Oceana: New Zealand
Asia: Thailand, Vietnam, Japan
Europe: Germany, Austria, Scandinavia, Spain
Africa: Morocco, South Africa, Zambia, Uganda, Ethiopia , Egypt
Asia: Oman, UAE
South America: Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina, Chile, Bolivia
If you have any advice, recommendations OR MOST IMPORTANTLY CONTACTS/FRIENDS in any of these countries (but also regions because we are not tied to the countries!) please please please don’t be a stranger!
