9 Important Reasons Why Long-Term Travel is the Best

The idea of long-term travel can be a scary proposition.

The uncertainty of being away from home for a long time, the anticipation of having life-changing experiences and the fear of going outside your comfort zone are all real.  

Depending on who you are, your personal circumstances and also your values dictate whether it is for you.   

So what is long-term travel?  

In a time frame, I would define long-term travel as anywhere from three months up to a year, or even longer. Another way of looking at it could be a one-way ticket somewhere.  Or even just selling up your possessions and heading abroad with no set time frame in mind.  Long-term travel is whatever you define it as.  The consistent theme is that it is beyond your usual two-week holiday.  

Long-term travel is a different type of travel.  A type of travel every traveller should try at least once.

Starting in 2019, my family and I sold our home and travelled the world non-stop for nine months.  

We sacrificed a lot to achieve this dream.  For some, that may be too much.  I get that.  What we got in return from the whole experience is priceless.  The value of these nine months away and what we learned changed our lives.

Beginning the journey in South-East Asia, we moved on to Europe, the UK and the United States before returning to New Zealand about two weeks before most of the world went into a Covid enforced lockdown in March 2020.

So why should you consider long-term travel?  What did long-term travel teach us?  The short answer is plenty.  

Read on to learn nine of the most important reasons I think long-term travel is the best (and why you should try it).

You Stop Counting the Days

When you travel long term, the day of the week doesn’t really matter.   

Your calendar doesn’t matter anymore. You relax more.

Unlike your typical two-week holiday, there might not be a defined end date looming just over the horizon.  The last few days of a short holiday would often make me anxious.

During our nine months of globe-trotting, I stopped looking at my watch and focussed on being in the present.

It is always a good idea to have a schedule of sorts for practical reasons such as accommodation but aside from that, having no time frame opens up many more possibilities in your schedule.   It allows flexibility and allows you to have random times where you can do something totally off the cuff.

Stay a little longer somewhere you like, move on if you don’t.  Time doesn’t need to bind you like on a normal holiday.

Long-Term Travel can be Cheaper than Living at Home

In some parts of the world, your living costs from day to day can be ridiculously cheap.  

From Asia to the Americas, Africa and even Europe, you can live a very comfortable life with decent meals, good accommodation and activities starting at about $30 a day.  For context, that is the price of a cafe lunch here in New Zealand.  

If you are fortunate enough to be able to earn some cash on the road, either from your laptop, teaching a language or by other means, then your options are almost endless.

Your budget will determine your level of comfort and what you can do.  Just remember that your dollar can often stretch a lot further than you might think in some places.

We lived by the ocean in Portugal for three months and lived a very comfortable existence for less than half the price we would have back home.

You Spend More Time Outside

I can probably count on my fingers how many times I turned the television on during the nine months we were on the road.

The language barrier sometimes contributed to that, however, when you are abroad, travellers like to explore. That is outside. That is where the real excitement lies.

Staying inside our homes, as many of us do at home, does not have the same appeal when you are travelling.  Things change when you go abroad.  You get out more.

It is important to recognise you need quiet days when travelling long term.  It can be exhausting.  A relaxing day at the campsite with a book or just chilling at a local cafe is needed from time to time to recharge those batteries.  

The beauty of long-term travel is you can take as much time as you need to.

You Get Used to Living with Less

We can all do with less ‘stuff’.  

Many of us live in an existence of excess.  Our homes are full of things we don’t really need.

Long-term travel is the antidote to excess.  To travel long-term comfortably requires you to live a minimalist life.  It is a lifestyle far from the material items we convince ourselves we need at home.

For nine months, my family and I had two suitcases and a couple of daypacks.  Most of that was for our one-year-old. We could probably have travelled and been comfortable with even less.  You work out quickly that you don’t need much to live.  

This lifestyle stayed with us when we returned.  The lessons of long-term travel don’t have to end when your trip does.

You Slow Down and Live Like a Local

Have you imagined living in an Italian village?  Or next to the ocean in Portugal?  Long-term travel allows you to do that.

Long-term travel is best experienced when you slow down.  Slowing down gives you a better understanding of where you are.  You become present and gain a new, more realistic perspective.  

Make yourself familiar at the local cafe, and get to know the shopkeepers by hanging around a while longer than you normally might.  

Through those experiences, we made friends.  We became more than just ‘another’ tourist.  Most of us only scratch the surface of where we visit.  The beauty of long-term travel is that you have the opportunity to immerse yourself into another culture in a way that only a longer stay can provide.  

You will probably pick up a bit of the local language, you may get invited to share a drink or a meal with some locals.  

Remember, people by nature are curious creatures.  

Locals are often just as curious about you, if you become a familiar face, you might make some new friends of your own.

No Housework!

I’m not sure about you, but housework is the bane of my existence.  I don’t mind a quick hoover here and there, but the idea of cleaning our home is a thought I don’t bear to think about.

When you travel long-term, you don’t have any of that.  Aside from laundry, cleaning a few dishes and a quick wipe down when leaving an Airbnb or a tidy up of the campsite, you can say goodbye to housework!

No housework leaves you more time for the fun stuff.  Like exploring your new neighbourhood or that morning swim in the ocean.

You Get to Meet More Family and Friends

With a more flexible itinerary, you get more of an opportunity to catch up with family and friends abroad.

Typically, timeframes are limited on a normal holiday.  Without a lot of planning ahead, this can mean some family or friends in the area might be unavailable or away when you visit.  Some places might be unrealistic to even get to on a two-week holiday.

When you travel long-term, your itinerary becomes easily adjustable.  Long-term travel may allow you the flexibility to catch up with a cousin you haven’t seen in years or visit that old school friend that you might not have otherwise.

On our travels, we saw friends and family that we might never have got the opportunity to visit.  

From visiting relatives in the USA to an old trekking buddy from Italy, we not only got the chance to catch up with these people, but we also got personal tour guides for a while.

You Get More Creative

When you travel long term, by its very nature, there are far fewer things to worry about.  

At times, all you might be concerned about could be what is for dinner that night.

With far fewer things consuming your mind, it opens up the creative side of your brain.  

Well, it did for me.  I found myself in a creative state that went far beyond any I had experienced at any other time in my life.  

Over many nights, my partner and I planned our futures.  We experienced a state of mind neither of us had ever experienced before.   The freedom we enjoyed by travelling long-term allowed our minds to broaden in a way that I doubt we could ever have done back home.   The creative juices we experienced while travelling continue to build our futures now.

On our terrace in Portugal, I typed the first few words of my book ‘Twenty’.  In Switzerland, the idea of a writing blog first came to mind.  

It felt like there was no limit to the ideas we were coming up with.

This creativity was an unexpected benefit of long-term travel.  Even though we aren’t travelling now, we both know that a flow state of creativity exists within us.  It took our adventure to bring it to the surface.

You Escape Society (For a While)

When you travel long term, you can’t help but live in the moment more.  

Over time, your mind changes to a point you might become unrecognisable to the ‘old’ you.  

Even on a short holiday, we often talk about returning feeling ‘refreshed’.  Multiply that ‘refreshed’ feeling by a hundred when you travel long term.  When you travel long term, work stress and other pressures fade away, or at the very least become easier to manage.  

When pressures from home slowly start to move from your conscious mind, the real you comes to the surface.   This new you might be someone you don’t know well, as it becomes apparent that the pressures we face in our normal lives are always there.  

Those pressures are a choice.

We all have baggage to deal with.  We have all had some sort of trauma at some stage.  If you have unresolved baggage, it comes with you, it doesn’t go away.  Travel does not fix those problems.  What long-term travel provides is a clearer perspective away from everything else that may help you deal with whatever is going on.  

I know it made my future path clearer for me to follow.

Summary

So there you have it, a list of nine of the most important reasons why travel long term may benefit you.

Long-term travel isn’t for everyone.  It can be challenging, it can be exhausting.  I don’t think it is something you could do forever, but it most definitely is something that I would encourage travellers to try once in their lifetime because the rewards are so great.

Have you travelled long term before?  What are your thoughts on this form of travel?  Let me know in the comments.