The Beginner’s Guide to

Long-Term Travel and Lifestyle Design

by Duane Storey,
migratorynerd.com

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 Table Of Contents

Introduction 4
Long-Term Travel 8
Common Misconceptions 9
I Can’t Afford To Travel 9
I Don’t Have Enough Time To Travel 10
I’m Too Old To Travel 10
Traveling Just Isn’t Safe 11
Saving Money 12
Ditch Your Apartment 12
Rent Your Home Out To Others 13
Park Your Car 14
Stay Away From Coffee Shops 15
Flying For Free 17
Best Travel Credit Cards in Canada 20
Best Travel Credit Cards in the United States 22
Booking Your Adventure 23
Flights 23
Accommodation 25
Staying Connected 28
Getting Travel Insurance 29
Staying Safe Abroad 31
Lifestyle Design 35
Lessons That I’ve Learned 39
Generating Passive-Income 41
Prioritizing What’s Important 43
Final Remarks 44
Share With Friends 45
Must-Read Books 46

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“Afoot and light-hearted I take to the open road.
Healthy, free, the world before me.”

Walt Whitman, Songs for the Open Road

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Introduction
Many of you reading this eBook were probably once like I was - bored
with my job and frustrated by the fact that I only received a token
amount of vacation each year. I’d spend most my time at work
dreaming about far-off exotic beaches or a foreign city I would explore
as soon as it was time for my yearly vacation. I’d often book a flight six
months in advance simply so I had an adventure to look forward to.

Most of us are led to believe that the daily grind is as good as it gets
for most of our adult lives, at least in North America. We wake up, we
go to work, we head home, we eat, we sleep, then wake up and do it
all over again, five or six days per week, for thirty or forty years. If
you’re like me, you would occasionally toss in a few pub nights with
friends just to try and keep your sanity.

If you talk to financial advisors or friends, most of them advocate

working hard during your 30s to 60s so that you can hopefully have
some type of comfortable retirement in your twilight years. That
sounds like a great plan and all, other than the fact you are essentially
sacrificing the best years of your life for something that may never
come.

I read a book a few years ago called “The 4-Hour Workweek” that
really changed my mindset regarding life, vacation and retirement. I
realized that you could still enjoy life today and also have a
comfortable retirement later.

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WIth that in mind, I decided to start a business with my friend Dale
about four years ago. We decided to take something we were
passionate about, the popular blogging software WordPress, and try to
make money off of it. For the first few years we mostly created
WordPress websites for businesses and bloggers, often starting at
around $2,500 a project.

It may not seem like a lot, but we could probably fit in four of those a
month, which amounted to $10,000 a month for two guys. We weren’t
rich by any stretch of the imagination, but we could set our own hours,
write-off all of computer-related business expenses, a portion of our
living expenses (since we worked at home), and had a company we
could call our own. Instead of going to the office every day and
working at a job we didn’t like, we had a job we were both passionate
about, and the freedom to do what we wanted, when we wanted.

Around that time we also created a free add-on for WordPress that
started as a side-project for one of our clients. It was called WPtouch,
and it helped make a WordPress website look great on iPhones and
other popular smartphones at the time. It was a something we enjoyed
working on, and we would add a feature or two to it every few weeks.

One day we looked at the number of downloads of our free plugin and
were shocked that it was over two million! Not only was it something
that we thought was pretty cool, but apparently others did as well.

In 2009 at WordCamp San Francisco, the main WordPress event each

year, our little plugin was voted the #1 plugin (out of approximately

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20,000) for all of WordPress - all for something we created with a little
free time and a lot of passion.

So in 2010 we decided to make a commercial version of the plugin that

would include professional support and a few new features. We
essentially bet the farm on that project, and invested 3-months worth of
our time into the development of it. Had the commercial version of our
product failed our company would have survived, but it would have
taken us a few months to claw ourselves out of the financial hole we
dug. But no great reward in life comes without sacrifice and risk, and it
was something we both felt strongly about.

That was three years ago, and today the sales of WPtouch Pro, the
commercial version of WPtouch we built, provides enough revenue to
fund full-time employment for five individuals. It also is a completely
passive income stream - customers are buying the plugin from our
website 7 days a week, 24 hours a day. Every day when I wake up
there is more money in our company bank account than there was
when I went to sleep - that provides great motivation to grab a coffee
every morning and add a few new features to the plugin. And best of
all, it has provided me with the financial security and lifestyle freedom
to travel whenever I want.

In the last three years I have visited close to 30 countries, often

working on my business from coffee shops, pubs or and the occasional
poolside patio. Looking back now it’s hard to believe that I was once
stuck in a cubicle job staring at the clock.

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After traveling the world for three years, I’ve seen amazing places,
walked with penguins, fallen in love, and sampled countless cuisines.
But I’ve also made plenty of mistakes and learned a great deal about
travel along the way.

The first part of this eBook details my best tips and advice for planning
and embarking on a long-term travel adventure. It’s a detailed
summary of my experiences over these past three years in a series on
concise tips that you can hopefully follow.

In the second part of this eBook I address lifestyle design, the art of
restructuring your life to accommodate the things in it that are
important, such as a travel. If long-term travel is a goal in your life, then
hopefully you’ll be able to use the information there to make it a reality.

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Long-Term Travel
While the term ‘long-term travel’ may scare some of you, it doesn’t
have to apply only to journeys that last a year or more. In fact, I would
consider any trip of a month or longer to be a long-term travel
adventure, since you often have to make special preparations in your
life to accommodate the trip.

While a one or two week trip can still be a great travel experience,
often a person needs a month or more in a new destination to really
start to appreciate the local culture or customs. If you went to Thailand
for a week you would probably spend your days alternating between
the bar and the beach. Undoubtedly you would have a great time, but I
doubt you would have much time to explore the many amazing
temples or know the absolute joy of riding a scooter around the
countryside in Northern Thailand. With a journey of three or four weeks
you can easily visit most of the major cities in most countries, and will
get a chance to fully appreciate some of the local culture.

I’ve done both types of travel over the course of my life - one-week all-
inclusive vacations to the Caribbean on one side of the spectrum, and
a three-month trip to Buenos Aires, Argentina on the other side. I enjoy
them both, but there’s something special about being able to spend
more than a few weeks exploring a city without the constraint of a
looming flight a few days away.

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Common Misconceptions

It’s amazing to me just how many misconceptions there are regarding

travel. Many people assume that it’s something only the rich can afford,
or that travel is primarily a domain for the young. But that’s not the case
at all.

Here are some of the common misconceptions I routinely encounter

when I talk to people about their long-term travel plans.

I Can’t Afford To Travel

Without a doubt, certain aspects of travel can be expensive, namely

transcontinental flights. For example, it’s pretty difficult to find a return
flight from the west coast of North America to Sydney, Australia for less
than $1,000 return. And there are certain parts in the world, like New
York City, where even a simple room can cost $150 or more per night.

But most parts of the world are actually quite affordable. A person can
rent a one-bedroom apartment in Thailand with internet, air
conditioning, and access to a beautiful pool for less than $600 per
month (I’ve done it). You can then walk down to the beach whenever
you want for a nice fresh dish of Pad Thai or Green Curry, complete
with an ice-cold Tiger Beer, all for only 50 Baht, or roughly $2.50. In
those parts of the world you can often live like a queen or king for less
than $50 per day.

Many of my friends in North America will easily spend $1,000 - $2,000

for a one-week all inclusive vacation each year in Mexico or the

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Dominican Republic. For that same amount of money you could fly to
South-east Asia and spend a whole month or more exploring a few
different countries with a backpack.

I Don’t Have Enough Time To Travel

It’s quite possible that like many people you only get two or three
weeks of vacation a year. But there are always ways to try and make
longer duration travel work.

One easy way is to ask your manager if you can work extra hours and
bank some time off that you can use for an extended vacation. You
would then need to put in those extra hours, but the payoff would be
having what would probably be one of the best experiences of your life
when you actually set out on your adventure. If you worked four extra
hours every week you could bank at least two full days of travel each
month. In just five months you would have enough days off, combined
with your yearly two-week vacation, to take one full month off to
explore the world on your own terms.

Another less popular option is to simply quit your job. It might seem
dramatic, but if you don’t care too much about your job and are pretty
confident you could get a new one when your travels were over, you
really have nothing to lose and everything to gain.

I’m Too Old To Travel

I once met a 75 year old german man hiking along the West Coast
Trail, a 75km hike along the west coast of Vancouver Island in Canada.

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He was there because it was something he had dreamed of doing for
years, and finally decided to make it happen.

I’ve also spent time talking to countless couples in their 50s and 60s in
various hostels around the world (one of them in Ushuaia, Argentina,
the southernmost city in the world), many of which decided to forego
the RV and instead hop on a few airplanes to see different parts of the
world during their twilight years.

While hostels used to be places that were mostly occupied with

younger people, nowadays one tends to see a wide range of ages,
from 20 year olds all the way up to 70 year olds, in hostels. Often
couples or individuals outside of their ‘party days’ will opt for a private
room instead of a dormitory-style room, but you will usually still see
these people mingling with everyone else in the hostel common areas.

So don’t let age deter you from living out your dreams - none of the
people I have met during my journeys around the planet have.

Traveling Just Isn’t Safe

It doesn’t matter how many countries I visit, each and every time I get
on a plane my mom calls me and tells me to make sure that I’m careful.
In her mind the world is a scary place, filled with war, poverty, dead
tourists in Mexico, and people getting robbed wherever you look.
When you watch the nightly news on the television, it’s not hard to see
why many people believe the world is that scary.

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But the truth is that I’ve been all over the planet and I can say without a
doubt that it is probably just as safe as where you live in the world. So
don’t be afraid of the world - it’s generally a really safe place, especially
if you follow my tips for staying safe later on in this book.

Saving Money

After traveling around the world for a year I sat down to work out the
math for how much my entire trip cost me. When I was all done
crunching numbers, I was actually a bit surprised to learn that in the
course of a year, I had actually saved money by traveling when
compared to the lifestyle that I had back home. That was shocking to
me, as it is likely shocking to you. But most of us live in expensive
countries, and the moment you switch from the dollar to another
currency such as the Thai Baht or the Argentine Peso, you can almost
always receive better value for the money you spend.

Here are some of the ways that I saved money during that first year, as
well as a few to help you save even more.

Ditch Your Apartment

Total Cost Savings: $500 - $1,200 per month

Making housing or rent payments on either an empty house or

apartment while you are away is one of the worst uses of money
imaginable, and can easily destroy the monthly budget of a long-term
travel adventure.

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If you are in someone else’s apartment and still have a lot of time left
on your lease, then possibly see if you can get a friend to stay there
while you are gone and give them a deal on rent. Many friends will ask
you if they can ‘house sit’ at your place for free, but often what they
really want is a deal on rent for a period of time.

If you are near the end of your lease, then just get rid of your
apartment while you are gone. Unless you are grandfathered in to an
amazing apartment, there will always be something else comparable to
what you had when you return. I purchased a storage locker for about
$80/month while I was away during my first year, and simply stored my
stuff there. It was still an added expense for my trip, but it was much
better to spend only $80/month on a storage locker than $1,200/mo on
an empty apartment.

Rent Your Home Out To Others

Total Cost Savings: $1,000 - $2,000 per month

If you own your own apartment, condominium, or house, things are

even better for you. Thanks to popular services like AirBNB.com, you
can likely even make some money while you are off exploring the
world.

AirBNB lets you rent out your apartment (or even one or two rooms in
your apartment) to individuals on the internet. They even provide
insurance in case something gets damaged during the stay. I’ve used
AirBNB quite a few times during my long-term travels, and all the
home-owners I’ve met have been really friendly and professional. I only

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have had good experiences with it, as have the home-owners I’ve met
along the way.

The only catch for using AirBNB if you leave the country is that you will
likely need someone to help administer your apartment while you are
gone. Often that will simply mean being at the apartment to welcome
new guests and give them the keys. If you have a family member
available that can help out, then that works best. You can even offer
them a reasonable amount of money (a percentage of each booking
for example) to sweeten the deal for them.

Park Your Car

Total Savings: Varies, but up to $300 or $400 a month

I have a love/hate relationship with my car. I like driving it around and

listening to music in it, and I sure am grateful when it saves me from
getting wet when it’s raining outside. But cars are one of the worst
assets you can own, because you are always spending money on them
and they are almost always depreciating in price every year.

During our first trip together, a rock was flung at my brand-new Mazda
3 Sport from the semi-truck ahead of me, completely smashing the
windshield. That one event cost me a day of my time and about $300
to have it replaced. Another time some kid bumped the side of my car
with his bike and then proceeded to ride off into the sunset. It was
about $800 worth of damage that my insurance fixed, but I still had to
pay the $300 deductible for the repair work.

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I think a lot of people don’t realize just how much money their vehicle
costs, even if it’s something they own outright without any type of car
payments.

My car personally costs me about $40 a week just in gas costs. Every
few months I also give it an oil-change to keep it happy, and that costs
me approximately $50 each time. My car eats tires like my girlfriend
eats Doritos, and that generally means I need to pay $800 to replace
all four tires every three years or so. Insurance in Canada is mandatory,
and my 2006 Mazda 3 costs me around $140 per month to keep it on
the road. If you put all of that math together, the total cost of using my
car is about $335 per month, and that doesn’t include any car
payments.

Whenever I go traveling I usually head down to the insurance broker

and replace my every-day insurance with storage insurance (which
covers any damage while it is off the road), and then park the car at my
sister’s house, often for months at a time. Storage insurance is usually
quite cheap, around $20 per month in my case, meaning that I have an
extra $315 a month to spend on travel whenever my car is parked and
not being used.

Stay Away From Coffee Shops

Total Savings: Varies, but up to $100 to $250 a month

Given that I work remotely, I can often be found around coffee shops
sipping a latte and borrowing the Wi-Fi. It’s something I personally
really enjoy, and I don’t think I could ever give it up completely. But the

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trust is that having all those fancy coffees can really eat into a person’s
budget each month.

If you have a coffee or two a day at Starbucks or another local coffee

shop, you are likely spending $100 - $200 a month. Toss in the
occasional muffin or cookie, and you can easily be up to $250/month.

If you can save the Starbucks for the weekends or special occasions
(like meeting up with a friend once a week), then you can definitely
save money. $100 per month may not seem like a huge savings, but
with that amount ($1,200 over 12 months) you can afford a return ticket
to South-East Asia or Europe from North America every single year.

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Flying For Free

One of the questions I often get asked is how I can afford all the travel
that I do. In addition to the tips I outlined on how to save money in the
previous sections, it’s also quite easy to earn free travel.

I use two methods to earn free mileage, both of which don’t take much
time or effort to set up.

Leveraging Frequent Flier Programs

Almost every major airline in the world has a loyalty program that can
be used to earn free travel. All you have to do is sign-up for their
programs on the Internet and make sure you use their mileage
numbers whenever you book a flight with that airline.

Most of the major airlines in the world are part of one of three airline
alliances: Star Alliance, One World and Skyteam. If you fly any member
airline in one of those alliances, you can often earn additional rewards
by quoting your loyalty program number when you fly in the alliance.

For example, I have a United Mileage Plus account, and United Airlines
is part of Star Alliance. Since Air Canada is also part of Star Alliance, I
can use my United Mileage Plus program number whenever I fly on Air
Canada and contribute to my loyalty account that way.

One of the biggest mistakes I made during my first year of travel was
not using my mileage account more. At the time I didn’t because I
didn’t realize that I could use my United Mileage plus number on all
Star Alliance partner airlines. Had I realized that during my first year, I

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easily would have earned enough mileage for a free transcontinental
flight during that first year. I currently have enough accumulated
mileage in my United Mileage Plus account for two intercontinental
return flights from North America, simply by quoting my Mileage Plus
number whenever I book and fly on a Star Alliance airline.

Recommended Loyalty Programs

They say you should never cook with a wine you wouldn’t drink.
Similarly, you should always sign-up for the loyalty programs of the
airlines you would actually want to fly on. Since most of my travel is
done between North and South America, I chose United Airlines’
Mileage Plus program for my main Star Alliance program. But if you live
in Canada, for example, you may want to use Air Canada instead.

If you’re not sure, then here are the ones I recommend:

Star Alliance: United Mileage Plus

One World: British Airways Executive Club

Skyteam: KLM Flying Blue

You should be able to apply for all three programs in 30 minutes or

less. This is one of those tasks that should be a ‘no-brainer’ since often
you will take these flights anyways and you might as well earn some
free mileage during the process.

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Leveraging Travel Credit Cards

One of the best ways to earn free travel is to take advantage of one of
the many travel credit cards in the United States and Canada. These
credit cards often offer a sign-up bonus, usually in the form of mileage
that you can trade for travel, as well as the ability to accumulate
additional mileage with each purchase. In less than three years I’ve
earned enough mileage with my travel credit cards to exchange for
three economy-class intercontinental return flights, simply by using my
credit card for most of my purchases.

I obviously don’t recommend using credit cards if you are one of those
people who can’t pay off your entire credit card balance in full at the
end of each month. If you miss a payment then your reward
accumulation for the month is effectively nullified by the credit card
interest you will have to pay, and often you will be worse off than if you
hadn’t used the card. But if you can pay off your credit card in full each
month then you can easily earn some free mileage, just by using your
card.

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Best Travel Credit Cards in Canada

At the time of writing, here are the three best credit cards in Canada in
terms of their ability to help you accumulate free airline mileage. I
actually own all three of these cards, but for the majority of my
purchases I now use the Capital One Aspire Travel World MasterCard.

1. Capital One® Aspire Travel™ World MasterCard®

This card gives you 35,000 (roughly $350) points worth of free travel
just for signing up. You will pay an annual fee of around $120 per year,
but that is almost covered by the 10,000 points (roughly $100 value)
you will receive each year as a bonus. I’ve only had this card for six
months and I’m almost up to $1,000 worth of free travel with it.
Another huge benefit is that you can redeem the miles on whichever
airline you want - that’s a big plus since many other credit cards force
you use their own travel services to book travel, and often there are
limited flights with those.

2. Scotiabank Gold American Express Card

With a $99 fee this card has a lower annual cost than the Capital One
Aspire Travel World MasterCard. It only gives you 15,000 miles for
signing up, which is around $150 worth of free travel. That’s lower than
the Capital One card, but is offset by the fact that you earn 4 miles for
every $1 worth of purchases. So while you receive less mileage for
signing up, you can potentially earn more free travel with your monthly
purchases due to the faster accumulation rate.

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3. TD First Class Travel Visa Infinite Card

This was my primary credit card for a few years, and I managed to earn
about $1,500 worth of free travel with it. It has an annual fee of $120,
but they will waive it if you open a bank account with TD and leave
$5,000 in it each month (which is what I ended up doing). You’ll
receive about $200 worth of free travel for signing up, and will receive
3 miles for every $1 you charge to your card. The one big downside to
this card is that you have to book your award travel through their
partner website at Expedia. I personally don’t like booking through
places like Expedia because often when things go wrong you get
tossed under the bus. But it’s still a great card and I earned a few free
trips with it, one of which was to Machu Picchu in Peru.

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Best Travel Credit Cards in the United States

At the time of writing, here are the best travel rewards cards in the
United States. Using one of these cards is a great way to earn free
travel.

1. Barclaycard Arrival Card

The Barclaycard Arrival card is one of the best travel credit cards on
the market. The card has an $89 annual credit card fee, but it is
waived in the first year. It also gives a 40,000 mile sign-up bonus
whenever you spend $1,000 or more during your first 90 days, which is
enough for $400 worth of free travel.

You’ll accumulate additional mileage at a rate of 2 miles for each dollar

spent, and also receive a 10% refund for any mileage that you do
redeem. That means your miles are effectively worth 2.2 cents for
each one, which is great value. In addition, there are no foreign
currency exchange fees at all, which is an amazingly deal for anyone
who travels to other countries - normally you’ll get dinged 2 - 3% with
each transaction you make.

2. Capital One Venture Rewards Visa Signature Card

New card holders receive a 10,000 point sign-up bonus when they
spend $1,000 or more within the first 90 days. There is a $59 annual
fee, and mileage accumulates at a rate of 2 miles for each $1 spent. In
addition, there are also no foreign currency fees. It’s not as great a deal
as the Barclaycard, but it’s still a high-value card that makes it easy to
obtain free flights.

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Booking Your Adventure

Well you’ve made it - you’ve decided to hit the open skies and start
living out your dreams. Congratulations!

Here are some of the best online services and tools that I use to plan
flights and book accommodation when I’m traveling.

Flights

Whenever possible I always try to book flights directly through the

airline that offers them. For example, if I find a cheap flight on United
Airlines via a third-party website such as Expedia, I will always try to
book through United.com if I can because it makes solving problems
much easier should they arise at a later time.

If you book through a third-party service like Expedia or Travelocity, in

my experience you’ll often get the run-around when you have a
problem - the airline will tell you to call the booking agent, and the
booking agent will often tell you to call the airline. It’s a frustrating
experience, and I’ve gone through it enough to now go out of my way
to book through each airline’s website whenever possible.

But for finding cheap flights, I recommend the following options.

1. Kayak

Kayak is pretty much my go-to web service for finding cheap flights.
You can choose a range of dates to search on for flights, and can find
the cheapest fares during that interval. Kayak also includes quite a few

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of the low-cost carriers around the world, something many of the big
travel websites don’t always provide.

2. Skyscanner

Skyscanner is another great site for discovering low-cost flights. One

helpful aspect of Skyscanner is that you can view the cost of the flights
in a graphical view for an entire month at a time. That means you can
easily find out which day of the month has the cheapest flight, and
possibly schedule your trip around that. Another great feature is that
you can specify ‘anywhere’ as your destination, meaning that
Skyscanner will try to find you flights to any destination from your point
of departure. If you have some time off and aren’t sure where to go,
then that can be a really useful option.

3. AirAsia

AirAsia shows up in both Kayak and SkyScanner, but it deserves a

special mention since they are my primary airline around Asia and
Australia. They are based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, so often you will
have to bounce through Malaysia whenever using them. But their fares
are extremely low, most of their airplanes are modern Airbus 330s, and
they fly to many popular destinations from Asia, such as Bali, Indonesia
and Sydney, Australia.

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Accommodation

Here are some of the best resources that I use whenever I am looking
for accommodation in a new location.

1. AirBNB

A few years ago AirBNB sprang into existence and dramatically

changed the travel landscape. AirBNB is a service where people can
rent apartments on a short-term basis directly from the owners. While
this service existed via other methods before such as classified
advertising networks, AirBNB has quickly dominated this space for the
masses.

If you own a house or an apartment, you can also look to AirBNB to

rent it out while you are away. But for me it is primarily a resource to
locate apartments while traveling. One of the reasons I usually try to
stay in each new country or city for at least a month or more is that
often you get deep discounts on monthly rates from AirBNB as
opposed to renting for just a week or two. In the long term you can
save money by staying longer in each location, and get to enjoy more
of the local culture.

2.Hostel World

If you’ve never stayed in a hostel before, chances are you think of them
as dirty and loud establishments meant for young travelers to party in.
While you’ll likely encounter young partiers in most hostels around the
world, often most hostels nowadays appeal to travelers of all ages.
They usually have shared kitchen space so you can cook your own

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meals, as well as a lounge or a bar to relax in. You can either share a
room (in a dormitories, or dorm for short) with other travelers, or can
rent a private room with one, two or three beds if you’re traveling with
other people.

I often use hostels when I travel because it is so much easier to meet

like-minded people than at a hotel. My only complaint is that hostels
seem to be charging more and more for private rooms lately, and
sometimes the prices are almost as high as the prices for local hotels
(which are usually much comfier than a room in a hostel). So if you are
going to book a private room in a hostel, take a quick look at some
local hotel prices as well to see if you can get better value for your
money.

3.Hotels.com

If you are looking for a hotel in a city for one of your trips, then
Hotels.com is probably one of the best options to find one. They aren’t
always the cheapest, but you do get to know all the details about the
hotel before you book and can read reviews from other people who
have stayed there.

4.Hotwire.com

Hotwire has some of the cheapest hotel and car rentals available on
the internet, but that low price comes with one notable string attached
- you often don’t find out the exact name of the hotel you are staying at
until after you have paid. You do however know the general area

26
where the hotel will be located and approximately what star rating (i.e.
four stars, five stars) the hotel is.

If not knowing the hotel name and location scares you then you should
definitely use Hotels.com for a little piece of mind. But if you don’t
really care about the actual hotel and price is the main concern, then
Hotwire is a great option. I often use them when I travel and I haven’t
really ever had a bad experience.

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Staying Connected

Nowadays one of the first orders of business that people take care of
when they arrive in a new destination is finding some location where
they can get on the Internet, hopefully for free. In some places that’s
not always easy - for example Internet in Australia and New Zealand
usually has to be purchased, even in coffee shops. But you can almost
always find Internet just by walking around town and asking the locals.

One of my most memorable travel experiences was on Bali, a small

island that is part of Indonesia. I arrived in my hotel, located a few
miles outside of the city of Ubud, and immediately checked for Wi-Fi.
Sure enough, even though I was in the middle of a huge rice field
surrounding by small picturesque rolling hills, I had access to the
Internet.

If you are traveling with an unlocked cellular phone, you should

definitely use the Pay as You Go Data Wiki as a resource. That website
is routinely updated with the most up-to-date information about cellular
service providers that offer pay-as-you-go data for phones. I usually
take a look at the Wiki whenever I go to a new country so I know which
cellular service provider to look for as soon as I arrive.

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Getting Travel Insurance

Many people who travel abroad neglect one of the most important
items before leaving - they fail to make sure they have proper travel
health insurance.

In many parts of the world an injury or a health mishap can not only ruin
your perfectly planned travel adventure, but it can also potentially
destroy your savings, depending on how much health care in that
country costs. In some countries like the United States, having to be
hospitalized can be enough to bankrupt you. Often for the cost of less
than a dollar a day you can purchase travel insurance that will make
sure you have proper coverage in case of a health emergency.

Buying insurance is always a hard decision, since if you never end up

having to use it, it feels like a waste of money. But your health is not
something you should take for granted, especially when traveling
around foreign countries.

I had a friend who was in a scooter accident in Thailand a few years

ago, and ended up breaking his collarbone. Because he had adequate
travel insurance, he received prompt care in Thailand and was flown
back to Canada in first class at the insurance company’s expense to
receive additional treatment in his home country. If he didn’t have
insurance he probably would have been forced to have surgery in
Thailand, far away from his friends and family, and paid for everything
himself.

29
The travel insurance company I recommend is World Nomads. They
cover trips of any duration for up to six months, and insurance can
easily be extended at any time with a simple phone call. They provide
coverage for over 170 different countries in the world, all for a very
reasonable cost.

If you’re heading out of the country, do yourself a favor and make sure
you have proper health insurance coverage before leaving.

30
Staying Safe Abroad

Every time I tell my mom about some of the places I’ve recently visited,
she seems to react as though I just barely escaped being killed or
taken hostage due to all negative media that certain parts of the world
get on the local news. The truth is though that in much of the world it’s
just as safe as it is for you when you are back at home.

But crime does happen from time to time, and many criminals
purposefully target tourists because they are often careless. In almost
all cases the type of crime encountered is simply petty theft - stealing a
camera that was left on a table while someone went to the bathroom,
or lifting a wallet out of someone’s back pocket while on the subway.

In almost all of these cases though, the crime would likely have been
prevented if the tourist had exercised just a bit of precaution and
common sense.

Here are some of my best tips for how to stay safe while traveling.

1. Be Aware Of Your Surroundings

Whenever you walk into a new situation, take a moment to observe

everyone who is there. While I don’t recommend judging every book
by its cover, often you can spot someone who looks like they are up to
no good simply by being a good observer.

One time when I was using a bank machine in the Alto Palermo
shopping centre in Buenos Aires I noticed a guy hanging around the
side of the ATM machine, discretely watching everyone who used it.

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Since I was getting a bad feeling from him, I decided to go for a walk
around the mall and come back to the machine later. When I came
back 15 minutes later, at first it looked like that individual left. But after
taking a long look around, I noticed that he had simply shifted to
another location on the other side of the mall and was watching people
withdraw money from there. At that point I left the mall and went to find
somewhere else that had a bank machine.

2. Don’t Let Anyone Into Your Personal Space

The area around you when you are traveling should be sacred ground -
don’t ever let anyone enter your personal space. If someone you don’t
know approaches you and tries to touch you, simply back away and
make sure they can’t. If they persist, make it clear that you don’t want
to be touched. Nobody can steal anything from you if they can’t touch
you, so don’t let them near you, even if they seem well intentioned.

A common tactic in Argentina is for a pickpocket to discretely spray

you with a goo that looks a bit like bird droppings. Then another
person will approach you with a towel or a handkerchief, show you
where the goo is, and then offer to help you clean it off. If you let that
person touch you, you will likely be distracted enough to not notice
their accomplice stealing your wallet or the contents of your purse or
bag.

3. Keep Valuable Objects Hidden

There’s really no need to wear an expensive watch or jewelry while out

taking photographs or walking around a new city, so leave it in the

32
hotel or hostel. In many parts of the world that watch is likely the
equivalent of a few months of salary, so don’t flaunt it or make it
obvious that it’s valuable.

If you’re going out to take photos with a camera that looks expensive,
keep it in your backpack until you are actively taking photos. The
moment you are done taking photos, put it away. If you have a camera
bag, then I recommend putting the entire camera bag into a backpack,
otherwise it’s painfully obvious you are carrying a camera around and
could potentially be targeted for your camera.

4. Always Know Where You Are Going (Or Pretend)

If you’re walking around in public, make sure you know where you are
going. If you end up a bit lost, try not to look like you’re lost (which
might draw attention to yourself). If you need to stop and look at a
map, it’s best to find a spot where you can peruse your map without
having many people watch you. I find coffee shops are always good
places to grab a quick drink and also regain your bearings.

Another great benefit to having a cellular phone with a data plan is that
it means it’s extremely unlikely you will ever be lost for long. Whenever
you find you don’t know where you are, you can simply launch Google
Maps and quickly pinpoint your location. Just be careful not to pull out
your phone too often, especially if it’s an expensive model such as the
iPhone.

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5. Don’t Keep All Your Money in One Location

It’s never a good idea to keep all your money and credit cards in the
same place. If you lose your wallet/purse or if you get robbed, you’ll
essentially be stranded until you can get some of your cards replaced
or someone lends you some money.

Whenever I arrive in a new location I will usually separate out at least

one credit card and usually about $100 worth of currency and leave
those back in my apartment or hotel room - often in a safe if it’s
available, otherwise hidden somewhere. I figure with that much cash
and my credit card I could easily take a taxi to the airport and book a
flight back home if I really got into trouble.

34
Lifestyle Design
Whenever I tell someone about my life and my ability to travel around
the planet seemingly at will, they almost always say that I am lucky.
And they aren’t wrong - I do feel privileged and humbled by my
experiences over the last few years. But my life is the way it is today
because of planning and hard work, not because I stumbled into it or
won the lottery. Instead of trying to find time to travel amidst the busy
life I had, I simply created a new life where traveling was much easier.
And part of that lifestyle redesign effort for me entailed leaving my job
and working hard to start my own business, one that generate passive
income so I can earn money even while sitting on a beach.

There’s a famous book called Walden about Henry David Thoreau’s

period of deliberate isolation. He spent two years of his life living in the
woods and reflecting on life and isolation in general. His experience
can be summed up in this quote, which was featured in the movie
“Dead Poet’s Society”:

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only

the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to
teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.

You will generally encounter two types of people in the world, those
who expect good things to happen to them magically, and those who
make the good things happen in their lives on their own. As Abraham
Lincoln said, “the best way to predict your future is to create it.” If travel
is important to you but you find that you don’t have the time to make it

35
happen, then you need to design a new lifestyle where you do have
that time.

36
Start Your Own Business

I am thankful that I live in a country that allows anyone to be a business

owner with relative ease. In fact, you can start a business as a sole
proprietor in Canada for less than $100 and a little paperwork.

But one thing you often hear from business owners is just how much
work being a business owner is. People start businesses dreaming of
endless amounts of vacation and the ability to defer work to others. But
the reality is most businesses are time consuming, and require
constant attention.

But no business owner should be a slave to their business, and most

owners confuse the difference between running a business and
owning one. In the words of Tim Ferris’, author of The 4-Hour
Workweek, the goal should not be to run a run the trains (for someone
who owns a train yard), but rather to own them and have someone else
ensure they travel on time.

37
If you are passionate about something, then chances are you can find a
way to monetize it. Our little plugin for WordPress wasn’t amazingly
complicated, but we put our passion into it and others noticed. If
you’re looking to start a company and need some ideas, then check
out the recommended reading below.

Recommended Reading: The $100 Startup

The book contains some great examples of small businesses that can
be started for $100 and can generate $50,000 or more each year. It’s
a great book if you’re interested in starting your own business and
don’t have (or need!) a lot of initial investment

38
Lessons That I’ve Learned

I’ve owned and operated four or five businesses in my brief life as an

entrepreneur. Not all of them made money, and not all of them were
successful. But they were all great experiences, and I learned a great
deal with each separate company.

Here are a few of the things I’ve learned over the years while running
various businesses. If you’re just starting out, then perhaps you can
avoid some of the mistakes that I made.

1. You are not irreplaceable

Many business owners work constantly because they think there really
is nobody else who can do what they do. In a few rare cases a person
does have a unique skill set, but often business owners take on
responsibilities and tasks that could just as easily be done by someone
else, mainly because they are afraid to give up control. But is the goal
is to run a business and not have the business run you, then you have
to learn to relinquish control and have trust in your employees.

2. Your way isn’t the only way

One thing I think we all forget from time to time is that there is always
more than one way to solve a problem. Often as business owners we
tend to think that the only right solution is the one we come up with.
But in my experience I’ve found that if you give your employees a bit of
trust they will come up with their own unique solutions that are just as
effective as your own.

39
3. Focus on your strengths; outsource your weaknesses

All of us have tasks which we are more suited to performing. For

example, I consider myself a fairly able software developer, but know
that customer relations and sales aren’t really my strong points.

It is important for all business owners to focus on their strengths and

hire other people, even for a few hours at a time, to perform tasks that
they are weak at. If you aren’t very skilled at web design or
development, then don’t waste tons of time trying to be - it’s far more
effective for you to focus on what you are good at and pay other
people to focus on what they do best. Time is the most important
currency for anyone who loves travel, and you’ll never have free time if
you waste it by performing tasks you simply aren’t that good at. Do the
tasks you are good at, and find others to help with the ones you aren’t.

40
Generating Passive-Income

One of the major problems with salary or work where you are paid by
the hour is that you only make money when you are physically doing
something. That means if you take time off or get sick for a period of
time, chances are you won’t be making a dime.

Almost all the people I know who have some type of financial
independence have figured out ways to generate passive income.
Passive income is essentially money that you can make even while you
aren’t working. It often comes from doing a bunch of work, and then
reselling that work again and again instead of only benefitting from it
once.

For example, fixing a website for a business associate might net you
$500, and that’s it. But you could invest that same time and write an
eBook on how to fix websites and sell that online for $25 instead. In
the first case, the most you will ever make by fixing that website is
$500. But if 100 people find your book online and buy it for $25,
you’ve made $2500, $2000 more, by only investing a bit more time
and taking a small amount of risk. And the best part is that money will
slowly trickle in over time, the perfect passive income stream.

I set out a year ago to add another passive income stream to my life by
making money off of my website with advertising and affiliate links
(basically earning money by promoting products I use routinely). Since
I’ve been writing articles a few times a week for the last seven years,
monetizing my website seemed like a no-brainer to me.

41
At first I only made a few dollars each month, which isn’t a whole lot.
But over time I have slowly grown it to almost $500 per month - not
enough to live off of in North America, but an amount that can pay for a
month’s worth of rent in a few places in the world such as Thailand.
And the best part is I make that money even when I’m relaxing on a
beach sipping a cocktail.

42
Prioritizing What’s Important

If traveling to new parts of the world and absorbing new cultures is

important to you, then it’s important to make that a priority in your life.
That often means that you will need to sacrifice other less-important
things in your life to make travel happen, otherwise it will always be a
dream and never a reality. That’s the main idea behind lifestyle design -
figure out what it is you want in life, then design your life to
accommodate it.

Many people assume because of all the travel I do that I must be rich,
but I’m not. All I’ve done is prioritize travel in my life and put it above
other items that cost money, such as eating out or going to pubs all the
time. I like restaurants and pubs as much as the next person, but I
enjoy travel more. And as such, because I’ve deliberately prioritized
travel, it makes it easy to divert money away from less-important areas
of my life to set that money aside of traveling.

Regardless of whether or not you want to travel the world for long
periods of time, it’s important to constantly re-evaluate what is
important to you and redesign your life in such a way to emphasize
that.

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Final Remarks
Long-term travel isn’t a luxury only available to the rich and famous, it’s
available to anyone who is willing to make changes in their life to
accommodate it.

Often these changes can be simple, such as negotiating time off with

your employer, saving additional money by renting out your home
while you are away, or giving up your daily coffee at Starbucks to save
money for a new adventure.

For those with an entrepreneurial spirit, it’s relatively straightforward to

start a business, often for less than $100 investment and some of your
own sweat and time. With a bit of effort, many people I know have
been successful creating lifestyles that provide freedom to make long-
term travel a reality.

Years ago I was stuck in a cubicle dreaming of far-off lands with long-
term travel a dream that I never thought I would ever be able to fulfill.
But today, thanks to relatively easy changes I’ve made in my life, I can
now travel freely and earn money even while I sleep. I don’t have any
special talents that made this possible, I just set out to deliberately
redesign my life in such a way to make travel a reality.

And if I can do it, then so can you. So stop dreaming of exotic

destinations and start redesigning your life to accommodate your first
long-term adventure. Maybe we’ll encounter each other in some far
away destination. And if so, the first drink will be on me.

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Share With Friends

If you enjoyed this book, I would very much appreciate it if you’d share
it on Facebook, Twitter or via Email:

1. Share on Facebook

2.Share on Twitter

3. Share via Email

I’m also on Twitter as @DuaneStorey if you want to say a few words or

let me know what you thought about this eBook. You can also
manually share the book with others by passing around the following
URL: http://mignerd.com/book

My personal travel website is called, The Migratory Nerd, where I

routinely talk about my adventures of all the tips and tricks I’ve learned
along the way. Feel free to follow along there if you’re interested in
long-term travel. If you want to be notified by email whenever I publish
some great new content, you can sign-up to be notified here. I hate
SPAM too, so don’t worry, you won’t receive any.

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Must-Read Books

Here are a few books that I consider absolute must-read books for
anyone who is serious about traveling or having more freedom in their
life.

1. Vagabonding: An Uncommon Guide to the Art of Long-Term World

Travel
Many travel books are good at answering the question of “how” to
travel, but very few books deal with the most important question,
“why?” This book talks about the importance of seeing new cultures
and pushing your own personal boundaries.

2.The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the
New Rich
This is probably the most influential book that I’ve ever read. It talks
about the importance of prioritizing aspects of your life, and how
20% of the things we do typically result in 80% of the results in our
life. It also has a great overview of ways to generate passive income
by setting up businesses that you can run from anywhere.

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Disclosure

Some of the links in this book are affiliate links, and generate a small
amount of income when someone clicks that link and uses that service.
That money is used to offset some of my many travel expenses as well
as allow me to release content like this eBook, for free.

That said, I only recommend products, books or services in this eBook

that I personally use myself, and would make these same
recommendations even without the little compensation that a few of
them provide.

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