In this report, I share the top 4 reasons why cheap world travel is possible now.
I have traveled the world for over 14 years now. I have visited or lived in 67 countries. I have been to all of the continents but Antarctica. I have done most of it on the cheap. Now, I will explain the top 4 reasons cheap world travel is possible now.
These are the reasons why I am able to slow travel the world now, on the cheap. By the way, you don’t need to take notes. I will give you a link to all of this information in writing at the end.
I will show you pictures I have taken all over the world as I explain how these top 4 reasons have allowed my life and what I call, the slow travel world highway. The slow travel world highway exists only in my mind now but is about to be in your mind too.
The slow travel world highway will take you all around the world from continent to continent. Within each continent, you can take exits into any country of interest. And within each country, you can take exits anywhere you want. You decide when to take an exit.
I have been traveling the slow travel world highway since I left the USA in 2007. I believe it is the key to how normal people like you and me can travel every part of the world before we die. Well, at least the parts we are curious about. But I need to destroy a few false beliefs first.
Is World Travel Only for Rich People?
World travel is no longer only a rich person’s game. The top 4 reasons are changes in the world economy that have made cheap world travel available to all of us now.
If you are like me, when you were young, you only saw rich beautiful people traveling the world in movies. They had heaps of luggage and a personal assistant. They sipped champagne on luxury liners and intercontinental jets.
They stayed in penthouse apartments, ate on crystal in fancy restaurants, drove around in Italian convertibles, stayed on sailboats with captains and yachts with crews, smoked cigars while gambling thousands, and shopped for fashions in Milan or Paris.
So, as a young man, I just assumed I had to win big in life to have any chance at being able to live my dreams. You see, I always knew that I wanted to see the world. I also thought that travel was something you did in retirement.
So those two ideas formed in my head. I needed to make a whole lot of money and then live like a king in retirement traveling the world. I was not from a wealthy family. There was no trust fund in my future. So I put my nose down on the grindstone for 30 years.
Luckily, I was wrong about both assumptions. I didn’t need to be rich and I didn’t have to wait until retirement to travel the world. The world changed drastically in some very specific ways between 1990 and 2010. Those changes have allowed me to live my dream life.
Okay, now for the top 4 reasons cheap world travel is possible now, and why I am able to live my dreams 15 years before retirement with 75% less money. After the top 4, I will explain how to live on the cheap when you head out on the slow travel world highway.
Top 4 Reasons Cheap World Travel is Possible Now
Internet: The Internet has taken information out of the hands of the few and put it in the hands of the many. Anyone with a passion and a better way to do something can offer it up to the entire world. This has allowed everyone to be able to access the best ideas, not just the rich. It has also allowed a race to the bottom in pricing or commoditization of goods and services worldwide. The Internet has been the backbone of the other changes that have enabled the slow travel world highway.
Sharing Economy: The sharing economy is one of the major reasons the slow travel world highway is possible now. Services like Uber, Grab, and Lyft, allow you to book a private taxi from airports, bus stations, and train stations to your accommodations, often for less than half the price of commercial taxis. Services like Airbnb, Facebook Marketplace, VRBO, Booking, allow you to book entire furnished apartments with kitchens and internet connections for weeks or months often cheaper than hotel rooms. Services such as Skyscanner allow you to find the cheapest flights. Other services like Rome2Rio allow you to find the cheapest ground transportation between countries or cities, such as buses, trains, ferries, and now flights.
Remote Work: Many companies around the world are hiring consultants or employees residing all over the world. This allows people in one country to have jobs, projects, or gig work for companies anywhere else in the world. So long as they have a workable internet connection, people are allowed to roam the world freely now.
Digital Economy: Companies like Paypal, Transferwise, Stripe, Commercial Banks, and others are the economic backbone of the digital economy. Money moves all over the world for goods and services purchased on the Internet. Citizens of a first country, working in a second country, buy services online offered in a third country, that pays an individual performing the services in a fourth country. So people are able to travel around the world and pay for services as needed.
I have been able to start my own business using the tools of the digital economy. My business now earns more than twice what I spend out on the slow travel world highway. I have a course teaching how to make money online if you are interested (link provided).
Slow Travel World Highway
Okay, I am going to simplify the slow travel world highway, but you will get the idea fairly rapidly. The goal is to spend as little money as possible within reason as you slow travel the world. There are three main costs of slow traveling the world: transportation, accommodations, and food. I will start with transportation.
Transportation
The slow travel world highway is just a name I made up. To understand what it means, just imagine that you can get from anywhere in the world to another place in the world on the slow travel world highway.
But imagine that you don’t have to fly everywhere. You can move between highway exits on the slow travel world highway on any combination of the cheapest transportation means such as airplanes, boats, trains, buses, bicycles, feet, or any other way you please. All of this information is available on the Internet now.
Since the goal of the slow travel world highway is to stay within budget, you can pick whatever means of transportation you please to get you from one slow travel world highway exit to another.
So for example, if your research shows that it is cheaper to move from one city in Vietnam to another city by train, you take a train. If the bus is cheaper, you take a bus. If a minivan is cheaper, you take a minivan.
But if a bicycle is the cheapest, you may decide to take something more expensive if you can stay within budget. So you pick the best mode of movement on each leg of your travels balancing your budget and your time goals.
You make this same analysis every time you jump on the slow travel world highway. Your slow travel highway will not be the same as mine. Because you will be selecting airplanes, boats, trains, buses, or bicycles based upon your budget and time constraints.
The good news is that the slow travel world highway has transportation modes that fit almost any budget: airplanes, boats, trains, buses, bicycles, or feet.
Types of Highways
The slow travel world highway has intercontinental highways, international highways, and national highways. An intercontinental highway is a highway that takes you between continents. An international highway takes you between nations. A national highway takes you between places within a single country.
In general, you will find travel between countries on the same continent is cheaper on buses, trains, and ferries. But sometimes planes are cheaper so you have to check. Travel between continents is almost always cheaper by airplane.
Intercontinental Routes
When you are designing your path through the continents, look for a path through the continents that reduces the sum of all of your intercontinental routes.
This order of continents was cheapest last time I checked: Asia to Europe (Turkey to Bulgaria, Train $24), Europe to Africa (Spain to Morocco on Ferry: 35 Euros), Africa to South America (Pretoria to Sao Paulo: Flights $398), South America to North America (Cartagena to Panama City: Flights $110), North America to Asia (Mexico City to Hong Kong: Flight: $417).
If you sum these continental transfers I found on RometoRio today, it would cost you $998 USD ($24+$42.58(35E)+$398+$110+$417) to fly completely around the world on the slow travel world highway. This intercontinental route should also be adjusted for which countries you want to visit in each continent.
Continental Highways
You have to decide which countries you want to see on each continent. That will help you select entry and exit points from the entire continent and the shortest or cheapest path between countries you want to see on each continent.
You also have to balance the time you spend in each country depending on the costs of living there and your budget constraints. For example, the countries in eastern Europe are much cheaper and the architecture is more interesting in general than the countries in western Europe because eastern Europe was not burned to the ground in World War II.
So you may want to spend more time in Eastern Europe and just grab a train over to western Europe from time to time for long weekends. By spending more time in cheaper countries, you will stay within budget so you can afford to see more expensive countries also for a shorter period of time.
So select a path through those countries of interest and time in each that is best considering your budget and time constraints. Once you have a path, verify the cheapest modes of transportation through the selected countries on that continent.
National Highways
Like the transfers between intercontinental and international highways, the national highways have many different modes of transportation. So you have to pick the desirable places in each country that you want to see and find the cheapest mode of transportation between them.
So the first secret to the slow travel world highway is to save money on moving between destinations whenever possible to stay within budget. Next, we talk about how to save on rent as you slow travel the world.
Accommodations
The largest expense when slow traveling the world is accommodations. The key to reducing accommodations is to stay longer in each place. Renting by the month or week is cheaper than renting by the night.
I have another report that explains how to find the best cheap apartments around the world. You need to get good at reducing your costs of accommodations. The better you are at saving on rents, the more money you will have leftover to spend on having fun exploring each destination.
But apartments might be too expensive for some people’s budgets. There are people that live for free on other people’s couches. One such webpage that helps people to find free couches to sleep on is called couchsurfing.org. People surfed my couch when I was living in India.
Other people do volunteer work around the world and get free places to stay while they are volunteering. Volunteering is also a great way to get to know the culture you are visiting.
Another great way to save money on accommodations is to become a house sitter. I have a report on how to live for free by house sitting around the world. Check out that report if you are curious. Last but not least, let’s talk about food.
Food
You can save money on food as you slow travel the world in two major ways. First, cook at home more often. It is easier to control quality and costs if you buy fruits, vegetables, and grains in the local markets around the world and cook healthy cheap meals at home.
But you also need to learn about the culture of each place you visit. One of the easiest ways to do that in the cheaper parts of the world is to eat in restaurants frequented by locals. Those are often much cheaper than the ex-pat or tourist restaurants.
If you get to know locals, they can teach you about their favorite home-cooked meals. They can also teach you where they buy the ingredients and how they cook those meals. Since locals in some countries often have tighter budgets than travelers, learning what and how they eat can help keep you within budget.
I have been traversing the slow travel world highway for 14+ years now. I have written hundreds of reports intended to give you a soft landing as you traverse the slow travel world highway. Just click the link in the notes below this video to see this and many other reports in writing.
Thank you for checking out my report, The Top 4 Reasons Cheap World Travel is Possible Now. This is Dan of Vagabond Awake, the YouTube channel for VagabondBuddha.com. The world is your home. What time will you be home for dinner?
Here are some additional resources you may find helpful in traveling on the slow travel world highway: (1) (Free eBook) How I Fired My Boss and Traveled the World for 14+ Years, (2) Retire cheap Reports All Over the World, (3) How to Make Money Online: The Hobby Income Course, (3) My YouTube Playlists for Each Country, (4) How to Retire Early.