Way back in July of 2007 at Hamilton International Airport we found the inspiration for this monumental trip.

We were headed to visit Aaron’s extended family in southern Ontario. With an eight month old Madeline in hand we flew into Hamilton airport. It was there we met Margaret and her family. Aaron knew Margaret through teaching.

It was surprising to run into Margaret & family so far from Edmonton. After chatting for a bit we found out they were embarking on a monumental year long family trip around the world. This was exactly the kind of thing we thought we wanted to do. That night I went online and started setting aside $100 a month towards our trip.

We didn’t discuss the trip often. Our families and the occasional friends heard about our plan. It was nice to hear feedback and get fuel for our excitement from then.

Margaret’s Advice

In January of 2014 we emailed Margaret to find out more details of their trip. All together they went to an astonishing 22 different countries: Scotland, England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany, Poland, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Italy, Greece, Egypt, Jordan, Israel, India, Kenya, China, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Australia.

They also gave us lots of recommendations. For accommodations Margaret’s family mainly used hostels but were able to do some couch surfing with friends and family. They pointed out that Hostels are great because of their low cost and kitchen spaces. We’ll definitely be taking advantage of the kitchens to keep food costs I low.

Back then they took advantage of the Edmonton Journal travel section to scope out places to rent. Many of the current articles are Alberta specific. We now have Air B&B, Vrbo, and other Apps that we will lean on. We’re also trying to line up some stops where we support missionaries.

On of our favourite recommendations is Rick Steeves, the travel guru. He is an awesome resource for getting ideas! No just off where to go but also how to pack and have great experiences. We’ve watched many of his Europe videos and some of his presentations. We’re still looking for a Rick Steeves like personality that covers areas outside of Europe.

She mentioned the idea that if we are going to travel for months, we need to set up one week per month where we stay put to rest from the travel. You really need to rest, but you want it to be places where there is still a lot to see.

They were able to rent out their house, fully furnished through a site called sabbaticals.com. I think this site is now sabbaticalhomes.com. We’ve reached out to a local Seminary to find renters. We’re hopeful that we can have some gentle renters.

Finally, they recommended we get a good visa points system. They used Airmiles to rent cars in Scotland, Italy and Australia. Expenditures like that are huge. That means finding a great points system and unfortunately leaving the points alone. We started to follow their advice on this one but found that we needed the points for things as we prepared to leave.