This isn’t a post about remote working or working holidays or being a digital nomad. This is a post about being a normal everyday person with a normal everyday job and still finding time to travel.
I’ve been travelling while also working full time since 2008. Well, I went to four days a week in 2017, but I had a few years to figure out the fine art of having a full time office job and also getting to run off to Iceland or Norway or Estonia more or less as and when I fancied (and airfare permitted). It’s not going to work for everyone but these are seven ways I managed to travel enough to satisfy me without giving up my job.
One:
First and most importantly and most obviously, judicious use of your holiday allowance. Use weekends and bank holidays to stretch those precious days off as far as possible. I managed to stretch 24 days of holiday into 40 days away in 2013 and I managed 50 last year, although the four days a week thing was happening by then. Thursday to Tuesday was a pretty magical combination for me in my full week times – six days away for only three days of holiday, depending on how often I wanted to leave my Brownies and Rangers to someone else. Now I still tend to do Thursdayish to Tuesdayish but it only costs me two days.
Two
Be careful with your timings. Many’s the time I’ve left work at 3pm, using two hours of holiday (we operate in hours rather than days) to get the Iceland flight from Heathrow at 9pm. By the time I should be sitting down at my desk the next morning, I’m already in Reykjavik and I’ve saved a whole day of travelling. Likewise, I tend to get the latest flight back possible. That sometimes means not getting home from the airport until 2am and then going straight to work the next day but it’s effectively another day tagged on that I’ve saved from work.
Three
I realise this one might be controversial. I work over Christmas. We’ve always had the option to take that week off or not and since it’s popular, everyone’s happy if I don’t take it. The office is manned and I haven’t wasted three days to sit at home surrounded by mince pies and Carols at Kings. I get to use those three days doing something interesting somewhere interesting. For the first time, I used those days last year because I went to Switzerland over New Year but even then, it only worked out at two or three days off.
Four
Don’t use a day to sort out the washing when you get back. There’s a lady at work who needs an entire day to unpack and do the washing and cleaning and various domestic tasks. That’s a day I could be climbing a mountain. Any of those things can be done in an evening later in the week or over the weekend. Don’t use your precious holiday hours for housework.
Five
I find it’s more efficient, holiday-wise, to do several short trips. I can get two free weekend days for every two or three holiday days I take that way, whereas if I did a long trip, I’d only be getting two free weekend days for every four or five holiday days taken.
Six
Last year, my boss came down to visit on a Friday. Since I don’t work Fridays, I took a day off in lieu which created a four day weekend for no holiday time used, which was enough for a quick trip to Malta. Lieu days are wonderful, although they’re only an option if you’ve got a bit of empty time in your working week, like my Friday. A few of my colleagues have earned them for going to trade fairs or meeting overseas suppliers, so there might be ways of converting empty weekends into days off work.
Seven
A really good way I found in 2016 of generating as much free time as I wanted was to leave my job without another to go to. I had all the time in the world! But I also had no money. So I suppose that’s ways and means number seven: even though maybe you’d like to be travelling permanently, there’s plenty to be said for a regular income and you can still earn one while travelling more than a lot of people. The conversation about working from a desert island is one that’ll have to come from other people. But having a job doesn’t at all mean that you can’t travel.