You've just finished school.
You want to travel the world.
But you don't have that much money.
You're young. You're broke.
But guess what? You're rich
with the most valuable resource of all: time.
However, once you turn thirty, your time is sucked up by
work and family commitments, and most people put off
big travel dreams until retirement,
by which time they are too old to enjoy the best things about travel.
It's a sad reality. I recently turned thirty,
and I can vouch..you do start to slow down;
you don't have as much energy,
and I realize there're certain trips you should take before you turn thirty.
Whether you're fresh out of school, in the depths of a quarter life crisis,
or like me believe that age is just a number,
this video will inspire you to get out and see the world while you still can.
And If you haven't already, hit that subscribe button.
Turn on notifications. Give this video a big thumbs-up,
and share it with your travel buddies if you haven't already.
These are thirteen trips you need to take before you turn thirty.
Let's do it. Let's go.
First up: backpacking through Europe with your best friends.
I know it's a little bit cliche, but trust us,
this really is an incredible experience.
We did it. I still remember my first backpacking trip with my best friends from high school.
It is a great experience for first-time travelers
because it's relatively easy to get around.
There's a lot of diversity in a small area,
and most passports have visa-free travel.
Most importantly, it's a great trip to take with your best friends
because as you get older, unfortunately life happens....
People get busy. Priorities come up,
and it gets harder and harder to dedicate time to go travel with friends.
But pretty much everyone dreams of going to Europe.
So, it's the perfect trip to take after graduation
before work, school, and life take everyone in different directions.
Travel by train using a Eurail Pass.
Make new friends in hostels, and learn to say"cheers" in as many
languages as your liver can handle. Trust me.
This will be a trip you're going to remember for decades to come.
In your twenties, you don't have a lot of cash,
but you do have a lot of time.
That's why it's important to take a big trip before you're thirty.
Sure. Europeans get to enjoy month- long holidays
throughout their entire career.
But in the United States, once you start working,
you're going to get two weeks of vacation time per year maximum for the rest of your working life.
That's why you should consider taking a month or two to travel before you really get focused on your career.
If you have student loans, we're not suggesting that you default on your creditors
and flee the country, never to return again.
But we are suggesting that you put this moment into perspective.
You might not know exactly what you want to do with your life,
but you're also freer than you'll ever be again.
In the U.K and Australia, it's quite common to take a "gap year,"
a year between school and life to
work and travel abroad.
If you want more information about how much it costs to travel the world for a full year,
click on this card to see the full video.
A gap year is not an option for most people.
But don't worry. A big trip does not have to take a full year or cost a lot of money.
The key to longterm travel on a budget is picking a part of the world
where you can get by on $25 to $50 a day-
places like Southeast Asia, Latin America, and
the cheapest country of all, India, where you can easily
get by on $1000 a month.
Do the big trip now because nobody on
a death bed ever wishes he had spent more time in the office.
But what if you can't convince your friends to come with you?
Then it's time for a solo trip.
There are few times in your life when no one is depending on you.....
when you don't have a job, a mortgage, and a family
all looking at you to pay the bills.
That's why of all these experiences on this list, traveling alone is
one of the most important ones to do in your twenties,
unless you get divorced and start trying to figure out the meaning of life again
and then go on an Eat Pray Love mission for a year,
because that could happen, too.
That definitely happens. No judgment there.
Traveling solo takes you away from the expectation of society,
a family, and even of your friends.
It allows you to discover who you are and what you truly like.
And most importantly, it teaches you to be comfortable being alone.
Southeast Asia is the ideal place for a solo trip.
It's cheap; there's plenty of other travelers around,
and sipping a beer on the Mekon River is the perfect way to figure out
what it is you want to do with your life
when it's time to settle down and get a real j-o-b.
Whoa....whoa...whoa.
Who said anything about getting a "real job" just yet?
Between school and a career there are plenty of opportunities
to work temporary jobs that allow you to continue to travel.
If you want to learn more about those, click on the card up there.
You could sail around the Mediterreanian(??) on a private yacht
and dine on fresh scallops.....
the leftover scallops from the yacht owner,
but nobody's counting.
You could teach English in Japan
or tend bar in a beach front cabana in Rio de Janeiro.
Rather than living to work, work to live, and see where it takes you.
For example, after I studied abroad in New Zealand,
I worked a season in Queenstown, basically doing odds and ends,
anything to pay the rent and buy my snowboard lift passes.
New Zealand and Australia are a great location for the working holiday visa.
There's more information about that in a video
that we're going to shoot soon.
So subscribe and turn on notifications, if you haven't already.
If you don't have a lot of savings and aren't ready for a 9 to 5,
consider a working holiday visa.
Working holiday visas are only valid for people under thirty years old.
So what are you waiting for?
Plus if you're worried about taking time off to travel
and how it's going to look on your resume`
just remember that most employers value life experience.
And going traveling gives you a ton of life experience.
At some point everyone should travel like a free spirit.....
no plans, no expectations, and not a lot of money to make it happen.
Your twenties is a time to read Thoreau and Kerouac.
To scrape together your meager savings,
pack your life into a backpack and
hit the road with thumb out-stretched.
Use Couchsurfing.org to find free places to stay
Woof.org to find farms where you can trade a day's labour for room and board,
and hitch hike from A to B.
If you travel like this, you really don't need much money at all.
This trip is important because it teaches you how to trust-
to trust yourself, to find a way forward,
to trust strangers to help you when you're in need,
and to trust life to give you what you need when you let go of your expectations.
Embrace serendipity. Say "yes" to life,
and enjoy the journey because if the destination
is marriage and a family, the time to take this journey is right now.
Good luck convincing your significant other to go hitch hiking and couch surfing.
But if you do find someone who's down for that,
you've got a keeper.
Unfortunately, when you hit thirty,
one of the first things to go is your energy..
that unbridled passion to just do stuff all the time.
Trust me.. I've just turned thirty, and all I want to do is just sit on the couch
in my pajamas, watch Netflix, and take baths with epsom salt.
That is why you should travel to a festival in your twenties.
The wilder, the better....
and ideally one that lasts for about a week.
Raise steins in October Fest in Munich.
Run with the bulls in Pamplona. Oh my god.
Or travel to the craziest carnival on your continent.
It could be Rio; could be New Orleans;
or it could be Venice, Italy.
Of course, music festivals count, too..
Glastonbury in the U.K., Coachella in California,
or if you're really going for it...Burning Man.
Just remember: be safe; stay hydrated,
and wear sunscreen, folks.
You're not going to be twenty forever.
Next up: travel for love.
Travel is one of the best ways to meet a potential lover.
If you meet on the road, chances are
you already have something in common....
that you like to travel.
Whether you believe in fate or not,
you'll never know what a chance encounter could be
unless you go for it.
Our parents met on a train in the 1970s (actually 1980) in Switzerland.
And if my mom hadn't asked my dad to see his map,
chances are we wouldn't be here.
So go visit that beautiful foreign exchange student you met in college,
and next time a handsome guy asks you if you want to go on an adventure,
say yes.
And if you're already in a relationship,
travel can be a great way
to find out how compatible you really are,
especially when things don't go smoothly.
If you are in a relationship and want some tips on how
to travel better as a couple, click that card.
Beyond traveling for who you love,
travel for what you love on a dirtbag trip.
A dirtbag trip is when you use all of your time and money
to pursue one of your favorite hobbies,
usually at the price of comfort.
The term originated with hardcore rock climbers who would camp out
in Yosemite Valley in California to climb
the face of El Capitan for months at a time.
Whether you rock climb, surf, snowboard, or scuba dive,
it's all about trying to spend time
doing what you love.
As you grow older, work and family take up more of your time,
and hobbies become vital for your well being.
So make them priorities now.
Your future self will be happier and healthier for it.
No matter what your preferred hobby,
everyone should spend some time backpacking in nature.
And everyone should use their own two feet
to climb a mountain, both metaphorically and literally.
Right now, you are in peak physical condition.
Climbing a mountain is not going to get an easier.
So find your nearest mountain and climb it.
Once you have the basic gear, camping is extremely cheap,
and it's a great way to travel and save money for bigger adventures
abroad, whether that's climbing Macchu Pichu,
Mount Kilimanjaro, or seeing the glaciers of Patagonia.
Speaking of glaciers, you should visit them while you can.
Warming waters are bleaching the Great Barrier Reef,
rising tides are swallowing Venice,
and glaciers are melting everywhere.
Who knows what these places will look like in ten years?
Visit them now.
See the impacts of climate change for yourself,
and learn what you can do to make a positive difference.
Share your firsthand experience with skeptical friends
and family members back home, and hopefully we can
all find the collective will to do something
and preserve these places so that our own children
can visit them in their twenties, as well.
Another essential experience is cultural immersion.
Travel almost always gives you perspective
because it shows you how other cultures do things.
But often times we're so eager to see
as much as we can that we move from place, to place,
to place, frantically snapping photos,
and in the end, you see nothing.
At least once in your twenties, stick around a place
long enough to get some cultural immersion.
The best way to immerse yourself is through language.
Use this opportunity to brush up on your high school Spanish
in Antigua, Guatemala, or learn French in Paris
or dive in the deep end and learn Mandarin in rural China.
If you're not a language person, don't worry.
Maybe just do a home stay or take a cooking course.
Or just stay around long enough to feel like a local,
whether it's a two week intensive course or two years
with the Peace Corps, taking the time to lose yourself in another
culture is very much worth it.
Still with us? Good.
We've discussed a lot of trips so far,
and chances are that even the most footloose traveler
can't check them all off before thirty.
As you approach the big 3-0,
you tend to learn how to prioritize things in your life.
Let's talk about your bucket list.
The bucket list is a list of things that you want to do before you kick the bucket...
that is before you die.
When you're twenty, you feel like you're invincible,
but the sad truth is that you are not.
Between Marko and me,
we've had nearly a dozen friends pass away
before they turned thirty.
We are not here forever.
It sounds morbid, but accepting that life
is going to come to an end really helps you prioritize
how you spend your time and your money.
The key is: dream like you'll live forever
and live like you'll die tomorrow.
Look at the ideas we've just given you.
Add in a couple of your own,
and ask yourself.....what is the one trip
that you really want to do before you die?
It can be big or it can be small,
but pick the dream that's closet to your heart,
and promise yourself you'll do whatever
it takes to make it happen
before you turn thirty.
Because if you tell yourself you'll do it when you retire,
it may never happen.
We're now at the end of our list.
Let's talk about the end of your twenties
and the importance of meaningful travel.
When you're young, it's natural to see travel as a
check list of countries to do and even as a way
of seeking status among your friends.
Once you've partied in Europe,
taken selfies in Rio
and collected a dozen passport stamps,
you might feel an odd emptiness.....
a feeling that it's not the world that is to be
conquered, but the self.
Enter the spiritual journey
using travel as a tool for personal growth,
whether it's a meditation retreat in Thailand,
volunteering at an orphanage in India,
or the most literal spiritual journey of all,
walking the pilgrimage of Camino de Santiago
in Northern Spain.
The spiritual journey is one that never ends,
and it helps you articulate that feeling
that you had the first time you traveled....
this idea of the non duality of nature
that despite our superficial cultural differences,
underneath we are all one.
Whoa... Far out.
You and I, the same thing.
All right ladies and gentlemen, Vagabuddies,
thank you for watching.
Those are our thirteen trips to take before you're thirty.
What is your travel bucket list?
Share it below in the comment section.
Also if you have any travel tips videos
that you'd like us to make,
make sure you share those down there, as well.
If we end up making the video,
you're getting a shout-out.
Okay guys, if you liked this video, you know what to do:
give it a big thumbs-up;
share it with your travel buddies and
subscribe to Vagabrothers and turn on those notifications, if you have not already.
And in the meantime, stay curious, keep exploring,
and we will see you on the road.
Peace.