Your home base can be anything you need it to be: a storage closet in a family member’s basement, an apartment you rent once you’re abroad, anything. The most important consideration is thinking of that location as a home base, no matter how often you see it or how you use it. There are some reasons that having a home base is particularly important.

1. Having a mailing address: Even if your mailing address is care of whoever can scan in your mail, having a mailing address is crucial to traveling. If you’re going to stay in one place long enough for your mail to catch up with you, that’s wonderful — but otherwise, having somewhere that can make sure you see any important documents is crucial. A relative with a scanner can be a good bet, especially if they can stick your income mail with any other stuff of yours they’re storing (and you may even get the added benefit of being able to list your address as ‘The Cupboard Under the Stairs’).
2. Important possessions: Downsizing entirely is rarely possible. You can get rid of 90 percent of what you own, get everything you need to live into one backpack, and still have that quilt that Grandma made you when you were ten. Most people have at least one or two things they don’t want to get rid of, but aren’t exactly practical to take on the road. Having a home base allows you to keep those precious memories, without feeling badly that you can’t simplify your life enough.
3. Entrepreneurial plans: Are you planning to create your own business in order to support your traveling? If that’s the case, then you have to have an address somewhere, if only to have something to put on your tax forms. It’s generally best to make sure that address is located in the country where you are a citizen, rather than where you’re traveling, unless paying taxes in two countries interests you.
4. Decluttering: If you have a home base separate from the places you stay as you travel, there’s a psychological benefit. Most of us start to think of wherever we are as home, unless we have a good reason not to. That can lead to cluttering up the place with stuff that we don’t necessarily need when we get back on the road again. But if you’ve got your home base firmly fixed in your mind, you can often avoid that build up.
5. A safety net: Sometimes things happen while you’re out on the road. From needing a place to recuperate to having a place to store backups of your work, a home base can provide you with a safety net for all sorts of mishaps and problems.

Sixteen-year-old Jessica Watson left Sydney over the weekend with plans to be gone approximately eight months.

The big difference is that Watson did not face any governmental opposition. It’s easy to point at the age difference between the two girls (Dekker is thirteen) as the reasoning, but I’m still not sure that age should play that big a role. Both girls, after all, have already racked up significant hours sailing alone — but Watson actually hit another ship on a test run in September, according to an article on the BBC’s website.

There isn’t any kind of magical change between the ages of thirteen and sixteen that make one girl obviously more trustworthy on her own, any more than there’s a mystical change the day you turn eighteen. The more I think about these sorts of situations, the more I become convinced that they really do need to be considered on a case by case basis.

Me, on the other hand… well, I have itchy feet. My career also makes travel a heck of a lot easier. All I have to do is stick my laptop in my bag and grab my toothbrush.

This could be a problem for the two of us: If I was to follow what seems to be the common approach — either stay home with him or talk him into taking off for parts unknown with me — one of us would be less than pleased. But we’ve discovered that we’re both willing to be a little more flexible and consider a few other options.

Flying Solo

Early on in our relationship, we realized that we didn’t really have to spend every day of the year together. Don’t get me wrong — we love being together, but we can talk to each other every day even if we aren’t in the same city. As long as I come home every so often and I get to spend some quality time with my husband, I’m willing to fly solo.

When we had been dating for about a year, I had the opportunity to spend four months in Dublin. After some long talks, we were convinced that this whole long distance relationship thing would work out — despite the many, many people who told us that it wouldn’t work. So I packed my bags, hopped a plane across the Atlantic and settled into a flat that I shared with four other American girls.

It’s interesting to note that those four girls had all left broken hearts behind them on their way to Ireland: they’d broken up with boyfriends back home because they didn’t think that a long-distance relationship would work. The sheer number of Irish guys with great accents that happen to live in Dublin may have been a contributing factor to that decision.

I had a great time in Dublin. Sure, I had Skype open on a regular basis and my cell phone bill was a little higher than those of my flatmates. But overall, I’m pretty sure than I had a much better time than they did. While they were out chasing replacements for their boyfriends back home, I was working film festivals, finding new bars and visiting friends all over the British Isles.

Traveling Teammates

There are a few trips that I do want to take with my husband and he’s willing to give it a go. But I also have travel plans that, while they would go smoother with a traveling partner, I know that my husband isn’t particularly interested in. That doesn’t mean that I’m stuck with going on my own if I don’t want to.

I’ve found a few friends in similar situations — some with a significant other not able to travel, or perhaps someone unattached but still interested in traveling with a friend. Right now, I’m working on the logistics of spending a couple of months in Europe next year with one of my friends and a whole stack of train passes.

You Can, Too

While not everyone is comfortable with conducting their relationships over a long distance, even for a couple of months, it is a feasible option for a lot of us. That said, there are a few things to keep in mind when considering it:

• You have to talk about it — down to every last detail. To keep a relationship going strong, wherever you are, takes plenty of communication. Traveling requires even more, especially before you leave: What sorts of expectations do you have for each other? Will you check in at certain times? Is everyone comfortable with the arrangement? What sort of emergencies would you come home for?
• You have to be willing to compromise. Just because one of you wants to stay year round in the same zip code doesn’t mean that both of you will. The same goes for wanting to spend all year long — not everyone thinks that sounds like a great idea. Bringing balance to your relationship when it comes to travel is just as much a matter of compromise as it is for every other part of your life.
• You will need time to recharge. For me, I prefer not to stay away from my husband much more than three months at a go. While we can maintain our relationships at a distance, I do like spending plenty of time with him in person. Going home and recharging your relationship is important.

Photo — GreenWhiteOrange

I’m torn about this situation: I don’t think a court really ought to intervene in this sort of situation. In my mind, the distance between ruling against parents allowing their children to sail alone (no matter how long the trip) isn’t so very far from a court ruling that a parent can’t take a child abroad. After all, if you’re living abroad with your family, there is a chance that you’re child could wind up in a dangerous situation. I’m not saying that a trip abroad is comparable to sailing around the world on your own — but I’m reluctant to think that a court should really decide either situation.

Laura Dekker is an exceptional girl: she has packed her 13 years with sailing experience. She spent her first four years on an around-the-world sailing trip with her parents. She’s been sailing on her own since she was six. She’s been planning this trip since she was ten. This is not some teenager who just hoped in a boat and decided to go. Personally, I don’t know that those qualifications are enough to handle a boat on her own for two years (the estimated length of her planned trip), but I also don’t think that her age should be the sole reason to stop her either.

It seems that every year, the world gets a little smaller: there is less that a kid alone is allowed to do. There are people who throw fits at the idea of children riding the subway or the bus on their own. I know that my own travel habits grew out of the fact that I had full faith in my ability to travel on my own, whether it’s catching a bus home from school or going across the ocean to another country. I don’t think I would have had that confidence without knowing that I could be independent.

WorldTrek: A Family Odyssey

The book is set up in a very easy to read format: it chronicles the adventures of the Fisher family chronologically, country by country. At the end of the book are appendices to help plan a round-the-world trip of your own. The real value of the book, though, is in the experiences the Fishers had. Do you know how you would react if you paid a local travel agent to arrange your itinerary and wound up with no tickets or vouchers for your money? Or what you would decide to do if some sort of unrest popped up along your itinerary? Or if you cracked a crown in Thailand?

With a little adaptability, the Fishers traveled for 376 days, homeschooling their daughters and generally taking the trip of a lifetime along the way. While their daughters had some typical concerns about the whole idea — what thirteen-year-old really wants to leave her school and friends behind? — but you can tell from the evolving descriptions of their travels, that they quickly came to enjoy travel and were quite enthusiastic about the whole idea.

Now, it is worth noting that the Fishers didn’t actually take a location-independent approach to their trip. They used savings to pay for the trip and relied on careful budgeting to make sure they made their way over 50,000 miles. When their year of traveling ended, the Fishers went home and to Texas and generally went back to living a more stationary lifestyle. WorldTrek: A Family Odyssey‘s value is focused more on the changes and adjustments a family has to make in order to travel together, especially when certain family members are only barely teenagers.

More information about WorldTrek: A Family Odyssey is available through the Fishers’ website, WorldTrek Online.

I’m also offering up a copy of WorldTrek: A Family Odyssey here. To enter the giveaway, leave a comment telling us where you would go if you could start a round-the-world trip right now before the end of the day Sunday. I’ll randomly select a winner on Monday (July 27). I will pay shipping within the U.S. — if you win and live outside the U.S., I’ll ask you to cover the difference.

Last year, she took part in an exchange program that let her live with a French family for a month. It was purely on her own initiative: She found the program and made the arrangements on her own, beyond getting our mom to sign the necessary paperwork. She earned most of the money for the trip by waiting tables. She flew from Colorado to France — and made it back in one piece.

Today, I called her and the phone got passed of to someone I’ve never met. There was a “‘alo?” and then some chit chat in French as my sister explained to her friend who I am. Then my sister announced who I was speaking to: her French ‘sister.’ The French family my sister stayed with has a daughter the same age (they’re now both seventeen). She made her own arrangements to come stay with my sister for a month.

I think it’s amazing that these two teenage girls have the drive to head to new countries on their own. I think their independence and willingness to go find adventures will be very useful as they grow up, and it leads me to think that both of them will make their own opportunities in the future. I think that sort of skill makes travel even more important, especially for teenagers.

My sister has big plans. She wants to travel — and she routinely mentions ideas like study abroad or Peace Corps as options that allow her to plan much more than a vacation abroad. I think that’s great, and I can’t wait to see where she goes!

Photo — Andrei Z

Today, I have a guest post from Lauren Roberts. Over and over again, I’ve gotten questions about how kids enjoy or handle long-term travel. Lauren is a self-described ‘expat brat,’ and was kind enough to write about the results of her travel experiences.

Good schools want well-rounded all-stars. Your kids’ best bet? Pack your bags and cross an ocean. Ignore the tantrums for now.

It doesn’t matter which way you go — you’ll save on summer camp fees either east or west. Back home, Suzy Soccer Mom is shuttling her kids to Spanish Camp and ‘Young Leaders of Tomorrow’ conferences. Out in the real world, these skills — and many more — are things expat kids pick up for free.

Of any myriad benefits gained overseas, I’ll focus on three:

1. Your family itself:
   Gone is constructed family bonding time. In its place – real life. Replacing wider support networks with just each other means that – through it all – you’re all you’ve got. Holidays are concentrated. Where mundane errands now promise absolute adventures, in Soccer Mom’s place is a full Survivor team.
2. Comfortable anywhere:
   ‘Travel’ no longer means an 20-something backpacking trip. It’s an addictive, compulsive form of life. Where a make-camp-break-camp habit might follow, expat kids are known for an easy ability to think on their feet and adapt to their surroundings.
3. The world shrinks:
   “How’s Singapore?” Friends ask when they mean Shanghai. Common mistakes – yet ones your own children will never make. ‘Cultural chameleonism’ and corollary foreign language abilities acquired while growing up global are a rich education that sticks for life.

When a ‘normal’ friend confided in me during our last term at university – I reeled to think what we had in common. After living at home through his undergrad years, law school meant the end of mummy’s cooking. He was going so far away he couldn’t come home every weekend — probably just every other. He didn’t think he could handle it.

Despite tears (and outrageous phone bills), children who’ve grown up overseas deftly handle change and, yes, hundreds of goodbyes. While our adolescent years hold a lifetime of miles, I’ve anecdotally found my expat peers to have a more mature sense of self. We’ve coped with upheavals and unknowns from an early age – and expect to emerge wiser, with a few good stories. My fearful friend just wanted things to stay the same. The expat kid knows they never will – and craves change and challenge all the more.

Whether it’s your toddler’s tantrums or teenager’s threat that put you off – they’ll thank you later.

A textbook expat brat, Lauren has her parents to thank for champagne tastes and obscene air fare costs. She’s a freelance travel copywriter based in Vancouver (this month, at least). You can find more about Lauren at her blog, ballywick.com/blog.

I’ve had job interviews over Skype, conducted interviews of my own for articles — it’s a tool I turn to pretty regularly. It might just be a fact of my life: considering my whole office fits in my laptop bag, I tend to rely on computer applications more than another person might. But I do think it may be worth getting my family a little more used to the idea.

This isn’t just a random thought: recently, my grandfather has been spending a fair amount of time on the phone to Chile. He has a friend there that he wants to be able to speak to on a regular basis, but he isn’t so fond of the international fees for phone calls. Various family members have suggested switching phone companies, buying phone cards and all sorts of things. I suggested Skype.

The general response seemed to be that my grandfather wasn’t tech savvy enough to use Skype, and neither is his friend. But finding a relative to set up laptops at each end seems like a pretty practical solution — and it’s free.

I’d love to see my family get more comfortable with using Skype. Even now, they only use it to speak to me when I’m out of the country. I think they’d find it to be a pretty useful tool even within the country.

Maya is really the epitome of the ideas I talk about her: she and her husband are both Americans, currently living in Buenos Aires, Argentina. They have four daughters, who have all spent time in a long list of countries and have each turned their own adventures into careers of their own. Maya’s book is based on her experiences helping her daughters through high school in countries like Brazil and Chile and through the college admissions process when they didn’t have SAT scores.

If your travels include a family, especially a teenager or two, you need to read Maya’s book. The situation is just that simple: she’s already been where you’re headed.