Is starting a family really the end of travel freedom ?
 

It's no coincidence.

The vast majority of people who seem to endlessly travel the world before retirement age do not have children. And if they do, they're often estranged from them.

Prolonged travel in difficult environments is a selfish endeavour. Independence, freedom and the great expense of it all is rarely compatible with family life for those of us who live in the real world.

I am 41 this month and my partner is 38. We both enjoy our independence, travel and our lifestyles. And we are in no illusion that we can only maintain this lifestyle because we don't have the cost and responsibility of children.

But we are in a biological point in life where we feel like we have a choice to make.

Family or independence !!!!!

How many people do we know who are "Waiting for the kids to grow up" before they can finally realise their travel dreams to head off on a trip which is more than a couple of weeks on the continent. And by then, they're too broke, too tired or just lost the desire.

Packing little Jimmy off to School one morning and then heading off on a RTW doesn't work for 99% of us.

It raises the questions.

Do people travel because they are filling the void of a family ? Or do people avoid having a family because they want to maintain their freedom and independence ?

However, I do appreciate there are many other reasons why people chose not to have a family.

I also realise having a family is one of the greatest adventures in itself. And I appreciate one can never fully understand it until they do so themselves.

I've met people who have tried to do both and but by god, it seems a chore. And not fun at all. And I know that my partner would not even entertain the idea. And we couldn't afford to anyway.

All of my riding and travel friends that I grew up with now have families. One by one their bikes were sold, their backpacks thrown in the attic and they now live for their children. They holiday in resorts and complexes and spend weekends painting their spare room. However, they don't seem to regret it.. Their kids mean everything to them.

So is travel just a poor comparison to family ??

When you are lying in your death bed, will you regret not having a family more than not seeing the world ?

This issue keeps me up at night..

Because you're not very old (really), you're under the impression that 20 years--of childrearing, say--is a long, long time. I've been out on my own, for 50 years now, which has allowed me time for a fairly vast variety of stuff, including more travel than most people manage. I'm not done yet, and neither are you, with or without kids.

Yeah, you make choices, but committing to childrearing now wouldn't mean the end of your travels; it'd just mean changes in approach, and maybe some different forms of adventure for a while. And when you're my age--a spritely 65 who complains a lot--you'll realize you were barely even started at age 41.

This is hard for you to believe right now, of course. That's ok; you'll see. When I was 39 I took off for a yearlong RTW trip, certain I was running out of time. Heh heh.

Hope that's helpful. At the very least, please get in touch in 25 years so I can remind you that I told you so.

Mark

I did meet some familys on my journeys. Parents who was travelling with 1-3 kids. Extended with "homescooling". I even meet a single mom who was travelling with 2 kids...

So it depends too on your counterpart, how your travel life will looks like with kids.

It has not to be "the end" of extended travelling, maybe you had to take the van.

If we all really have to go the "family / children" way, is very hard to say. What will we regeret in 20 years? How honest are the People with/without kids, after reviewing their decisions after 20 years?

We all have to live with our decisions, so probably we dont want to hurt our own balance with ongoing "self reality checks" with decisions we cant make undone.

Funny to read parallels to "the hidden costs of travelling extended at differtent stages of our life " thoughts..

Surfy

The answer to that is .... probably. I'm even older than Markharf so there's a lot of perspective to look back on, and from my vantage point now I'd say that going down the family route has been worth it. It doesn't mean the end of travel - or it hasn't for me anyway - but there has been an added life element of 'from tiny acorns, mighty oak trees grow'. Just as you've had to juggle travel with work and try to get each to come to an accomodation with the other, adding a family dimension is just adding a third leg to the stool. It may seem like the end of your travel life at the time but it opens up a lot of other ideas and opportunities that you might have otherwise dismissed. For example we rediscovered skiing and both our kids ended up good skiers by the age of 4.

I freely admit to being a reluctant parent and had I remained married to my first wife we almost certainly wouldn't have started a family. Even after remarrying she never did have children. Neither have two of my (male) friends. Both of them never saw it as a priority in their lives and they still don't regret the decision. So it's not for everyone, and had my current (!) wife not 'insisted' I'd just have let things slip until it was too late. Children were always something 'for the future'. I was a little younger than you (39) when our son was born and a few years older when our daughter came along. Interestingly (for me anyway) I can remember talking to a client back then about how I felt way too old to be a parent at 42 / 43. She was in her early 60's and laughed at me, saying you've hardly started at your age. And she was right.

There are issues with children in the family though. It is hard work and the problems you have to deal with change as they get older. We tried to sneak travel plans into their early years (Granny was happy to get involved) and managed (with 8 month old son) a wilderness camping trip across Scotland. Our next one, a trip to Kenya when he was 18 months old, didn't go so well though. Two days before departure, on a booze cruise day to Calais, he took ill on the ferry and ended up in Calais hospital for 2 weeks in an oxygen tent. That had us reappraise our priorities. For a number of years after that travel became subdivided. There were 'kids trips' - adventure playgrounds, Eurodisney (no flights - it's not worth the stress), summer camping in France, Spain. Then there were 'us trips' where the kids would tag along with our plans and finally 'me trips' where we'd each go our own way for a bit. I managed to get down to West Africa by bike a few times and over to the US as well during that period but they were hard to arrange.

There's little point fast forwarding 20yrs when you're staring what feels like a voluntary prison sentence in the face but life doesn't end with children, it just takes a different direction and one that is often just as interesting as the plans you already had. As my two kids have grown up we encouraged them to travel themselves and in recent years they've been the ones hauling us off to places. Covid notwithstanding I might end up in Japan this autumn on the back of my daughter's travel plans. Without a doubt having children around does keep you 'thinking younger', something that'll become more important as your decades pass. Interestingly in light of this discussion the whole issue has come full circle for us as our son and his wife are now expecting their first - a daughter - to arrive this Sunday coming. They've already planned their first trip for this July.

I don't see this as an “either/or” question, but a “how” question. In my own case, I’ve travelled all of my life, both in the sense of moving homes around the world, and also in terms of taking trips from these homes, for periods from days to months. When my children were at our many homes, we took lots of trips, although I have to say that they were never more than a month or so. We decided not to embark on any “big trips”, in the “overlanding” sense, while the children were at school.

During our subsequent “big trips” over the last decade we’ve met lots of families on travels, from a weekend to a few years. Travelling with children for more than a couple of months means a different approach to their education than would be considered “normal”, however it’s entirely feasible, and arguably gives them an education very valuable in ways that a sedentary education cannot.

In terms of cost, once again I think it’s a question of “how”. We travel, on our “big trips”, in a vehicle in which we sleep. If we were travelling as a family of 3, 4, or even more, then we could do this easily by adding a tent (ground tent or rooftop) or two to the spread. Food and drink cost more or less the same whether you’re travelling or not (and in much of the world you can eat more economically than in the “developed” world. Fuel consumption is essentially the same whether you're two or five in the vehicle. Obviously if you occasionally stay at a hotel or lodge then it’ll cost more to have more than one room, however overall it's not much more expensive than travelling as a couple. The families we've met were travelling in much the same style as we do.

So, entirely doable in my view.

My 1c's worth, when you have children you have a responsibility to them, not just for them. Some time away is one thing, extended periods are not fair either on them or on the person who has to care for them. When my kids were small I used to go away to the Isle of Man every year for 2 weeks to race, and several weekends a year at short circuits. That in itself is potentially rather selfish but happily I managed to come back whole (well, usually). The penalty (apart from the financial one) was I missed some valuable time with my kids growing up, and even now they are closer to their mother than to me.

Which is a longwinded way of saying while you have responsibilities (family, mortgage, pension payments, etc) you need to make them your priority. Go travelling when you're young, sleep in bus shelters, work in bars to pay. Or do it when you're older, the pension is waiting for when you need it, the house is paid for and the kids have left home - doing big trips in between is asking for trouble later in my view.

I appreciate what you're saying. If I had kids when I was 22, I'd already be kicking them out of the door and free to do what I wanted now.

However, It's quite likely I'd never have travelled at all and I'd probably be broke, fat and ruined like the rest of my friends who had kids when they were 21. :cool4:

I just REALLY regret not doing a lot more travelling in the last decade. But there were other obstacles such as my disabled mum who only passed away two years ago.

If I have kids now, I'll be in my 60's before they're adults. By then we'll be in lockdown 45698 and travel will have been banned outright anyway ;)

When we were out and about on the bike seeing a good chunk of the world we never met any fellow motorcycle travellers who had kids in tow, but we've spent most of the last twenty years sailing another chunk of it, during which we've met dozens and know of hundreds of yachties who've got their kids with them. Home/boat schooled and the overwhelming majority seem to grow up to be smart, personable young men and women; learning to sail/navigate ain't rocket science and ocean capable yachts don't have to be as expensive as you might think. :palm:

Hurry up and have them now but make a pact with your partner that they’re out the door at 18 - if you’re quick you’ll still be under 65.

We haven’t got kids and think about when we’re older - no one will come and see us, no grandkids, it could be very lonely.
Our plan is to set up some kind of holiday business so we actually interact with people.

None us are the same, we all have a diffrant life style !
Most people have a family. but miss out on other things in life !
THERE IS NO RIGHT or WRONG
I have a family of motorbikes etc !!!!:scooter::scooter::scooter::scooter::scooter:: scooter::scooter::scooter::scooter:

This is something I think about.

Rotting away alone in a shit hole waiting for the end. No family because I chose freedom and no money because I spent it all on motorcycles and travel.

I looked after my semi-disabled mum for ten years before she died. I shudder to think what her life would have been like if she didn't have kids and family to around her. It breaks my heart just at the idea of it.

Then again, there are plenty of parents who have kids who throw them in a home. Or maybe they move abroad and have their own lives. "Thanks for nothing mum and dad, I'm off to to the Mars Colony - Don't live too long now. I want my inheritance."

Having a family is no guarantee of a happy one is it.

Studies show that couples without children are happier than those that have them.

Couples without children must obviously have issues - or so most will assume of anything so unconventional. Put full time traveling on top, and you obviously must be messed in the head. Only thing worse would be to go solo.

Now, there are families with 1-2 small children who have done RTW on bikes - who loved it. But it is extremely uncommon. Crushing on a sailboat is more common.

For years I considered taking my kids RTW one way or another. In the end I came to the conclusion that roots, social networks, close friends and family, shared history, and conventional competences and social skills give the greatest odds for an upbringing that give the best prospects for long and lasting happiness in life for MY children. I thought it would be egotistical to go ahead with it.

As it takes some +20 years for them to become independent, my everlasting travel dreams were shelved. I'm happy with family life, but I am still often drawn

My kids are my number one love and priority... but if I could have made my choices 8ver, I would probably not had kids - because it affects every decision 5hst comes after, to the day you die.

I still to on adventures by carving out a chunk for a decent trip every few years. But going on those as a couple is no longer an option.

In two years, my son is old enough to start "practicing" on a 125 (at age 15), which means that he can ride across the country as long as I ride behind him with 7ntercom, and my daughter can pillion with my girlfriend. Two years after that it is her turn. Two years after that we can ride anywhere in the world, in each our bikes - during school holidays.

Is that how it will turn out? Probably not. My next long trip will have to wait another ten years.

Family and rootlessness seldom mix well...

Remember, when its time to choose if you are going to a 4th rate nursing home or a 2nd rate one it will be good to have someone who cares in your corner. Lots of people can travel when they are 65, but by then most of my friends from my 20's had either died, were rotting in jail, or hiding from me.

This tread is getting too morbid now !:ban:

It's not morbid one bit. Unless you're living in denial that our time on this planet is finite.

Just scroll on brother. Plenty of other threads to read :thumbup1: