Roughstuff

25x your income is also a good thumbnail estimate of the amount you should retire with. Since my income is zero and 25 times zero is zero, any amount I have available puts me ahead!

Rowan

This is it. I've done something similar to you, too. I've had stretches where I worked my butt off, saved, then went touring. That's how my first ever tour happened, from Perth to Adelaide across the Nullarbor Plain. I didn't have a clue what I was going to do when I finally got home to Hobart, but somehow survived until I developed a microbusiness in historic bicycle tours of the city.

Then I got into bicycle advocacy which allowed me a lot of freedom to travel and tour. That's how I ended up in France on my first European trip, doing PBP and as a delegate to the 2003 Velocity conference.

I left the advocacy job and set off on the journey I talked about in my previous post. I had all the gear, and it was well proven by the time I set off -- I think I calculated that I spent around 100 nights in one year camping before then. I also lived for around 12 years without owning a motor vehicle, so my bike, a Fuji Touring, was my only means of transport... along with the occasional bus or train or plane.

Those also were the days before conveniently sized laptops or smart phones. My communication was through email, with a little device called a PocketMail that just requited a public phone. It was really handy until the company suddenly stopped doing its communications business and went into mining, leaving subscribers like me high and dry.

I fast forward a little, and the orchard work and a stint as one of those veritable council workers have helped me save again and when we had amassed a sizeable bank account, Machka and I set off on a 7-month journey around the world. We bought round-the-world tickets which were amazingly cheap for what they provided, and we sampled from the buffet before us -- Asia and Europe by bike, then North America by car.

We spent quite a bit of money, mainly because we liked to be comfortable on that trip, and it was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. But it also gave us an opportunity to decide the destinations that we would like to return to -- places such as the West Coast of France, Hokkaido in Japan and Scotland stand out for me. It also gave us the confidence to know that despite significant language and cultural differences, we could survive.

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The working holiday visa arrangements between various countries is worth looking into. I am an orchard supervisor now on a cherry farm, and we have just finished the (Southern Hemisphere) picking season. We employed people under the age of 30 from countries such as England, the US, Canada, France, Italy, South Korea, Taiwan, and China -- an eclectic mix of young people.

The key, though, is that age restriction. It enables people to work for up to a year and have money to spend on their trips around Australia. If they work in certain designated regions -- and our orchard is in one -- they can record their work days and once they get to a certain threshold, they qualify to stay another year in Australia, or return again under the same arrangements.

And we pay well. The piece rate for picking is based on a worker being able to earn about $170 a day, and some were earning up to $350 a day. The packhouse workers were paid something around $22 an hour.

However, the working holiday visa agreements don't extend to all countries and there is that 30-year age limit. It's worth seeing if your country has arrangements in place with others before you depart.

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A couple of other notes. Look up Schengen Zone for threads here in Touring about the restrictions on visiting certain European countries.

And, in the current environment, immigration official take a dim view of people who overstay their visas or work illegally. I know that as an employer, if we take on an illegal worker, we can be liable to up to a $15,000 fine for each person. And the individual will be deported and barred from re-entering Australia for three years.

I know they are more travel issues, but for extended touring between various countries, they could impact long-term plans.

MassiveD

One way to do this is to dump the nonsense about cycling and either switch to a trailer, or a yacht. Obviously if you just made your first check at mickey D, you may not be able to afford these options, but they have a lot to recommend them. Particularly for people of low income.

At the moment, or two years ago anyway, you could buy a yacht for what a touring outfit cost you. I tried to buy this 37 foot trimaran trailer sailor, 12K at the time. Immaculate condition. If you discount out the trailer, it is almost the price of all the gear for top end stuff, which could be 6K in cycling, This boat had way better accommodations for 4 than you get at the top end of cycling. With a boat, you can stay on the water, which is still free in many places. You can travel internationally at little cost. The bahamas crusing license is very cheap, and with it you can spear fish or line fish a lot of food. You are literally eating lboster, not Kraft diner.

In general your standard of living can be higher than in an apartment, you have enough room to run a variety of businesses, and you can move in and out of opportunities. If you need to do a job for a while, you can get a slip, pay usually a low rent, and go daily to work, you don't have to find an apartment. You can have a mate, even kids, certainly friends. If you want to hit the road you untie the lines and set forth.

You can make stuff on the boat and sell it, or do as my friend did, take his massage business to the beach, or richer yachts. Carpenters and welders can pick up work in yards. People really do this stuff, not just Heinz Stücke, as in cycling. Heinz Stücke is described as a vagabond on his Wiki page. If you aren't moving on a bike, your lifestyle is so low, that it is hard to consider it a sustainable choice.

Technology is gradually moving to the point where a boat, can be solar powered. It is there now, except it is not cheap. But cheap options well above the lifetstyle of a bike exist. I do worry with some of the options that tech is now allowing that it may at some point reach a point where the lifestyle is appealing for millions. Maybe water is too repelling, but in the US, there is an opportunity for millions to take to the intercoastal, and inland waterways, and to live cheaply, this will wreak everything, so the time to go is now.

While it hasn't the greatest appeal to me, you have to figure that if you are going to be permanently resident in various parks or farms, you might be better off with a trailer of your own. This option is not super appealing to me, in part because I have a paid for house, and 3 kids. While I would never tour in a large trailer, I can see it as a permanent, or seasonal tool, where you move a day or two, per month. Trailers in the smaller sizes, palaces compared to what bike tourist use, are very cheap.

There are some excellent books on this kind of lifestyle, one involved living on board a boat with only a few grand for investment capital. Unfortunately here, and now, the economy does not favour retirement income, and government policy is to make up the hole left by the borrowers and speculators, on the backs of the savers. This is also US policy relative to the rest of the world, so if you don't live in the US, you have a lot of additional risks from being used as a blotter for their debts.

In the US, I was surprised to see that heathcare didn't make the list of expenses.

mev

Since my first trip across US in 1992 (6 weeks), this has been my pattern with breaks in 1997 (3 months), 2001 (12 months), 2007 (10 months) and 2013 (6 months). Already dreaming and scheming about the next big trip.

One nice thing about a longer trip is you can also approach costs a bit differently. If only taking one or two weeks of vacation, I am more likely to incur costs like plane travel or others that don't amortize across many days. I am also less likely to take a rest day here or there. On a more extended break, I don't have same sense of moving every single day and occasionally take some days here or there. Also, a more extended trip might mean one can travel through lower costs parts of the world or travel in places where there isn't as many opportunities to spend (e.g. Australia has become more expensive since I visited and currency appreciated - but in outback regions there wasn't many places to spend; similarly in rural parts of Siberia or India also not as many places to be spending money. For all these the cities were fair amount more expensive).

Rowan

Boats are extremely restrictive, despite what you say. They cost a fortune to maintain and repair breakages. Many marinas are littered with "the dream" that is falling into disrepair because boats remain unsold.

The Grey Nomads or Snowbirds are classic examples of living in a trailer and moving seasonally.

You can travel very cheaply on a bicycle. And you don't have to pedal all the way. That's what buses, trains and planes and even hire cars are for. Sick of camping? Take a motel/hotel/hostel room, or couchsurf or use warmshowers (I have not done either of the last two).

One of the things I have observed with the backpackers who work for us is the issue with unreliable motor vehicles many have.

However, the piece I have left quoted brings up a point that is often ignored -- insurance, or more specifically travel insurance, and especially if someone is travelling overseas. We won't leave without travel insurance. It's a cost, and it's one that has to be written off most times. But if there is some sort of incident resulting in an injury, in a country where healthcare is expensive and there are no reciprocal arrangements, then you'd better have some sort of health insurance. And watch the exclusions.

pbekkerh

I first decided that I'd save up and take leave for a year but it dawned on me that I'd loose a very free and profitable job so I made a deal with my boss, that I'd take the jobs others didn't want and then take compensation for 3 months every year. I did that for 15 years and made a lot of trips while having a very good income.
I even had some jobs abroad and they paid me extra for it ;-)

Roughstuff

Basically, touring and wild camping saves you rent, the crazy incidentals you get when you call a place home, and the cost of a motor vehicle, per month. Don't include "food" in the cost of touring, you would have to buy food whether you were touring or not: and you may very well eat less and more healthy than you would snacking and going to restaurants, etc. Since rent is by far and away my largest angle expense, for me the economics of touring are compelling.

mdilthey

Did it, for about a year. Worked great. My blog still makes a little side-money, and I freelance in between grad school assignments. It's a great life, if you've got the writing ability and patience required to build an audience. I don't think I'd be the writer/student I am today without the experience, FWIW.

MassiveD

I basically agree with you Rowan. But the OP, BB, asked how touring could be made self-sustaining (SS), and as far as I know, virtually nobody has done it. Yourself and M. are as devoted as just about anyone, and you are not living that life. People who are serious about touring either can't make it work, or choose not to. This is not a thread about how to maximize time in the saddle, or finance a bunch of trips, through work play arrangements, it is how to make it SS, and that is not happening. There may be failures in the boating community, of course there are, but there are thousands, probably hundreds of thousands living on boats. With a folding bike it could even get you a lot of time in the saddle.

You could say the same thing about south florida real estate, where many of the boats in question are. I also know a little about the Oz yachting scene, and what you say about resales is true at the moment. People shouldn't have bought all that bad US paper. But what your comment points out is boats are cheap. If boats were expensive, it would prove their value was not currently down, but only because they are expensive. We want the opposite, we want the prices so low, you can throw the thing out for 1 year of rent checks, one doesn't have to sell a boat like that.

As far as maintenance is concerned, some boats are very low maintenance, and simple, but the average yacht is not. The people who want a self-sustaining life style should focus on the former. Getting a yacht that is trouble free, with a lifestyle way better than you can have bike touring is not a problem. Do you carry a fridge, a full size TV, etc... Today as with cycling there are many miniturizatrion options that are making a luxury level of support on a yacht relatively cheap.

Yeah, but that isn't the point is it. Are warmshowers people really looking to put someone up for months a time? That would burn through the goodwill of the network in no time. For 300 you can spend 6 months in the Bahamas, and it is legit. Free fish, place to anchor. After that, in the real world you probably will dip out, some people I know go on a trailer through the bad weather. I live next to a harbour, and one guy goes up the ICW to Canada, and back down to the Bahamas every year. He has a small boat. He just anchors out front every year, he is not the only one doing it.



That is why I brought it up. The folks in the US have a great deal for all this stuff. They either do/don't have insurance now, or they qualify under some poverty classification, or they get senior health care. If you are in Canada, once you have one bad condition, you are pretty much knocked out of US travel, and it might be a thing that you will live with without incident for decades. Cycling may have the advantage there, because of the lifestyle. I basically assume the US coverage we get to go there won't pay off until we sue, that is the wise approach to such matters, but a lot of people just hope for the best. But getting back to the US, the health care is what it is regardless, but they already live in a continuity that has every imaginable option for warm weather living.

MassiveD

Remember this guy?

The Original Technomad: Steven K. Roberts - Teknomadics // hippies on http - Technomad LifeStyle, Responsible Travel, Sustainable Living

https://leanpub.com/technomad

What has he done since? He took to the water, though he did it in a very complex way.

MassiveD

Dave Cutter

Yep! A lifetime of hard work, saving, a pension, Medicare, senior discounts.... and so on. To travel and/or be idle is a luxury. If you aren't born wealthy a lifetime of hard work and planning (and some luck)... and your time is your own.

Buffalo Buff

Thanks for all the posts so far, reading every single one!

A little about me...

I'm a few years shy of 30. I'm well above average in strength, endurance and just over all resilience / bouncing back from injuries and fatigue. I am debt free and can avoid paying rent or storage unit facilities while I tour. Everything I own can fit into my small car that is paid off and I have safe places I can keep it.

I did my first real tour last fall, riding my Trek 4300 from South Carolina to Ohio, unsupported, no planned route, just wake up and pedal every day.

I stealth camped for free that entire tour, and don't ever plan on paying for a camp site or hotel unless its an emergency. I love my hammock and the freedom of coming and going as I please.

I am currently planning to repeat that route this Spring on my Ridley Fenix, then after a week or so in Ohio heading east to NYC.

My problem with touring is even if I avoid paying for any car related expenses or rent, I still need to be able to afford 5-10$ of food a day minimum. When I did my SC to OH tour I spent about 6$ a day. Which is cheap, but that's still 6$ a day that has to come from somewhere.

I've been thinking about trying to get into investing, but that's more of a long term thing for me since I have zero experience in that area.

I do have an IT background, but if I were to try to do coding on the road I'd need a laptop and places to work with outlets etc.

I've already gone the route of finding odd jobs by asking around and checking craigslist for the towns I pass through. This can work, but it isn't steady or predictable.

I might be able to find a cougar to take care of me. Older women are attracted to me for some reason

I do make some $$ off of my youtube channel, but currently a bit under what I'd need to support something like this. Plus it'd be tougher to generate new content on the road with no computer.

Machka 

If you are under 30, forget touring in the US ... come to Australia and follow the Harvest Trail, make some money, save some money, and then return to the US with a little nest egg ... and then you will have something to use in between the odd jobs you pick up.

MassiveD

So BB, how long is this self supported thing supposed to go on for? If you are just doing it a few weeks at a time, you really don't need to bother, just save up, or are you asking how to stay out there for ever, whether you/others decide to come back after a year or a month?

Investing is a tough one, that is how people actually do it, but you can go underwater for decades at a time, so it isn't reliable. It is a lot of work, and a lot of hard lessons, usually. It also normally looks most appealing just before there is a major down. Most people who feel inspired are kinda loosers. Successful ones seem to be driven to it almost outside of the money. Buffet used to collect slips of paper with random numbers on them and look for a pattern. Milken spent all his very long commuting time, reading junk bond prospectuses. And Barry was a medical student who studied companies during the night shift. None of these guys woke up and thought the stock market looked like a real winner, and they didn't want to get left behind. As the saying goes, where are the customers yachts, though that is a somewhat different point.

Bumfuzzle » Books

Live on the margin is a pretty good book, but it does come down to more or less: Well Sarah Silverman said it best: "mommy believes she is one of the chosen people, and daddy believes Jesus is magic". Kind of thinking. You can talk a lot of sense, but at the end of the day, the magical thinking takes over.

MassiveD

Also, self sustaining is well, sustainable. Eating on 6 bucks a day is probably not that. Not sure what the menu looks like but if you tour you are putting heavy burdens on your body, and it is hard to put it back with 6 dollar a day budgets. Eating real, good, food is expensive. Though I still like the idea of a juicer that runs off the rear wheel and processes greens as you go. That would actually work.

Another good book is sailing the farm. How to live on your boat and grow your own food. That is the kind of thing a bike is for the most part too small for.

Roughstuff

Many useful comments. I'll add to the investment stuff, that I generally use options to generate monthly income because it requires the least amount of daily monitoring.

My new comment or caution is: be careful that by making your tour your life, you do not turn a tour into a JOB instead of an adventure. I find I like to tour maybe 5-8 months at a time and then settle down into one spot (Alberta, Oregon, Upstate New York the past 3 years respectively) during the cold winer months, doing grunt work and chores in exchange for room and board, conserving my cash flow.

For breakfast I have cereals and yogurts; for lunch I have sandwiches, anything from peanut butter to cold cuts; and dinner i usually cook up a stir fry of sausage and vegetables. Other variety creeps in: bacon and eggs with home fries (and the extra bacon is great for midday snacking at minimal cost, as well as being just the fatty salty stuff you crave. Like many others I wild camp and rarely have difficulty finding nominally public property. My one splurge item is coffee; where i sit in a convenience store and schmooze with the locals.

leissp

You know this is a cycling forum?