Travel Young or Work Young
When I tell older ladies that I’m living overseas or travelling, their reply is often, “Good! Travel young! Don’t wait until you’re old like me.” But as I smile and walk away, the voice of society whispers something quite different. Which leaves me wondering: Is it better to travel young and save later or work hard young and travel later?
The more I’ve thought about this question, the more it feels like I’m stumbling across a thousand different recipes to make a trifle dessert. There are multiple recommendations for creating layers and flavours, but the end goal is still the same: they want it to taste good. Similarly, everyone wants to create a good life, but the concoction of how they build their lifestyle, save, and travel is incredibly individual.
I travel because my heart loves experiencing new places, and my legs jiggle under a table if I sit there too long. I miss home and my people and land indescribable amounts, but still feel my heart being drawn out to sea like a boat drifting in a soft current. However, I look at my friends my age with established families and beautiful babies, houses and growing savings accounts and think, “Am I doing it all wrong?” I hear 20-30 year olds discussing first home owners grants and putting down deposits to buy land. The voice of society knocks on my door and says, “Hey, you’re almost 30, have you completed that list we sent you to tick off before your birthday so you can be an acceptable citizen of society?” I worry that the life I choose now will greatly impact my ability to settle, afford kids or support myself in retirement later. But I also worry if I don’t tick off the destinations in my heart now, then I may not be as time-free, healthy or alive enough later.
To travel young or work young, that is the question. Fortunately, there are many ways to skin the cat. Some ideas could look like:
1 Earn high pay and travel in high-class luxury
2 Earn little pay and travel locally
3 Work hard and take 2- 4 weeks off each year for travel
4 Work the seasons, 6months over summer and ride powder in winter
5 Or work hard and then take a 1-year sabbatical, backpacking and staying at hostels
As the saying goes, we can have anything but not everything. We can’t travel without money, well, that’s if you exclude plane tickets, and travel on foot, camp at rec sites and commit to dumpster diving. If you want the kids, the house, the boat, the fancy hotels and an invitation to visit the queen, chances are you may need to put in the hard yards now to pin down a high-paying job. Or maybe you value working less and having more time during the week to camp by a river or do regular thru hikes. There’s no right or wrong preference, but every choice will have to give a little to something else, like affording a house or having time.
Here are some wise words from a friend of mine who’s had a few more laps around the sun.
“I would say that it was good for me to travel within Europe before I arrived in Canada at 23 years old. Here at first I visited parts of Alberta and BC and also spent a week in Los Angeles - all without children but parts with my finance. Travelling like that was much easier than later on with children. My children left home when I was in my late 40s. I remained a full-time self-employed person until I took semi-retirement last year. Since then, I have travelled a lot again and have big plans regarding travel in 2026! I certainly intend to travel and go on many more adventures in the future - on my own or with my partner, sometimes with a friend or my daughter. I have the time and the money to travel now that I did not have when I was younger or while raising my children.”
For some, the trifle recipe will look like working hard now and adventuring later. For some, vice versa or a mixture of the two. The options are exhaustive. I think at the end of the day, little old ladies are just in our corner, cheering us on, “Well done for getting an education and working hard. Well done for living your life and adventuring”. Whichever lifestyle recipe we choose is up to us.