If you’re reading this blog, it’s not unreasonable to assume that you’re either a traveler, or someone who is interested in travel or gaining a global experience.
It’s also not far off to assume that you may be college-aged, or right around that point in your life. Being college aged, you’ve probably made the conclusion that, right now, you can’t travel.
You don’t have the time.
You don’t have the motivation with everything else going on around you.
Perhaps most of all, you don’t have the money.
It simply isn’t possible, the logistics don’t add up, there’s no time and the contents of your wallet are typically reduced to 0 every time you need to buy a few more textbooks, pay off your Discover card or open your phone bill and begin pondering whether you really need unlimited data (you do).
Well, I’m here to tell you that you couldn’t be more wrong. You can travel in your 20s, and you absolutely should. Over the next few weeks, I’m going to tackle each of the main “problems” of traveling while you’re in college or shortly thereafter, putting on full display the reasons why you absolutely should travel even when you “can’t” travel.
I Don’t Have the Time
If you go to almost any school in the country that uses a semester-based scheduling (rather than quarters or trimesters, for example), you do, without a doubt, have plenty of time to travel.
Most colleges that have a bonafide “summer break” offer about three months of time without classes, assignments or meetings between May and August. These three months, not coincidentally, are some of the best months for travel.
Three months is more time off than you’ll have at almost any other point of your career (unless you get a job that offers some unparalleled amount of paid vacation, in which case you can ignore this). Summers should be taken advantage of, particularly when you’re earlier in your college career and not necessarily bogged down by an internship or two.
Three months allow for plenty of travel, whether it’s a cross-country road trip, or a passport-packing intercontinental trip across the Atlantic to explore new cultures. Most employers understand that summer is a prime time for vacations, and will allow you to take a week or so off to plan something big with your friends or family.
But what if you summer is too full? What if that internship doesn’t let you take time off, you’re taking a summer class or two, and you work an evening job to pay your bills? Fortunately, summer break isn’t the only time you can travel as a student. Spring and fall breaks–not to mention longer breaks around Christmas time almost always allow for enough time off to plan a quick trip somewhere you’ve always wanted to see.
The fact of the matter is, you do have the time, you just need to open your eyes and recognize it. Not only is it entirely possible to travel in your 20s, it’s easier! Never again will you have as much time (and energy) as you do when you’re still in college. Take full advantage of the times given to you and plan a trip this fall or spring semester. You won’t regret it.
