The idea came to us years ago on a whim. The movie, “Mean Girls,” had come up in conversation with my husband, and I said I wished we could just go travel around the world with our kids instead of having them endure middle school. We didn’t even have kids at the time, so clearly I was projecting. Nonetheless, it wasn’t an entirely new thought, because long before I was even married, I had always fantasized about sailing around the world with my family. Alas, I had somehow managed to marry a non-sailor, so I had shoved that notion aside. While the middle school comment was a joke, to my surprise, my husband jumped on the idea. And boom. A year-long RTW trip with kids (by plane, train and automobile rather than boat) became our dream. Now many years later, to our amazement, it’s becoming a reality. Ironically, the hardest part is taking our kids out of schools they absolutely love.

RTW. It stands for “Round the World.” It turns out that this is a widely-used acronym in a small but growing subculture of avid travelers.  Yes, incredibly, there is a population of people who quite literally travel around the world for months and sometimes years at at time. And they became invaluable in helping us get ready. Thanks to the generosity of their blogs, we have had an extensive tutorial in RTW planning and are putting all of that great info to use as we gear up to leave on our own trip in just a few months.

The plan is to travel July 2017 through July 2018. We’ll visit roughly 30 countries, spending just a few days in some and a month or more in others. We’ll “road school” the girls (wish us luck), meet locals and other travelers, enjoy the sights, explore, rendezvous with friends once in awhile, and sometimes just hunker down for a break from the action.

In addition to keeping friends and family posted, this blog will help us “pay it forward.” We’ve been inspired by and learned so much from others, and we are ready to start sharing our own lessons learned and experiences on the road. Our two daughters will also be blogging along the way, and we’ll share those posts as well. In fact our 12-year-old has set hers up for friends and family here (email me for the password): www.1000wonders.com.  The main reaction we get when we tell people what we’re doing is, “I’m jealous.” And our response is that they should go for it, too! So maybe we’ll inspire a few more families to follow suit. Maybe we’ll even see you on the road!