long term travel.
 

I am in my early thirties from western new york and I am looking to do some serious long term travel. I will be traveling with my companion. We have already started the planning process including saving and selling small possessions. We are also looking to rent out our house when the time comes. We are giving ourselves a year to a year and a half to accomplish everything necessary. We would like to travel long term, spending anywhere from 3 to 6 months in any place( or longer if fit). We plan on working small jobs in each place and really immersing ourselves in the unique cultures of each destination. We have a couple places in mind to kick off our travels and would greatly appreciate any advice or tips on our travels. We would like to ease into this, so our first thoughts are Australia. Overall we would like to live places that are not big cities... with comfortable, relaxed atmospheres, like beach and island areas. Other destinations ideas include Bali, Fiji, maybe some Central and South American coasts. Also, we are very interested in then heading to Europe ( Greece, Spain, Italy). If anyone has any thought on where to start, the hows and wheres, that would be great. Thank you!

Welcome to Fodors mmohan: OK -- many countries have very strict rules about visitors not being able to work. And many have VERY stringent visa requirements -- for instance you can't stay longer than 90 days w/i any 6 month period in much of Europe. That doesn't mean 90 days in one country -- it is 90 days total. And you cannot work during those 90 days. Do a google search on 'Schengen' and you'll get all the details.

I'd re-post your questions on the individual region forums (Asia, Australia, Europe, etc) and you'll get lots of specific information. See the 'Change Forum' pull down menu --click that and move to the other boards.

As above, I think legally finding paid work is going to be your trickiest bit to figure out. Many (most?) places that is not allowed by foreign visitors. Second is about how long you are legally allowed to stay in various places (like the 90 day Schengen restriction in Europe).

You might find these sites interesting:

http://indietravelpodcast.com
http://www.neverendingvoyage.com
http://aswetravel.com
http://www.theaussienomad.com
http://www.legalnomads.com
http://www.nomadicmatt.com

And a bunch more - spend some time on twitter and you'll find plenty.

Paid work in any country depends on the internal policy of the company in which you want to do work .Also each contry has different set of rules and regulations for their corporate world.

hostpitalityclub.org good site for you.

escapeartist.com internationalliving.com

Save a lot and travel you cannot legally work without a visa

Develop a web based income source what I do.

Renting your house from a distance is a nightmare

sell it and put the money into travel you will need it.

All the places you want to go to are expensive.

Go to South America beautiful cheap Ecuador Colombia my favs

saexplorers.org/clubhouses/quito

You definitely need to rethink your options and investigate the various immigration/visitor policies of all of the countries that you are interested in visiting.

Get a temporary work visa for Australia and you will be fine; we're not unreasonable, just protective of our 5% unemployment rate! You will need to get the visa anyway to get past the 90 day visa waiver, but it is fairly easy to get a work visa if you have an outbound ticket.

For a different experience in a small town, try the towns up to an hour or so from Canberra. Since Canberra is the nation's capital a lot of the well paid public servants live in the country and commute. What appears to be a small country town may well be crying out for casual labour because most of their citizens are on the 7am bus to Canberra every morning!

This area has the added advantage of being less than 2 hours to beaches and about 2 hours to skiable snow in winter. Canberra has good night life but average household income is $A135,000 per year (USD 150,000) so nothing is cheap. There are good backpackers hostels right in the city.

North Queensland, the Riverina in NSW and country Victoria and South Australia are often looking for fruit pickers.

You will probably enjoy Australia but will need an Australian income to survive; even Macdonalds pays over $18 (nearly USD 20) an hour. Enjoy!