This is a question we get asked quite often…

How do you do travel so often when you work full time? There are a few factors that come into play which we’ll go through below. But rest assured, it can be done!

Make the most of public / bank holidays

If there is one thing we did exceptionally well while we were living in London was making the most of the bank holidays.

This does often mean planning ahead as often these weekends can prove to be more expensive than others. We looked a year in advance, got our calendar out and marked up all of the long weekends. Then we made a list of cities we wanted to visit and which season is best for playing tourist.

Then, jump on Skyscanner or google flights and find the most reasonable flights and book them in! Quite often the earlier you book, the cheaper your flights will be. We had quite a few fantastic city breaks such as Krakow!

Krakow, Poland

When you have longer breaks, such as Christmas or Easter, you only need to take minimal annual leave to make the trip into a week or so and go somewhere for that bit longer. So again, plan which country you want to go to and lock it in! We used these breaks for Morocco, Iceland and Cinque Terre to name a few!

Manarola, Cinque Terre

Gullfoss Waterfall, Iceland

For our top 16 must visit European destinations, click here!

If you’re not living in Europe, picking different countries can obviously be a tricky thing! We’re now living back in Australia but we are sticking with the same method and will go further into detail below.

Know your annual leave entitlement

Depending on your country and organisation, you could get anywhere between say 15 – 30 annual days per year – some more and some less. You need to be strategic in how you use these days.

Remembering that you are probably forced to take some of that leave over the Christmas break, it doesn’t always leave a lot left for the rest of the year.

Some organisations require you to book your leave well in advance, so make sure you know what your company requires before you book your flights!

If you are trying to work out how to ration out your leave throughout the year, and it doesn’t look promising… see below!

Nyhavn, Copenhagen

Purchase Additional Annual Leave

When we were working in London, we both purchased additional annual leave.

Basically, this means buying extra leave which gets deducted from your pay. When you go to take this type of leave, you will still get paid. Essentially it is the same as unpaid leave, except you’re paying it off over the year, rather than going fully unpaid at the time of your holiday – who wants to be without pay when you’re away!!

Enjoy city breaks!

If you’re living in Europe, city breaks are easy, can be relatively inexpensive and you can take plenty of them! If you leave on a Friday night after work, you can return on Sunday night and not take a single annual leave day!

This means you’re still exploring the world, getting to know different cities and cultures without reducing your leave balance.

Paris, France

Embrace you’re own neighbourhood!

If you’re living too far away to escape to a different country each month (like we are now) then you need to really embrace your own back yard!

We have made a real effort since moving back home to explore what our own country has to offer. We’ve had a heap of weekends away and are really enjoying ourselves.

Port Stephens, NSW

The benefit of exploring your own local area means you don’t need to waste hours in transit at airports, in the plane and so forth – you can just jump in the car and head off.

If you don’t always have a full weekend, plan some day trips! We have also made the most of the sunshine here in sunny Queensland and have booked in a heap of day trips which make us feel like we aren’t missing out too much while exploring what is close by. Again, this doesn’t use up any annual leave!

Figure 8 Pools, Sydney

Do you have travel insurance?

Before travelling, make sure you get a travel insurance policy – you never know when you might need it! Click here for information on travel insurance, what company we recommend and a link to get an instant quote.

Alternative accommodation

If you’re looking for alternative accommodation to either save some money or share with friends or family, click here for information on Air B&B ($50 discount on your first booking), hotel price comparison websites etc.

Do you work full-time and manage to get away frequently? What are your top tips? Leave your comments below!

“We travel, some of us forever, to seek other places, other lives, other souls.” – Anais Nin