I really should title this post “What it feels like to be the Old Fart in the room” because in some of the hostels where we stayed in South America, that’s what I felt I was: the Old Fart. It was such a shock to feel that way.
Before we left on our trip, one of the first questions friends asked was “What will you bring with you?” – usually my (women) friends and usually incredulously.
This post is a long-overdue answer to that question and also because my friend Peter challenged me that even with all my careful shopping the contents of our packs will be completely different by the time we get back to Seattle. (Full pack lists are at the bottom of this post.)
We packed four days worth of clothes each. The boys each have four pairs of convertible pants, four t-shirts, undies and socks. Murph has a shirts rather than t-shirts. My wardrobe is a little more varied: I have one dress, one skirt and two pairs of convertible pants; I have three t-shirts and two light wool tops from Ibex. We each have a set of thermal undies, flip-flops, low hiking shoes, a fleece sweater and swimwear. In the specialized gear category we each have a silk sleep sack, a large travel towel and either a bandanna or a hat. We all have Petzl headlamps (extremely useful) and a light rain shell jacket.
We bought almost everything at either REI or ExOfficio – OK, except the Ibex tops I have which were a splurge. We did have some gear (such as long undies and rain jackets) already, but since both of the boys had grown a lot in the past twelve months, they needed new clothes and shoes anyway. Shoes were our largest single expense at about $100 each. It didn’t help that my kids are both in adult shoe sizes.
Even though I know that you can buy clothing in every country, I did go out of my way to research products in advance with two things in mind: CAM is notoriously difficulty to dress (this is a kid who has previously had year-long phases of wearing just one particular brand of jeans); specialty gear such as convertible pants are very handy when traveling but can be ridiculously expensive to buy outside the U.S.
One small fashion note: I a-g-o-n-i-z-e-d about wearing convertible pants. There’s just no way to make them look anything but dorky. In the end, I couldn’t justify packing both pants and shorts and so I went looking for the least offensive pair of convertibles that I could find.
The total approximate cost to kit us out for a year? $1500.
We also have a bunch of electronics – camera, netbook, kindles, iphone – most of which we had already. The kids started with a school packet each containing workbooks, paper, a fully-stocked pencilcase and a journal notebook. (Since BigB’s backpack was stolen in Arica, he’s skipping math until we can get a new copy of his math book but we’ve replaced everything else). We’re using backpacks that we had already. We have a basic medical kit which I re-stocked from our local drugstore before we left and basic toiletries.
So there you have it. We’ll see if Peter is right and we’re all wearing completely different clothes by the time we get home.
Full Packing Lists
BigB: 4x REI boy’s convertible pants, 2 cotton t-shirts, 2 technical t-shirts, 1 Eddie Bauer fleece sweater, 1 pair of REI boy’s thermal underwear, Lands’ End swimsuit + swimshirt, 1 Sierra Designs light rain jacket, 3x ExOfficio men’s briefs, 3x Thorlo hiking socks, 1x Merrell low hiking boots.
CAM: Almost identical to BigB except his pants are REI men’s small and the swimwear is Quicksilver.
Murph: 2x REI men’s convertible pants, 2x ExOffico pants, 2x ExOfficio long-sleeved shirts, 2x Columbia short-sleeved shirt, 1x North Face shell, 4x ExOfficio undies, 1x thermal undies (no clue what the brand is, we had these already), 3x Smartwool socks, 1x Merrell low hiking boots.
Me : 1x North Face convertible pants, 1x ExOfficio Amphi pants, 1x REI Pinyon Peak skirt (black), 1x ExOfficio travel dress (black), 1x North Face printed t-shirt, 1x REI OXT t-shirt, 1x ExOfficio ExO Dri t-shirt, 2x Ibex fine wool short-sleeved tops, 1x Lowe fleece, 1x REI rain shell, 1x Teva light hiking boots, 3x Smartwool socks, 4x ExOfficio undies, 1x Snow Angel thermal underwear.
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We are currently in Chile.
You can read about our adventures so far on our family world trip here.
We’re glad we packed:
1. Headlamps. We’re using Petzl headlamps and highly recommend them. They rock for: kids reading in bed at night, compensating for the lack of outdoor lighting at a rental house and taking a nighttime run on the beach – for a few unusual uses.
2. A small flexible extension cord. Ours is a cheapie one from our local drug store (although REI does stock a pricey “travel extension cord” from Swiss Army). With one socket converter, we can charge three devices making it easy to keep Kindles, Nintendos, the netbook and the camera charged most of the time.
3. Waist wallets.
4. Long underwear. The Andes in the Spring are warm and sunny during the day but sweet heavens it’s freezing at night!
5. A handful of dried cherries and pineapple scores a winning smile from an Andean toddler.
We’ve learned:
1. Don’t take directions using public transport without asking for the bus, tram or train number -and be suspicious if the person giving directions puts an arrow pointing off the map to the intended destination. Our taxi-ride from central Quito to the bus station to catch a bus to Cotopaxi took long enough that even Cillan was starting to get suspicious that we may be in danger.
2. Always carry an empty plastic bag. Why? See here.
3. Washing clothes by hand is hard work! (Murph may disagree, but maybe that’s because I’m more particular when I do the washing).
4. In Ecuador buying bus tickets at the station is more expensive than buying them on the bus. We’re only talking about a few dollars difference, but when you’re keeping a tight budget it’s worth keeping in mind.
How the kids are doing:
1. They don’t seem to be bothered by the abrupt change from Starbucks-on-every-corner Seattle to being stinky backpackers in impoverished Central Ecuador. They still rate free wifi in accommodation a critical necessity.
2. So long as they have a seat on the bus, hopping on and off the busy buses plying the Panamerica Sur and coastal Ecuador has become as normal as walking to our local grocery store.
3. We’re going to have toileting issues. At least one of our children is only comfortable using a clean, western-style toilet with a seat. We’re already joking that by the time we get to Western China the standards in Ecuador will seem regal in comparison.
4. We’re planning to follow the Seattle Public School 2010/2011 calendar. School started on Wednesday 9/8. So far, so good.
5. The kids have started blogging at TravelingPikmin.com. Officially, this is school-work (the writing component), but I’m finding it’s fun to read what they have to say about the trip.
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It’s been a crazy few weeks de-cluttering and packing up our house but we made it: house cleared, storage unit locked and bags packed just in time for our flight to Miami and on to Quito. Let the fun begin!
(If you’re concerned that BigB looks decidedly unhappy in that photo, don’t worry. He is still worried about how our year is going to work out, but only when he remembers to be worried – the rest of the time he’s fine.)
Head on over to DeliciousBaby.com for more Photo Friday fun.
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Since our recent dinner-time conversation where CAM berated us for being irresponsible parents for abandoning our jobs in order to go travel for a year, I’ve been thinking about the reasons behind my confidence in making this choice now. CAM is right, it is a little crazy to leave a well-paying job in the middle of a recession but I argue that taking a trip like ours is never a financially prudent decision and there are other reasons why now is a good time for us to leave.
Our children are the perfect ages for family world travel. We first considered the idea of taking a year to travel in 2001 but with a new baby and a kindergartener who struggled with change, we parked our plans. In 2007, when CAM was coming to the end of 5th grade, we discussed the trip again with our kids. BigB’s response was to run to get his toothbrush. CAM flat out refused to even consider the idea. Just a year later we started talking about 2010 as our proposed departure date. Never enthusiastic, CAM resigned himself to the mercy of his crazy parents and at least entertained the idea as a thought experiment.
Even at this point, we could have kept on talking and never actually taken the trip if it were not for two things. Firstly, a friend of mine here in Seattle took five months and traveled in South East Asia with her husband and two boys who were just a little older than my boys – and they had a fantastic time. Secondly, the recession brought us some financial turmoil, enough for me to think, “OK fine, I’m going to have to re-build my retirement savings anyway, why not take a break and then start saving again when we get back?”
But neither of these reasons would make someone comfortable with the risk of leaving a job and perhaps having difficulty finding another one in a year’s time. That confidence – if it is confidence, not hubris, only time will tell – comes from the career experiences I’ve had over the past 19 years working in technology.
This will be the fourth time I’ve resigned a position without having another job to go to. The first time, when we moved from Dublin to the U.S. I was way too excited at the prospect of moving to a new country to worry about something as minor as work – at least for the first couple of weeks. And once we started looking for work, we were gainfully employed within days. I left work again when CAM was born, finding a new job just as quickly once I realized that I was not cut out to be a stay-at-home mom. Similarly, I stayed at home for three years after BigB was born and my job search in that case amounted to a phone call to my previous employer. Who knows what the job market will be like when we return to Seattle, but I’m pretty bullish on my employment prospects. (You can check my LinkedIn profile if you think I’m making this up.)
There’s a general point here relating to working in technology and how the business of building software is new enough to have counter-culture tendancies such as being more tolerant of people taking a break from work now and then than other industries. There is a price for this, as anyone who has worked on shipping a software product or who has supported software systems will tell you: long hours are expected, no required when you’re in the middle of a project. But this is a true ‘work hard, play hard’ world and I’m glad that I can take advantage of it.
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One of the best things about being a parent blogger is that you get to write about the funny things your kids say and do. Continue reading
I’m a blather-er. You’ve never heard that word? Apparently it’s a Norse word, but people use it a lot in Ireland. As in “She’s an awful blather-er” to describe someone who goes on-and-on-and-on and never really gets to the point. That’d be me, most of the time. Which is why when I’m writing a blog post I have to make a huge effort to be brief and stay on point. But today I’m going to indulge in a a little navel-gazing introspection and blather for a moment. Feel free to sign off now if you’re not interested.
These days, I sit on the bus on the way home from work, dreaming up and partially writing fun blog posts about the awesome places we’ll be going and things we’ll be doing on our family world travels, but once I walk in my front door all thoughts of eloquent prose dissipate in an instant. I finally understand why artists may choose not to have children. I can’t think about writing while I’m defusing arguments between my kids or thinking about what they might like for dinner and by the time they’re quietly playing or reading, my brain is fried.
This is reaching a critical point at the moment because my kids are very stressed. They’ve known about our trip for over two years now. In Italy, our urban backpacking trip was a “proof-of-concept” experiment for my husband and I to verify to ourselves that our boys would be able to handle this style of travel. They had a blast. They were more dubious about our recent experience hosteling in Ireland but amused by the novelty of this style of accommodation. They’ve been involved in many conversations about where we’re going and what we’ll be doing. They drove the decision to incorporate schooling into the trip. But the reality of what we’re doing seems to be just hitting them now. As I box books and sell furniture around them, they’re starting to appreciate the fact that we’re really leaving Seattle.
So right now, they’re wigging out in all kinds of ways. You might say that I should have expected as much when I sold out their beds from under them (they’re currently sleeping on mattresses on the floor), but they’d grown out of their bunk-beds anyway. Yesterday’s pandemonium came when I asked BigB to empty his desk (because I’m selling it today). The sulking was Olympic standard. He’s never really used the desk as a desk!! Even though I still have a monster packing to-do list, we went for ice-cream and talked about how he was feeling. He’s scared. Mostly about what it will be like when we return. Will he go to the same school? Will he be in the same class as his friends? What will his room look like? (Since I said he’ll get a new, bigger, bed and desk). It’s interesting to me that he has no questions or worries about the trip itself.
CAM was resisting all involvement in our trip preparations. When I asked for his help on Tuesday, he pointed out that it was “unfair of me to expect him to help me pack for a trip that he doesn’t want to do”. (Imagine a big parenting deep breath). I said that since we’d leased our house, whether he wanted to travel or not, we still needed to pack up our stuff. He’d obviously thought about this while I was at work yesterday because he came to me in the early evening with a hug and said “Mom, tell me what I can do to help you for an hour”. I was so happy I nearly cried. Then he continued “And when I’m done, you can let me do what I want to do for an hour without bugging me”. I think a promise an hour of zero nagging while he plays video games in exchange for his help in boxing books is a fair trade. We’ll see how long that agreement lasts – I only need another week or so and then we’ll be done.
My boys are currently almost 10 (this week!) and 14. I really didn’t have to work at coming up with entries in a list of books for tween boys, I just had to sit down and think about the authors and titles I’ve seen as I’ve picked up after my kids over the past three-to-four years. (Well, OK, I’ve picked up, sat down and read many of these books too!). I’ve included quite a few book series because I’ve found that when you have a reluctant reader, finding a series that he will read is like hitting the jackpot since you get not just one book or one author, but a whole set that will keep your child going for weeks.
Additionally, I’ve included single titles from great authors such as Louis Sachar, Sharon Creech, Nancy Farmer and more. If you can, encourage your child to try other books by these authors – he won’t be disappointed.
That’s it for book lists from me for now, but please, do add your suggestions in the comments below – I’m really enjoying learning about new authors and titles this way.
Update (1/24/2011)
My boys have started their own blog where they have posts about our travels and reviews of books they’ve enjoyed. The links below are to their review of the title in question.
Eragon
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I am struggling with deciding on reading material for my children for during our family world trip. If you know me, you will understand that this is particularly annoying a) because I love to read and can easily rattle off suitable titles for any child, any interest, any age (it’s my own personal rain-man habit) and b) because I like to check my to-do boxes. We’re six weeks from leaving and I have something I can’t tick off. This is very, very stressful.
Why is this happening? Well, firstly because my children are very independent and equally strong-willed (I wonder where they got that from?). Neither of them likes anyone telling them what to do particularly when it comes to choosing what to do to relax i.e read a book. Secondly, I’m their mom. This is a disadvantage in understanding the relaxation needs of a teenage boy. I’d be the first to admit that I have no clue in understanding what such a creature needs to read to chill out.
So I crowd-sourced. I reached out to friends and asked for their suggestions and ideas. I am hugely indebted to my friend Stuart for sending me a long and detailed list of books. I appreciate that my buddy Barry took the time from his busy tech-start-up day at Opscode to send my his ideas.
Many of the books recommended are books I know and love but many more are books and authors I’d never heard of – which is something I’m used to since I realized a long time ago that although I loved Milly Molly Mandy in grade-school in Ireland, that doesn’t mean that my parent-peers in Seattle either (a) had ever heard of those books or (b) thought they were any good. I’ve started a shared list of books for teenage boys on Amazon. I’ll keep adding to it as I parse through the recommendations I’ve received through email and facebook.
I’ll also be sharing my tween-age boy recommendations next week. If you want to add to either list, leave a comment below.
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