Reality Check

Is it possible to keep to a travel budget when introducing teenagers to the world on an adventure holiday? Teenagers eat alot, cost the same as adults for most tours, activities and shows and love to buy stuff. It's a potential money pit of grandiose proportions. Sure, the ideal of travelling within the pre-travel budget is all well and good until the trip begins and the spending doesn't stop.

One way in which to ease the necessary reality of a holiday budget when travelling with teenagers is to ensure that they save up their own spending money before departing. Great idea? Absolutely. Is this possible? For sure, but not without challenge and sacrifice on behalf of the teenager. What! Challenge? Sacrifice? I know, it almost sounds cruel to expect such things from teenagers especially before the holiday even begins, but with such destinations as Tokyo, Paris, Rome, London and New York to name a few on the horizon, spending is inevitable.

So for the past two or so years, Adam and I have encouraged our girls to save money whenever possible, and once their money went into the bank it wasn't available until the holiday. This sort of 'rule' of course was indeed a test of commitment 'to spend now or not to spend', and that became the reoccurring conflict the girls faced each time money was burning in their hot little hands.

"The wait was worth it!", cries Rosiegirl as we enter Shibuya 109 in Tokyo - 7 levels of shopping heaven for teenage girls size S or smaller. She makes a beeline for her favourite stores, Yen poised, ready to spend to her heart's desire, or at least to her own budget. I'm thinking, this is fab! Not only can the girls buy what they choose, I don't have to pay for it. They will learn so much about budgeting, how to resist impulse buys, ration out their spending and......... well....... we are now only 3 weeks into our 14 week trip and both Sunny and Rosiegirl have spent over half their money. Hmmm, at least they haven't spent it all? After a frank discussion about the swift depletion of their bank accounts in a relatively short time, they decided that no more spending is going to take place until they reach London - that's 6 weeks away.

So, as we visit the spectacular Chateau's of the Loire Valley, walk through the vast Popes Palace in Avignon, admire the scenery of the French and Italian Rivieras, see priceless works of art in Florence and Rome, drive the stunning Amalfi Coast, relax and eat gelato in Venice, drink schnapps and see an orangutan in Vienna, dance on a famous fountain in Salzburg, scale the heights of the original Disney Castle in Bavaria, ride the highest railway in the world in Switzerland, drink fine wine in Dijon and dream new dreams in Versailles, there will be NO spending.

This should be a breeze. Ask me again in 6 weeks......

Let's get Practical

Let's get practical, practical
We gotta get practical, let's get into practical
Let me hear your suitcase talk, your suitcase talk
Let me hear your suitcase talk......

First stop: Tokyo, Japan

When organising this adventure holiday each family member had the opportunity to choose a destination and/or event that they particularly wanted to experience which could be included in this trip. Going to Japan was Rosiegirl's request so off to Tokyo we go to begin our magnificent adventure holiday.

Because of the way our hotel rooms were booked (and the size of the double bed!), I chose to be roommates with Sunny and Rosiegirl while Adam had a room to himself. Not too bad, lots of girly fun to be had! We reached our room, I put down my bag, opened it in the corner, turned around and the floor had disappeared. An explosion of clothes, toiletries, shoes, jackets and bags had confiscated any resemblance of square footage - hmmm, this is not very practical I thought, just functioning may be trickier that I anticipated! So herein lies our first practical lesson - keep your stuff in your own space or else Mumma will go slowly crazy!

I have to mention here that Rosiegirl is a bag packing champion. If there existed a bag packing Olympics she would be the gold medalist. Her bag packing skills and prowess are to be admired and we all benefited from her particular travel gift before we left. Our bags started out orderly and as we leave Japan today and head for Paris our bags are sorted once again. It's just the in between time we gotta work on! So ok, nothing too difficult here to solve, sure I may have had a couple of outbursts because I couldn't reach my bed without embedding something in my foot but other than that I was cool!

Did you know Tokyo railway tickets are tiny? We were all amazed at their lack of size and this fact was certainly tested on our journey home from Disneyland. It's late, cold and wet (yet we still had a fun time at Disneyland despite the weather), and we are on Japan Rail (JR) almost at Tokyo station when Sunny announces "I've lost my ticket!". I'm thinking, oh bummer, (actually insert swear word here) what do we do about this? I'm too tired to deal with this, blah, blah (yes whingey mother arrived!). Then this very lovely Japanese man sitting next to me said he saw her drop it a few minutes ago, and there the ticket was at her feet. Yay! Saved from dealing with this problem! We all happily get off at Tokyo station to change railway lines - by the way Tokyo station is absolutely HUGE - then Rosiegirl pipes up and says "I've lost my ticket!". Oh crap! Really! In my 'I don't really want to deal with this but have to' mindset, I find a rogue ticket on the ground with the right date and sufficient fare. I suggest we to go our destination and use this one. Of course it doesn't work! Trying to then explain to the ticket man who has zero English why we have this 'fake' ticket was impossible so I paid the whole fare again and we were on our merry tired way. Practical lesson learnt - put your railway ticket somewhere safe or Mumma will swear out loud!

I must mention here that Sunny navigated the JR and subway very quickly and was able to guide us all on many complicated journeys around Tokyo. I knew her fab maths brain and skills would come in handy practically someday!

101 Days to Go

It's the night before I set off on a world adventure holiday with my husband, Adam, and our two teenage daughters, Sunny aged 14 and 11 months and Rosiegirl aged 13 and a half (very important to post exact ages apparently!) for 101 days - yes you read correctly, 101 days. Is this wise? Yep. Is this crazy? Yep. Is this intense? Absolutely.

When I mentioned my upcoming trip to people in conversation I found their responses varied from excitement and envy to shock and even "that's in the too hard basket". Travelling has it's challenges as I've experienced in the past so I imagine travelling with teenagers will be a whole new experience of varied challenges. My girls have never been out of Australia but will now have the amazing opportunity of visiting 11 countries in 101 days with us, Mum and Dad!

Why such a big trip all at once? Firstly, this trip is not only to introduce a global experience to my teenage girls but it's very much an opportunity for me (and my husband) to break away from the treadmill of life and choose something new and courageous everyday for at least a little while. The forced physical change of location and the varying challenges that present themselves through the nature of travel will hopefully lend to an increased capacity of internal growth which is something I desire. And secondly, hey we just really want to go on an adventure holiday with the kids!

I do expect this trip to be A-mazing especially because of my teenagers. Because of their youth, worldly innocence, boldness and current interests, their perception of the world as they meet it will be a wonder to witness, a special time to behold as the beginnings of new ideas, fresh inspiration and a newfound respect for this incredible planet and all who dwell here bubbles up, and takes firm hold of their hearts and minds in unique and profound ways. That is what travelling has done for me in the past so why not my girls too? Oh yes, the teenage thing. Right! Ok!

Well herein lies the challenge of travelling with teenagers - how do we all have a fab time, not kill each other, learn something new or be inspired and come home talking to each other? Guess I'm about to find out: it's that expectation versus reality issue although my gut tells me that both will end up the being the same........

I plan on posting blogs along the way of my trip although regularity will depend upon what's happening and it's relevance to travelling with teenagers! (might be more often than I anticipate...)
If you have travelled with teenagers before I say congratulations you did it! That's amazing - feel free to share any handy tips!

If you are like me on the brink of travelling with teenagers - I'm choosing to believe that it won't be too bad. Mood swings? Sure. Complaining? Yep. Whinging and whining? A little. Being unreasonable? Ok! Let's stop there!  As a family we've jumped in boots and all and plan on swimming. Here we go!