How to see the most and spend the least while traveling

I assume most of the people like to travel. Some of them do it more frequently, some less. I am in the group of those who love it. When I decided to go to Australia with one-way ticket I also thought of costs and how expensive the travel will be. I wanted my journey to be as low-budget as possible with many places visited. Luckily there is a platform called Workaway that makes it possible. As a ‘workawayer’ you pay 30€ for annual subscription and create a profile with pictures and description of yourself. And then you are ready to go! Once you arrange your stay with a host you are obliged to work 3-5 hours a day, 5 days a week. Easy. In return you get an accommodation and food. Isn’t that great?

Let me share with you a few short stories of our Workaway experiences in the first month.

First one happened in Melbourne where we have stayed with two different hosts. For the first week we were living with a woman in her 40s in a nice neighbourhood called Glenhuntly. My job was to create a very simple website for her business that she was about to start. Mario cleaned her backyard, did some weeding and other odd jobs which were easy and didn’t take long. As it was Christmas time we asked her if she is planning to do something special on a Christmas day and she said: “Oh, not really. I don’t celebrate Christmas. For me it is just another normal day.” And to be honest, even for us didn’t feel like Christmas because of the summer and hot weather. We decided to go to the beach with a six-pack of beers to enjoy the sun. Well, I must say this was a great decision. Once we arrived, there were thousands of people drinking, dancing and having fun in the sand. We experienced a totally different Christmas and had a lot of fun.

After first host we moved to Heathmont, a suburb in east Melbourne. We were so called ‘house sitters’. The family went for a holiday and gave us the keys with a list of paper where the tasks were written. Can you imagine a Slovenian family doing something like that? I don’t. Before giving us the keys, they spent exactly two hours with us. In 10 days in their house we did some gardening and cleaned the windows. Sounds easy, right? We had plenty of free time to discover Melbourne, one of the most beautiful coastal drives in the world - Great Ocean Road, Mornington Peninsula and Dandenong National Park. All worth to see!

Before flying to Sydney we spent one week in Torquay which is a lovely town where the first surfing world cup began (on Bells beach). It is also a hometown to the most famous surf shops such as Ripcurl, Quicksilver and others.

The most exciting Workaway story happened in Sydney. We were picked up on the train station by a really unique family. Unique in all ways you can imagine. The car they came with was more like a spaceship to me. It was Tesla X with 6 seats, doors opening upwards (like a sports car in a 50 Cent’s Candy shop music video :)) with two hard working kids, lost and completely unorganized business man who too often forgets that he is a father and his current girlfriend. We arrived to a 3 level villa with its own pier, huge windows and few big terraces. Sounds like a dream. Our main task was to babysit the kids and entertain them. I thought 8 and 11 years old kids have interests and do something else besides playing computer games. Well, I was wrong. Even though they didn’t show interest in anything, we decided to take them to the beach and do a day trip to the Royal National Park near Sydney. A few minutes after arriving they couldn’t wait to jump into the water. I didn’t see them having some much fun in the last week. Neither did I see them eat so much for the last days at home. I learned a lot from this family. Now I know even more that you really need to be ready to have children and spend time actively with them plus teaching them to appreciate things in life. Those two kids were a great example of “too busy” parents with money who forget to take care of their children.

You can see how many different and interesting people you can meet along your way while traveling. I appreciate each and every person who welcomes me in her/his home and makes me feel welcome. And most of all I admire their openness and how trusting they are.

So now you know how you can travel on budget, live with locals and have a lot of fun at the same time.