Thetownend.com

Afternoon all!

I don't write on here much but do often read your comments daily.  :)

Anyway...

As the title suggests i'm thinking about travelling but i'm in a sticky situation. A mate of mine has asked me to go travelling with, which i'm up for. The only problem that i have is... my job. It's fairly well paid etc but i don't really want to quit and then come back to shitty job when i finish my travels.

Any of you been in the situation before?

I'm thinking about asking for a sabbitical but not sure they'd allow it.

Opinions welcome!

Dependant on how the big company is that you work for, bigger companies usually offer a career break to cover this sort of thing.  Nationwide where I work allow you to take a career break for up to a year and then you come back to the same job or a similar one.  A friend who worked for a smallish company took unpaid leave for 6 months to go travelling and the company got a temp to cover her role for the 6 months.  There should be some sort of policy available from HR?

Yeah, i've been thinking about asking our HR department. I had a look through the company policy and procedure manual the other day but couldn't see anything in there about taking a period of time off unpaid. I'll go and ask tomorrow about this. If they don't offer it, then quitting is the only option or i don't go travelling?!?!

No job's worth keeping over the chance to go travelling, you wont regret it even if you do end up jacking in.

Thanks for the advice Sutton. I personally am under the impression that if i don't go now, i never will!

Has anyone on here been for a period of time before and any suggestions of places to see?

My advice is to take this advice.

Do it.  Lifes way too short to miss out on an opportunity to travel!

Depends which part of the world you are going to but I did Australia and Fiji and it was incredible - provided you don't spend too long in the cities as thats where the money gets eaten up!

The hardest part of travelling is making the decision, where you go after doesn't really matter you'll have a great time wherever. Mind you if you haven't been Oz and NZ are brilliant.

I've never been to either! Luckily i have a friend that lives in Sydney and Weillington. Free accomdation for a week or so at each could be sorted to cut some cuts!

P.S - how do i do a 'quote'? Sorry for my ignorance.

I've spent around 4 months in  total in Wellington on 2 visits, love it there. As Luci says Fiji is ace as well, good for winding down on the way home.

Thanks for your suggestions! Much Appriciated.

Nationwide gave me a sabatical, they even paid me for some of it.

I suspect that they are none too happy with me.

Unrelated but who is 'him' in your username?

MM would be my guess.

It could be used for MM but intact it wasn't. There used to be a forum member called boeta. I went school/college with him. As fellow Swindon supporters, I saw him posting on this site and thought it would be funny to set up a user name and abuse him! Funny at the time but looking back on it, I was fucking sad! Like I said in my previous post, I don't post on here that much due to work and football commitments but I do view the site daily and there are some brilliant posts. One of them was the sandwich filler post and the other was about the guy nicking someones van and hiding it! Bravo sir, I salute you! Tremendous effort for doing that!

Hope that clears your confusion!

My younger brother has just gone to New Zealand to play cricket for 6 months.

The little fucker

Fuckin' hell, these cricket matches are just getting longer and longer!

I did this in 2001. Just approach your boss and say you are thinking of going travelling, would they consider keeping your job open for you when you return. This is what I did, no guarantees but a month before I came home I dropped them an email and got my old job back.

Of course, I am an indispensible genius; but I am sure you are as well ;)

I'm sitting down with my mate this week to decide where to go. Get something in plan first before i go rushing off asking for a sabbitical.

Just wanted to see if anyone else had been through the experience.

Where did you go L.O.B?

Mainly Africa...Egypt, Tanzania, Malawi, Zimbabwe and South Africa. Then on to Thailand. I had a round the world ticket but basically lost out on 2 grand while I was away so given my next stopp after Thailand was an expensive one I stayed in Thailand 'til my cash ran out and then cashed in my ticket for a flight home.

Gutted to miss out on South America but I'll go again one day.

I would love to see some of South America. New Zealand and Canada have always appealed.

The scenery around the Cape in South Africa is well worth seeing.

Fair play! A few countries i want to conquer are:

Thailand, Lao, Vietnam, Oz, New Zealand, Argentina, West coast of USA.

I may buy some travel books to see what else i'd be up for. I gather that i'll have about 4-5 grand. Grand a month should get me by. Got places to stay in Oz and NZ so that can cut the cost.

Bali is pretty good and still cheapish, and as it's smack bang in the middle of Thailand and OZ, would be an easy stop off.

Lao isn't worth the trip.

It's OK as a visa run from Thailand for a day, but after that there is NOTHING TO DO!

Thanks! i'll have a look into it. Someone said about Bali today. I just want to keep the cost down as much as possible whilst going for as long as possible.


Yeah, my girlfriend has just mentioned that whilst i've been on the phone to her! Thanks for the information though!

So BR, do you actually work in Bangkok at all? Just wondering what's the reason for the name?!

I live here, have done for 10 years.

Fair play. I went there for a week last september. £150 for flights and accomadation! Thought that was a good deal. Long travel but well worth it. Managed to go to a dodgy 'Ping Pong' show! They demanded money from us to leave so i did a runner!!

Nusa Dua in Bali is dear, you can get cheap in Kuta still, but on the northern coast and up in Ubud it's dirt cheap.

Thanks! I'll have a look into it and see what i can find out!

after looking through photos of my mates trip to the baltic states made me want to do something similar.

Im aiming to do a euro tour in 2012 going all around europe, its still in the early stages but looking at taking a month or 2 to do as many european cities as possible, concentrating more on eastern europe so will skip out spain/italy/greece and such.
The plan is to end up in poland/ukraine for euro 2012.

travelling is on of those 'must do' for everyone in my view. i did usa, fiji, NZ, oz, thailand, malaysia, swaziland and south africa with a mini europe tour for the world cup in 2006 a few weeks before. best year of my life!
with regards to going with your friend, i'd personally recommend going alone though just to throw a spanner in the works! i did it alone and you get to meet so many more people that way and 80% of people travelling were also on their own which made it a lot easier too!