Here’s an update on your schooling question from last year. We just finished up a 6 1/2 month stint on Boracay Island in the Philippines. When we first arrived at the end of October last year we immediately fell in love with the place and started making friends faster than ever. There were two international schools on the island and we met parents, children, and faculty form each.

After trying out one of the schools, our 7-year-old decided he didn’t really like it there. So we went to the other school and they immediately fell right in. He jumped into 2nd Grade (in-line with his age and peer group) and within 2 weeks he was at the top of his class. Plus, the 3-year-old was able to enroll in a Kindergarten class and while he wasn’t able to comprehend or complete all of the work, he is much more advanced than one would normally expect.

Our 2 years of traveling prior to these experiences in no way limited our children’s learning experience, but in fact, prepared them quite well for “real school”. We’ve now left the area for the summer, but we know that our kids will be fine and get all of the schooling and education they need no matter where we go from here.

Take care,
– Jon & family

There’s really no need to wait, or wait that long. When we decided to pack up and go, we barely knew what we were going to do, much less even what we wanted to do. We gave it 6 months at the most and now it’s been more than 31 months!

We do have a free audio course and other information, if you’d like to check out our site. When you do take off, we’d love to hear your story!

– Jon, Kathryn & the boys

Travel is my passion, I cannot wait to go out and visit all of the places that I have dreamed of and just live the life!

Lori

The majority of folks immediately assume that it’s out of reach even though it isn’t. It was scary at first, not knowing exactly what we were getting ourselves into. But then, the excitement and desire just grew and grew. Now, it’s hard to imagine NOT traveling at least every month or two.

– Jon

As I mentioned above in response to a very similar question, our two young boys are being home-schooled, or rather “un-schooled”. While we do have two older boys busy with their own lives (working and attending college) our 6-year-old is a self-starter in reading, writing, and a multitude of other subjects. I also spend a lot of time listening to him and his 3-year-old brother, explaining things, and helping them build math skills. Plus, our Leapfrog Leapster and Brainquest flashcards have been amazing teachers too.

Both children continue to learn about culture, climate and travel and due to our recent trek through Central America, there has been a lot of Spanish spoken in the past four months. Plus they make friends easily and are becoming very strong swimmers. We couldn’t be happier with their progress!

Take a look at our most recent ezine which includes some insight and links to all of our products and free audio courses:
http://www.traveliving.info/ezine/090831.html

Abundant Travels,
– Jon & Kathryn (The Portable Lifestyle™)

I tried replying to this message many months ago, but had trouble posting to the site.

We do sell products (books, courses, and audio programs), but they are indeed a transference of ideas and so they can easily be made into electronic products and delivered via the Internet. However, we still ship all of the physical CD’s and printed material.

Aside from Kathryn’s book which is distributed worldwide, we maintain a presence in the States where a part-time employee fulfills the necessary orders across the Globe. The stock doesn’t take up too much space and digital files are becoming more and more popular these days so it just gets easier and easier for us.

If the products you sell are not your own, you can even set-up drop shipping to avoid ever needing an inventory.

-Jon of The Portable Lifestyle

I really like this idea also and would like to persue something very similar.

Super job my friend!

-Justin

I was originally trying to figure out how to be portable and mobile, like a big up front decision, but then I think it’s better to test chunks at a time. Just like mini-retirements, do mini-mobile adventures. Testing is a great way to do it incrementally and find what you really enjoy as well as deal with the surprises you didn’t expect (sort of like Stumbling on Happiness).

I know several folks first-hand that did the ‘take a year off” thing to see the world or travel cross country and it always seems to be the highlight of their life.

I think it is a trend that more families are finding as it is easier and cheaper than most realize. Here is a post I wrote on the topic of how to do extended travel:

http://www.soultravelers3.com/2008/06/how-to-do-exten.html

Hope more find this wonderfully free lifestyle!

This story is indeed amazing and inspiring.

All you need is a laptop to blog and browse online for an interesting issue to blog about.

Not only are virtual products useful for traveling entrepreneurs, no need for extra space to hold your inventory, and no packaging needed, no postage, all sent with a click of a button.

That’s one of the reasons I chose to mainly market affiliate programs.

Franck.

Your point about teenagers putting more stock in their friends than anything else hits close to home. A few years back we took a trip to Europe with our older kids and both of our mothers. It was an amazing time spent in Belgium, France, and Italy. Still, our teenagers barely wanted anything to do with getting out and experiencing the international culture.

Well, now it’s about 5 years later and these two boys (now 19 and 21 respectively) feel blessed for what they did get to experience. They only wished they had spent less time on MySpace during that amazing trip.

Ok, I am assuming that this “traveliving” is done in the summer, or you must be homeschooling your children. Although my business is 90% virtual and can be run from anywhere in t he world, I can’t imagine just picking up the kids and go. Not only do they have school, they also have friends they’d miss greatly!

If I were to give my 14-year-old son a choice between going to Cancun for a month or spending time with his friends, the second choice would win hands down!

I also want to comment on something you quoted from the book:
“Every month that we’ve been away, our sales have gone up”

This is absolutely wonderful, but might not make sense to many entrepreneurs who can’t imagine leaving their business.

The reason the sales go up is because of the systems you have to put in place. To become the “remote control CEO” you start thinking differently, which ultimately impacts your bottom line. Just when I didn’t think I could increase my revenue any further without increasing my work hours, I did! So the right systems are the answer!

Milana

But whenever I see pictures of people sitting outside on the beach with their laptops, I always wonder how they do it. They must have some kind of anti-reflection on their screens. I can’t work outside in the sun on my laptop, the reflection makes it impossible to see anything!!!

Go out and do it.

Found some new guy at this website. http://www.steadyincome411.com It has a testimonial by you but it looks like a spam site. Wanted to know if it was true or not.

Cheers,
Jeremy