To the edge of the world!

Have you ever had a dream about full-time traveling instead of working eight to five? It sounds like an amazing plan, but not everyone has that much courage to go and do it! One family from Lithuania sat in their car and started their long-term trip without any return tickets. Two little kids, jobs – nothing can pull them back! Now they are sharing their story, to prove, that nothing can stop us from fulfilling our craziest dreams!

– How did you come up with the idea of long-term travel, by car?

Our whole family is very spontaneous and loves to surprise those around us. If we come up with something and it turns out to be a good idea for both of us, we are starting to do it without waiting for anything. The same thing happened this time too.We both like to travel and we want to see as much as possible.We realized that there would be no better time than now.After all, children are small, school is still a long way off.

– How much time did it take the preparation for your trip? How was the preparation?

In fact, after a spontaneous idea, in a couple of weeks, we found a suitable car – Volkswagen Caravelle. We minimally equipped it with a portable toilet, mini kitchen, a bed with good mattresses. We gathered clothes, a little bag to start, found the main sponsor – NordPass, and after 2-3 months we left our home. At the same preparation time we were still finishing our work. So, we organized the last event of the cycle of events organized by us at Ratrace.lt and left. As I mentioned we are quick to adapt to any living condition.

– Do you have any daily rituals which help you with your travel?

In the beginning, it was hard because we wanted to drive as far as possible. That is why we had to become circus performers and theater actors for our children. However, now we have some well-established rituals. For example, if we know that we have to make a long drive that day after breakfast, we play, walk and have some other activities in the morning so that we can drive while our tired children are sleeping afterward. We are stopping after their naps, to have some active time again

– What challenges and difficulties did you face?

The main difficulty is the ever-changing requirements and situation in the world due to the pandemic. While being next to the Turkish-Georgian border, we learned that we would be required to perform PCR tests. We had to go back and do them. This change was announced a few hours before we arrived at the border. Also, in the ‘closing’ states, we couldn‘t enter 2 of them, because they were closed just before the nose…

The second difficulty is finding time for yourself and being alone. We try to invent walking, traveling alone, giving time to rest from each other.

It is sometimes difficult to adapt to the culture of certain countries, driving, and so on. We have to adapt very quickly to the rules of each country, the subtleties of the language, and so on.

Also, due to the not very fast internet, it is sometimes difficult to transfer large format files to our video editors.

– Which countries have you already visited? Which one made the biggest impression?

We currently travelled over 10,000km. We have passed Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey, Georgiaand we are in Armenia now. We are waiting for a response from the Iranian embassy on the visa.

We could not single out one country – all liked it in its way. Maybe Armenia stands out for its hospitality and natural beauty. Here we are for the first time, so impressions may be bigger.

– In your Instagram profile I saw that you visited Romania. What did you visit there, what was the impression of this country?

Yes, we visited Romania too. This country immediately stood out with much better weather than in Lithuania. I also really liked the mountainous places and snowy peaks. It‘s a pity that it was not possible to go to one Sibiu mountain due to too much snow. My mother is from Ukraine, so it was a kind of inner feeling of “second home”. I still really enjoyed the grandeur of the buildings, especially in Bucharest. And the Christmas decorations in the towns created the feeling that we are in a fairytale country.

Also, in Romania, we were looking forward to Dracula’s Castle! The children were a little disappointed that they didn’t see Dracula, but still, it was very exciting.

– What is the final destination of your trip? How many and what other countries you are planning to visit?

The original plan was to see the Dakar Rally. Unfortunately, the pandemic changed our plans and we were unable to get there. There was another plan to move to the island of Cyprus, then to Israel, but this plan also did not happen due to the closure of the borders. There is no specific number of countries we need to see. Now we are currently in Armenia,the ninth country and we are implementing our plan C. How it will be you can see on our Instagram accounts @oxiuke and @ ratrace.lt or on Youtube „I Pasaulio krasta su NordPass’.

– What is your plan after this long time trip? Do you have any advice for a person, who would like to make long-term trip?
Good question. For now, we live in a journey and a journey. You see more opportunities, the horizons are expanding, you meet new people. The world no longer looks so immensely big if you can travel that much with two little kids.

I would like to encourage people to take an action, follow their dreams, not to be afraid of difficulties and uncertainty. I get a lot of messages about ‘and you are fulfilling my old dream’. I mean, there will be no better time than now.

You can follow their journey online here:
https://bit.ly/ratrace-trip
Or on Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/oxiuke/
https://www.instagram.com/ratrace.lt/

The journey „I Pasaulio krasta“ is sponsored by NordPass:
https://nordpass.com/ipasauliokrasta
Take care of your online safety!
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Author: Emilija Lideikytė

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