ABOUT US
Hi there, we’re Jeff and Kristen Miller and this is our travel blog, Our Passion For Travel.
We’re both Australians with a big appetite for travel. And whilst we’ve squeezed in plenty of travel, it seems the more places we visit, the more we want to explore the world further.
We’ve been travelling for half our lifetime.
Yep, we’re that “young love” couple. Together since we were 19, we’ve visited over 70 countries. We’ve travelled through Europe, North America, Asia, Africa and Australia. We’re still missing South America and Antarctica, but they’re on the list!
For our first few years together we were poor uni students. Our trips mostly consisted of budget travels along the east coast of Australia. Lucky we live in such a beautiful country!
Once we started working, we took multiple trips through south-east Asia, using up all of our 4 weeks annual leave each year on amazing adventures. We explored the islands of Thailand, hiked in the Vietnamese countryside and stood in awe of Cambodia’s ancient temples. Travel was no longer a dream and now a reality.
Moving to London
At 26 we moved to London. Neither of us had been to Europe and we fell in love with the continent. We ended up travelling a lot more than working. We covered a huge amount of mainland Europe, the UK, Turkey, the Middle East and some parts of Africa.
Back home to Sydney
Returning to Sydney we settled back into home and the corporate life. We got married and honeymooned in the USA, Europe and India for 6 weeks. We then took advantage of the corporate flex leave policies and bought extra leave. We’d work holidays around public holidays and turn work trips into longer adventures. As we got older we allowed ourselves to splash out on some luxury travel too. We stayed in the Shard in London, a luxury villa in Tuscany and thanks to Jeff’s points hacks, managed regular business class trips on long haul flights.
Yet, we weren’t content.
The adult gap year
In 2018 we found ourselves in an amazing position. Kristen was made redundant and Jeff had 3 months long service leave. For our North American readers, Australians employed for 10 years+ with an employer are entitled to extra leave. Awesome, we know.
We considered taking a short trip but decided to take a leap of faith and “go all in”. We sold or donated a lot of our belongings and packed the rest up into storage. A period of nomadic living was now upon us!
Whilst we started out saying we’d be gone for around 6 months, we ended up living nomadically for 18 months. There are so many highlights from these travels. One thing we know is that we love a good road trip! Some of our favourites over the past year have included Iceland, Puglia, South Africa, Oman and the USA.
And whilst we’re back in Sydney, and 2020 has been a battle for much in the way of travel, it has helped us ease back into everyday life.
We started this blog
This blog originally started as a place for those travel tips we’ve been asked for from friends and family. Rather than sending email tips, we decided to start capturing our travel thoughts for sharing with a wider audience.
Over time, we’ve fallen more in love in blogging, and working out ways we can best help you, our wonderful audience.
You’ll find travel tips from our own experiences, with our own photos and insights. We don’t proclaim to know everything there is to know about travel and we certainly haven’t been everywhere or seen everything. We do aim to provide genuine guidance on our insights on a new city, town, country or otherwise that might be useful to help you plan before you go or once you’re on the ground. Looking online is often our starting point when heading abroad, so it’s something like returning the favour.
So, what kind of travellers are we now?
Well, as you might have been able to tell from the above, our style of travel has evolved as we’ve gotten older. Whilst a bed in a hostel and a warm shower would have sufficed back in our 20s, today we like to travel with a little more comfort. We aren’t luxury travellers, although we will make room for luxury experiences every now and then!
Travelling independently is our jam. We can count on one hand the amount of group tours we’ve done. Whilst we don’t necessarily have any major problems with group tours, we just love the freedom and flexibility of being able to explore at our own pace.
We can’t say we’re adventure travels, or hikers, but we absolutely love the great outdoors. So if you like wide open spaces, but not so much hiking for weeks on end, you might be our type of traveler.
Food is a big part of travel for us, and a major reason why Italy is our favourite place on earth. We’re just as happy eating at the best restaurant in the world as we are finding some amazing cheap eats. Gelato is our un-doing.
Jeff loves his frequent flyer points hacks. 15 years in banking will do that to you! Kristen isn’t complaining though. Those 14 hour flights are so much more bearable in Business Class. We’ve even been able to fly First Class on Emirates, on board shower and all!
Finally, we’re big believers in gap years, career breaks, sabbaticals, whatever you choose to call a longer break!
If you’ve managed to read this far – thank you! We hope there is something on our site that can help fan the flame of your passion for travel. We love to hear from our readers too. If you’ve a question or comment, please do fire away.
Thanks for reading.
Yours in travel,
Jeff and Kristen