It was going to be the adventure of a lifetime. Late last year, Josy and Joe Davis decided to quit their jobs, sell their home and pull their two young daughters out of school to travel the world. Though their life in Gloucestershire was good on paper, post-pandemic it had been increasingly feeling like a grind. Josy, 35, a police dispatcher, worked shifts that swung from early morning to late night. Joe, also 35, a logistics manager, was often on call until 10pm. Neither felt as if they could ever switch off – let alone enjoy family time.
Exhausted, Josy caught herself being short with her daughters, Lola and Zara, six and four. “I felt like I spent my days off recovering, rather than actually being present,” she says. Though only in Year 1, Lola was feeling the pressure at school, fretting about where she ranked in the class.
Josy and Joe wanted more, for themselves and their children – and Instagram was a constant reminder that it was possible, serving them envy-inducing updates from young families like theirs who had escaped nine-to-fives to explore the world full time. “It made us stop and think,” Josy says. “If they can do it, why can’t we?”
In mid-February this year, after storing their possessions and making their farewells, the Davises set out from Heathrow, their lives packed into three suitcases. Their plan was to ease in gently with five days at an all-inclusive resort in Oman. From there, they would travel to Sri Lanka, Malaysia and Thailand.
Although they hadn’t booked beyond August, the Davises were open to travelling long-term – Joe had family in Australia and they were curious about the quality of life. What mattered was making the leap.
But just three months later, their dream had been brought crashing down to reality. In August, after a family tragedy at home, they were back in England, flights to Bali and Australia cancelled. “Ultimately,” Josy says, appearing on Zoom alongside Joe in Cornwall, where they’ve since settled, “we got to the point where we were thinking: was this our family’s dream? Or ours?”
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There are now an estimated 40 million digital nomads – mostly footloose young freelancers, able to meet all their obligations on their laptops as they hop between continents. And since the pandemic, a growing number of families have been making the leap, too, inspired by rising living costs, the increasing ease of remote working and social media influencers modelling it as a possibility. Some even use social media to help fund their adventures.
The lifestyle has become known as “worldschooling”: educating children through travel. On Instagram, the #travelfamily tag has 1.3m posts, and #worldschooling 350,000. The largest worldschooling Facebook groups have around 100,000 members, swapping tips for family-friendly destinations, home schooling resources and sustaining the lifestyle long-term.
For those who can afford it, the appeal is obvious. Parents get to escape long commutes and stretch their money further; kids gain life skills and a real-world education. Interest in home schooling is already rocketing, driven by concerns about children’s mental health and inadequate school support. Why not do it in paradise?
But the digital nomad lifestyle isn’t always as aspirational as it appears. Many describe loneliness, a lack of community and stress from managing work across time zones. A recent survey of 4,729 nomads by the online bank Bunq found nearly two in five (38%) struggled with their mental health. Factor in children – not just parenting but educating them – and the dream may seem more daunting than idyllic.
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New Zealand-born Melissa Wiringi has been travelling with her husband Rimaha and their four children since 2020. Her children are now 18, 16, nine and three; the younger two have never been in formal schooling. Her three-year-old was even born a nomad, in Spain, while Melissa was on a tourist visa.
“People thought I was nuts for a while, going on about how I was going to travel the world with my kids,” the 40-year-old says from her family’s base in Hoi An, Vietnam, palm fronds reflected in the mirror behind her. “Making that happen – it was a slow process.”
Melissa set the goal back in 2010, after escaping an abusive relationship, with her eldest two children. “It really came down to: what do I actually want from my life? One of my early mindsets was that if I’m going to live my dreams, that’s a good thing for my kids,” she says. “Even if it’s uncomfortable and hard for them, it’s still showing them they’ve got to put their dreams first.”
Sceptical of formal schooling, Melissa began home schooling her eldest in 2016, while living an otherwise conventional life near Sydney. Rimaha, 41, was earning a good living as a truck driver, allowing her to quit a job as a travel agent. They set out from Sydney with less than AU$20,000 (£10,000) in savings. “In hindsight, it’s no bloody way of doing it,” she says ruefully. “We just locked it in: ‘We’re going to make this work.’”
Their progress was slowed by the pandemic, grounding them in Vietnam. They spent 18 months in An Bang, a tiny beach village where they had connected with other worldschoolers. That turned out to be a blessing, Melissa says, forcing them to embrace a slow pace of travel. “Fast travel, long-term, doesn’t work – it’s tiring for the planner and for the kids. The adventure can quickly turn into a disaster if you’re go, go, go.”
These days, Melissa’s older children’s education tends to be self-directed and informed by their interests, but her younger two learn formally for about an hour every day, with coding and touch-typing on top of core subjects. While travelling, they will read, play games and prioritise informal learning from their environment. “The reality is the kids don’t get the same education as sitting in a classroom,” Melissa says. But she believes it’s better preparation for adulthood. “Now, with five years under my belt, this is worth so much more than I ever set out to achieve.”
But the lifestyle isn’t easy, she adds. Sometimes they have turned up at their accommodation, found it not as billed and had to “deal with it for a night, if it’s livable” – or find somewhere else on the fly. They have had to travel while sick, and leave countries sooner than desirable because their visa was up.
Melissa is the most restless in the family, “happiest on an adventure”. Her older children, however, prefer some consistency. Her 16-year-old daughter in particular struggles with social anxiety (predating nomadism, Melissa says) and adjusting to new places. After their quiet pandemic stint in Vietnam, landing in busy, urban Istanbul was “a shock”, Melissa says. “She was having a meltdown, like, holy shit, there’s so many people.”
Although her children may complain about repacking their bags or travelling by overnight train, they have told her they don’t want to return to a “normal” life. They tried that out in New Zealand in 2023, leasing an Airbnb for six months. But after three months, “they were like, ‘This is boring – we want to go travel again,’” Melissa says happily. “My heart was like: yay!’”
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When Sharon Ward set out on a “free-range” life with her family, “it felt like we were a giant social experiment”, she says. A New Zealander, she lived in Papua New Guinea as a child, Honduras for part of her teens, then spent 15 years in Dubai, where she started her family. For the past year they have been settled in Bali, from where Sharon appears on Zoom one evening, deeply tanned and apologetic for being in her pyjamas.
“I often blame my nomadic ways on my mum and dad,” she says good-naturedly. “They gave me the bug.” In September 2020, Sharon, her husband Mike (also a New Zealander) and their two daughters, then aged eight and five, left Dubai to travel. Sharon, 44, had been managing a group of childcare centres, while Mike, 46, a builder, fitted out the interiors of restaurants and offices.
Both routinely worked 50-hour weeks, and saved for three years to afford their trip. They had imagined it as a “gap year”, travelling through south-east Asia and Central America at a clip of two to three weeks a country before settling in New Zealand. But after Covid and travel restrictions disrupted their plans, they settled in for the long haul.
A qualified early-years teacher, Sharon was more confident at worldschooling than many parents. They used textbooks, visited museums and historical sites, and, after their eldest turned nine, signed up to an online platform for home learners for extra support.
Living off savings, they stuck to a budget and sought out cheap accommodation. “I’d pick a country on Airbnb, drop the price right down to the cheapest possible,” Sharon says. Many listings looked “fairly unsavoury”, or not family friendly, but there were often hidden gems: a comfortable caravan in Spain, a bungalow built up a tree in Turkey.
When money was really tight, they would book a hostel – even once, in Marrakech, a shared dorm, the two girls in a single bed. “A lot of people would say, ‘I wouldn’t take kids into that environment,’ but they’ve always been really good at top-and-tailing,” Sharon says. In Turkey, they spent three nights at a backpackers’ hostel, all four of them sharing a bed.
With Mike’s skills as a builder, they were often able to do manual labour in exchange for board through sites such as Workaway and WWOOF. Sharon was also writing a blog, which slowly began generating income.
But finding a balance between education, earning and enjoying their adventure was often challenging. When settled at a base, the kids would knuckle down to some focused schoolwork and Sharon would update the blog. But when on the move, both would inevitably fall by the wayside. Some months, Sharon says, “There was no space for anything more than just getting from A to B, unpacking then repacking the bag, figuring out what we were going to eat … ”
Their youngest daughter has struggled with change since she was a baby, and early in their travels used to get upset or throw tantrums on the days they were due to relocate. “To alleviate that stress and pressure on her, we’d look for opportunities to stop and just pause for a month,” Sharon says.
A planned road trip through Turkey ended up being scrapped to give their daughter time to recharge. Over time she developed coping strategies and is now “quite resilient”, Sharon says. But managing everyone’s needs, booking travel as they went, was a “constant balancing act”, easily thrown out by the unexpected.
Their toughest ever month was in Morocco, in June 2022. After a few days in Marrakech, they jumped on a 10-hour bus to Tagounite, a small village near the Algerian border. Sharon and Mike had committed to a one-month homestay on a date farm in the desert, living in a traditional mud brick house in exchange for three hours of work, five days a week.
The accommodation was “rustic”, Sharon says, with next to no furniture, dirt floors and palm-frond thatching on the roof; one of their tasks was to patch up parts of the wall. But it was comfortable enough, and they got stuck in. “It was really fun. It was also back-breaking,” she says. This was summertime in the Sahara, with temperatures routinely exceeding 40C. There was no air conditioning and there was limited drinking water.
Then their youngest started showing signs of fever. The next day, her sister had the same symptoms. Sharon carried on working while Mike looked after them – then he was struck down as well. “I’ve never seen them that sick in my life,” Sharon says. All three were bedridden, almost delirious. Sharon’s mind was racing. “Typhoid, hepatitis – your brain starts going to all those places.”
They arranged a truck to take them to the nearest doctor’s, where they found the waiting room full of people with similar symptoms, leading Sharon to suspect a water contamination. They were given hydration packets and soon recovered.
But for Sharon, it was a wake-up call. “I do remember thinking, please God, let us get through this,” she says. She had grown so comfortable with travel, she’d underestimated the potential for things to go wrong. It was the first time she and Mike doubted their lifestyle, Sharon says. “We really started to think: what are we doing to our kids?”
However, it proved only a blip: one difficult month in four magical years – it could even be considered part of the worldschooling education, Sharon suggests. “The challenges are hard, but at the same time the rewards are even bigger. When I look at my kids and how well they cope, how resilient they are, how worldly and tolerant, I think a massive reason for that is those experiences of travel.”
Since January, they have been settled in Bali. Mike has gone back to work, and the girls, now 13 and 10, have joined an international school. Only time will tell how her children look back on their nomadic experiences. “We’ll know in a couple of years whether we’ve broken them or not,” says Sharon, half jokingly.
Because digital nomadism is such a recent phenomenon, little is known about the impacts on children – but recent research on early experiences of mobility may give an indication. A large study published in the JAMA Psychiatry journal found that adults who had moved frequently as children had a significantly higher risk of depression than those who hadn’t.
Clive Sabel, a professor of big data and spatial science at the University of Plymouth and the paper’s lead author, says they did not investigate potential causes, but he speculates that it reflects the effect on friendships, community and sense of belonging. “Social capital is really important, and moving disrupts that.”
However, Sabel stresses, “individual familial circumstances” could also play a part – for example, marriage breakdowns and diplomat parents. It “absolutely is not” the case that digital nomads doom their children to depression, he says. Children do need stability, but that can be met within the family unit. “Maybe the parents have a better lifestyle as nomads, and are more present.”
Anecdotally, however, the range in experiences is stark. Sabel received a huge response to his paper from adults who had moved around in childhood. “Half said, ‘It was the best thing that ever happened to me’ and the other half said, ‘It was awful.’”
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By the time the Davis family embarked on their adventure, their daughters were “absolutely buzzing”, Josy says. They had loved going abroad on holidays and approached this flight the same way, running down the airport travelator already wearing their neck pillows.
For their parents, “It took a few weeks before it really sank in that this was our new way of life,” Josy says. The biggest shift, landing in Sri Lanka, was the change in pace: waking up without a job to go to, or even a plan for the day. The sudden proximity also took adjustment. Though they had wanted quality time, “it is a lot, to spend 24/7 with your family”, Josy admits.
But waking up in their beachfront apartment in Galle, with ocean views from their balcony, they felt sure they had made the right decision. Over three weeks, they found a rhythm, doing 90 minutes or so of home schooling in the morning, then exploring in the afternoon. After the girls had gone to bed, Josy and Joe stayed up editing video of their trip. They had started documenting their travels as The Roaming Rascals in the hope of being able to monetise the trip, potentially extending it. “Ultimately, that was how we’d seen that this was possible – through following other families,” Josy says.
Online, Lola was being taught maths and phonics; on safari, she and Zara learned about nature, food chains and the importance of conservation. They found out where their tea came from by visiting a plantation. Swimming counted as phys ed. The girls still had low-energy days, squabbles and the occasional meltdown. “Kids are still kids, wherever you are,” Josy says. But they were enthusiastic about the adventure, and took tuk-tuk rides, unfamiliar foods, pre-dawn departures and travel disruptions in their stride.
Even the harsh contrast between the poverty in Sri Lanka with their privileged life in England seemed valuable, Josy says, “showing our children how other people live, really”. As “mid-budget” travellers, they aimed to spend £80 a night on accommodation and £30 on expenses – roughly the same as Sri Lanka’s median monthly household income.
By the time they reached Thailand in about May, the Davises felt as if they had hacked life. They were spending a month on Koh Samui island, staying in a private villa with a pool in the beach town of Bo Phut. As a popular base for worldschoolers, there were kids’ clubs and groups for them to slot into. And they could eat out for an entire day for what they would have paid for a takeaway back home. Lola’s past worries about school had melted away and neither she nor Zara were showing any sign of homesickness. But two weeks into their stay, they were dealt a blow that they could never have predicted.
The family had just piled into their rental car to head to the beach for the afternoon when both Josy and Joe received a text from Joe’s mum in Cornwall. “Call me urgently,” it said. They pulled over and Joe called home. Josy saw his face drop, then Joe broke down: his father had died in a freak accident.
The funeral would be in two weeks’ time, in mid-May; they were booked to fly to Bali from Singapore. Joe floated the idea that he would return to England alone while Josy pressed on with the girls, but Lola and Zara pushed back. They had been close to their grandad and were struggling to make sense of what had happened. It hit them just how far away they were from home.
After 36 hours of travel, the Davises eventually arrived in England. They spent three weeks there, staying with family. For Josy and Joe, there was no question that they would be resuming their travels. They had been going so well, and Joe’s dad had been nothing but supportive. “We knew he wouldn’t have wanted us to stop,” Josy says.
They decided to skip Bali and return to Sri Lanka, where they had first fallen in love with the travel family lifestyle, intending to revisit their favourite spots and explore more. But this time they found the magic had gone – at least for Lola. Earlier in their travels, she had been up for adventure. Now, Josy and Joe found she was more reluctant, wanting to stay put at their accommodation and swim in the pool rather than the ocean. Getting her along to new destinations became “a bit more of a fight”, Joe says. “We just felt a complete shift,” Josy agrees.
Both Lola and Zara kept talking about home, and wanting to call loved ones on FaceTime. Even spotting leopards on a second safari and holding newborn turtles at a sanctuary didn’t lift their mood. When their parents brought up where they might go after Sri Lanka, their daughters were united. “They both just said: England.’”
Josy and Joe were torn. On the one hand, Australia was just on the horizon. They had flights booked to Perth and planned to drive a camper van up the east coast from Sydney to Cairns. On the other hand, their daughters were no longer thriving.
In late July, Josy announced to their 26,500 Instagram followers that, after seven countries and 14 flights, they were stopping their roaming to return to England.
With the Davises now settled in north Cornwall, both girls are doing well: Zara has started school and Lola’s past anxieties haven’t returned. Josy credits their experiences abroad with boosting her girls’ self-confidence. But as “incredible” as their five months of family travel were, they were also challenging, emotional and at times overwhelming, she admits. “It’s not all about the Instagram moments … I do think people should show more of the reality.”
They are planning to buy a camper van for exploring Europe during the school holidays. But any decisions will be made as a unit. Josy’s advice to any other parents tempted by worldschooling is: “Listen to your children.” It’s possible that Lola and Zara will regret not travelling for longer when they’re older. Equally, she and Joe “might look back and wonder: ‘Why were we steered by a four- and six-year-old?’ But actually,” Josy concludes, “we’re a really close family – and we’ve all got to be happy.”
