Our Sabbatical FAQ

WTF?

We (Craig and Meghan, AKA Craighan) have quit our jobs to spend 2018 traveling around Europe, focusing mostly on cities with major art museums so that we can deepen our understanding of great art and make it more accessible to others. We’re calling it an art sabbatical, but let’s be real: there will be a lot of cafe and brewery time as well.

Why?

The short answer: Because we can. #nokids. The longer answer: The past few years, we’ve taken an art-focused trip to Europe every year, and every time we’ve felt like we could have stayed much, much longer. When we think about what we want to do with the limited time we have on earth, seeing great art and spending relaxing afternoons eating cheese and drinking beer and/or wine always rises to the top of our thoughts. Any time we talked about what we’d do if we won the lottery, it always started with, “Well, of course we’d go live in Europe for a year at least…” And one day, we decided to do the math. Just how much would we need to win to make that feasible? It turns out that we don’t actually need to win the lottery at all. That’s when we started getting serious about making it happen.

Why now?

Given our good health and where we are in our careers, there really is no better time to do this. We feel like we are in the right stage of our careers where we have a decent chance of finding employment when we come back, and we’d like to think that we’re ready for climbing bell towers as well. It seems almost foolhardy to wait to do something this important to us, when there isn’t anything truly preventing us from doing it now. It’s now or never.

Another major reason we want to do this trip is to be able to spend some time in Europe with our parents. Right now, parents on both sides are totally rockin’ the retired life, with all kinds of fun travel and more energy than us most weeks. They’re totally up for the challenge of cobblestone streets and those steep stair wells in bell towers (we may or may not have told them about the lack of elevators yet), so now’s a great time to get them to fly over and join us for a few weeks.

When did you guys decide to do this?

March 12, 2017. Seriously. I remember the exact moment and place. Unlike most of our “let’s live in Europe some day” conversations, this one was sober and in broad daylight. We’d been talking about it for years, though (usually at a bar or while on vacation in Europe).

Why a whole year? Couldn’t you do a shorter timeframe so you wouldn’t have to quit your jobs?

This is a good question, and one that we agonized over quite a bit. In the end, it came down to wanting to feel like we could take our time and really savor whatever places and experiences we chose along the way. We also didn’t want this to be like our usual travel where we feel like tourists the whole time. We are hoping (and a wee bit nervous, if we’re honest) that this will be a transformative experience for us. For that, two weeks every year for the next 20 years just won’t cut it.

So, you just quit your jobs?

Yes. Meghan was self employed, but she’s not taking her work with her. Craig worked (until Dec. 8, 2017) for the federal government, and was just about done professionally with his job when they decided to take this leap.

What are you going to do with your stuff/place while you’re gone?

We’re going to rent out our condo, which is partly why we’re going for an entire year – while we could probably find a short-term renter in D.C., it’s easier to go the standard route of a 12-month lease. We briefly considered renting the place furnished but decided we’d rather put our things in storage.

Sounds expensive. How can you afford this?

That is the not-quite-million-dollar question, and we’re still trying to get a good handle on the answer. The nice thing is that there is a ton of information out there regarding long-term travel. The hard part is that everyone’s experience is a bit different, and things change year to year so one person’s very detailed budget from 2014 may not be at all relevant to what we want to do in 2018. Most people who do a yearlong trip balance out the expensive countries with Southeast Asia and South America, which we will not be doing. Because we’re focusing so much on major cities (because that’s where the art museums are), our trip is more expensive than most. Right now, we are estimating that the trip will cost $40k to $45k, including pre-trip expenses like visas and moving. We’ll definitely be adjusting this as we go, though.

Not to get all Mr. Money Mustache on you, but we’ve simply planned well and made choices related to where and how we live with this goal in mind. We’ve also been pretty lucky in a few other respects. We’ll be renting our condo, which will cover a lot of our expenses. We have some savings set aside specifically for this time off. And, we won’t be staying in five star hotels and eating in Michelin starred restaurants. If you want to know, we’re happy to answer questions – just drop us a line.

Holy cow – that’s a lot of money! Wouldn’t it be more responsible to save that money, or spend it on something else?

Well, it is and it isn’t a lot of money. To put it into perspective, we haven’t owned a car since 2008. If you add up the car payments and expenses for two vehicles that we hypothetically would have owned in the past nine years, it probably works out to something close to $40k if not more. It’s possible that our perspective is distorted from having originally thought we needed to win MegaMillions to make this trip possible, but we think this is not too much for the trip of a lifetime. We’re also planning to finance about half the trip by renting out our place, which makes it substantially more affordable. (Yes, D.C. rent is ridiculously high, but since that works in our favor right now we are not complaining!)

Where will you be traveling?

Europe. Most of it at least. Because we’re making this an art-centered sabbatical, we’re planning on spending at least a month in six cities that have most of Europe’s great art: London, Madrid, Paris, Rome, Florence, and Berlin. But because this is an ever-evolving plan, but these are just the rough outlines are that we will spend a lot of time. In between those cities, we’re not really sure where we’ll be. Craig wants to spend a month traveling around Spain, especially the south of Spain. We’ll definitely be spending time in other places – sometimes for art, sometimes just for the heck of it – Barcelona, Lisbon, Vienna, Venice, Siena, Leiden, Cologne, Munich, Nice, Antwerp, Amsterdam, the south of France, Budapest, Prague, and a few other places. We’re trying to strike a balance between planning enough to get the cost savings of advance planning and be able to meet up with friends and family, but also allow us to flow as we figure things out and learn how to make the most of our time.

Is your favorite city or location not on the list? Drop us a line and tell us what we have to see.

Where will you be staying?

For the longer-term cities, we’ll be staying in Airbnbs. For shorter stays, hostels, monasteries, and such.

Do you guys speak the languages of the countries you’ll be visiting?

Um, no. Nein. Nyet. Non. We speak un poquito de Espanol, but other than that, we are typical Americans who show up and expect to be able to order coffee and a cheese plate without knowing the native tongue. We keep saying we’ll up our Duolingo practice, but so far we have not been diligent on this front. We should probably get to work on that- BRB.

Are you going to be documenting your travels somewhere?

Yep! We ambitiously plan to maintain two websites, one for art (MoreThanTheMonaLisa.com) and one for travel (this one – The Craighan Report [at craighan.report]). Depending on your interest, you can subscribe to one or both to keep up with our activities.

How are you able to stay in Europe for so long when the tourist visas are only for 90 days?

Meghan now knows way more about visas than most people would ever want to. She discovered that most European countries, at least the ones in the Schengen Zone (most of what you think of as “Europe” except for the U.K.), offer something called a non-lucrative visa. Basically, if you can show that you can support yourself and won’t be a burden to society or take away a job from a local, you can get a visa for up to 12 months that’s good in the entire Schengen Area. The exact requirements vary, but they all include having medical insurance, a clean criminal record, and enough savings to support yourself for the time period of the visa. In our case, we are going to apply for a non-lucrative visa from Spain, as that is where we will likely spend a lot of our time, both for financial reasons and for the jamon (delicious, delicious ham). Oh, and the Prado.

You’ve mentioned art a couple of times now. What’s that all about?

With all the time that we imagine we’ll have on our hands, we thought it would be good to have a project while we’re traveling. We’re going to be creating guides for art museums to help other people who would like to like art. If you’re interested, you can find all of our art musings on MoreThanTheMonaLisa.com.

Do you guys have an art background?

Nope! It’s a habit we picked up in Amsterdam. We had the good fortune to see the best of the Rijksmuseum’s collection when it was being renovated, and one thing leads to a Joan Miró exhibit leads to Hieronymus Bosch exhibit in ‘s-Hertogenbosch, Netherlands, and here we are spending lots of time seeing, reading, and talking about art. When we first started talking seriously about the trip, the options of where to go and what to see were overwhelming. Using art as a focal point really helped to narrow things down and also give us a project so that we have something to show for our time besides a bunch of photos of beer. For more on the art side of the trip, check out www.MoreThanTheMonaLisa.com.

MoreThanTheMonaLisa.com?

It’s our website where you can find what we hope will be content that will help art-curious travelers make the most of museums. Museums can be intimidating and overwhelming. There’s only so much you can see in one visit, and if you don’t know what you don’t know, how do you figure out where to start? More than the Mona Lisa is your resource for making the most of your art museum experience.

I’ll be in Europe in 2018. Can we get together?

Yes! We are definitely psyched about seeing folks we know while on the trip. The easiest way to plan depends on what your deal is. If you know where you want to go, let us know and we can tell you roughly when we plan to be in that vicinity (or at least when we *won’t* be there based on cost, which might be helpful info for your own planning as well). If you know when you want to travel but aren’t sure where exactly you’d like to go or have multiple places in mind, tell us when and we can suggest possible rendezvous points. Even if we can’t meet up, we’re happy to provide ideas and tips based on our experience and research. Drop us a line.

What will you do when you return?

Return?

Seriously?

Well, we’ll probably come back in December 2018 or early 2019. When we do…¯\_(ツ)_/¯

We really love the city and the neighborhood we live in, so as things currently stand we anticipate moving back to exactly the same place. A lot can change in a year, though, and the need to find a job might affect these plans. While living in Europe indefinitely seems appealing at the moment, we’re pretty sure that we’ll get tired of traveling and miss the conveniences of living in the U.S. at some point.