Got Wanderlust? See the World While Working With These Travel Jobs
Most people are satisfied with just one or two weeks of vacation a year. Though, as you probably know, you are likely rushing through your vacation rather than enjoying it.
And then, it’s back to work.
But what if you didn’t have to do that? What if you could travel and work at the same time?
You can, with a travel job.
Types of Travel Jobs
Anyone can go and travel. Lots of us can simply get into our car, pick a direction and drive and we will reach a destination. But besides sustaining long-term travel financially, housing is where you start to stall out.
There are two rather common types of jobs that will provide some way to cover your housing issue.
- Jobs that require travel as a normal part of the job description.
- Seasonal jobs that allow you to live in different places for a few weeks or months at a time.
If are looking for predictable income, you’ll probably prefer the first kind. If you are looking for more variety, you budget well and you like occasional long stretches between jobs, the second kind is probably more appealing.
We’ll look at a few options from both categories in this list of travel jobs.
Looking for a Travel Jobs? Consider These Options
Work In National Parks
Some people’s dreams are to simply visit and frolic in a national park. But for others, it’s their everyday place of work. A quick reliable way to find work in national parks is to search for it on Coolworks.com. Most, if not all, of these jobs are run by private entities that have the privilege of working on national parks grounds. They almost always offer housing because their employees come from all over the world and stay for seasons at a time. The housing may not be free, but it could be a super low rate of dollars a day as well as with three meals.
The available jobs are nearly endless when it comes to resorts or tourism. Common jobs include housekeepers, cooks, guides, maintenance, retail and more. What better way to explore the grandiosity of a National Park than by being paid to work in one?
You can also search for public jobs via USAJobs.gov. There you can find a plethora of options when it comes to working for the National Parks Service, which works with more than just National Parks. There are national monuments, historical parks and more. You also don’t have to just be a park ranger; other jobs are needed, too. But housing will likely only come with the jobs in the most remote places, such as Acadia or Yellowstone, since there’s not much housing around anyway.
Work as a Flight Attendant
A flight attendant may be one of the lowest barriers to entry for traveling for work. As a bonus, you get to travel with the fastest form of transportation imaginable so that you could be in two or three different time zones in a day. The question is, however, how much time you’d have outside of landings.
Your destinations will also vary depending on the airline. But you can expect an airline not to ship you off to land at a location hundreds of miles from your home and expect you to find housing immediately. The best way to find out how much you will get to see and experience is to question other flight attendants on the airline you want to work for.
So, if you’re comfortable with customer service experience, you can get a job with just a GED, though college experience always looks better. According to The Bureau of Labor Statistics, the median annual wage of flight attendants is currently $61,000.
Work as an Au Pair
Working as an au pair is a great option for young people to gain access to other countries and be paid for it. Aupair.com treats the whole ordeal as a cultural exchange. The deal is that you come to a host family’s country as a childcarer for a bit and they provide you with the opportunity for cultural exchange and a bit of occasional pocket money.
If you are interested or able to provide child care and are up to go and experience a completely different culture in a different country, then this can be a great way to travel and make money. Unfortunately, just about every technical detail will only be discussed between you and your host family, otherwise, there are a lot of variables to consider. But if you’re one to jump into the frying pan, then working as an au pair may be the perfect opportunity for you.
Work as a Pilot
Working as a pilot may be one of the most obvious choices if you are itching to see as much of the world as you can. You will be able to fly directly into hotspots of travel destinations, and if you have the time, visit the local area. This one is for those who are interested in the flight attendant job, but are itching for a little more.
It’s not going to be easy to put the hours in to become one, though. According to the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, you need 250 hours of flight time, 50 hours of cross-country time and 10 hours of solo training cross-country and at night, among a few other requirements. It won’t be a stroll in the park, and there are only so many pilots per plan, but it has the potential to pay far and above other options.
Work as a TEFL Teacher
Teaching English as a foreign language (TEFL) provides a way for most of you reading this to travel to as many destinations as there are people who want to learn English. It’s often for long stays, as you will work for something like a semester in another country where English is not the native language.
The site LanguageCorps.com offers TEFL certifications onsite for 4 weeks, hybrid, or online at your own pace. Their training centers are in Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Peru, so simply doing your training will bring you to exotic places for the average native English speaker.
A little-known fact for those who are interested in learning another language, too, is that nearly everyone wants to learn English. It is the current Lingua Franca of our modern world, and it may surprise you that simply being a native English speaker makes you super valuable in these other places where living is often cheaper, too.
Work as a Tour Guide
There are plenty of places that need tour guides that are relatively unreachable by the average person. By that, we mean, there’s nowhere else to live except whatever kind of housing is available by the employer. Alaska is a state with great opportunities to work as a tour guide and also receive free housing. Private tour companies, resorts and adventure companies need someone to safely steer their patrons while providing valuable entertainment.
You might even have the opportunity to work somewhere more exotic like a ranch. Whatever fits your passion, whether it’s for an area you’ve roamed for years or are interested in roaming and guiding people on – there’s plenty of opportunity to see things.
Work as a Truck Driver
This may honestly be an opportunity that is going to be lost in the near future. This is an engineering speculation, but as we continue to dive deeper into AI drivers, there’s a likelihood that it will simply be more profitable for everyone to have an AI drive a truck cross-country without stopping at all, than paying a driver who has to take breaks, But, the opportunity is still here for now and for the near future.
Truck driving is not for the faint of heart, for those who dislike road trips, for those who are uncomfortable being alone for most days, nor for those who are uncomfortable sleeping on the side of the road.
But as a long-haul trucker, you will get to see the country. It should be noted that most of that time seeing the country may be on the same interstate you have already traversed dozens of times. But there is an opportunity there, especially since truckers are needed right now.
The median wage for tractor-trailer truck drivers is $48,310 per year in 2021, but there are plenty of truck drivers who proudly mention they make over $100,000 a year.
Work as a Diver
For anyone curious as to what lies beneath the waves, this is perfect for you. I have an acquaintance who used diving as an opportunity to quit her engineering job and work abroad in South Africa for months at a time before heading over to Europe to do the same. She had a lot of money saved from the engineering work, but working as a diver in these countries was self-sustaining.
But you don’t have to look far to work as a diver in beautiful areas. This Waterfront Manager posting on coolworks.com lets those who are SCUBA certified, or willing to get certified, the opportunity of a lifetime to explore the ocean, have housing and make money all at once.
Work on a Cruise Ship
If you have sea legs, cruise ship jobs are a perfect opportunity to see the world and peruse the waves. From Alaska to Maine, to the Caribbean, to Hawaii and more, working on a cruise ship is an efficient way to cover housing, transportation and food costs all while getting paid. There are a ton of different job opportunities on cruise ships, which include:
- Deckhand
- Clergy
- Bartender
- Casino dealer
- Entertainment director
- Maintenance
- Retail clerk
- Dancer
- Hairdresser
- Lecturer
- Cook
- Dishwasher
- And even captains!
Cruise ship work might even be a better opportunity for those of you who have never been on a boat or seen the vast grandiosity of the ocean. Get started on your research for what suits you on sites like coolworks.com and indeed.com.
Work as an Archaeologist
You may not be able to simply sign up for this one, unlike some of the other options mentioned. As a technician you will likely need some kind of experience or degree, but who’s to say you shouldn’t plan ahead?
So, an archaeologist’s main function is to go out and conduct archaeological investigations. This overlaps well with the world of construction and engineering, which is where lots of the job opportunities are at this time. Depending on the company and the way you go about obtaining the job, you can also have the opportunity to have the usual two weeks of paid vacation each year to go along with your already paid travel.
If you have that travel bug, this is an uber-efficient use of your time to see lots of places, and hopefully do some cool field work. Naturally, lots of these employers are also huge companies that have the budget and opportunity to pay for your housing as you travel around unearthing secrets.
Work as a Civil Engineer
While we’re on the topic of degree-related jobs that let you travel about, there’s also civil engineering. Working as a civil engineer, I got to explore and see a lot more of New Jersey than I ever would have otherwise. During one inspection, I even got to see what Delaware was like and see lots of coastal Virginia on my way back, which I never would’ve explored otherwise.
Since I was out that far, I stayed at a hotel that was paid for. That was just for one project at one job.
There are civil engineer jobs where you practically do nothing but travel. There are also civil engineer jobs where you do everything but travel. There’s an opportunity to work remotely, but there’s also the opportunity to work in one city or county for the rest of your life.
Civil engineering pays well and you’ll be able to go wherever there are people. You’ll also be able to go wherever there aren’t people because that’s where new construction takes place.
Civil engineering as a field is super flexible, and while it’s the lowest-paying engineering field, it has its unique perk of dealing with physical infrastructure that can require you to be paid to go places you never would have seen otherwise.
Work as a Lifeguard
Lifeguarding might not immediately pop into your mind when you think of travel jobs. You might also believe it’s just a summer job for teenagers. In some cases, such as a local pool that only employs a few lifeguards at a season, that may just be the case.
But there are places that need a lot of lifeguards, a lot of experience and helpful oversight, and are more serious than the average pool lifeguard. For those who still want a somewhat relaxed experience, there are opportunities for pool lifeguards all around the country. Some of those places, such as the YMCA Blue Ridge Assembly in North Carolina, provide housing, too.
For those who are okay with the decent, but still hard-to-manage pay, as well as the experience of the ocean, you have opportunities in many locations like San Diego and Florida where lifeguards can be needed all year due to the climate.
And, hey, educators, if you’ve got the summer off, why not use that free time to go lifeguard somewhere you’re interested in for a bit?
Work as a Travel Nurse
Nursing offers a huge opportunity for traveling, working and saving tons of money. TravelNursing.org lists positions for registered nurses all over the country, and says “most travel nursing jobs last between 8-26 weeks, with the majority of the positions being offered for 13 week terms.” Therefore, you could spend two months up to six months in a new place, spend time learning what’s nearby on your days off, and see if you really like it. You can do all of this while sometimes making upwards of $10,000 per month and having a choice in the location.
And it’s not just for nurses, either. Other medical professionals, like ultrasound techs, medical scribes and therapists, can score travel jobs.
Healthcare almost always needs more workers, and that has been even more true since the pandemic. Besides all that opportunity, good benefits are common and can often include free housing during your assignment.
Dennis Lynch is a civil engineer turned freelance writer with a passion for personal finance. While young, he acts as the spearhead of personal finance to just about everyone in his life, passing on his knowledge from the perspective of financial independence. You can find Dennis over at colossicus.com between his freelance ventures.
