We are creating a traveling village

It started as an idea from a small family, but now 4 families (USA, India, Denmark) are creating a big adventure: To find other families and together co-create what we call a traveling village. We want to take the best of the new world (remote work, digital nomadism, traveling) and combine it with what has worked for centuries (community, families helping each other, communal meals).

This is a non-profit co-created experiment and we want to build it with you!

Background, the idea and who's behind

Before having kids we were traveling as very typical digital nomads. We wanted to have a lifestyle with a lot of traveling with kids, but we also quickly realized that it does take a village to raise kids.

After having kids we have grown increasingly interested in the way we structure life, where all families live in small silos without being part of a community living nearby. When we did our first 6-month trip with 2 kids, we realized that traveling and living abroad with kids is amazing, but it also required a lot from us. Especially the social element, finding friends in a new place, is tough, but so important with kids.

This is the realization of a dream that got defined in 2017 in Nepal, when we decided to have our first child. We have discussed many ways to build this and we have come to the conclusion that we want to go all in on one trip, to make an experiment in living differently. We want to build this as one of the biggest adventures of our life.

We have studied cohousing projects to see what works in that setting and being involved early and creating the principles and the village together is something that we see brings people closer to each other. So we decided that we want to build this as a community. This is not a group trip that you buy through an agency, but a community where we take active part.

We have both our kids at home and our dream is to unschool. We really believe in the idea of learning through play and exploration and self-directed learning. We want to create a unique setting where it’s possible: In nature, with a lot of other kids and a community of adults instead of a professional daycare/school.

After a month of research, discussions and workshops, the 4 founding families have decided on the above locations. 3 locations in 4 months will be around 5 weeks in every place with some transition time in between.

Working on locations was very interesting because we had to start with imagining daily life for village. A lot of different considerations had to be taken into account. We decided on 3 locations in 1 continent to make traveling easier and the footprint a bit smaller.

We also wanted to try to find a combination that was not just beach life and not only super easy. It has to be an adventure, but at the same time also attract enough people.

After many hours of research, meetings and spreadsheets, we can say that we are very excited about these locations. Now the work continues with finding exact areas, dates, financial setup and so on.

Communal dinners

Eating together is the simplest way for a community to come together and research shows that the more often people eat with others the more likely they are to feel happy and satisfied with their lives. That is why communal meals will be an integrated part of our weekly schedule.

Researching successful cohousing concepts, the best of them often have communal dinners 4 times per week.

Every family with their own place

From studying cohousing projects across the world, we know that residents say that one of the most important things is the space to withdraw from the community and to be able to have privacy. That’s why every family will book their own place to live, so everyone has their own place to just be themselves.

The Community Livingroom

We need a place to meet and a place to default to. A place you go to hang out and where you casually meet other people from the community. We see it as quite important to have this place within walking or biking distance from your home. This will probably be one of the biggest challenges of the project and it can come in many forms.

Timeline

Travel dates are January 15th, 2024 to May 15th, 2024 (over a year from now).

We launched the idea and website in September 2022. By October we had a full team of founding families and in November we had decided on the locations.

We are now working hard on exact dates, areas, places, and financial structure.

We have a fully public decision log/timeline, where we publish everything that happens behind the scenes (meetings, decisions, and so on). Find it here.

Possible to work remote

We imagine that some will join as a kind of sabbatical, but we expect many will work remotely. It’s also the dream to try to do an experiment of something that could be a more permanent way of living, so of course, in all locations it should be possible to work remotely. Maybe we work from a local coworking or we create something ourselves.

‍‍‍ Founding Families and Member Families

The first step is to find 4-5 families who are 100% in on the project and where we develop it together. This includes locations, financials, and the core principles. We call these families "Founding Families".

The Founding Families will develop the project further and afterward open the project up for Member Families. The only difference is that the core of the project will be developed by Founding Families.

The day-to-day life will be developed by us all. Maybe someone will make yoga classes, maybe someone wants to do weekly hikes, and we arrange activities for the kids. Maybe you dream of learning to surf or build in bamboo and want to create a group that does that.

We also think it would be very interesting to create different work groups with different purposes. One example could be about how we engage with the local community in a meaningful way.

‍ Learning through play and exploration

This is also an experiment in living with kids differently. Where play, exploration, and self-direction are in focus instead of classrooms.

Everyone is 100% responsible for their own kids and their learning, but as a community, we create meaningful opt-in activities. We imagine that we use our collective skills and interests to create learning experiences.

Locations

The Founding Families need to decide on locations, both where and how many and the overall travel plan. We imagine enough time to settle and have a daily life and no rush. One of the strengths of traveling as a community is that it will probably be easier to go further out to locations with a little less infrastructure than mass-tourism destinations.

The Founding Families

The first step in the project is to gather 4 founding families, which was achieved in October 2022 (The goal was by the end of 2022). The role of the founding families is to develop the project together with consensus-based decision-making.

The founding families have per October 2022 started the work that will result in member families joining. The work consists of workshops and deciding on the following:

• Values/Vision
• Timeline
• Location/travel plan
• Financial framework
• Guidelines for group process

Meet the families

Get Involved

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