Pictured above: Jessica and Garrett Gee and their three children Dorothy, Manilla and Calihan are known as “The Bucket List Family” (Garrett Gee/National Geographic)
Besides a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Europe, the furthest Jessica Gee traveled while growing up was to Walt Disney World in Florida with her family.
However, over the past eight years, the travel influencer known as “The Bucket List Mom” has visited more than 90 different countries with her entrepreneur husband Garrett and their three children Dorothy, Manilla and Calihan.
“It never crossed my mind that ‘I want to travel the world,'” Gee, from Denver, Colorado, tells CNN Travel. “I’ve never been like that. But the more I travel, the more I want to see.”
According to Gee, everything changed when her husband, whom she met on a church service mission in Vladivostok, Russia, sold the app to Snapchat for 54 million dollars (around 50 million euros) in 2014 and decided to leave her job as a secretary. .
Unique opportunity
Jessica and Garrett met in Russia and have been married for almost 15 years. Garrett Gee/National Geographic
“We were in a strange situation where you might not find a lot of twenty-somethings,” admits Gee. “We were sitting on new wealth and didn’t know what to do. So we decided to put all that aside and see what was going on in the world.”
The couple, who have been married since 2009, were eager to experience different cultures and “learn a little.”
“We still felt very young and naive,” adds Gee.
Before long, they began planning an extended trip to Southeast Asia and decided to launch an Instagram page, The Bucket List Family, to chronicle their adventures.
“Honestly, I think we had this perfect storm between Garrett’s creative abilities and my marketing experience,” says Gee, explaining that he studied product placement in college. “Now I only do it with my own life.”
After putting the money from the acquisition into savings, they sold their furniture and most of their belongings, raising around 42,000 euros, and set off around the world with Dorothy and Manilla – Callihan was born while they were traveling – in August 2015.
Initially, they had planned to spend a few months traveling, visiting Thailand, Singapore, New Zealand and Australia, as well as the Pacific islands of Fiji and Tonga, but after briefly returning to the US, they decided they wanted to continue.
“The little time spent traveling turned into three years full time,” adds Gee, who has just launched a travel guide, The Bucket List Family Travel, in partnership with National Geographic.
The family has visited dozens of countries around the world, including Germany, Morocco, Japan, Brazil, Guatemala and Dominica.
Family favorites
The family of five has traveled to more than 90 countries. Garrett Gee/National Geographic
Gee counts Belize among her top “family-friendly” destinations, describing the Central American country as a good “starter destination” for U.S.-based families who aren’t ready to venture too far.
He also recommends the “amazing” Alaska for anyone looking for outdoor adventures for their children.
“There’s fishing, wildlife, whales and bears,” he says. “It’s great for children maybe a little older – from five years old and up. But I took my two-year-old son there and he had a lot of fun.”
Gee was also incredibly impressed by the East African country of Rwanda, a destination she was apprehensive about visiting due to preconceived ideas.
“I had seen [o filme] ‘Hotel Rwanda’ and that was all I knew,” she says. “So I was nervous and scared. And it ended up being the destination that changed my life the most.”
After spending so much time on the move, Gee is used to long trips and actually finds them easier than short trips, explaining that she often feels exhausted after taking a week off.
“When I travel for a month or more, I get into a rhythm, I get into a routine,” he says, adding that he packs more or less the same amount of items, regardless of whether he’s traveling for a month, six months or fifteen days.
During her third pregnancy, she spent her entire life “living out of a suitcase” before welcoming her son Calihan in 2018.
“I didn’t realize the impact that air travel has on our body,” says Gee. “Therefore, it was exacerbated [devido à minha gravidez]”.
“Maybe it was also because it was my first pregnancy after I turned 30, but my back and body hurt. But, at the same time, we went to so many places during those nine months that I loved.”
Big Adventure
Gee says when it comes to traveling with young children, choosing “the best attitude” is key. Garrett Gee/National Geographic
Gee makes a point of making sure her kids feel involved in her travel plans before they head off anywhere, asking them to help pack their backpacks, framing everything, even a long-haul flight, as a “big adventure.” .
“Then, as soon as they sit on the plane, they are so excited that they take out the toy, book and snacks they brought from their suitcase,” he explains.
According to Gee, one of the best ways to make traveling with young children as painless as possible is to “choose the best course of action.”
“Kids feed off 100% of their parents’ attitudes,” she says. “So when things are tiring and exhausting and stressful, we just have to try hard and be positive. Because if we’re losing our minds, they’re going to lose our minds too.”
Although she tries to plan every aspect of travel, including scheduling flights for nap times and making sure her luggage is packed, Gee has learned from experience to always have a backup plan.
“Things go wrong,” she says. “Luggage gets lost or a flight gets cancelled. These are things that happen. Having to deal with that and guide the kids and their needs – that’s always been the hardest part.”
The Bucket List Family’s Instagram account has accumulated nearly three million followers over the years, and they have since launched successful accounts on YouTube and TikTok, with revenue earned through partnerships with different companies helping to support their trips.
Gee recognizes that her situation is unique and that there are many parents who simply cannot afford to travel the world with their children.
In “The Bucket List Family Travel,” Gee gives money-saving tips, including home exchanges and budgeting apps, and encourages families to figure out what they want to do in terms of travel and try to “make it affordable.”
“Often, you just find a national park and camp or hike,” he explains. “Or see if you can work hard enough to earn some time off for an extended period.”
The Gee family has “duty of service” among their travel goals and does their best to incorporate activities like volunteering at an orphanage into their travels.
“Typically, traveling is a selfish endeavor. Taking time to look abroad and at one’s own family and see who you can be of service to locally will be a great blessing,” Gee writes.
After three years of traveling full-time, the family of five returned to the US, where they purchased a bungalow in Hawaii in 2018.
Ever-changing wish list
Gee says his family’s extensive travels have brought them closer. Garrett Gee/National Geographic
“The one thing we miss about being on the road is the community,” Gee says. “We miss having friends and family [por perto] and we wanted our children to play sports and experience that. It was then that we decided to settle down and try to have the best of both worlds.”
Since then, they have continued to travel as a family and recently spent an entire summer in Africa.
But staying in one place for a long period of time proved to be something of a challenge for the children, particularly their son Manilla, who was about 11 months old when they first traveled.
“He was used to sleeping in a different bed every night or every other night. [quando regressámos]”, she explains. “So I slept in different rooms of the house every night. It was a strange adjustment for him to know that we weren’t going to the airport and that we were staying at home.”
Although Gee does her best to schedule her trips during school holidays, there are occasional exceptions, such as her upcoming visit to Antarctica.
“We have extra explanations to keep them on the right track”, he explains. “And we take their school work with us. And even during the summer, when they don’t have school work, we still bring the extra books and try to make it exciting for them.”
According to Gee, her family’s bucket list has changed over the years as they’ve all become huge wildlife enthusiasts, so things like seeing the “pandas in China” and “orangutans in Borneo” have come to mind. the top.
“The thing I most enjoy doing with my family is a safari,” he adds. “We’ve done this a handful of times. But for me, there’s nothing better than being in an environment where something new [está a acontecer] every day. We wake up and we don’t know what we’re going to see, and then we see these animals and the wildlife and how they all live together and depend on each other. It sounds so corny, but it’s literally the circle of life. Experiencing that and witnessing that with my family is really beautiful.”
Therefore, he advises other parents who want to travel more with their children to try to get out of their comfort zone and “go out and explore”, whether it be “for one week of the year or for a lifetime”.
“I feel like the more we go out and try things, the more our bucket list grows,” says Gee.
“I think a lot of American families have their vacations that they go to. For me, it was Disney World. And I love Disney World, don’t get me wrong. But [é importante] being able to go out and see the world and realize there’s so much more out there.”
