Slow Travel, Cheap Travel - A Low-Cost Honeymoon To Conquer The WorldVERONA — One honeymoon. 90,000 kilometers. 321 days. Two rules: 1) never take an airplane, and 2) never pay more than 15 euros for a meal for two.
Elisa Bocca, a 32-year-old interpreter, and Alessandro Bocca, a 37-year-old photographer, are the Italian stars of this global honeymoon. They travelled through the United States, Mexico, South America, China, Russia and Europe — 26 different countries in total — finally arriving back in Verona where they started.
“As soon as we met, we started to talk about this project,” says Elisa, “It was a dream; a lot of people thought we were completely crazy: I gave up a permanent position, and Alessandro dropped all the work he had taken on. But we weren’t happy with our lives, so we jumped in the deep end. Now we have lots of unknowns in front of us, but we are new people, positive people, and very aware that we have made a great investment.”
Both because Bocca is scared of flying, and because going slowly means you can capture every single detail of the journey, the duo chose to travel only by bus, train and boat. They recounted their adventure, day by day, on their blog Their transport requirements had a huge influence on their itinerary and their chosen destinations. “We wanted to go west to follow the spring and the summer,” says Alessandro. “We had designed our ideal route, but costs and transport timetables made us change our plans.”
The United States, for example, was not among the destinations on the top of the newlyweds' original list, but after spending night after night on the Internet searching for an Atlantic crossing, Miami emerged as the best solution. “We discovered that cruise ships sell off tickets when they have to relocate from one corner of the planet to another, with discounts of up to 80%,” recalls Alessandro. “So we crossed the Atlantic spending very little, then in Miami we bought bus tickets for 26 euros each which took us the 4,000 kilometers to the border with Mexico.”
Cargo ships and no-star hotels
To get from Chile to Hong Kong, the two globetrotters jumped on a cargo ship. Again thanks to the Internet, they found a cheap transfer on a merchant ship: 28 days sailing across the Pacific with 24 crew members.
“It was definitely not a relaxing holiday,” says Elisa. “But meeting new people and being immersed in new cultures all the time has made all our efforts worthwhile. Each time that we reached a new place we looked for somewhere to stay — sometimes with friends, or with friends of friends — but always hunting for the cheapest solutions: hostels, no-star hotels, families renting out rooms or sofa beds."
The same thing applied to buying tickets: In places like China or Asia, they could do everything online. But in South America, she recalled: "You had to check everything hundreds of times, sometimes only to find out that the bus you were waiting for would come by a week later.”
Here are some of the tallies: 47,000 photos taken, 130 places slept in, more than 2,000 hours spent on transport. Romantic, captivating and, with a few adjustments, doable for all budgets. “You need to be flexible and make a few small sacrifices, knowing that, for a year, your house will be a rucksack on your back,” says Alessandro. “We calculated an initial budget, even though we knew that it would be difficult to make a reliable estimate. But on balance, we can say that we have spent a very similar amount to how much we would have spent during a year in Italy, taking into account rent, bills, car insurance for two cars, and food costs."
And one final calculation: "It is true that we haven’t had a salary for these last 12 months, but I can assure you that as people we have gained infinitely more.”
维罗纳——度一次蜜月，90000公里路程，321天时间。路上的规则有两条：1，决不坐飞机；2，两个人吃一顿饭决不超过15欧元。
32岁的翻译艾丽萨·波卡和37岁的摄影师亚历山德罗·波卡是本次环球蜜月旅行的主角，他们走过了美国、墨西哥、南非、中国和俄国等26个国家，最终回到了出发地意大利北部城市维罗纳。
“我们相识后就开始谈论这次旅行，”艾丽萨说，“这是我们的梦想。有许多人认为我们疯了——我辞掉了一份固定工作，亚历山德罗也放下了手头所有的工作。那时我们并不满意自己的生活，于是我们毅然开始了这次远行。现在我们面前仍有许多不确定的东西，但我们已经成了新人，有了积极的人生态度，我们知道自己做了一次有价值的投资。”
因为波卡夫妇俩都害怕乘飞机，也因为慢旅行意味着你能看清楚旅途中的每一个细节，他们两人决定在旅途中只乘班车、火车和船。他们在网站的博客上记录了他们每一天的旅行 他们在交通工具方面的特殊要求对于行程和目的地选择有很大的影响。“我们想要跟着春夏季节往西走，”亚历山德罗说，“我们曾经设计过理想的旅行路线，但是旅行费用和交通工具的时间表使我们改变了原定的计划。”
比如说美国原先并不是这对新婚夫妇优先考虑的目的地，但是经过许多个夜晚在互联网上研究横渡大西洋的方式，迈阿密成了最佳的解决方案。“我们发现邮轮在变换港口时会卖出打折船票，有时折扣高达80%。”亚历山德罗回忆说，“所以我们花了很少的钱就横渡了大西洋，然后我们每人花26欧元买了巴士票，巴士把我们送到4000公里以外的墨西哥边界上。”
乘货轮，不住星级酒店
为了能从智利到香港，两位环球旅行者乘上了一艘货轮。还是要感谢互联网，他们在一艘商船上找到了便宜的旅行方式——在28天时间里与24名船员一起横渡太平洋。
“这绝对不是一次轻松的度假，”艾丽萨说，“但是在整个旅途中我们都能见识到新人，沉浸到新的文化当中，我们所付出的努力是值得的。每当到了一个新地方我们要找地方住，我们有时和朋友，或朋友的朋友住在一起。我们总是找最便宜的住所——客栈，没有星级的旅馆，家庭旅馆或者别人的沙发床。”
在买票方面也是一样。在中国或亚洲他们能通过互联网做所有的事情，但是在南美他们需要反复地核对信息，有时会发现他们正在等待的班车要过一个星期才能到达。
这里有一些统计数字：他们拍摄了47000张照片，住过130个地方，在旅途上花的时间超过2000小时。这是一次浪漫而有魅力的旅行，只要做少许调整也可以适合其它预算不同的游客。“要有灵活性，有时需要做出一些小小的牺牲，要知道在一年的时间里你的全部家当都在你的背包里。”亚历山德罗说，“尽管我们知道费用很难估算，在开始时我们还是做过一个预算。最后结算下来我们可以说，把房租、各种账单、两辆汽车的保险费和食品支出一起算进去，我们在外旅行花的钱和在意大利待一年的开销非常接近。”
还有最后一项计算：“确实，我们在过去12个月里没有拿到过工资，但是我可以向你保证，从人的阅历来看我们所得到的价值不可估量。
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