How Travel Shaped our lives
We’re a family who believes the best memories aren’t things — they’re places, moments, and stories you carry home.
Travel has shaped our lives from the start. It’s how we connected, how we built our life together, and how we’ve learned to feel at home in more than one country.
How we met (and how travel started it all)
Before we ever became a “family travel blog”, travel brought us together in the most unexpected way.
By 2014, I had already been to Vietnam a few times when my parents decided they wanted to do a Southeast Asia tour — the classic route through places like Singapore, Malaysia, Cambodia, and Vietnam. I was more than delighted to join them for the journey.
When we arrived in Saigon, my parents booked a couple of tours to see the city properly and experience the Mekong. I tagged along too — and as luck would have it, our tour guide that day was the woman who would later become my wife.
We weren’t in Saigon for long, so there wasn’t much time… but my wife invited me out for dinner, and from there things just happened.
When “goodbye” didn’t feel right
Two days later, our tour continued on to Da Nang and then onward to Hanoi.
The original plan was simple: fly home from Hanoi back to Ireland.
But a flight change — almost like fate stepping in — meant I had to fly back to Saigon first.
So I booked a flight to return to Saigon a day early, just to spend a bit more time with the woman who already felt far more important than a holiday memory.
Before we said our physical goodbyes, I promised her something:
As soon as I landed back in Ireland, I’d book another flight — three months out — so we’d know exactly when we’d see each other again.
Long-distance, big decisions, and doing anything for love
From that point on, it was constant messages, regular Skype calls, and the kind of long-distance relationship that quietly takes over your whole day in the best way.
By early 2015, I was back again — and after a few trips, I realised something clearly:
If this was going to work long-term, I wasn’t going to do it halfway.
I needed to move to Vietnam.
That was easier said than done.
I was a cartographer, and there weren’t exactly loads of opportunities for foreigners in my field at the time. So I had to reinvent myself quickly.
Within a few months I completed a TEFL course, took a career break from my job, and moved over in 2015.
I winged it at first — teaching in a high school with basically no support — and then found something far more suited to me: teaching English (and even Maths and Science) to younger children. It was something different, fun, and genuinely rewarding once I knew what I was doing.
Because sometimes you don’t follow a perfect career path…
you follow a person.
Marriage, moving back to Ireland, and starting our family
In 2016, we got married.
Not long after, we made another big decision: we moved back to Ireland — building our life closer to home while still holding onto the part of us that came from Vietnam.
Then we became parents… and everything changed again.
Our daughter was only five days old when we were already dealing with passport paperwork, and by three months old she was on her first flight. At nine months, she took her first long-haul trip to Vietnam.
Since then, we’ve been incredibly fortunate to show her more of the world than we ever imagined — not in a flashy way, but in a real way:
Beaches, cities, quiet towns, road trips, budget hotels, early starts, snack stops, tired legs, big smiles, family chaos… and those moments that make you stop and think:
This is what it’s all about.
In 2020, a job change took us from Northern Ireland to the Republic of Ireland, where we’re now based.
Why we share family travel
This website is where we share what we learn along the way — honest family travel guides, practical tips that actually help, and stories from life between Ireland and Vietnam.
We’re not here to pretend family travel is perfect.
We’re here to show that it’s possible.
If you’re travelling with kids and you want it to feel doable (not flawless), you’re in the right place.
