Is travelling with kids safe?

I hear you! and travelling with children is definitely different!

Part of the reason we took the opportunity to travel as a family is that I never had a gap year after university and it always felt like an itch that I needed to scratch. I'm sure the trip we took was very different to how it would have been when I was 21! There's pluses and minuses with both - it's certainly more expensive as a family of four (although I was in the fortunate position of being on paid gardening leave so it meant we could stay in accommodation and have experiences that wouldn't have been an option as a student). You obviously have to be more organised (home schooling and safety aspects mean that you can't 'wing' it in the same manner). That being said, when we got on to our first flight the only accommodation we had arranged was our first couple of weeks of the trip. The beauty of living in the Airbnb era is that it is a lot easier to book nice, safe places to stay on the hop (in fact, in most cases the later we left it the more leverage we found we had negotiating a cheaper stay). We did take out the premium level travel and medical insurance and although we didn't really use it (apart from when my wife got ill in Thailand) I would always recommend doing this for peace of mind.

I would liken your question to one I often hear regarding children playing rugby. Parents quite often have reservations about concussion and injuries when their children play such a physical sport. I would always argue that the character building, social, team-bonding and lessons you learn about life and yourself through playing the sport far out weigh the relatively small risk of serious injury. Likewise, what your children will gain from the experiences they have travelling make the tiny percentage chance of something negative happening fall off the radar. There's always risks, whatever you do - that's life. But for us as a family we definitely thought the opportunity was worth it, and I have to say, without doubt it was the best thing we've ever done. The only negative being, that most of our future holidays will struggle to ever compare!

Best of luck, and I hope you take the plunge (I'm sure you wont regret it and please send us a post when you get back).