Around the world in 500 days: Homewood couple takes 500-day journey around the world

For much of the past year, Jordan and Elizabeth Shipp haven’t had a home address. They might be found in Egypt or France, in Bali or South Korea, as they spend 500 days traveling the globe. 

The couple’s journey began about 6½ years ago, when they met while volunteering at a Christian retreat experience in Northern California. Elizabeth was from Homewood, Jordan from Corner.

“We both applied to work at JH Ranch, but they were full [of volunteers] for the summer. When they emailed me back and offered a position at Scott River Lodge, I had never heard of it. I said to myself, ‘You know what? I don’t have any other plans this summer. I should try it out.’ So I accepted my position, and it was one of the best decisions I ever made,” Elizabeth said.

JH Ranch is a Christian-based camp that provides families and high school students a place to connect and grow in their faith and relationships with one another. Its sister organization, Scott River Lodge, is specifically for married couples. Scott River Lodge is where the Shipps got to know each other.

“We fell in love pretty quickly while we were out there. We dated for a few years after that, and we got married after I graduated from college,” Elizabeth said.

While the two were not high school sweethearts, they both discovered that they had mutual connections after that fateful summer in California.

“Our dads had met each other, and we knew some of each other’s friends. It really felt like a God thing. If we had been at JH Ranch, where there were so many people, we probably would have been in different friend groups, and we probably never would have met,” Elizabeth said.

Since high school, Elizabeth knew that she wanted to teach internationally. She has her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in education, and she began saving her pennies as a teen to fund her dream of working overseas.

“My junior year of college, I started making plans. I found a place in Thailand that I got a job with, and Jordan and I were engaged at the time. I asked Jordan if he would be interested in going with me. He said no because he loved his job, which I understood,” Elizabeth said. “My plan was to go over there temporarily and then to come back and get married. And then Covid hit.”

Like many well-laid plans in 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic interrupted both Elizabeth’s dreams of teaching internationally and their wedding plans after her return. The couple ultimately decided to go ahead and get married since she was no longer going to be traveling.

As they settled into married life, the Shipps realized they felt called to different paths when it came to their working lives. Elizabeth still wanted to travel, but Jordan enjoyed his job and didn’t want to leave it.

“I wasn’t against it [traveling], but I didn’t feel like it was something I needed to do at the time. I really liked my job,” Jordan said.

For the next three years, the couple discussed what their life together was going to look like. Elizabeth continued to search for jobs overseas, until one day she stumbled upon an article about a couple who took a trip around the world. That article led to the discovery of more stories of couples and individuals who quit their jobs for anywhere from six months to more than a year to travel around the world.

“I posed the idea to Jordan and said, ‘Hey. I know we’ve talked a lot about working overseas or teaching overseas, but how would you feel about quitting our jobs and just traveling?’ Jordan said, ‘I don’t know. Let’s think about it,’” Elizabeth said.

The Shipps went back and forth about the trip, while continuing to research ideas and add to the savings they already had.

“One day, I called Jordan and I said, ‘We need to go. We are going to talk about this forever. If we don’t go, we’re always going to think, “What if we had gone?”’ And he said, ‘Ok, let’s go,’” Elizabeth said.

Four months after that declaration, the Shipps were on the way to their first country, starting with a trip up the Nile River from Sudan to Egypt. Both Jordan and Elizabeth decided not to work during their year of travel, though they had discussed the possibility of working remotely after their trip was officially over.

“We chose not to work during our year of travel because we had saved for this,” Jordan said.

The Shipps believe that this opportunity to travel has only made them grow closer to one another. Elizabeth said that, at home, it was too easy to carry on independent of one another, but while traveling, they both depend on each other for support and working through various situations together.

“At home, you get in this rhythm. You don’t ask questions. You just do the things that you do every day. Here [in another country], you have different experiences, which cause you to act differently, and it makes you ask different questions and react differently,” she said. “It has helped us to appreciate each other’s differences and communicate more effectively.”

At home, you get in this rhythm. You don’t ask questions. You just do the things that you do every day. Here [in another country], you have different experiences, which cause you to act differently, and it makes you ask different questions and react differently.

Elizabeth Shipp

The Shipps had a little difficulty choosing their favorite country out of the 36 they have been to since their journey began in June 2023. Both agreed that countries like Thailand and South Korea had some of the best food they’ve ever had, and Elizabeth said that scuba diving in the Philippines was something she’ll never forget.

Visiting Omaha Beach in Normandy, France, really impacted Jordan.

“The significance of it, you see it and hear about it your whole life, but just to see it stays with you,” he said.

Elizabeth said they have been continually surprised by the generosity of their hosts and total strangers, and their willingness to share their culture and offer the couple a play to stay.

“Every day, we see more and more that the world is full of way more kindness than we give it credit for,” she said.

In Bali, their host invited them to take part in a traditional Balinese funeral for his uncle, who had just died.

“I got pushed into playing symbols in the procession, in the [traditional] attire and everything,” Jordan said. 

“It was funny because Jordan was significantly taller than everyone else, so he really stood out,” Elizabeth said.

Jordan also said, for anyone else looking to travel like they have, that it has not turned out to be as difficult as people may imagine. There are ways to make travel around the world work for all kinds of budgets.

“We are blessed that English is kind of a universal language. Someone from Thailand and someone from Cambodia speak to each other using English because their [native] languages are different, but they both know English,” he said. “It’s not as expensive as people think it is either. It can be a little expensive to get over there, but once you’re there, it’s not.”

Jordan said they were lucky to be able to save the money they needed to take this trip while they were young, rather than waiting until they retire.

“Not everyone can do it, but if you have the opportunity — you can always save and get more money, but you can’t get the time back or your physical ability to do things back,” he said.

“I was really nervous that it wouldn’t be worth it — that we might regret it. I can say, without a shadow of a doubt, that this has been the best decision we have ever made for our marriage, for us as individuals and for our paths in life,” Elizabeth said.

The Shipps plan to continue traveling through December and hope to make it to 70 countries and every continent. To follow their worldwide journey, find them on Instagram and TikTok @shippedworldwide.