A woman who passed up a gap year to work full-time after college shares her best tips to travel more when you have a desk job

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May 12, 2017 3:30 PM

Greta Omoboni of Greta's Travels explains how to make the most of your vacation days.

"When you start working, you feel like 'Oh my god, I'll never be able to do that again — backpack around Southeast Asia for three months," says Greta Omoboni, pictured taking a break from hiking up Pedra Bonita in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

When Greta Omoboni graduated from University College London in June 2015, she had a job lined up for the fall.

"A lot of my friends were taking gap years to go traveling and I was so jealous," she told Business Insider. "When you start working, you feel like 'Oh my god, I'll never be able to do that again — backpack around Southeast Asia for three months."

She's found this way of thinking isn't exactly right. "You might not be able to do that," she said. "But there's so much more you can do."

Since she started her job as a management consultant at EY in London, Omoboni has taken seven long-haul international trips — to destinations including Thailand, Mexico, Dubai, and the Caribbean — plus countless weekends away.

Omoboni gets 25 days of vacation per year, plus national holidays, and was given the option to "purchase" a maximum of six more from her employer, which she decided to do. "They take it out per month, spread out across the year," she said. "I get paid a little less every month but I get six days. In my opinion, it's worth it. There's no amount of money that's worth me going traveling."

After fielding questions from friends on how she manages to travel so much, Omoboni started detailing her adventures on her blog, Greta's Travels, and on Instagram.

She says her travel schedule isn't just thanks to a relatively generous amount of vacation. To travel frequently while holding a full time job, she said, "you have to try to save either time or money." Here are her best tips for each:

To save time:

Combine vacation time with holidays. "The way I see it, it's not so much about how many holidays you have, but about what you do to make the most of them," Omoboni said. She rarely takes days off that aren't adjacent to public holidays, and she chooses to travel with friends or family over longer breaks instead of heading home to her parents in Italy. "Over Christmas I was gone for 10 days, but only took about four days off work just because of the holidays."

Being a two-hour flight from most major cities in Europe, she knows, is a privilege. "I'll be at work on Friday until 5 p.m. and have a flight at 9 p.m., then I'll have two days in another city and not take time off work."

To save money:

Decide what you care about — and what you don't. "The way I see it, traveling is the only thing I save for and spend money on, beside food and rent." Omoboni said. Although she admits London is an expensive city, she shares a flat with two university friends about half an hour from her office, and brings a packed lunch to work every day. "I don't have money for a car or fancy clothes because that's not my priority."

Travel in the off-season. "If I'm trying to save money I'll go at a random time of the year," she said. "Kenya was in middle of January, which is a random time so it was cheap. It's similar with Bali, where I'm going next week — it's the rainy season, so accommodation isn't expensive."

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