They arrived in Australia with 27 cents and an “accident” made them millionaires: the incredible story of a hippie couple | the Chronicle

The life of a backpacker is synonymous with adventure, risk and experiences lived through trips and places, and an example is Maureen and Tony wheeler, an Irish couple who fell in love and started traveling in the 1970s with backpacks and no money.

However, one day everything changed when they decided to write a guide to their cheap trips and from that point their story changed: they not only founded Planet alone otherwise what they were brought up with a fortune.

Maureen was born in the North Irish city of Belfast in 1950, and at the age of 20 she decided to move to London. After arriving on October 7, 1970, she sat in the sun to read a book on a bench in Regent’s Park, and there she was captured by Tony Wheeler, who watched her read with relish and was encouraged to interrupt it: “Is this the trendy place to read a book?” “

“His smile disarmed me”, she confessed and that day they talked about travel and he told her about his experience in Pakistan, USA and Bahamas.

Wedding and travel

After a few short and tight escapades, they ended up getting married on the same day and at the same time, on the anniversary of running in this park.

In 1972, they bet on adventure and get into a rickety Austin van and set off on the roads of Europe. After several months, they crossed the Asian continent via the Bosporus. On the hippie trail they reached South Asia, India and Nepal.

They arrived on the Australian continent without resources (with 27 cents), but happy, and the peculiarity is that everyone asked them for advice for their backpacking trips, and this it was the beginning of success, since they started writing their first travel guide: All over Asia at low cost. In 1973 the first hand-sewn guides were born by themselves, success overwhelmed them and in seven days 1,500 copies were sold.

Almost without realizing it, they had founded Planet alone, a publishing house which will be, ten years later, a prosperous company.

In an interview in the middle The Guardian, Tony confessed that the first book was “An unexpected accident” because they both had full-time jobs in Australia and did everything in their spare time. The name Lonely Planet was born from a mistake in choosing a phrase from a song by Joe cocker… but in fact, Joe said “Beautiful planet”.

In 1975, while staying in a hotel located in an alleyway in Singapore, they wrote their second book: Southeast Asia at a low price.

But Maureen doubted they could continue following these guides any longer, and just in case, she decided she needed to study: “I was convinced that one day I should quit the trip and have a normal job.” He enrolled in a bachelor’s degree in social work, at the University of La Trobe, which began in February 1976 and ended in 1980.

In 1979, they had another daring idea: to create a workplace. “Instead of working from home, we moved to an office (…) Until then all the books were stored in a small shed, under the beds and everywhere (…) It was a very amateur affair, homemade “, Maureen explained. “For the first few years, it was just me and Tony. We did it all: we packed the books and shipped them around the world to the distributors we contacted; we took the books to bookstores and sold them ”.

Soon after, in 1981 and with ten people in the business, they released the biggest and most successful guide of all: India.

Of the times that followed, she mainly remembers one day: “I walked into the office and realized that we already had about 60 people working. I almost had a panic attack. I thought to myself: how are we going to pay the wages of all these people? How will we pay the rent for this office?

Birth of their children

The hippies who wanted a simple life with little money, but full of adventure, had laid the foundation stone for a mega-business that would make them immensely wealthy.

When Maureen was 31, her first child Tashi was born and two years later, in 1983, Kieran arrived. “I realized that if I didn’t take my kids on a trip, I had to stay home. So for years the four of us traveled, until it was incompatible with school ”, Maureen bound.

With two kids in tow, the questions they asked Maureen revealed the next step they needed to take. The parents of the other boys asked for advice and wanted to know if they recommend postponing their trips and adventures until the little ones get older. This is how the guide came to be “Traveling with boys”.

It should be noted that the Wheelers have toured Africa, Asia and Latin America. “When you travel with young children, especially in Africa and Asia, mentalities change and they are interested in you, they help you … It was very enriching”, Maureen said.

Once, returning from a trip through Egypt and Israel, the teacher asked Kieran, who was 5, to tell him what he had learned. Maureen said: “He showed the image of a sphinx and explained that he had a big mustache that the English had pulled off him. When the teacher corrected him, he slammed “Have you been there?” “

The boys learned in their own way and the result was far from conventional, as the Wheeler children had no problem sleeping on the deck of a ship or traveling cramped on overcrowded trains, but one day the experience had to come to an end. And it was Maureen who stayed home. He only traveled during vacations and over time was able to leave them with relatives and when they reached their teens they began to stay with friends.

What happened to Lonely Planet?

Lonely Planet has grown into a major publisher with branches in Melbourne, London and Oakland. More than 500 collaborators, 300 authors, 6 million books per year translated into 17 languages, a annual turnover of $ 85 million.

In 1994 Lonely Planet TV aired and the following year they landed on the web. In 2005, Tony wrote Lonely Planet Story, an autobiography of the couple.

The same spirit that drove them to start their business was the same that drove them to get rid of it, as they wanted to regain their lost freedom and continue to travel as they pleased.

In 2007, they decided and sold 75 percent of the company to BBC Worldwide, and Maureen and her husband are said to have earned over $ 100 million. With this money, they had funds for their humanitarian projects with the Planet Wheeler Foundation with which they sought to help developing countries. His new assignments ranged from founding a school in Tanzania to providing drinking water in Ethiopia.

Some time later, they sold the remaining 25 percent to the same company for $ 42 million. In 2008, Lonely Planet magazine was released in the UK. In 2010, the 100 millionth guide was printed. In 2011, they started with guides for boys. And, in 2016, Lonely Planet’s combined social networks reached ten million followers.

Maureen pointed out that the guides “They are used to give you the first impetus, but you don’t have to follow them as if they were a closed card” and “They help you see that the world is a fragile place and that people are the same everywhere.”

Travel and coronavirus

A few decades ago, Maureen recognized how the concept of what it means to travel has changed since they embarked on their adventure in the 1970s: “Today, people are more surprised by those who do not travel than by those who do. Over the past 30 years, travel has gone from being an absolute luxury or something that only crazy young backpackers do, to something that everyone tries ”.

Today, away from editorial management, Tony recently confessed to Spanish media ABC: “The world suffered from tourist obesity before the Covid-19”. In your essay “In defense of travel”, reflects on the effects of the pandemic on tourism and calls for a more sustainable future for the planet.

The couple of travelers recognize that after the coronavirus, resuming travel as we did before will be a difficult task because the universe of 510 million square kilometers has shrunk, for a time, to a few kilometers around where we live.

“In the future, we will do differently and Tony predicts that there will be no return to this excessive tourism and these many polluting planes.” On the other hand, they know that their advice will be outdated because many places, due to economic crises derived from quarantines, will no longer exist. Maureen, for her part, confesses that she hates airports, sees them as stressful and assures that “The last destination is always my favorite.”

Today, the couple are splitting their time as best they can between London and Melbourne, Australia, where their two sons and a granddaughter live. Maureen, 71, says knowing her husband It was the best thing that had ever happened to him.