Another option, why not find a startup that you can join remotely while traveling? Unless you really want to not work for 6 months, working during the week and

Another option, why not find a startup that you can join remotely while traveling? Unless you really want to not work for 6 months, working during the week and exploring on the weekend while living anywhere might be a nice balance. You'll get experience that will help when you find what you want to do on your own. From a life standpoint traveling for some time is a great experience. From a career standpoint, having a 6 month gap in your resume at such a young age could be an issue. I hire a lot of engineers and to be honest if I saw somebody that worked at google for 2 years and then took 6 months off to travel I would really worry about their commitment. 2 years is about the absolute minimum you should stay at one company. Moving any more often tells me, as a hiring manager, that I risk taking a bet on you, training you, and then having you leave right when you actually start adding value. Obviously, this assumes you need to get another job if your startup doesn't work, but that is unfortunately the most likely outcome.