Michael Greller, who left his job as a maths teacher to caddy for Jordan Spieth, has often said that dealing with children for 10 years helped prepare him to work for a 21-year-old golfer who ended the year ranked No.9 in the world.

Not to be overlooked in his training was an adventure to Australia more than a decade ago.

Greller was reminded of that last month when Spieth essentially ordered him to take a week off during the Dunlop Phoenix in Japan (his agent caddied for him) so Greller and his wife could take a second honeymoon Down Under ahead of the Australian Open.

Greller had another name for the trip.

“The redemption tour,” he said.

In 2002, Greller already had been accepted to graduate school and had a six-month window before the start of classes.

He had never been outside the United States, so he saved money and decided to go to Australia for six months, staying in hostels and carrying nothing more than a backpack.

“My only goal was to meet people from other cultures,” he said.

He never met the 10 people with whom he shared a room at Bondi Beach, a backpackers with so much “extracurricular activity” that Greller covered his head with a pillow.

He woke up the next morning and realised his wallet and about $A200 had been stolen.

The scariest moment was when he got sick with what later was diagnosed as ulcerous colitis.

“I’m with this Aboriginal guide in the middle of the desert, fighting this disease, no clue what’s going on,” he said.

“My parents were very worried. I travelled for about four months until I ran broke in Perth.”

Greller already had booked a flight from Darwin to Perth, and he already had his train ticket from Perth to Sydney.

The train broke down halfway there but he found plenty to like about Australia.

“I was on the train with $50 and a credit card, nothing in my savings,” he said.

“I was sitting by two 80-year-old women who fed me meat pies the whole way across Australia. We played cards. I played gin with them.

“And they had homemade meat pies, which I had never had. They got me to the finish line.”

Greller had one more day in Sydney before flying home to Seattle, and he had planned on a nice meal on his last day to celebrate.

“I had $20 left,” he said.

“I went to McDonald’s. And then I got on the plane.”

The most recent trip was different. Greller got his “redemption,” along with some reflections.

“In a lot of ways, it prepared me for caddying,” Greller said about his first trip Down Under.

“I carried a backpack for four months. I was living as cheap as I could. I had no expectations. I didn’t know where I would be sleeping. And I operated on the fly, which I did all of last year.”

Greller and his wife, Ellie, were married a year ago and spent their original honeymoon at Kapalua, Hawaii, a week before the 2014 season.

In two years, the former school teacher has been on the bag for a kid who already has over $US8.5 million ($A9.20 million) in earnings and three wins worldwide.

So the accommodations were better for this trip. And he didn’t run out of money.