After embarking on a Contiki Tour with my two best friends when I was freshly 18, I became enamoured, obsessed, and addicted to travelling. At 19, I disregarded cautionary tales from weary friends and family, venturing overseas to explore solo travel in various European countries by staying in hostels, hotels, and Air B&B’s alike. Through the starkness of solo travel, I learned the difference between tourism and travel. Now, it’s my mission to help others learn, too.

The word tourist is often used as an insult—carrying connotations of ignorant disrespect for cultures, peoples, and places. But I believe we must all first be a tourist to become a true traveler. And to be a traveler involves surrendering preconceived notions or stereotypes to allow for emersion in a new culture, a new world, where everything you have become familiarized with is challenged.  

A defining moment where my pre-convinced notions were challenged came when I entered a small surf hostel in a small town south of Lisbon, Portugal. Densely populated with women, most of whom were alone like me, the notion of solo-travel as a woman became less outlandish. Starring back at me was a community of independent women, a community encapsulating people from every corner of the entire world, connected by a shared love for boldness and discovery—people whose souls are ignited by unknown possibilities burning before every step.