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How Travel Evolves With Us: One Woman’s Journey Through the Stages of Life
36 Plays1 month ago
From childhood vacations to girlfriend getaways and now slower, deeper travel in her 50s, Carrie shares how her relationship with travel has changed at every stage of life. This episode is a beautiful reminder that we grow through the places we go — and it's never too late to redefine how we explore the world.
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Transcript
Introduction to Go Far Girl Podcast
00:00:13
Speaker
Hey there, and welcome to Go Far Girl, the podcast where women share the stories that change them one journey at a time. I'm your host, Chantel. I'm a travel writer and a lifelong wanderer.
00:00:23
Speaker
And I believe that every mile we travel brings us closer to the strongest, boldest, most authentic versions of ourselves.
Keri's Travel Evolution
00:00:31
Speaker
Each week, I'll sit down with incredible women to talk about the trips that shaped them, the lessons they learned along the way, and the power of going far in every sense of the word.
00:00:40
Speaker
So grab your copy, your journal, or your carry-on, and let's dive in. Today on Go Far Girl, I'm joined with Keri. She's a seasoned traveler, a former dancer, a therapist, and a school psychologist who now brings the world to life through storytelling and practical advice.
00:00:56
Speaker
Keri views travel through both an artistic and a human-centered lens, which I think is so cool to get kind of both angles on things. And today she's going to share with us how her relationship with travel has changed from the time she was young to when she studied abroad in college and to now as an older adult, how her travel has changed.
Magical Ljubljana Experience
00:01:15
Speaker
So she's going to talk to us about what changes with us, how we gain and grow through travel and how we can continue that no matter what stage of life we're in. So, Keri, welcome. I'm so glad that you're here. Thank you so much for having me. I was super excited about this. So I'll let you get going on your story. I was just going ask you two super quick questions first to kind of get us all warmed up.
00:01:34
Speaker
Tell me your favorite destination you've ever been to, which I know is such a loaded question. Wow, that's big. I know. That's really... But I feel like there's always one that just has your heart just to a little bit more.
00:01:47
Speaker
Yeah. You know, I mean, I have places that I've been to and that I've loved, loved, loved. But um I went to Ljubljana once.
Childhood Vacations and Wanderlust
00:01:56
Speaker
We just went last summer. Well...
00:01:59
Speaker
And I called my husband. I said, honey, we're moving here. Like I i walked around that town and I just thought, this is magic. Like I just loved it there. and The entire country is magic. It's gorgeous. It's gorgeous and lovely and quiet and tiny and nobody sort of knows about it somehow. And said the colors and yeah, no, i I really, really want to go back there. i want to go back in the winter. I want to see, you know, all the season. Yes.
00:02:28
Speaker
I'm so happy you said that because like you said, no one ever talks about Lugliano with me. And it's so, oh my gosh, we had the greatest time. I love that. All right. So take us back. Let's start. What was your earliest travel memory? How did you kind of get started? Was your family traveling all the time? And then I'll just let you go.
00:02:47
Speaker
hey thanks. so um So I grew up in Massachusetts. Worcester, Massachusetts is about an hour um west of Boston. It's the heart of the Commonwealth, the hat of the Commonwealth.
00:02:58
Speaker
And, you know, i'm I'm the youngest of four kids. And so um my mom was a stay-at-home mom, as women were in the 50s and 60s. And so we did summer vacations to Cape Cod.
00:03:11
Speaker
That was our only travel, pretty much. We went for two weeks to the Cape. And then when I got a little bit older, we had cousins in ah Wisconsin and those were like my first plane flights.
00:03:22
Speaker
Well, sometimes we drove to Wisconsin, but sometimes I flew out there. And so that was the beginning. But my mother had a very strong wanderlust that I think I sort of inherited. I remember being really little, sitting on like on the end of my bed, there was a window and I'd look out and there were these hills near me. Now, I now, you know, I later figured out they were just two neighborhoods away. wasn't like, but but but as you know, I was like really little and I thought, oh, that that, what did those people do all the way over there? Who are they? like I remember way gods imagining, like, what if I could go there someday and get me
Life-Changing Tel Aviv Experience
00:04:01
Speaker
out?
00:04:01
Speaker
Yeah. girl Anyhow, so I think I inherited that wanderlust, you know, at an early age. And then and then i my parents started to travel more. I think that's what happened. My siblings sort of grew up and moved out, but then my my dad's business was taking them places. And then I was the only one home alone. So, you know, they could leave and go traveling more to Europe and ah Japan and doing things.
00:04:25
Speaker
bigger um kind of trips. And so I think I got more interested then. Did you get to go with them? No, you didn't. Not, but I got more and more interested. And then um in college, by this point, i have ah my but all of my siblings had done some kind of study abroad or travel piece when they were in college or, you know, that age.
00:04:51
Speaker
And um one of my sisters ah had been to Israel and met her husband.
Dancing Adventure in Mexico
00:04:57
Speaker
And so by the time I was in college, David was part of our family and Israel was a big part of our sort of family.
00:05:05
Speaker
And my mother had visited. Maybe my dad had gone also. I'm Jewish. And that was like ah an interest for me. So i it was not a popular thing when I was in college for kids to do their junior year. I mean, now everybody does that, but...
00:05:20
Speaker
It was not a thing. And so it was kind of a big deal. I had to sort of organize with, you know, the school and credits and all of that. And anyhow, I figured out how to go to Tel Aviv University for a semester.
00:05:35
Speaker
And a couple of my friends also went with me. And, um you know, it was I mean, it changed my life. It was amazing. Right. I, you know, had a great time. I learned Hebrew. learned.
00:05:46
Speaker
met some really amazing friends. i The school part was really not that important. I took classes and I was supposed, I was a dance major at my college. So I was supposed to be taking dance classes in Tel Aviv.
00:05:59
Speaker
And I went sometimes and I pretty much didn't go a lot. You know, they i ah ah every weekend we were away. We were, you know, at once I made made this group of friends, we were off and running the whole time. And did did you stay with a family or did you guys have your own apartment?
00:06:14
Speaker
No, I was in the dorms. Oh, in the dorms at the school. Okay. And so when the semester was over, friends of mine from home came to meet me. And the idea was we were going to travel.
00:06:29
Speaker
And I'm not really sure how we pulled all this together, but we all decided let's just stay in Israel for the summer. so we actually rented an apartment and I got a job waitressing. And my Hebrew must have been good enough for me to do that. but Yeah.
00:06:43
Speaker
I kind of, it's not but that enough, wow, I don't know how I did it. And you think back on, like, we didn't have cell phones, we didn't have computers. How did, like, we wrote letters to come and meet me. How did I know that they were arriving at the airport? I wonder about all that stuff. Like, how did we figure that out? How did we even know this apartment was for rent? Did we...
00:07:03
Speaker
knock on door like yeah yeah i can't remember any of that but anyhow we spent the summer there in an apartment and then traveled a little bit traveled to greece and did some things coming home and but when i got back to to school that fall semester after that whole big adventure i'd been gone like nine months or whatever I just felt so different than my peer group.
00:07:29
Speaker
I felt like we were all seniors in college and I had this big, massive, eye-opening experience and I felt like nobody else did. No fault of theirs, but I had gone and seen in the big world and they had kind of gotten out of the bubble.
00:07:47
Speaker
Right, right. Because I went London and Paris and spent all that time in Israel and went to Greece and I had done stuff. So that was that for me. I just kept wanting to travel after that.
Career Shift to Dance Therapy
00:07:59
Speaker
Then i was a dancer and I got connected to this woman who knew my parents. It was like this very random thing the where I got hired to be in a Bugs Bunny show.
00:08:12
Speaker
That was going to Mexico. So I was like, I was in because if they were going somewhere when I could dance in Mexico, what did I do? So I, in fact, was the Tasmanian devil. I went to Bruggs' understudy.
00:08:27
Speaker
my gosh. I danced with a circus. It's called the Atayde Circus. I don't know if they still exist, but they were like... The Barnum and Bailey of Mexico. They were like a very big deal circus in Mexico.
00:08:40
Speaker
And somehow they were connected to this Warner Brothers touring group where we were there was a Bugs Bunny storyline along with the baboon ladies and the the elephants and the trapeze and the little people. we they were It was just like this wild thing.
00:08:58
Speaker
thing that happened. And we spent this summer in Mexico City with the circus people and these other dancers that were mostly, everyone was living in New York at the time. I was the only one who was hadn't been dancing in New York.
00:09:11
Speaker
yet because I had just graduated college. So it was a wild time. It was really fun. I was Bugs's understudy. i we would We toured around Mexico a little bit and we were on TV and stuff, but mostly we were at this big stadium in Mexico City.
00:09:28
Speaker
And at the end of the show, when I was understudying for Bugs, I would get picked up onto these out two elephants' trunks and I would swing on the elephants' trunks and have to wave up to the kids like way, way, way up in the stadium.
00:09:45
Speaker
It was kind of crazy. Yeah, I know it is too bad that there's not a video recording of it. So that so that was great. It was great. And then, so then when I came back,
00:09:55
Speaker
I moved to New York and then I was auditioning and teaching exercise and dancing and waitressing and doing all the things
Traveling with Young Daughters
00:10:03
Speaker
to survive in New York. And then that same company, the Warner Brothers group, sent me on a couple more tours around the United States. And so then I was Daffy Duck for a few months and yeah.
00:10:17
Speaker
I got to read and I got to travel and it was all good. Did you love Mexico City? Did you get time when you were doing these shows to get out and explore a little bit or was it really a little work? Yeah, no, no. We got to we, everybody had ah one day off, 14 shows a week, like three shows on Sunday, three shows on Saturday. it was a very busy schedule, but this understudy system allowed everybody to have one day off and you had a buddy who had your day off with you.
00:10:44
Speaker
or something. So we could go to the pyramids and go to do different things. and And there was there was a group of men who, i again, I don't know how they found us or we found them, but they were wealthy, like older men who just, of course, all these New York showgirls were in town.
00:11:03
Speaker
So they wined and dined us They took us to all these fancy restaurants and to the horse races, and they took us all around Mexico City, which is a very gorgeous, I don't know if you've ever been. I've never met.
00:11:15
Speaker
yeah Very, very beautiful place. And um so we got a little bit of everything. We got touring and seeing the historic sites and then we got this other nightlife experience and and then, yeah, yeah. No, it was it was a pretty fun time. I was in my 20s. I mean, it was great.
00:11:33
Speaker
It was great. Yeah. yeah it was good I want to go back to Tel Aviv real quick before we get too far into your story tell me about that when you when you got there I'm sure it's ah just a totally different world than what you're used to Massachusetts and in school we what kind of struck you the most what did you feel how was that when you first got off the plane and you were like okay I'm here now in Israel is it what you thought is it not what you thought how did that sort of Okay, well, so first, let's just preface this by, i think everything's very different there now.
00:12:06
Speaker
Very, very different there now than it was in the 70s, right? So this was 1979. hating So a couple things are very striking there. It's old. Everything's really old, right? Like biblical old.
00:12:21
Speaker
Older than, right, older old, you know, New England, older than old Europe. It's very, very old. um So that is ah always hits me.
00:12:34
Speaker
Sort of any time I'm at something very ancient, I, ah you know, i have ah an emotional experience. with that. it's I can't really describe it other than that.
00:12:46
Speaker
So that that's very striking. The other thing that, you know, as a Jew, it's it's kind of sort of profound that you're that everybody, pretty much everybody's Jewish, you know, like all of a sudden,
00:13:01
Speaker
You know, nobody is and then everybody is. And and so that that was sort of interesting. So I remember those two things really affecting me. Plus the language, you know, i mean, as you know, everyone around the world speaks English. You know, they just all do. They grow up learning English. They speak English. They do. Right. Right.
00:13:20
Speaker
um So, but when you're when you're immersed someplace for that many months where you're not hearing English all the time, I don't remember being tired at the time, but I imagine it's pretty exhausting, you know, right in the beginning. But then, you know, was...
00:13:36
Speaker
you know it was thinking, dreaming, you know, yelling, you know, I could, i could like be sort of quick. I mean, my Hebrew is not, not good at all anymore because I don't. you know some Hebrew before you went? Okay. So good question. So growing up, I went to Hebrew school. We belonged to a temple. And so that all that meant was that I, I learned how to read and write Hebrew.
00:14:00
Speaker
um So that helps me before I went knowing that I was going to go um in that that fall semester of my junior year, I did a very intensive ah Hebrew class.
00:14:12
Speaker
They didn't offer it at my college, but I did it on. Now, how did I do that online? Now that you're sick now that I'm thinking that, there wasn't an online. So there were there was must have been some tapes, some recordings, like listen and repeat.
00:14:24
Speaker
I must have done. And then when I got there, the first, I don't know, the first probably five weeks, of the semester is ah we did what's called an old pond where that's all you do every day is learn Hebrew.
00:14:38
Speaker
Like you're not in the other classes. Like eventually I took an archeology class and a music class and did different things. But the beginning you're learning Hebrew. So they, you know, so you learn fast. um or faster than you would otherwise yeah yeah i was thinking about that even while you were in slovenia in lubliana of course more people spoke english but we did kind of go into some remote areas and people really didn't speak as much and i feel like when i go some places um in europe you know italy rome or or italy france wherever you have those same root words you can kind of pick out alphabet is the same kind of get your way around but in slovenia
00:15:19
Speaker
didn't and there were even the even in Greece honestly Greece is really hard for me to travel through because I don't recognize all the letters I don't know what the sounds are and right go places and they wouldn't speak English or well enough and we had to go to like a pharmacy and do all of these crazy things and it made me think about people that come to the United States
00:15:42
Speaker
with not knowing the language as well and just trying to survive every single day, bring how exhausting that must be and just overwhelming because even if you know a little bit of English coming to this brand new country where all it is and it's surrounded, there's just things you're not going to know and there's things that are going to take time and it's just got to be so...
00:16:02
Speaker
overstimulating and I feel i think more for people now than I did before because I know what it feels like even just for two weeks to be like right I don't know I'm thinking about immigrants yeah and they come and there's nobody to help them there's like just about nobody that's speaking their language you know I mean there's kind of mean Right. Like, oh you just speak English. Well, I can't.
00:16:27
Speaker
But I think that that's one of the good things about travel, too, is it does open your eyes to certain things like that and makes you realize that there's so much more than like your center of the world. And I think it helps you like understand people on a different level, too.
00:16:40
Speaker
Yeah. and And it builds community. I, you know, I have, I remember this time at the end of that Israel trip. And then my friend and I went to Greece and we were in Athens and we got on the wrong bus and we were trying to find the Acropolis and nobody spoke English on the whole bus, not the bus driver, not one person on that bus.
00:17:01
Speaker
And so we're trying, we're describing a properly Acropolis, we're saying, you know, a million different ways and we're trying to find, and then somebody um spoke French and um my friend spoke a little French and then somebody else.
00:17:15
Speaker
So they were able to translate that somebody else spoke Hebrew and then somebody else talked to me. So there was a way that like it took like five people on the bus to help us figure out that we were on the run bus and how to get on the right one and wait and what to do. And and people were willing to help.
00:17:32
Speaker
People were. i mean, that that's one of my favorite things of traveling is that people by and large are really, really sweet and lovely and want to help. Oh yeah.
00:17:42
Speaker
Brings you back to humanity because I think a lot of times like we're just so busy and in our own head, we don't realize, but yeah, it is so nice. Yeah. Yeah. and yeah Yeah. No, that is, that is really a beautiful part.
00:17:55
Speaker
All right. So after you're dancing, then your family. Right. So then, yeah, so i like I left New York in sort of a weird state. um Things were working out as well.
00:18:07
Speaker
And I had decided to go to graduate school to become a dance therapist. So I did that. And that's what led me to San Francisco because i I spent a year in graduate school in New Hampshire and then came to San Francisco for my internship.
00:18:24
Speaker
And that's when I met my husband. and ah almost as soon as I got out here. Really? Through around the Bay? Yeah. Yeah, okay. Yeah. And through a mutual friend, through a woman that I was a roommate, know, it's a long story. I won't bore you with that. But but that I mean, it's a good story, but it's a long one.
00:18:41
Speaker
So, yeah, so I met him when I first moved out here and then I was working as a dance therapist and um we got married. And then um a few years later, we had the girls. And so during that whole time, there wasn't a whole lot of travel, right? It was going back to Massachusetts to see my family, you know, when the girls were little, getting them on airplanes like at four months old and schlepping them back, you know, to Massachusetts.
00:19:07
Speaker
ah So that was the only travel we did and pretty much. when the girls were little. And then i was just dying to go somewhere. You know, I was just so. So I remember this year when we said, OK, we're going to save up our money. We're going to take the girls to Europe.
00:19:23
Speaker
And they were they were in elementary school. They were little. And and we figured out how to get them to London and Paris. and we had this amazing trip. We did this great, great trip with them when they were really young. And then that was that. Then then we were all, all of us on board with, you know, let's go, go, go anytime we can.
00:19:48
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So both my girls, when they were in high school, both did a semester abroad in high school. One went Brittany and the other went to Belgium.
00:20:01
Speaker
Oh, wow. Yeah. Yeah. And then of course I had to go and visit them. Right. got but ah Yeah. Yeah. So traveling with kids when they were little was a lot different, obviously, than traveling with them now and as young adults.
00:20:16
Speaker
um You've done it, I'm sure. yeah You know, you have to really, really just accept the fact that You know what? You're not going to see the whole loo.
00:20:29
Speaker
Okay. Well, she's outside the museum vomiting because she has really bad jet lag. So dad, you stay with her. Mom will go in and see the Venus de Milo come back out, take the other up with switch. But i mean, those kinds of things happen, you know.
00:20:46
Speaker
yeah I think my issue when the girls were little was that I wanted to see things and I wasn't planning around them and their needs. And I think that was a big error as a mom. You know, I wasn't focused enough on the food and like when you need to eat and how often you need to stop.
Traveling with Lifelong Friends
00:21:04
Speaker
That's good point.
00:21:05
Speaker
And I wasn't focused on how jet lag they were going to be and how they weren't going to bounce back, you know, quickly. And um they weren't going to sleep okay. And everything was going to be disrupted.
00:21:17
Speaker
And like, i I needed to go see the queen. I needed to get me to Harrods. But it didn't work out. It totally didn't work out. Like my little one, that first, very first trip, she really didn't feel well every day from waking up until about, I remember like 11 in the morning or noon, then she would feel fine.
00:21:39
Speaker
So it must've been her whole little body and her whole little system. And right. And so ah I was just, it took me a while not to be like anxious and frustrated and like just be patient. And this is it. So I learned some hard lessons in the beginning.
00:21:53
Speaker
Yeah. Part of it though. Right. Right. Right. We still learn the lessons as we travel. We still do things. where We're like, ah sounded better in my head. Right. Right. right or How are you traveling now?
00:22:05
Speaker
So the girls are older. So the girls are older and and they do a lot of their own travel now. They're, you know, they're really good travelers and they love to go. And, but that you know, they did their high school abroad and then in college they both did it abroad um time.
00:22:21
Speaker
And um so they're off and running. They would love to keep coming with us, but just just recently... We're in the place where they're working and and we're retired, so we can't really afford the family of four.
00:22:35
Speaker
And that's why they want to go with you. Because that's what my boys are like, oh, there's already Airbnb? Oh, yeah. you great book and went Right. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. So um so now i would say in the past, um well, ah for a long time, I've had this group of girlfriends, the women that I literally grew up with. I've known them my whole life.
00:22:55
Speaker
And we do a trip not every year, but pretty much every year. And so we all have had our. Early marriages and our children and now our retirement age sort of all together.
00:23:08
Speaker
So those early trips would be maybe two nights away at a, I don't know, like Yosemite. And then then it started to be maybe three nights.
00:23:19
Speaker
And then it started to be maybe a bigger Airbnb or a nicer hotel. and now And then we went to Costa Rica and then we had to have a week and then we had to have chefs and then we had to... and So that level of travel, and because we've all sort of paralleled each other's lives in terms of time, finances, all those things, um we've been able to really do some fabulous trips with that group of girlfriends, which is great, pretty great, great.
00:23:49
Speaker
Just keep leveling up. there and Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, we just went to Death Valley together, which have you done a Death Valley? How is it? Unbelievable.
00:24:01
Speaker
It's a place like it's been on my bucket list for a long time and I live in California, but I had never been. it is like being on a different planet. Every place in that national park looks different than the, you know, your sand dunes and desert. And then there's these salt flats and then there's these red rock mountains like in, you know, Utah or Arizona. And then, then there's these golden mountains and then ye effort it's really, you're on the moon all the time.
Upcoming Anniversary Trip
00:24:32
Speaker
it's and is it artist point or something where there's there alert in Yep, there's a place called Artist's Palette and that in there's there's green and pink and gold and it's really magnificent, honestly. we had There's a volcanic crater there. there's
00:24:48
Speaker
You could drive for hours and hours and still be in the National Park. Where did I stay? So this is this is what works for us, for this group of girlfriends who like the luxury stay, because there's two places. One is called the Oasis Inn and one is the Oasis Ranch.
00:25:06
Speaker
And the ranch is supposed to be the sort of the um less luxury. But there are these gorgeous cabins, like these cottage, they're very cute cottages that, um you know, two people into a cottage in this nice little village. It's very quaint, very, it's beautiful.
00:25:24
Speaker
There's a swimming pool, there's restaurants, there's a little general store, there's a shuttle that takes you to the the fancier inn with the nicer restaurant. when ah Originally, we were going to stay at the nicer at the inn, but it was much more expensive and they actually didn't have rooms for us for that, those days or something.
00:25:44
Speaker
But we're so happy we ended up at the cottages at the ranch because they they were really, really nice, really nice. So i I highly recommend Death Valley. right was Right. We're trying to see all the national parks, so we do need to get there eventually.
00:25:58
Speaker
But yeah yeah, it's just one that I always just don't think about, I guess, when I'm planning. Well, you can't go in the summer, obviously. No, sure. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So at springtime is the best we were hoping for um wildflowers. Like they're supposed to be super blown, but apparently it happens like every decade. So we we did not see one flower.
00:26:17
Speaker
When did you know? What month were you there? um Just last month. Yeah. okay Yeah. No flowers, no wildlife, but it you know, it didn't matter. It was great. so stunning it is i love that it's so different than other places too that's cool yeah yeah yeah so are you doing solo travel right now too or just so um well um so my husband and i have a 35th wedding anniversary trip and we're going to be gone the whole month of september basically we're going to um london and ireland and scotland and portugal
00:26:52
Speaker
no
Changing Travel Preferences
00:26:54
Speaker
Okay. Well, I'll have to talk to you about it because I'm super excited. Yeah. Can't wait. Have you been? No. No. You're going to want to move there. Oh, really? In one day you're going to be leaving.
00:27:05
Speaker
Okay. i I don't know if they have like some sort of like drug in the air or something, but it just, you breathe it and then it gets to you and it never leaves.
00:27:17
Speaker
I'll be just like doing the dishes. Sometimes I'm like, I should just go to Scotland. Like, it's just, I don't know. You'll have, I can't wait for you. Oh my gosh. Okay. im put How long were you there? ah We were there six, seven, eight days, seven or eight days. Okay.
00:27:33
Speaker
So we did a girls trip there last year. Jessie from Brighter Things and I posted some girls and we went, Jessie goes about like five times a year. She is obsessed with it.
00:27:46
Speaker
And I was like, yeah, I'll go. But now I'm obsessed with it. And I mean, ah my gosh. i Oh, I'm super excited. 27 episodes on my love of Scotland.
00:27:58
Speaker
it And so what I did is we went with the girls so to Scotland. We did Edinburgh and then up to Inverness and over to Isle of Skye. We did like an Outlander tour to all the castles from the movie scene. was really cool.
00:28:11
Speaker
But then when everyone left, I took the train to York. and stayed for a week by myself in York. I met up with my friend, Coralie, who lives in Harrogate, pretty close to York.
00:28:26
Speaker
So she took me up through like Northmore Park and over to some of the cabbies and oh, it was the best trip. But 100%. Oh, I can't wait. I can't wait. Yeah, we're very excited. We're very excited. So that'll be a, we haven't done a big trip, just the two of us ever like that. I think the lack time last time we were in Europe, we had the girls with us and it was 2019.
00:28:53
Speaker
It was Christmas time. We often will travel at Christmas time. That's my birthday time. And that's when everybody had time off. Now my husband and I are not working as much, but the girls would have it off. And so we we often travel then. um And we all got a little bit sick at the end of that trip.
00:29:11
Speaker
And who knows if it was COVID or not. was to say threat. It was right. It was it was December 2019 was the last time um we went to Europe together. But then I got to go. So here's another thing that I launched my getting paid to travel but but episode of my life.
00:29:30
Speaker
um ah We have friends who, my husband's a musician, and we have friends who own a company that takes money. high school and college orchestras and choirs around the world to festivals and performances and that sort of thing.
00:29:47
Speaker
And a few years ago, it was 2022,
00:29:51
Speaker
two um Well, maybe it was 21. Anyhow, it was in pandemic time. She called me on a Tuesday in the summer and said, ah do you want to go to Europe on Thursday?
00:30:03
Speaker
Somebody, one of her workers had gotten COVID and couldn't go. And it was a three week trip with, you know, like 200 people. families of high school students and traveling. That's when I got to go to Slovenia. We went to Czechoslovakia. We went to Dresden. We went, we had Vienna.
00:30:25
Speaker
It was fabulous. It was great. So I got paid to go. I met fabulous friends. i I had work, but it was being on the bus with the families and um the other tour guides who were sort of taking us around and And then the kids were performing and it was like, oh my God, I've arrived. i i'm getting I'm literally getting paid. like And five-star hotels and all the meals covered and, you know, all it yeah, was good.
00:30:56
Speaker
It was really good. So that same company um has just asked me to go to Australia this summer. Of course you said no. I was like, oh, who wants to do that? i'm not going to Sydney.
00:31:12
Speaker
Oh my God. Yeah. so i Super excited. So, so i have, I'll be like with the group for like four days. So I have like a week in Sydney that I'm sort of officially getting paid for. And then my friend, one of these high school friends is going to come and meet me.
00:31:32
Speaker
And then we're going to go to the Great Barrier Reef and we're going to, I know it's good. It's good. It's the life. So talk about like how things evolve now. I'm like, hey, you know what? If we are going to go do this, then, you know, I'm going to spend the money I'm making on the trip because I want to stay at the really nice place in this Fitzroy Island.
00:31:53
Speaker
Send me to the resort or send me, you know, i mean, it's July and the weather's not, you know, it's not. I'm to be super hot because of winter. It's winter, but the apparently Great Barrier Reef is like in the 70s, that time of year. So, right. So I don't feel like, back to just sort of how I'm evolving as a traveler, I don't feel like, not that I have tons of money, but I also feel like I'm not willing to budget and worry. And, you know, that that way that we used to have to travel, like... Sleep on the ground or in a hostel or something. Well, yeah, definitely not with the backpack and the hostiles anymore. mean, I did that in college and that was that. but
00:32:32
Speaker
But even now, I'd like and I want to stay at a nicer place and I want to eat at the nicer places. And I don't want to sort of worry about those things. Or I want to be able to take an Uber or a car instead of like figuring out the public...
00:32:47
Speaker
transportation with my suitcase and my, you know, sure you know that kind of thing. I just, um yeah, I'm just not willing to sort of um struggle as much. Not that it's like a big struggle, I know that sounds weird, but you know what i mean? Like i i want I want to enjoy the the reasons I'm there and not have all those transitions be stressful.
Encouragement for Women to Travel
00:33:10
Speaker
I love that. I think we earned that though. I think we put in our time and with the other things. And it's funny because i used to say, I'll just get the cheapest hotel because it's just a place to sleep.
00:33:24
Speaker
And so my husband got really used to that. But now when I travel, he's like, it's a really nice place. I'm like, oh yeah, we are staying somewhere. like with yeah We're not doing this. So it's funny that you said that.
00:33:36
Speaker
It makes me feel valid because I'm like that too. I'm like... He's like well, it's just a place to sleep. I'm like, hmm, and going to be dang comfy, too. I want 27 pillows, and I want it to smell delightful, and I want it to like a bounce. Right, and you want to feel safe, and you want, you know, all those things, and you, you know, like, like you were saying, you're exhausted sometimes when you're traveling, and so you want to be able to be comfortable.
00:33:59
Speaker
And yeah, and have it be clean and nice. Yeah, yeah. so So I i i don't um compromise on some things now that I used to.
00:34:10
Speaker
Like I remember when my oldest was in New Zealand for her study abroad. So I took my younger one and we went and we, yeah you know, we had an amazing, amazing trip.
00:34:21
Speaker
But it was November and it rained and we're like schlepping our suitcases like through the rain, trying to get to the car rental place and everything's breaking and falling, you know, and like, no and it was like, what what ah you know what?
00:34:38
Speaker
I don't want to do that. I don't want to think about it. but but Right. So what would you say the one piece of advice you have for women right now?
00:34:49
Speaker
Like no matter what stage they're at, if they're like, oh, just, it's not going to work at this stage of my life. What would you, what would your be advice? You've been through all the different stages. You've, you've done the hard stuff. You've done the fun stuff.
00:35:00
Speaker
What you, what would you say? um I would say make it happen. You know, I would say that um I think finances are a thing that really hold people back from doing things, or maybe that's an excuse. ah Maybe they're nervous to go. And so they say, oh, I don't have, I can't afford it, that kind of thing.
00:35:19
Speaker
So I think that it's really, it's really good for women to get out there, especially if you've been the You've been working your whole life and you've been the mom and you've been, you know, you've been doing all the things for other people. I think it's really good. So you can go local.
00:35:34
Speaker
You don't have to, it doesn't have to be some huge major trip, right? It can be local or it can be an organized tour. I think this works really well for a lot of people.
00:35:46
Speaker
you know, not my thing, but people, ah cruises or, you know, these group tours, like you said that you took women, a group of women on truck. so So that feels organized and safe. And I know people who are doing um National Geographic tours or, you know, they everybody's offering amazing tours. And yeah, they might be costly, but that that's a good way to get out there.
00:36:10
Speaker
Especially, you know, people my age or older, there are lots and lots of senior tour companies. and And you're paying for the convenience of not having to worry, not having to think about the itinerary, not having to take your back in and out of the hotels and the stuff.
00:36:25
Speaker
You're paying for that too. And you're just able to experience it without the chaos. Right. And they tell you where to eat and they write and they've bought the plane tickets and, you you know, they're handling all those things. So I think that yeah if women are tentative, um then that's a good way to start.
00:36:43
Speaker
Or literally just a weekend away, you know, by yourself or with your girlfriend is great. could be in your town. if You could be in a different hotel in your town and just right don't be in your own life.
Conclusion and Social Media
00:36:56
Speaker
Right. Right. Yeah. I love that. all right where can people find you where can they follow you and catch up we see we gotta see that's right that's right i have a lot i have a lot to write about well i'm at kerrygreensin.com and my instagram is kerrygreensin and my facebook is kerrygreensin and everything kerrygreensin so um it's easy to find me yeah i'll have some links for those down in the transcript so people can click on them easy but thanks so much for hanging out i Thank you. It's so good to catch up with you.
00:37:29
Speaker
Absolutely. All right, everyone. Thanks for joining us today. And we're going to be back next week with another episode from Carrie. She's going to tell us all about New York, which is one of her favorite travel places. All right. We'll see you then.
00:37:40
Speaker
Thanks. Bye. sorry
00:37:54
Speaker
Thanks so much for listening to Go Far Girl. If this episode made you smile, dream a little bigger, or realize it's never too late to book the trip, I'd be so grateful if you'd share it with a friend.
00:38:04
Speaker
And hey, we've got an amazing group of women waiting for you inside our Facebook community. Just search Go Far Girl. Come on in and say hi. And until next time, keep exploring, keep growing, and never stop going far.