My Travel Story.

I was born and raised in a mid-sized city - Raleigh, North Carolina. Friends of mine have lived here their whole lives, as have their parents, and their grandparents. They have deep roots in a small garden. I, on the other hand, came from a family of wanderers with a genetic predisposition for travel, who drifted like dandelion wishes from one place to the next. I inherited wanderlust like I inherited blue eyes and a dimpled chin. I received curiosity with my blood type, breathless wonder with a widow's peak, restlessness hand in hand with a smattering of freckles. I was given the same drive that compelled my mother to spend the summers of her twenties in Alaska and that had my father country hopping from Wales to New Zealand to Mexico with nothing but a backpack and some spare change.

By the time I turned 15, I had traveled to the UK three times and was boarding the plane for my next great adventure: the Women’s World Cup in Vancouver. As the plane descended, I gazed out of a window that framed towering mountains on one side and a glistening city on the other. They were barely visible through the happy tears on my lashes. 

Two years later, I cried again as I watched the Yucatecan dancers in Merida, Mexico. While wandering the cobblestone streets that criss-crossed the city, I stumbled upon a traditional festival in the main square. People crowded around the dancers and cheered as they twirled in white dresses and colorful ponchos. My eyes devoured the scene, my ears drank in the music and laughter, my tongue clung to the lingering taste of paleta. My heart was full, but my soul was hungry.

A voracious desire to seize the world took hold as I planned my next few months. In 2019, I spent fewer than six months in the country of my birth. I followed the women of the USWNT to France and spent the summer covering their journey - and mine. I wrote articles, took pictures, made videos, everything I could to capture the experience. When the Cup concluded, I boarded a train and traveled under the English Channel to London, where I spent the fall studying politics, history, and art at King’s College. From there, I set my sights on the rest of Europe and spent my weekends bouncing from Dublin to Abergavenny, from Prague to Budapest, and from Amsterdam to Vienna.

There is something inside of me that pulls me towards adventure, like a magnet in my chest. In every city that I have been to, I have wandered winding streets, open air markets, and crowded cities, my only purpose to regale my senses with the wonders of the world. As I traveled, I felt as though I had been starving, and hadn’t realized it until sitting at the feast; it’s like every town and city is a small taste of something wonderful, feeding an appetite that only grows with indulgence.