The Language of Kindness
A gentle breeze blew through the vivid green rice fields and made the sea shell wind chimes above me sway. I was surrounded by the mountainous green hills of northern Thailand, but I wasn’t paying...
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Green Lessons in a Shell
Green. And slimy, too. All nestled in their shells. Anything that is green and slimy belongs...
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Climbing to Montana Glaciers
Something looks different about glacial runoff water. While the average lake has a banal navy blue or even brown color, one composed of glacial melt has a rich, aquamarine, slightly opaque look to it....
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New York. New Me.
I couldn’t stop smiling, my enormous grin was permanently chiseled onto my face; my heart wouldn’t cease its drumming in my chest, it was as if King Kong himself was pounding his huge fist throughout...
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Peace at Last
When my parents first proposed a twenty two day road trip from our native Arizona to Florida I was skeptical. We...
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Survival, Much Like Smiling, Is Universal
My time in Cambodia had brought me many challenges. I had a running fever with no access to trustworthy medical care, I was fumbling with cultural differences and customs, and we worked long days teaching...
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Finding Peace in Hiroshima
We stared with hands clasped over our open mouths and eyes glued to the figures before us. They were bathed in the red of their own blood, burned skin, and the flames that surrounded them. Their clothes...
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Old New World
Bullet holes still dot the walls outside the Pergamon Museum...
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Murder On The Prospect
Visiting the setting of a book you have recently read may be completely different from what you imagined. My imagined setting of Crime and Punishment, I discovered, was completely different...
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Building Hope in Mexico
Let me back up a little. I come from a family that travels. Sometimes we travel for fun, sometimes for adventure, and sometimes for cultural experiences. About every other year, we travel for missions...
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Barfing in the Light of the Stars
I come from a family of six very large boys, and the most frequent response I get after divulging that information is “Oh your poor mother!” I smile and nod, thinking back on the good times I’ve...
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I Know the World, But Have Never Left America
T?t c? b?t ??u v?i It all started with my dad, a war refugee from Vietnam. Ever since I was a little girl, I heard stories of “life back in Vietnam.” Stories that included...
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How to See
Before, I had never left my home. I’ve flown across the seas in my dreams, traversed the highest mountains between classes, but one day, I promised myself that I would travel. Across the nation......
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Goat Milk and Gratitude
The plane landed in Casablanca Mohammed V International Airport on June 24th at 2:37 P.M. I looked around and saw cacti and emptiness. I was slightly disappointed, to say the least. Vast stretches...
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The City of Lost Souls
Although my story is not considerably phenomenal, it is unique. Because unlike most, I will not tell you a memory of greatness, but rather one of realization. When asked about your...
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My Trip to Stirling Castle, Scotland
I could hardly contain my excitement as I drove up the tiny, winding road. Up I went, up, up, up. When would I ever get to the top?
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Home of the Soul-less
The 18 hour drive from Virginia to Florida was exhausting but all the while worth it. I was on my way to go to Cuba. As I walked onto the plane, my heart filled with excitement. I haven’t been there...
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Cammino di Assisi: The Characters and Challenges that Made It So Much More than an Italian Pilgrimage
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A Friend 2,790 Miles Away
My eyes pop open as the cooing of roosters awakens my slumber. I roll over on my paper-thin mattress, careful not to hit my head on the bunk above me. Stepping onto the filthy cement floor, I look around...
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TRAVELING THOUGH TIME TO DISCOVER – AND UNCOVER – DINOSAURS, FISH AND TRILOBITES IN THE WILD WEST
This summer I got to travel through time with my family. We started our journey by heading back 50 million years to a spot near Kemmerer, Wyoming. After riding up a mountainside, we stepped into a barren...
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Camping By the Seat of Our Pants
A lot of families, when choosing to travel, often already have booked which hotels they will stay at on specific nights of the trip, days or weeks in advance.
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A Day in the Life of Japan
This past June I flew to Japan. I was deliriously underprepared for the experience that awaited me. I had crossed the Pacific Ocean to attend Tokyo’s...
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Helping Others, Or Getting Helped?
Dancing with children on the dirty streets with the rain pouring over our heads, playing soccer on the dusty roads, and...
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The Trip That Changed My Life
As a human being, I am often guilty of becoming far too comfortable with my circumstances in life. I become comfortable with the house that I live in, the clothes that I wear, and even necessities such...
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My Voyage to Living History that Inspires Within
One world blends into another as a formation older than anything else I've ever seen appears in front of me. Sidewalks transform into cobblestone roads, and townhouses become...
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Dirty Water and Inspiration
I was a travel virgin. Until, that is, my grandparents invited me on a trip to New York to see Niagara Falls.
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The 3 Years That Changed My Life
After living in the United States for 5 years my parents could no longer renew our Business Visa. We had to go back to Europe, but this was also the perfect opportunity for my parents to finally accomplish...
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Journey Back to Darwin
“Stepping out of an airplane into the balmy, pleasant air of Baltra Island is definitely not the way Charles Darwin made it to the Galápagos Islands,” I thought to myself, as I walked toward the...
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The Silk of Uncertainty—My Tentative Journey Underground the Guatemalan Jungle
My eyes are bleary, eyelashes split by Guatemalan sun. My hair is damp and tangled in hot, wet air. I tug a tee-shirt over the damp swimsuit that I must have fallen asleep in. I hope there aren’t...
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I Found My Spot
“Every American citizen should stand in this spot before they die,” I proclaim to my fellow students and our chaperones. Despite my tendency to speak my mind before I think,...
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Alive and Coarse and Strong and Cunning (Or, How I Learned to Be Independent by Getting Lost in Downtown Chicago)
(Title taken from Chicago by Carl Sandberg) The thing about going to Chicago is that you have to realize the city will inevitably steal your heart. With skyscrapers stretching to the crowds,...
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The Eerie Struggle
We were waiting in line to go to the top of the Empire State Building. Our time was ticking and we only had 3 hours left in the city at most. To start off our impromptu 5 hour excursion, I witnessed...
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Meeting the Rest of My Family
The roads are full of cars that don’t seem to be following any rules. People stand by the car window holding maimed body parts up to the glass begging for money. Men, women, children and animals run...
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The Last Homely House
I'm the kind of person who is easily enthralled by the romanticized ideas of adventure. Having always loved fantasy novels and the like, the concept of exploring something...
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Falling Stars
My best friend, Kiana, and I first hung out when we were assigned a Spanish project. We were to take "selfies" of us experiencing different emotions and insert those pictures onto a slideshow to present...
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I Traveled Incomprehensible
I sleepily opened my eyes to daylight, heard locusts whining, and sat up with my sheets sticking to me. It was 5:00...
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Here’s What I Didn’t Learn In The Classroom – From A Teen Girl Travelling The World
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Éire
Sunshine that feels as though the world is telling you to live. Bright green fields and farms that you can’t get away from. And Helen, who has been by my side since day one, venturing into alleyways...
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