A Girls' Guide to Travelling Alone by Gemma Thompson

Rural location about a twenty-minute walk from Okayama. True freedom as an older, female, solo traveller! Once I arrived in London, where I stayed with my niece, I had the confidence to be more adventurous and spontaneous. So I chose destinations/ countries where I had family or friends. I had only ever travelled to Australia from New Zealand, where my three girls live. I’d also discovered this wonderful volunteer site called Workaway. I had wanted to see the Cherry Blossom in Japan, so that was my obvious first destination. I took a year off work, sold half of my belonging, put the rest in storage, saved like crazy and rented out my house. My 4 kids were living their own lives so it was time that I lived mine.

He’d never retired and now at 75, he was dying! All the money in the bank and invested in his farm but no adventure. I was watching my Dad fading away with dementia and a third bout of cancer. Yes, I had raised four children, getting my teaching degree in my 40’s while raising them and becoming a head teacher at a kindergarten – but i wanted more… That night I made a decision to have an adventure. That night I discovered David Bowie died and this really impacted on me. She asked me about mine and I realised with horror that I was goal-less. I was having dinner with a friend and she was sharing her goals and plans for the year. What prompted you to book your first trip?

Some of this is paraphrased from our interview. I’ll begin the process with the remarkable Karen Sim. I began formulating a plan for an anthology of single moms turned empty-nesters who became solo travelers. Her mother, she said, raised four kids by herself before quitting her job and traveling the world for a year and a half.Īn idea was born. When I mentioned to the young woman from New Zealand, perched on the bunk across from mine, that I had not journeyed intentionally (can’t really count Greece and Turkey and England to find my kidnapped daughters) to faraway places until my kids were grown and flown, she told me about her mom’s adventures. I was the lone geriatric in my hip hostel in Buenos Aires a couple of months back when I stumbled on a treasure trove.

A Girls' Guide to Travelling Alone by Gemma Thompson