hello

I guess first thing is first and I should introduce myself. I’m Rachel. A young free spirit type that longs for her next adventure before the current one is over. I love my small town living but I love to get out and see the world a little more. I spend too much time dreaming of my next adventure and I have a Pinterest board full of ideas. I have always loved to travel and check places off my bucket list. Seeing new places, meeting new people and eating great food soothes my soul. And travel is truly shaping me to become the woman I know I can be.

Many moons ago after high school, I swore I would never go back to the small town I called home. I was off and never wanted to look back. Well, that lasted for the few short years I was at school earning a degree in education. I returned home to teach in my hometown but something was missing. My desire to up and go was constantly growing stronger than ever and I knew I needed to follow that. So after a lot of consideration in March of 2020, I left my job as a teacher and started to seek adventures that I knew were out there. It has been a difficult year for me being away from the school. I miss seeing my friends everyday and I miss the students. I like to think I will go back to teach. I guess time will tell. Of course, because it was in the middle of the pandemic, I didn’t get to travel much. Scratch that. I didn’t get to travel at all. I questioned more than ever if I made the right choice to leave my job.

Soon after leaving my job my Grandma Gay got sick and needed to have emergency surgery. I went to visit her after her surgery and help her around the house for a few weeks. We spent a lot of time reading and relaxing. Something both of us desperately needed. I told her about my dreams of traveling and how I was going to drive Route 66 before I turned 30, stay tuned to see if this happens. She told me about her travels to Hawaii, New York, San Francisco and more. She talked about not being able to travel anymore and how she wished she could. I made plans with her and said that the next summer we would go on a road trip together. Unfortunately that will forever be a dream. My grandma passed away in September of 2020. It was devastating. The woman who calmly talked me down when I was worked up. The woman who always saw the good in people. The woman that I someday hope to be, was gone. And with her went my desire to travel. The spark that I had was gone. I no longer wanted to travel, I didn’t want to do much. I was grief stricken and wanted to just go through the motions. But then something happened in December of 2020, it was like a switch flipped and I realized sitting around and not doing what brought me joy wasn’t how she would have wanted me to live.

So that was when I started to plan my epic year of travels. And that’s why we are here right now. Year 30 travels are about exploring new places, finding joy and loving life. I hope that this blog brings you joy. I hope it sparks travel inspirations. I hope that you will also follow your heart fully. I hope that this lasts longer than a year and I can travel this much in all my years to come. But most of all, I hope that I find myself again.

Rachel