This article got me pumped to do some traveling!!
http://convergemagazine.com/featured/travel-young/I have been pretty privileged in my lifetime. I was born in New Jersey, but my family moved to Florida when I was young. Early on we would vacation to see family up north, but it was not until high school that I started to travel on my own. My family absolutely did not have funds to support my travels, but I was blessed with friends who would take me along and a school that would find sponsors to pay your way on class trips.
Two of my really good friends and I would do summer road trips or winter ski trips up the east coast. Usually we headed to New Hampshire or Massachusetts and would just hit fun landmarks along the way. We drove up Mt. Washington, took in all the beauty of Washington, DC, sat in awe as we stood at the railing on the Canadian side of Niagara Falls, and watched hundreds of people pile out of bars in downtown Boston on New Year's Eve to cheer as the clock struck twelve.
School was equally as rewarding. I attended the Business Academy in my high school, which would find sponsors for students who did not have funds to attend their trips. Thanks to local businesses in my home town I was able to explore both NYC and Seattle. From watching Wicked on Broadway to throwing fish at Pike Place Fish Market, my school handed me some memories that will stay with me forever. I got travel fever by this point.
I even joined a local youth group that took an annual ski trip. We would raise the money throughout the year so basically all of the money I saved went toward a spending account for my trips.
My senior year after graduation my oldest friend and her family gave me the privilege of joining them in Costa Rica. Costa Rica is breathtaking. From the jungle to the ocean, zip-lining by monkeys to rappelling down waterfalls, sitting in hot springs to fishing for marlin. I never wanted to come home.
So when I finally came home, I had to get away. I jumped on the first opportunity that came my way, and it turned out to be rooming with a close friend in Tucson, Arizona.
So here I am in Tucson. Life took over with bills and rent. A job that requires 40 hours a week of my attention and school when I can fit it in. A class here and there. Six years have passed. I was ready to go and here I am six years later. Do not get me wrong, I have done a lot that I am proud of and have a life to call my own, but that spark to travel still sits deep inside me waiting to explode.
Last year I took my first trip out of Tucson that did not involve going home to Florida. My boyfriend and I went to Rocky Point in Mexico. I swear if I could I would have made that one week last a lifetime. This place made me happy. After working all the time a week of beachfront property and no obligations was more than anyone could ask for. The beauty of Cholla Bay is really a sight to see. Mexico is my destination because it is the first thing I could grasp in a long time that made me feel free.
After this trip I will have to get on with life and back to my bills, so this will be the journey I have been waiting for and will be the inspiration for my vacation jars in the future. So there is a little insight to my life. :)
