In the final days of 2021 I flew to Cape Town, South Africa – officially checking off my seventh continent in just under seven years. Before I launch into a sparknotes style synopsis of my journey, I need to mention that international travel is a privilege that many never experience – and I wouldn’t have gotten to this point had it not been for special resources and some profound luck in my career.
In March of 2015 I took my first international flight from Chicago to London for a 2.5 month study abroad program. I was 21 years old and had a fear of flying – I remember gripping my seat in distress as we experienced perfectly normal turbulence, and I tried to block out the idea that we were flying directly over the Atlantic Ocean with nowhere to land in a pinch.
A study abroad trip is truly a once in a lifetime experience. I spent the weeks exploring art museums, trying out the nightlife, and attending performances of the London Symphony Orchestra. On the weekends I took solo international jaunts on budget airlines to cities such as Amsterdam, Prague, Madrid, and Paris.
Days before I was to return to the US I took a trip to Edinburgh, Scotland. There I met a 25 year old who had left their “dream” job back in the US and sold all of their belongings to backpack Europe. Having experienced considerable frustrations in my own career I found their story compelling, and this last minute encounter inspired me to return to Europe in some shape or form.
Back in the “real world” I had one more year of undergraduate studies and then graduate school before I planned to enter the professional orchestra audition circuit. In early 2016, a few months before my graduation from Lawrence University, I applied and was hired for a two week summer opera gig in the small town of Périgueux, France – the flight for which I could not afford.
Not long afterwards my parents informed me that I could fly on Standby through their job with United Airlines – a detail that they left out for 22 years (!) So, that summer I took my first standby flight to Frankfurt, Germany to backpack with my sister for a week before heading to France. I couldn’t believe that I had returned to Europe so soon, it felt like a sign that my study abroad was only the beginning of a life in travel.
In the fall of 2016 I moved to Miami, Florida to begin graduate coursework in violin performance. Despite the allures of Magic City it was sometimes difficult to be present while daydreaming of the far off places that I could go on standby at little to no cost. Wanting to test the limits and take the longest flight I could, I made it a goal to spend a spring break in New Zealand.
During the two years I lived in Miami I returned to Europe on three occasions – two for work with my viola/piano duo, and another for a week-long trip between Salzburg, Vienna, and Venice. In the meantime, my schedule in Miami made my dream flight to New Zealand impossible.
In late 2018 I moved from Miami to Louisville, KY to start a second masters degree at the University of Louisville (a move that I don’t recommend anyone repeat). Then in March of 2019 I finally cleared my schedule for a whirlwind 7-day road trip around the South Island of New Zealand, ticking off my third continent of Oceania.
I thought perhaps after visiting NZ I would be able to focus more on my music career, but in its completion my desire to travel became evermore insatiable. In the spring of 2019, (shortly after the NZ trip) I dropped out of my second masters degree at the University of Louisville, seeking to have more freedom to wander and pursue freelance work after eight years of higher education.
That summer I held a Viola Fellowship at the Tanglewood Music Center in Lenox, Massachusetts – a prestigious training program for young orchestral musicians. Having just dropped out of school, I had no idea what I was going to do after Tanglewood, and I had very little money with which to enjoy my freedom from academia.
Not long into the summer I received an email from an agent at an entertainment company in Montreal, Canada. They had found my musical duo through social media and were looking for a duo to fill a vacancy on the Holland America Cruise Line. Soon enough we were offered a four month contract to sail between Central/South America and Antarctica through early January 2020.
My time on the MS Zaandam ship was one of the most memorable travel experiences of my life. Between performing and bouncing from country to country on an almost daily basis I was completely hooked on ship life. This contract was my introduction to Antarctica and South America, and we spent nearly two months alone in the latter – making frequent stops in Ecuador, Peru, Chile, Argentina, The Falkland Islands, Uruguay, and Brazil. Prior to the end of the contract we accepted a follow up contract on the MS Amsterdam for a segment of HAL’s 2020 Grand World Voyage.
My 50-day stint on the 124-day Grand World Voyage didn’t tick off any new continents, but it provided a taste of what the South Pacific has to offer as we made our way from Chile to Australia, stopping in numerous remote island territories and nations including Easter Island (Chile), Tahiti (French Polynesia), Pitcairn, Rarotonga (Cook Islands), and Nuku’alofa (Tonga). Aboard the Amsterdam it was perfectly normal to meet other crew and passengers who had been to every continent and 70+ countries. Having already visited five continents I made it my new goal to visit Asia and Africa.
Then in March of 2020, just days after visiting Sydney, Australia – the cruise was shut down due to the Covid-19 pandemic. My hopes of spending that spring backpacking Southeast Asia was shattered as borders closed all over the world and we were flown back to the US.
Seven months passed before I began traveling abroad again, a period of time that honestly felt like years after such constant international travel. Though the bulk of Asia was closed off, there was one country with open borders and zero covid testing requirements – Turkey.
So after an ill-fated attempt to move to Denver, Colorado I flew to Istanbul and spent 36 days backpacking by bus and rental car around the entirety of Turkey – making my way as far east as the Iranian border. Some might consider it “cheating” to refer to Turkey as part of Asia, but technically the eastern side of Istanbul and everything past it is considered part of Asia.
Over a year passed before I made it to South Africa, a trip that almost didn’t happen amidst the emergence of the Omicron variant in late 2021.
I am so happy to have a flexible career and travel privileges that have allowed me to make my travel goals a reality. Now maybe I’ll strive to visit 50 countries by the age of 30? (check back soon for my post on Cape Town, SA!)
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