Sarah WallockI just returned from a whirlwind holiday.
3 countries, 3 cities, 12 days, 7 family members, and loads of friends.
Boulder, CO, USA > Athens, Greece > Vienna, Austria > London, England > Boulder
I could never imagine stopping traveling. I never envisioned my life would go this way!
But after a few big curveballs, now, there’s no place like home.
After moves across the world, more diseases and doctors’ visits and strange infections and stomach issues than I could count, and job after job after job… I made a commitment to myself in 2025 to just sit still for a minute. My wanderlust and subsequent career has taken me all across the world from Oceania to Asia to Europe and beyond. Though a health scare changed my relationship with travel, particularly work travel.
With each new country and city, came new experiences, viewpoints, tastes, perspectives and people. It was an absolute treat. But every time I left, I was leaving something and someone behind. I’ve always hated the “jet in jet out” “indulge indulge indulge” type of travel. I could never see myself traveling in that rushed and intense capacity. Slow, sustainable and intentional travel. Yet as I continue to age and my needs continue to change, being a socially responsible traveler still informs many of my actions.
Being an American means a limited amount of PTO, expensive international flights and a limited amount of paid holiday time. I tried so effortfully to escape this traditional work environment for years. But ski season by ski season, the adventures stacked up and so did the bills. As I wave goodbye to my young 20s and hello to a set of increased responsibilities, I knew seasonal work wasn’t gonna cut it.
While I shift from couch-surfing across Europe and dining on a budget, to prioritizing friends’ weddings, baby showers, and family gatherings, I didn’t expect my definition of travel and love for it to constantly change.
On our most recent flight from Heathrow to Denver, the pilot was doing massive C-shaped curves to avoid the landing queue. I grabbed my barf bag and vomited. Not from a crazy night out in Hanoi, Vietnam, or from having street meat in South America, or from loving the pubs in London. But from the mundane bumps and turns of motion sickness.
While now I don’t stay in hostels or sleep on couches or share beds with coworkers or stay out late, I still travel with my little carry-on backpack and hold the memories of these past adventures near and dear to me. And I now create new and different ones.
Now, I share my location with my husband and I don’t gargle with the untreated shower water in Ecuador, or jump into alpine streams while solo hiking in New Zealand or hitchhike (as much).
Rather than housesitting pets, working on farms and connecting with animals every chance I got, now, I have two little kitties of my own.
While my international traveling won’t come to a permanent stop, it has definitely come to a halt as a result of my changing needs, growing up and infatuation with my current home of Colorado.
Maybe travel in your late 20s looks like: friends you never get to see, huge smiles and laughs, time spent with family, revisits to places you once knew, and prioritizing people you love, rather than the adventure itself.
I’m looking forward to another ski season in the books. Learning to splitboard safely and completing my avalanche training and continuing to share travel stories from right here in my own country, and my own backyard.
