While riding her blue Yamaha through the streets of São Tomé and Príncipe in the Gulf of Guinea in 2009 and 2010, Beth Santos had a defining realization.
“I became very aware of myself as a young woman traveling to an unfamiliar place alone,” she recalled. “It was there that I realized the true connective power of travel and how it changes us. If we embrace it, travel teaches us to challenge our perspectives, to embrace uncertainty and to adapt quickly.”
Six years later, Santos is the founder and CEO of Wanderful, an international membership community for independent, adventurous women who travel. Wanderful now includes 21 local chapters across the United States, Canada, Brazil and Spain, as well as an active online community of around 12,000 women travelers.
“We are creating a global sisterhood of women who can use their most powerful resource — each other — as they travel the world,” Santos said. “Whether it’s information about a new destination, meeting up with a friend abroad or hosting a traveler in your home, the network makes travel easier and more rewarding.”
An American tourist in Granada, Nicaragua © SCOTT GRIESSEL |
DREAMSTIME.COM
Wanderful’s goals include helping women travel safely and confidently, increasing visibility for solo women travelers and encouraging curiosity, openness and global citizenship. Santos wants the community to be so pervasive that, wherever a woman arrives, she can count on someone in the Wanderful network to offer local guidance or meet for coffee so she’s not alone.
This fall, Wanderful members will gather on trips to New Orleans and Nicaragua, and all women interested in exploring are invited to participate.
Kelly Lewis grew up on the east side of Hawai‘i, where opportunities to travel felt limited. Unable to study abroad in college, she moved to New Zealand for a year after graduating on a working-holiday visa—an impulsive choice that transformed her life. Living with travelers who had explored the world inspired her to believe she could do the same.
Six years ago Lewis followed a calling sparked by a guidebook for women. She launched Go! Girl Guides and has since published six books: guides to Thailand, Mexico, Argentina, London and New York City, plus 50 Essential Items for Female Travelers. A South Africa guide was scheduled for early 2017, and Lewis spoke with us from Tanzania.
“Our books focus on women’s health and safety in different countries and offer real, practical advice from one woman to another,” she said. “My ultimate goal is to encourage and inspire women to travel because it helps us recognize our own power and capabilities.”
Being in Africa has been especially motivating for Lewis. She noted that while the continent can seem intimidating to travel solo, hearing firsthand accounts from women who have done it can ignite the courage to go. “Sometimes it takes hearing the stories of someone who has gone before to light the fire of wanderlust and possibility,” she said.
A woman examines a map while exploring in the Grand Canyon. © ANDRES RODRIGUEZ | DREAMSTIME.COM
On a 2013 U.S. book tour, Lewis discovered the power of live conversation. Women brought family and friends to her talks and lingered afterward to ask questions and share stories. That energy led her to create Women’s Travel Fest, the first consumer travel conference for women. Since its launch in New York City in 2014, the festival has sold out annually to audiences of more than 300 women, with events held in New York and San Francisco and a 2017 event planned for New Orleans.
In July Lewis launched Damesly, a tour operator that designs workshop-based trips for creative and professional women. The inaugural trip was a photography tour through the Grand Canyon, Antelope Canyon and Horseshoe Bend; future trips in development include an Argentina Wine & Design itinerary featuring InDesign and Photoshop workshops.
“I want to bring women together to talk about travel—and to travel,” Lewis said. “I’ve seen incredible things happen when women take the leap to follow their dreams and explore the world.”
Nicole Lierheimer, director of public relations, Americas, for FRHI Hotels & Resorts, also emphasizes the importance of firsthand travel experiences. “As a PR professional in the travel space, I’m in the business of storytelling,” she explained. “I’m not very effective if I’m only sharing tales of castles and exotic places from the comfort of my Manhattan office. Travel is more than photos or tickets; it’s feeling and emotion that must be experienced firsthand.”
Lierheimer added that travel makes her more skilled at her job and enriches her life. “Experiencing the world and inspiring others to travel isn’t just my career—it’s a personal passion.”
Santos, Lewis and Lierheimer are among many women who work to encourage others to travel—whether that means exploring close to home, visiting neighboring states, or journeying across the globe. Women are traveling alone, with friends and with family, and the benefits are clear.
In a Booking.com survey of 17,000 women conducted in October 2015, 98 percent said travel gives them something to look forward to. Travel energizes 89 percent in their daily lives, improves the moods of 94 percent and provides 97 percent with memories they’ll cherish for a lifetime.
Here’s to making those memories.