so traveling in my 20s versus my 30s how has it been different is it better is it worse
it is completely different and these are seven big ways in which i have really changed and evolved
from how i traveled in my 20s to now in my 30s tell me why your 30s are better than your 20s
because now i just don't give up so the first big solo trip i took was when i was 21 i moved
alone to taipei in taiwan and i stayed there for about eight months that really kick-started my
love and thirst of solo travel i came back to the states i got a corporate job for four years
which i then quit and i became completely nomadic buying a one-way ticket to bangkok
since then i've been to over 60 countries by myself over the last 10 years
so starting when i was 26 to now when i'm 36 this is how things have really evolved and changed over
those years the first big thing is my travel goals have changed so in my 20s when i bought
that one-way ticket to bangkok and everything was open-ended all i wanted was freedom i wanted
serendipity i just wanted to go for as long as possible for as long as my money would take me
i did everything as cheaply as possible i only stayed in shared accommodations so i almost
never had my own room i was always in dorm rooms and that was cool with me because that
was a really good way to meet people my biggest priority in my 20s was just having a good time
i didn't have anything specific that i was there to see or do i just knew that i liked
asia a lot from having been there before i knew that southeast asia would give me an opportunity
to meet a lot of like-minded people that put me in a position to meet a lot of people who were
there with similar goals which was i just want to have fun so that brings me to the number two
biggest difference between traveling solo in my 20s versus my 30s in my 20s i was there to party
i'm not saying i didn't have super enriching experiences that i didn't have amazing cultural
experiences i went scuba diving a lot i went hiking a lot i had great connections with locals
and travelers alike but i've got to be honest i was partying a lot and everyone in the dorms
people sort of in that hostile world are there to have kind of their big last hurrah before becoming
a full-fledged adult if you will or maybe they're on a break from work and they just want to have
fun there were lots of people there for very different reasons but in our 20s we kind of had
one united thing that we were all doing and that was partying i remember at one point being like
wow i'm drinking almost every single day and now in my 30s i actually completely stopped drinking
i haven't had a drop in the last five years of course my experiences are way different now oh man
if 21 year old kristen could see me now party animal i don't party at all anymore
i'm basically in bed by 10 and i'm very happy with this i wouldn't want it any other way did
i become more boring i really don't think so i just think that now my traveling is enriched
in a very different way no more hangovers no more sort of looking for just opportunities to
go out and experience a destination through its bar scene now it's about experiencing the nature
the culture more and the food more like there's just more things i can devote my budget to as well
that brings me to the third biggest difference which is how i meet people and who i meet so when
i was in my 20s i would just walk into a dorm room and those were my friends for the rest of my time
in that town sometimes we would even decide to travel together longer term i met amazing people
who i'm still close friends with that way and i really do value those experiences that said
going back to southeast asia when i was 31 i was really worried actually that i wasn't going to
meet people because i worried that everyone was just there to party but i realized that the
people i met were just completely different and those were really amazing experiences
that i super value now as well and i still meet people in just the most random ways i feel like
when you have a different kind of travel goal the universe still puts people in your path who you're
going to have really good connections with i would meet people in cafes i'd meet people at beaches
at viewpoints like the most random places hot springs like i just end up making friends
by going about my day and doing what i'm doing so it's not that i don't make good connections
now it's that the connections that i make are just with people who also have the same goal that i do
now which is to have a less party experience and a more immersive experience the biggest difference
number four is that in my 20s i was super extroverted and in my 30s i am quite introverted
and this is an experience a lot of people share a lot of people tell me in my 20s i was super
extroverted i always wanted to be out meeting people and that they've really changed now to
me the biggest difference between an extrovert is that they get their energy from being around other
people and an introvert gets their energy by being on their own feel comfortable outside i think it's
nice to be alone i'm still very outgoing i don't have social anxiety or anything like that but
in my 20s i needed to be around other people constantly in order to not get depressed
now in my 30s i am very happy to be by myself for days on end and i'm not bothered at all and
i really want my own space and if i am feeling like i just want to like get out of a social
situation and be by myself i do that i get very over stimulated very easily when i'm having to
like meet new people constantly you know it's like a party situation i usually don't last very long
and i end up going home and going to bed early and i'm happy with that that does bring me to
my number five biggest difference between solo traveling in my 20s versus my 30s and that is the
type of travel that i seek so i was backpacking in my 20s now in my 30s i am way more likely to go
hike by myself for days on end i did that in peru i went on a solo trek and i did meet
people along the way which was awesome but if i hadn't i would have been cool with doing it
completely alone for four days i also will regularly just take my truck out to utah or
out to the desert or just take it on a little trip where i might not meet other people or see other
people for days on end and i'm really totally cool with that i really love the solitude now
don't have to share it's really beautiful i think that mother nature is a very amazing companion and
that i'm an amazing companion and so i actually really value that time that i get to be by myself
self-reflect i think that it's helped me to get to know myself a lot better and that's a big
difference between my 20s and my 30s as well as i feel like i really know who i am now in my 20s
i was very much searching for that and now i feel like i'm just a lot more confident in myself and
maybe that's why i'm so happy to spend more time alone now the number six biggest difference is the
type of accommodation that i stay in so i said before that i was staying in dorms all the time
now i don't stay in dorms at all really i don't want to share my space anymore part of that was
budget before but it was also because i would walk into a room and have a built-in group of friends
now i don't stay in hostels really anymore even in private rooms i just find that the age is a little
bit lower than where i am now i also find that i want comfort i kind of like having the affordable
luxury now when i first started traveling solo in my 20s i was just beginning a new career i had
my new blog instagram was like a brand new thing influencers didn't really exist yet but now things
have really evolved and it's a full business now that i have so that has allowed me and empowered
me to stay in nicer more expensive accommodation and things that are just really really interesting
last year i went to new mexico and i got to stay in a really amazing earthship this is insane but
that's not something i could have done in my 20s because that was 250 a night and so i will splurge
now and then because i can now but before i really couldn't and so accommodation used to be something
with a lot of people and now it's something where i am there by myself almost exclusively my budget
and my time frame i mean before i was really on a shoestring budget i value that time so much
i look back on it so fondly because it's what led me to take cargo fairies for 36 hours as
like the only foreigner in indonesia so that i could avoid buying a plane ticket because
it was like thirty dollars versus three hundred dollars it's what led me to start
solo hitchhiking in china which is still one of my favorite stories to date i hitchhiked for
two months through two provinces of china and it was a beautiful experience and it's
not something i would have done without the desperation of my budget like doing one of these
i don't need to do that anymore i'm so much more likely to book the comfortable option
i love business class now i love having a trip where things are more planned out because i have
a shorter frame of time i'm often traveling with my partner now who has a finite amount of time
and so we plan out our trips more we have specific things we're going to see
we tend to have everything booked before we go that's completely the opposite of the way it
was in my 20s i just winged it and i loved that i loved that it was so open-ended and that i had all
the time in the world i was rich in time but not in money and now it's kind of flip-flopped where
i have a bigger budget but usually a shorter time frame and i'm happy with that i like coming home
in between i like not being fully nomadic anymore so it's just it's not better it's just different
i don't know if i would travel the way i do now in my 30s without the experiences that i had though
traveling solo in my 20s so i think in a lot of ways i've been able to close that chapter
on sort of like the party aspect and the needing to be around all people all the time aspect and
now that i've sort of done that and checked those boxes now i just have a sort of different way that
i like to travel having mother nature and myself as a companion being a lot more willing to just
like go out in the wilderness be by myself and not letting that scare me and i think that these are
our gifts from traveling in my 20s that i have to think there is one big thing that has not changed
though over the course of my solo traveling career if you will and that is what i value in a trip
it's always been for me about how i can change and become better as a person the things that i
can learn even in my 20s i was doing 10-day silent meditation retreats in thailand
i was going off the beaten path as much as i possibly could i wanted to really be immersed
and i wanted to really understand and or at least try to understand and appreciate the cultures the
people the food in the places where i was i'm very curious how traveling has maybe changed for you
or maybe you're in this transition now if these things are something that you really related to
i've talked a lot about traveling as an introvert i've talked a lot about the best places to
travel alone for the first time whether it's international or domestic so watch those videos
next if you just be getting your solo travel journey and i'll see you next week