ALFORD: A lot of the time, women are told that they can't
pursue their dreams because it's not within our typical stereotypes.
Women can't travel alone, women can't be successful adventure travel creators,
and my response to that is that all of the most successful people who have ever lived
break outside of the stereotypes.
So if you can pursue what makes you different and what makes you come alive,
that's how you are going to succeed.
[inspirational electronic music]
My name is Lexi Alford, I am a travel photographer and video creator.
So for the past three or so years
my biggest project has been to break the Guinness World Record
for the youngest person to travel to every country.
And just a few months ago, I
finally finished reaching this goal. I'm 21 years old and I traveled to
196 countries
[music continues]
ALFORD: I started traveling when I was really young with my mom, who started a travel agency when she was 19.
And...
I graduated from high school early, got a degree by the time I was 18.
And that's when everyone was asking me what I wanted to do for the rest of my life and...
I didn't want to rush into getting another degree that I could potentially never use. So I started, uh,
started traveling and and picking up my camera and
that's when I realized that I had been to around 70 countries by the time I turned 18 and
that's when it dawned on me that I could potentially break this world record.
And I knew that I would regret it for the rest of my life if I didn't try.
[music]
When I decided that I was going to,
to set out to break this record and travel to
so many obscure corners of the world,
a lot of people told me that it wouldn't be possible, especially to do it
alone, as a woman, that it was too dangerous.
The biggest takeaway I had was that the world is so
ready to change its perception of women. I felt
nothing, but kindness and hospitality in my travels. So overall I think it was a very good,
good moment to realize that that the world is ready to, to see women.
[music]
So I started taking photos and videos when I was really young, just picking up any
camera that happened to be around me or with my with my parents.
And the more that I started documenting my own travels and sharing it online, I was realizing that
by doing that it was actually inspiring a lot of other--
especially young women--to get out of their comfort zones.
So I actually think that one of the
benefits of being a woman while traveling was that a lot of people are much less hesitant towards being
open around women with cameras than the men with cameras
I traveled with a lot of male photographers, and
I could tell that people--you can tell in their shots that people were a little bit more
standoffish towards
towards them rather than
being a female.
[music]
I traveled alone for seven or eight months over the past couple years.
And I was gone for most of the time if I wasn't just by myself.
[Alford continues] And I definitely got very lonely,
that was one of the biggest obstacles that I had to overcome while I was traveling, was
just learning how to be alone without being lonely and it changed my outlook
towards the people I have in my life because I'm way more grateful
for the time that I get to spend the people that I care about, and I feel like spending so much time
on my own and depending on myself rather than the people around me really
influenced my self-confidence
My family and friends were a little bit hesitant when I... [laughs]
Told them that I was going to travel to every country. I think that they didn't really believe me.
[laughs]
But one thing that I was really appreciative is that they didn't tell me that I couldn't or that I wasn't ever gonna be
able to to do something like this. They're almost hesitant support actually went, went a long way.
[music]
Uh, I get a lot of very similar questions. One is usually what are my favorite countries and...
I definitely don't have a favorite country,
but I have a few different favorites for different reasons.
Like I'm a diver, so the diving in Indonesia was by far the most amazing.
I love Egypt for the history,
Pakistan for the friendliness of its people,
Iceland is probably the most unique country, or unique island in the world, and
Venezuela for its natural beauty.
So my next biggest project is that I'm going to be developing a full travel course to teach other people,
especially young women, how to budget travel, how to travel around the world safely.
And I'm hoping, to hoping to get that out in this year, this coming year!
I think it's really important to celebrate days like International Women's Day because it's
celebrating how far we've come as,
as a society and it shows how much the world is ready for change!
[music]