Sample Chapter – Introduction

The Backstory

It was February of 2009 and I was sitting on the couch licking my wounds.

My husband, Ron, had passed away in December 2006 and on that cold Saturday afternoon, over two years later, I felt myself falling into another cycle of grief. But this time, I’d had enough. I got angry. When would it end? And then, for whatever reason, I thought “well, I guess I’m traveling solo”.

 Ron and I had traveled extensively with our children. We traveled as we could afford – which was not fancy. Early travels included road trips and camping across Canada. We went east to Newfoundland and west to British Columbia. When money became a little more available, we immediately spent it on a six week camping trip through Europe. We knew how to stretch a travel dollar. In 2001/02, after selling our small business, we rented a Volkswagen Pop-up Camper, homeschooled our youngest and traveled Europe for 10 months. Our other sons joined us at various points along the way. We were “The Drifters” with kids.

 But in 2009, I no longer had Ron as my travel mate and the kids were grown. With a wanderlust that went back to my pre-teens, I decided that February afternoon that I would travel again as I had in my twenties. I would travel solo.

 As a writer with a basic knowledge of the online world, I guess the next step was to be expected. I picked up the computer lying beside me and googled “solo travel”. The site I found was full of ads and didn’t offer the type of information that I would have found valuable. I decided at that moment to start my blog, Solo Traveler.

 The entire Solo Traveler Project – this book, the blog, the Solo Travel Society on Facebook and speaking engagements — is a personal journey as well as a call to action. I urge you to break the bounds of convention and expectations; to claim the right to be alone, whether for a day or a lifetime; and to travel solo.

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