Travel ignites the wildest imagination. It pulls you into a dream-like state, takes you out of your comfort zone and reveals to you a whole new world.
As a child, I was blessed to travel the world – not because of some over-privileged upbringing, but thanks to my hard-working father who worked in the travel industry all his life. I couldn’t imagine a world without travel. I couldn’t imagine a world where aeroplanes would be stationed in the Australian desert; parked, for months on end, their wings well and truly clipped by governments worldwide, terrified for their people. Such a world was unknown to me.
When I first realised that fleets of grounded aircraft both, domestic and international, would be a long-term strategy to curb the COVID-19 pandemic, I was honestly confused. Such a concept simply had no place in my reality. A world without planes? Without cruise ships? What? A world without trains connecting cities and towns, families and friends? A world in which we cannot touch our fellow human beings, nor can we be touched?
It was, in fact, this concept of not being allowed to touch or be touched that hurt the most to me. Because travel for me has always been emotive. It is a means to touch and be touched – maybe not always physically, but certainly always spiritually. There is something that changes in the human spirit when we travel. We realise just how small we really are, and what a vast and astonishing world we live in.
Our Mother Earth coccoons us with mountains and forests; we are blessed to swim in her oceans and drink from her streams, whether it be from the waterfalls at Kakadu or the pristine waters of the Mediterranean. Sharing the love of this magnificent home we call Earth, experiencing her in all her generous glory; this is the world I knew. And this is the world I want to share with my clients – a world where our minds are opened and our hearts are touched; a world where we understand and respectfully partake in the gifts we are so generously given by nature. Like a true mother, she grants us blessing upon blessing, further offering opportunities to make new friends, learning from different cultures and again, we are touched. The blessing of travel is indeed, the touch. It is the movement that happens within, that feeling of excitement, the unfolding of new adventures, new connections, and new experiences.
I give deep gratitude to all the lands upon which I have walked, and the friends I have come to know and love; I give great thanks to the Temples of the Pharaohs of ancient Egypt which open their doors to me time and time again, and which give me the opportunity to bring my clients to their doors too, so that they may experience that soul-touching feeling. Similarly, to other ancient sites such as the magnificent Acropolies of Athens, guarded by the goddess Athena, for welcoming me time and time again, and allowing me to introduce my clients so they too can be touched and moved.
Travel is indeed a blessing in itself; one which so many of us took for granted, perhaps just as we did our Mother Earth. When travels begins again, I cannot wait to embrace those foreign lands once more, and continue to share them with you. This is my gift to the world.