We were lucky to catch up with Lainie for an extended chat from her home in Guanajuato, Mexico.

So many of us in the worldschooling community know who you are. For those newer on the scene, can you tell us about your journey?

Sure. In 2008, I was a business owner and a single parent living in Los Angeles. I had worked in advertising and marketing for 18 years, the last eight of those with my own agency. When the economy crashed in 2008, I knew I was going to close my business. I wasn’t going to bring back my staff the following year, and my clients started going away. I remember being frustrated and overworked, with lots and lots of stress. And then just having this inspired thought one night late in the office. My son ​Miró was nine at the time and it was too late for him to be in the office, but I still wasn’t done with my work. He was playing a video game, and I just said to him, ​Miró. And he stopped. He looked over at me and I said, What do you think if we just get rid of all this stuff? And you and I go have an adventure? 

I didn’t even know where that inspired thought came from. I wasn’t planning on it, hadn’t been thinking of it. It just came out of my mouth. And he said, Are you sure? And then before he replied, he said, I have one question: if we do it, do I have to go to school? And I said, no. And he’s like, yeah, let’s do it. 

So we started excitedly talking about it. We decided that we would leave the following year, get rid of our stuff, sell it or give it away to downsize. We were going to just travel for a year, and I wanted to go south. Our plan was to go into Mexico and then head south overland via bus, take the time that we needed in each location and end up in Ushuaia, Argentina. I created a little nest egg so when we came back, we’d have some money to restart. All the things we needed to do to make this trip our trip, we did in partnership. And then one year turned into 15 years, and we never did make it to Ushuaia! We just haven’t gone home. 

What does community mean to you? How have your programs helped foster a sense of community among worldschoolers?

I guess the best place to start is that the desire for community never came from an outward need. It came from the inner desire to connect. And a lot of that is an extension of the mental health work that I did to prepare myself to be a good parent. When we started out on our journey, it was just the two of us, and that was enough. For the first couple of years, it was about the connection between Miró and me–creating a stronger bond, really talking about our inner worlds while experiencing the outer world, healing, learning together, and growing together. 

A lot of the traveling was so rewarding, so fulfilling. And coming from hyper-commercialism and -consumerism, we shed that and started living on way less money and connecting with the humanity around us more. We really started to ground ourselves in being present in our lives by cooking together, going to the market and having relationships with the vendors, being friendly with them and being invited in and exploring their lives, and by meeting people from all over the world. It was really about digging deep and the cultural exploration and the conversations about our own worldviews and about our humanity that helped us to expand. 

When ​Miró hit adolescence, he started to kind of feel disconnected with the journey we were on. Just with the biological changes that happen around that time, he was feeling isolated. We had conversations about it–do we want to go back, do we want to make changes in our life? We were living high in the Andes, in Peru, and his only ability to connect with others was through the local children of potato farmers. There were expats around, but they were mostly coming through and leaving to go to Machu Picchu. We weren’t forming relationships with them. 

So, our idea was to create a temporary learning community for teens. It would include immersive learning and social learning with all the people around us. It was just another inspired idea that sent me down a path of learning everything I could about teenage brain psychology. I learned about conflict resolution and about holding space. I learned about sacred ceremonial spaces by studying a Native American tribe, and I learned philosophies on how to facilitate power. I learned everything I could about the stages of development in the adolescent brain. That allowed me to tap back into the tools that I used in my own mental health journey. And then I was like, okay, I feel prepared. Let’s do it. 

How did all this lead to the Project World School retreats?

Soon after, ​Miró and l launched our first business together, Project World School. And for the first few years, it was amazing. We created our circle structure and functioned in a partnership, but in the early years he was mostly a participant. And a friend of mine, a French traveler, helped me co-facilitate based on the structure we designed before the retreat. I learned so much about hosting communities.

As we did our first retreat, we figured out what worked and what didn’t, then we adjusted the next year. With those changes, the retreats became a little more polished. Communities are very much based on intention. I learned everything I could about the participants and the stages of development that they were in, and the ways and tools to serve them. 

Our retreats are based on consent and consensus. We interview people before they come in, and we start off with a set of agreements. We talk about what the next day is going to be in our evening circles. We use consensus because if one person doesn’t want to do it, that means their needs are not being met. We try to accommodate everybody who has opted into this experience and find out what is not working, and to use tools and strategies for managing and holding space for people when they’re outside of their comfort zone so they feel seen, heard, and understood. It’s really about intentional communities, and because it is temporary, there is this greater sense of urgency to fill every moment. And as the organizing adult, I am taking responsibility for the safety, wellness, and mental health of the teens–they are other people’s children I am serving. 

We had about a 75% return rate for retreats before the pandemic when we were doing anywhere from three to five retreats a year. We had great experiences; people felt very connected to it. We ran ten conferences in different places around the world. Our first one was in 2016, and we ran them until COVID, and our most recent one was in March 2023 in Mexico.

What do those events look like now? 

We do two kinds of trips with teens. We do a short format for the younger teens stepping into being on their own for the first time. Then we’ve done a longer format–we just did one in Thailand in November. 

We’re going to be doing a bit of restructuring to Project World School. We’ll continue the shorter trips.

​Miró wants to do an 18+ trip, which will have a different flavor, more like peer/mentor. ​He’ll soon be turning 25. It’s a great transition and he’s really excited to start leading. The biggest challenge for me in stepping away from the longer trips is the caretaking and safeguarding I do as a mom, which gives parents confidence when they’re sending their kids to a retreat. I’m accountable and responsible for all these kids. 

What about your early online offerings?

First, ​Miró and I produced a podcast. And it was like our mom and son project together – it really wasn’t for other people to listen to. Every place that we went to, we would research together and talk about either the history of the place or find a story about it. And then we’d find somebody interesting, and we’d interview them. Like I remember we were in Panama and ​Miró was really interested in two things at that time, zombies and pirates. And that became a part of the podcast. It just was so much fun putting together the episodes. 

They became popular in a strange way. They were on our website–there were no streaming services at the time–we just uploaded the files, and we played them and had our show notes pages. It was just a lot of fun. And then we started getting travel questions from people who listened. There were hardly any other travel blogs, especially family blogs, especially single-parent family blogs. So I was blogging, too. I’d write about travel fears and all that stuff. 

Can you tell readers a bit about your Facebook groups?

I started getting a lot of travel questions in Facebook groups I was in. And somebody said to me, why don’t you start a Facebook group for traveling families? At the time, we were unschooling. I knew intuitively a year of travel would be way more educational than fifth grade, but I discovered there was something called unschooling, and we were already doing it in partnership. I started including unschooling into my blog and getting questions about that as well. 

One of the people we ended up interviewing for our podcast was a young man, Eli Gerzon, who was unschooled as a youngster and through his teen years. When he became a young adult, he started traveling more, but he always hated the word unschooling so he called it worldschooling. I was like, that is the coolest thing ever! We met him when he was in his late 20s, and he was doing other things, so he had outgrown it. So when I started getting questions, I was like, I’m going to call this worldschooling. 

Eli had started a Facebook group called Worldschoolers. It was dormant for like five years; there were less than 200 people in there. I asked him if I could take over the group because I had a vision for it, and he said sure. I built it up to more than 40,000 members. It was built so we could tap into the brain trust of the community, because I couldn’t answer everything. Instead, everyone could ask each other. 

Later I moved away from the Worldschoolers page, and now I manage another page called We Are Worldschoolers. The Summits have dedicated pages I administrate, too.

Let’s switch gears to some of your other projects. You wrote a book called Seen, Heard & Understood. Can you tell us about it?

It’s about understanding parenting and partnering with teens for greater mental health. The book is a combination of personal stories and scientific research. It’s a psychological exploration for the reader to understand themselves in order to connect in the spaces where teens or adolescents are needing connection. The book talks about how to manage the trigger responses you have when interacting with them. I wanted to understand that from a neurobiological perspective, a hormonal perspective, and an evolutionary psychological perspective. And then understand it from a sense of self and use connection as the foundation, not coercion. The book has a lot of information, but I made it easy to absorb. I’m not a PhD or MD; I’m a researcher and a mom who has lived this.

And you’re writing another book now, too? 

Yes. It’s about partnership parenting which is really anarchist parenting, like how to parent without rules, without the authoritarian paradigm, what tools to use and how to manage moving through challenges. There’s neuroscience and psychology and all this stuff wrapped into it–there’s a lot of multidisciplinary places that I’m pulling from. I’m going to self-publish it like I did my first book.

You have a new class on getting started with worldschooling. Can you tell us more?

We’re doing a three-hour course on how to create your family culture, with tools and strategies on how to worldschool from a family culture perspective. This is such an important part of anybody’s worldschooling journey. Every worldschooler should understand it as a foundation before they set out. Before they budget, before they sell their stuff, before they make their itinerary: they need to get their house in order. We also wanted to make the class very low cost–it’s just $25–and accessible online. 

Did I see that you are also planning a Summit reunion?

Yes, that too! Because everybody’s telling me they want another Summit, and I kind of miss them. There’s a big part of me that knows I’m kind of an elder now. My son is grown. But I miss creating conferences. I miss the community. I loved the connections and for me it was very, very important to normalize the worldschooling experience for kids–for them to meet other kids who worldschool.

What’s outside your window right now? What fascinates you about where you are?

I love Guanajuato, where I live. It’s colorful. It’s a university town, there are young people and we have a big arts festival here. There’s theater, music, and all kinds of art everywhere. My house is funky, and I have an art studio and being able to paint again is really lovely. I have a garden on the roof. There’s a peach tree and a lemon tree. This is the place for me at this stage of my life. ​Miró lives in his own apartment in town.

If you could go back to the beginning of your journey, are there things you wish you’d known that you’d share with others? 

I really didn’t know what I didn’t know and what I needed. I mean, people ask me for advice all the time. And, you know, it’s always like, slow down, let life unfold, be present. But those are things that you have to experience in order to know their value.

Which of those is the hardest for you to live by?

I guess being present, because I come from a culture of busyness, of productivity. My mother would say, if you’re lazy, you’re worthless; you’re doing nothing, you’re not contributing. And so I had this really tough relationship with relaxing. And although I already got really good at multitasking and reaching lots of goals, there’s still a part of me–even though it’s been healed–that doesn’t feel worthy unless I am doing, doing, doing. When I was a kid, I used to say to myself, I’m going to live a great life and show them. It put me in that habitual belief that I still need to show them, whomever “them” are. 

Do you think that’s why you keep creating new things? 

Probably, but I wouldn’t know what else to do with myself. I spend time in the garden. I play with my dogs. I paint.

Do you feel like you get to enjoy your creations, too?

Remaining curious and playful are core values to me, and I am really in my element when I’m with teens. I will always carry the responsibility of holding space, but I get to unapologetically be playful, too. I get to do improv and be crazy and tell stories and work on shocking the teens and getting them to laugh and connect. That’s where I feel most alive. 

What else are you doing with teens?

I offer a 12-week online course for teens. Our 13th cohort is going to happen soon. This is where I teach the tools in my book, and create a safe space for teens to be exactly where they are on their journey. These courses are filled with weekly challenges, reflections, accountability, and sharing. Most teens feel a sigh of relief when they finally recognize two things: there are tools to manage stress, anxiety, depression, and other experiences; and, they are not alone.

I also show up weekly for two online meetups for teens. Thursdays are for teens 15 and older. There’s a 21-year-old there who started at 17, and she still comes! And I do a group on Saturdays for tweens and younger teens ages 11-14. The meetups are totally free, online safe spaces. The first hour we have conversations. We talk about philosophy. Like today we talked about whether a person’s nature can change. Or we do “Would You Rather,” so we can talk about their choices. And then the second hour we play, like games or drawing or creating music or writing stories. So it’s playful, it’s joyful. And they know I’m that adult who shows up for them every week so they know they’re important. And they won’t let me quit.

Clearly, you’re giving a gift and the participants gain a lot from it. And listening to the energy in your voice, it sounds like you do, too.

I love it. I love it. It’s just my honor to do it. 

We are grateful to Lainie for spending time with us and sharing her personal stories and thoughtful perspectives. You can use these links to find out more about her offerings for teens, parents, and the worldschooling community at large. 

Mentoring and courses for teen mental health: https://transformativementoringforteens.com/about/

Partnership parenting courses: https://partnershipparent.com/

Trips and retreats: https://projectworldschool.com/

Summits: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ProjectWorldSchoolFamilySummit

Worldschooling community: https://www.facebook.com/groups/weareworldschoolers

Lainie’s personal page: https://www.instagram.com/ilainie/

The post Community Connectors: Lainie Liberti appeared first on Wonder Year Travel.

Please tell us a bit about your journey.

In 2005, Austin and I moved into our very first home together: a tiny popup camper. We lived in that camper for months and traveled to all 48 contiguous United States and as many National Parks as we could. It was the trip of a lifetime, and we have wanted to recreate as much of that experience as possible for our children. We spend most of each summer road tripping in our camper (a larger popup to make room for the 5 of us plus a dog!) and we recently got a Sprinter van as our new tow vehicle to increase our adventure options. We take advantage of pretty much any opportunity to travel, and plan to take our first international trip as a family at the end of this year.

Austin and Mariah moving into their first home together in 2005: a popup camper named Donna.

What’s outside your window right now? What fascinates you about where you are?  

Can you describe a time when learning for your kids or family happened organically and profoundly…when you learned outside the “plan” you started with?

My husband and I have been visiting National Park sites together for many years. Our favorites tend to be the ones with beautiful natural landscapes, abundant wildlife, and opportunities to immerse ourselves in nature. However, earlier this summer we happened to be near Castillo de San Marcos National Monument in St. Augustine, Florida. This National Monument preserves the oldest masonry fortification in the continental United States. Originally built by the Spanish, the fort holds 450 years of history. We weren’t sure whether the fort would even interest our children, so we were astonished to discover that our middle kiddo became absolutely absorbed within moments. This became an organic learning experience for both of us! My 9 year old started to piece together his interest in weapons and military things with actual U.S. history, and I came to the realization that I need to take my children’s unique interests into consideration when planning our travel routes. In the future, we plan to incorporate many more historical sites and battlefields in our travel routes!

This summer in their current home on the road, Zephyr

 

What have you discovered about your family by being on the road together?

Travel teaches kids amazing amounts of adaptability, and has helped our children learn that experiences are more important than things. These life lessons helped our kids remain resilient when we recently experienced a tragedy. In December 2021, along with 1,000 other families in our Colorado hometown, we lost the only home my children had ever known in the Marshall Fire. Our house and entire neighborhood burned to the ground, and nothing was saved from the blaze. Of course my kids were sad to lose all their favorite possessions, but they also understood that if we stayed close as a family we could get through anything. I truly attribute much of the strength of our family to the experiences we have had while on the road together.

Is there another traveling family you are particularly inspired by? How are they inspiring?

What do you wish a fellow worldschooling family had told you before you left home?

Boys, 7 and 4, proudly show their junior ranger badges along Hurricane Ridge in Olympic National Park.

What’s your favorite story to share about this experience? 

Stuck in the North Dakota mud, along the Enchanted Highway!

I think it’s funny how some of the strongest memories I have of our time on the road often come from adversity. We recently drove the”Enchanted Highway” in North Dakota, which, despite its name, is basically just a couple of large sculptures in the middle of huge stretches of corn and sunflower fields – nothing life-changingly exciting, but we figured it might be more interesting than a regular highway. However, it had been raining for several days in a row, and as we pulled into the parking area to look at one of the sculptures we got our van and popup camper ridiculously stuck in some thick, clay-like mud. While our van does have 4WD, we weren’t able to turn it on once we were already stuck! So, there we were, alone with 3 small kids and a dog with our van and trailer super stuck in the mud. Luckily, we were prepared with traction mats and a tow strap, but we still had to get really creative. We ended up having to unhitch, fight the van slowly out of the mud so we could get the 4wd turned on, and then tow the camper out of the mud with the tow strap so we could get to solid ground to re-hitch. In the process my husband and I got absolutely covered in mud! Was it fun? Definitely not! But I’m proud of us that we didn’t panic and we worked together on the issue until we solved it – and our kids got to watch us do that. And now all of us will certainly remember North Dakota’s Enchanted Highway forever!

What are you excited about seeing/doing/learning next?

Thanks to Mariah for sharing inspiration and an important perspective. To follow along with their journey, you can find them at @zephyr.travels. Also if you’re a family facing chronic illness, check out Mariah’s website mamasfacingforward.com.

Check out other Fernweh Families on this blog to get inspired and learn all the different shapes your Wonder Year might take.

First trip as a family of five to Mount Rushmore

The post Fernweh Families: The Z-Leaches appeared first on Wonder Year Travel.

My initial reaction to Chat GPT was a wholehearted, “heck no!” But the more I talk with friends and my kids, the more I am trying to keep an open mind. My dad, a former engineering professor, says it feels like humans are at a similar crossroads that we faced with the introduction of the calculator. When that happened, math instructors thought it would be the downfall of math education–many had the hyperbolic notion that it was the undoing of society–but perhaps it’s opened us up to higher math concepts rather than rote calculations. Somehow ChatGPT feels bigger, more a crisis of humanity, but maybe it’ll just pass over us as easily as the calculator and our adapted educational model will happen organically and meaningfully.

Early takeaways for how AI might affect your worldschooling education

Acceptable Use

AI is not the same thing as ChatGPT. AI is already in use with grammar checks, spell checks, and citation generators, making the question: where do we draw the line in acceptable use? And what do we consider plagiarism? We need clear policies in our online classes and in-person instruction and a mutual understanding with our more informal worldschooled kids. You and your older kids, ones who are very adept with the internet, need ground rules of what is acceptable. Can they use AI to write a paper, research your next destination or create a citation? The rub might come if you are each making assumptions about what is okay. Legally you do not need to cite ChatGPT as a source, but that doesn’t mean that at your worldschooling table you agree. So, come up with your own agreements.

As we puzzle through these questions, kids in classrooms now are finding what is acceptable and how to use AI as a tool. If you plan to return to traditional classrooms soon, make sure you take time to learn the new rules. For example, instructors use AI to find AI. Turnitin is the plagiarism and AI spotter most commonly used in our area’s schools.  Individuals can also pay for Grammarly, GrammarlyGO (just out), or Chegg. Anything in direct quotations or a bibliographic citation will show up with these applications; anything else is plagiarized. These applications should also pick up anything written by Chat GPT. Last spring, my fellow faculty each found 3-5 papers written by Chat GPT. I warned my students about the detectors and found none. Learning to write by yourself is not a skill that will be thrown out any time soon.

If your worldschooled child is young, you might be thinking these concepts and ramifications are very far removed. But what seems to be happening is that kids just learning to write or do research have so much information at their fingertips that they begin to write by cutting and pasting other people’s work. A good writing exercise for middle schoolers is to read something and practice both summarizing and paraphrasing skills. 

A New Tool to Master

Just like the calculator and spell check, AI is a tool. The more we expand our understanding of its benefits, the more we can use it to focus on critical thinking. How do we use it for an educational advantage? For many of us, we are using AI to begin a writing project. We might feed in a question, see the results, incorporate some of the ideas by paraphrasing, and use it as a springboard for more searches and research. Many of my students say they use it to brainstorm, then hide it from sight to put concepts into their own words, find creative threads and metaphors, and put their humanity into their writing. As I am playing around with its use, I do notice that AI does not write, think, and research with an inclusive and social justice lens.

And for parents, did you know that AI can also grade papers (?!?!), generate tests, and create active learning modules? I am not insinuating that robotic feedback can replace a mom’s golden touch, but it can be one more read, needless to say a more objective one, that can add perspective to a piece of writing. Especially if your kids are young, I would filter any AI feedback before letting them see it. Nolej is just one company that creates e-learning curricula and is behind a paywall. I am super curious about the quality, and I think many similar companies are not far behind. In essence, these would do everything that IXL or Oak Meadow would do, but it’s created by AI and would be cheaper and potentially more individualized. If this is something you’re curious about, let me know how it goes. 

AI Can Heighten What Makes Us Human

Many educators feel that any use of AI is an egregious insult to education and that its users are breaking the academic code. If they find any use, the students get an F. I do understand their thinking. But I think the genie is out of the bottle. I’m staying awake at night trying to prepare my three kids and my college students for a post-AI world. After learning basic writing skills, students should learn all the ways to insert humanity into their written work. I want to create more personal reflections, opinion pieces, reviews, and narrative nonfiction assignments. As worldschoolers, think about how these types of writing projects might be included for your kids. We can focus on more human-centered writing. I believe the lines between creative nonfiction and “academic” nonfiction will be the focus of writing instruction courses in 10 years. 

The college-level assignment I’m currently conjuring is: write an essay about ____. Ask Chat GPT and GrammarlyGO to write on the same prompt. Then compare and contrast and write a position paper on the use of AI in writing. For middle schoolers, you might compare a paragraph, for highschoolers a five paragraph essay or a five page research paper. Again, let’s share the outcomes. We all benefit from this open and honest exploration.

And “exploration” is the word that keeps coming to my mind as I write this. Time in front of our screens wondering what the robot will come up with is time away from the exploration of a creekbed or wondering at the colors nature has given us for this evening’s sunset. We know that kids (and adults) thrive in nature emotionally and physically and that high screen time can be one of the factors plaguing our mental health. As worldschoolers, you are giving yourselves and your children more exposure to nature to foster creativity and hone the skills for a post-AI world. The optimist in me wonders if rote pieces of writing can now be done in little time; maybe, like the calculator, it will free us up for more time for higher order thinking. And more time for all of us to watch the sun set.

How do you see AI changing the writing instruction of the future? Will it change the way you guide your worldschooling?

The post AI and Worldschool Education appeared first on Wonder Year Travel.

A bit nervous and bit excited on the way to Maoming.

In our book, we write about choosing travel destinations built about personal history. Some families research their ancestors’ countries of origin; others travel to places of personal significance–maybe a country or site of a battle their grandfather or great-great grandfather fought or died. This is one of our family’s moments, written the day after our visit to Lucy’s orphanage in 2018. Travel can be truly healing. 

This is the real reason we came to China: to bring Lucy back to the place she spent the first three years of life. Seven years ago, we met our daughter, Lucy, in the Social Welfare Office of Guangzhou, not in the Maoming Orphanage five hours away. On this return trip, we hoped that we could volunteer at the orphanage: do dishes, play with kids, mop floors – whatever was helpful. But the Chinese government doesn’t want any of that. The best we could get was a $300 half-day permit, given by the provincial capital in Guangzhou. And the best timing for our visit would be the tail end of our month-long stay in the country.

The facts: Lucy was born with a large hole in her heart. Lucy was left at the entrance to a large park in Maoming, China when she was one month old. Lucy spent three years in the Maoming Orphanage. Lucy still had a large hole in her heart when she visited a Chinese cardiologist in February 2010. Lucy was matched with our family and came to Colorado in early June 2010. Lucy’s hole had closed spontaneously by the time we visited Denver Children’s Hospital in late June 2010. “A medical miracle,” the pediatric cardiologist pronounced.

Lucy’s reunion with her caregiver. This woman made her an incredible baby book and wrote about her with such affection that I couldn’t wait to show her my gratitude! We are connected on social media now!

There’s a hurt in Lucy that I can never totally understand but it comes out, sometimes, as anger that she was thrown away, or discarded because she was born a girl. It’s so tricky to explain the nuances of China’s one-child policy to a child; to explain that Chinese parents had one shot to have a traditional heir; that her heart condition at birth may have forced her birth parents’ hand in finding the best medical care for their infant girl, even if that care could only come from an orphanage.

I was anxious about our visit to Maoming Orphanage. We all were. What if they were cold and formal? Or what if they didn’t remember much about Lucy? What if the conditions of the orphanage were depressing and hard for all our kids to see? But instead, when the gates opened for us at 9:30 am on October 26th, they rushed forward for hugs and had a “Welcome Xin Feng” electronic banner flashing across a screen. We stayed through lunchtime, visiting her old playroom and bedroom and touring the facility. We clung to the stories of Lucy as a baby and toddler, soaking up all the details. They wanted to know how her heart was now and happily heard the tale. They made Lucy a heart ornament with her embroidered Chinese name to hang in her room. Lucy said that the visit made her feel “very popular” and we made lifelong connections with these incredible, loving caregivers.

When we walked out the orphanage gates, two of her biggest fans followed us for final hugs. They were tearful and stood watching us leave; stood until we got to the end of the block, watching and waving. What must these women feel after loving so many children, finding

12 year old Lorna’s entry to the visitor book. The dedication of these women made huge impression on the kids.

them homes, and then wondering how they are faring overseas?  I am so glad that we could answer some of their questions too.

From the orphanage, we walked to the park nearby, where Lucy was “found” ten years ago, wrapped in a white cloth, with a birthdate written on a torn edge of a red envelope. Many adoptees write about the power of revisiting their “finding place” and I thought this might be another emotionally charged moment. Instead, Lucy triumphantly posed for a photo in her spot.

After the intensity of the orphanage, we explored the coast for two nights and then returned to Maoming for just 18 hours.  On a quick trip to the park, we randomly crossed paths with the orphanage director who ran up to us and hugged Lucy some more. We all felt a bit like locals, a bit like we’d found a place where we were loved, like this was our place too.  

The facts of her early years, when stated as a stark list, sound sad. But being there to feel the love of Lucy’s caregivers, the warmth of the Chinese people toward her – wherever we traveled – and the magnificence of this country, turned a sad set of facts into triumph, acceptance and a source of pride. The holes were filled with love. I wonder if this month in China rewrote a story, solved some unanswered questions, and helped that heart heal just a little bit more. By naming that place in the park her “finding” spot, it implies that she was lost. My Lucy has never been lost in her life. These women will now always be part of her finding her way in this world – of finding love, courage and connections.

Lucy at her “Finding Place.”

The post Stories from the Road: Visiting a Chinese Orphanage appeared first on Wonder Year Travel.

Maxime stretching across a “rock fall” area in Capitol Reef National Park

Our fifth Fernweh Family are the Lebobes. A French-American family, the Lebobes were living and running their own business in Italy prior to launching their long-term travels. We caught up with Terry (41), Guillaume (44), and their three sons Maxime (9), Léo (7), and Noah (5) as they were tent camping in the Southwest United States. 

Please tell us a bit about your journey.

We were originally inspired by friends to do a 3-month trip in the summer. But after realizing how complicated it would be to organize

The boys made some friends who lent them their transparent boat in Moalboal, Philippines

putting everything on pause for three months, we decided to go all the way. We left our jobs and sold our business to travel for 15 months. We initially expected to be traveling more slowly but with one-month visas and a compelling desire to see everything, we have traveled more quickly than planned! We usually spend between four days and a week in most places. We tend to crave more time in places close to nature and move relatively quickly through cities as we find that we are all happier in nature! 

What was one of the most important ingredients in getting your family on the road – what did you do that worked out well? 

Selling our business and renting out our home were two essential yet potentially challenging items we needed to achieve before making this trip a reality. But in both cases, the universe was on our side. We found friends and acquaintances for both almost immediately!

What’s outside your window right now? What fascinates you about where you are?  

Does a tent window count? We’ve been camping for the past three weeks on a road trip through some of the most amazing American national parks of the southwest. The geology and nature in these places just take our breath away! 

Can you describe a time when learning for your kids or family happened organically and profoundly…when you learned outside the “plan” you started with?

We have learned so much about geology! We knew we would learn a bit but the US National Park Junior Ranger programs have sparked an incredible interest from the kids to learn about how these wonderful rock formations were first created! 

What have you discovered about your family by being on the road together?

That our kids are incredibly adaptable and can thrive in many situations if we give them the opportunity! For example, now they can sleep anywhere (and we parents almost can too).

Noah making art with nature in Canyonlands National Park

What does community mean to you, and how have you found it during your travels?

We have had less of a community than expected during our travels but we have met a surprising number of families traveling long term and have connected well with them! We clicked immediately with several of those families and have kept in touch and even met up in subsequent places on the road. 

What’s your favorite story to share about this experience? 

Seeing elephants in the wild in Sri Lanka! We prefer to avoid visiting zoos or even elephant sanctuaries, anywhere where animals are in captivity, so we were very excited to go on a safari in Sri Lanka to see elephants in the wild. And it did not disappoint! We spent hours

Working on zip line and jumping skills in Laos

following around an incredible group of 20 elephants and it was definitely one of the most amazing experiences of our trip. 

What are you excited about seeing/doing/learning next?

We’re excited to see where we will be one year from now as we currently have no idea! We will be returning home to our house and school for one year but the kids want to do another year of travel and the parents need to figure out what new business we will create! We are excited about the possibility of moving long term to a new city in Europe but only time will tell! 

We appreciated Terry and her family checking in with us to share a bit about their many adventures. To follow along with their journey, you can find them at @greentribu.ontheroad and  facebook.com/greentribu.ontheroad. 

Check out other Fernweh Families on this blog to get inspired and learn all the different shapes your Wonder Year might take.

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Using the world as a classroom is a fantastic way to teach your kids. But leaping into long-term family travel and worldschooling requires courage and conviction. Sometimes you need inspiration to help you believe that leaving (almost) everything behind could be totally worth it. Or, you might be in the dreaming stage, not yet ready or able to launch but longing to explore from home and immerse yourself in stories of what is possible.

360 Degrees Longitude: One Family’s Journey Around the World by John Higham

The OG of worldschooling memoirs, 360 Degrees Longitude: One Family’s Journey Around the World was released in 2009, years before e-readers caught on and trip planning was done via apps. Author John Higham and his wife September began planning their trip ten years before leaving their comfortable Bay Area life for an around-the-world adventure. This memoir is the story of their journey and an inspiring must-read for others hoping to travel long term with their family, too.

Higham brings the reader along chronologically on a trip spanning 12 months, 24 time zones, and 28 countries. Engaging and funny, he couples anecdotes with thoughtful descriptions of destinations and the people his family meets along the way. His two children, Katrina, 11, and Jordan, 8, when their trip begins, are always in the loop–helping choose destinations and plan adventures. Designed partially as a biking trip across Europe, a playground accident in Switzerland leaves Katrina with a broken leg. The family nimbly adjusts to this and a series of other misadventures that Higham never shies away from sharing with would-be travelers. Entries from the kids’ journals round out his story, as does John’s innovative use of Google Earth, which allows readers to access photos and videos of destinations the Highams visited across the globe. Clever (or, using John’s term, “stupid”) facts at the end of the book punctuate the experience.

360 Degrees Longitude helped lay the groundwork for what it means to be a citizen of the world. Highlighting what their family learned along the way, the author shows it’s possible to navigate almost anything when they’re doing it together. As Higham shares in his introductory message, he wrote the book to “take you to distant lands and meet the people who live over there to show that, at the end of the day, humankind in all its wonderful weirdness is the same all over the planet.”

The World is Our Classroom: How One Family Used Nature and Travel to Shape and Extraordinary Education by Cindy Ross

Ross, a lifelong writer, began worldschooling her kids in the ’90s. The term worldschooling was either extremely niche or nonexistent, but her interactions with her children and the world define the term organically. She began by spending time in nature and in the garden with her very young kids, wondering together before Google could explain. They spent summers hiking the Continental Divide with toddlers and llama support, learned American history by riding a Conestoga wagon along the Oregon Trail, and even partnered with local naturalists for their science lessons. The notion of learning from participation with the world grew naturally from these experiences. Her chapters have titles like “Learning from Play,” “Learning from International Travel” and “Learning about Values and Priorities.” Each chapter is full of anecdotes and ends with a section called “Nuts and Bolts” to outline how to get it done. 

This book outlines how worldschooling looked before online education and screens were a thing. There are thousands of ideas to inspire you if you want less time on tech. Ross and her husband also kept their kids in public schools and supplemented their education incrementally with long stretches in the American wilderness and in more than 12 countries.

The memoir has the strength of perspective. Ross’ children are now in their late 20s, and the book weaves the roots of their current passions into the narrative. Sierra and Bryce (also the illustrator) each have several pages at the end where they sum up their childhood in their own words. These words by Sierra, as she describes her current work in environmental stewardship, particularly struck me. She says, ” [Experiential education] is a cycle whereby we become informed about the world by participating in it, and with this knowledge are both empowered and gain the tools to change it.”

How to Be a Family: The Year I Dragged My Kids Around the World to Find A New Way To Be Together by Dan Kois

So many parents are pressured by and face tough questions about modern-day work, “screen age” parenting, and the realization that life is short. But it takes a moment of awakening or some sort of existential shake-up to pull up stakes and get out of one’s bubble. Dan Kois, his wife Alia, and daughters Harper and Lyra did just that. In search of greater connection and meaning, they set out on a global family adventure that took them to New Zealand, the Netherlands, Costa Rica, and rural small-town America in Hayes, Kansas. How to Be a Family is an honest, hilarious, and heartfelt account of the experience of togetherness through the fantastic and the mundane, the gorgeous and the gross.

The raw and accessible quality of this book invites readers into the metaphor of life as a journey. We feel the Kois family dynamics, their vulnerabilities and victories. Anyone who has experienced long-term family travel might chuckle throughout, knowing exactly how it feels to be tumbled into a family unit while living outside of your comfort zone. But whether or not you have taken a trip around the world, How to Be a Family is a good read, a parenting odyssey that will entertain, inspire, and challenge you to think about your parenting style and family culture. Many parents want their kids to feel engaged and connected and have agency in their own lives. Travel is empowering that way. Kois captures it beautifully when he writes, “…and the thing I love most about this trip is the way that moments from this year are already becoming family lore, retold by children who are finally old enough to contribute to their own tales.”

How to Become a Family reminds us that sometimes the best adventure is the one where we’re simply together with family and friends.

We Came, We Saw, We Left by Charles Wheelan

We Came, We Saw, We Left is a fascinating story about one family’s experiment in taking a gap year. Intelligent and full of charm, the Wheelan family solves one problem after another and strings together nine months of adventure, mishaps, deep learning, and togetherness. An economist, professor, and author, Charles Wheelan also has a way with storytelling, especially when it comes to acquainting you with the idiosyncrasies and proclivities of his three kids. Many readers will feel inspired to start planning their own family gap year after reading We Came, We Saw, We Left. Others may be spooked and instead plant a garden. 

This travel memoir offers a great job of portraying the imperfections and improvisations that go along with long-term family travel. For example, day 10 for Team Wheelan was marked by a lost pair of kiddos in Medellin, Colombia. On the verge of panic, Charles and his partner, Leah, held their breath and resisted accusation while they waited on the metro platform for that text to come, which it eventually did. Buoyed by reunion and a round of beverages, the family recounted their errors: “Over dinner, we reviewed our ‘rookie mistakes’: taking the metro at rush hour; not making sure we all knew the stop; not having a plan if we were separated; not giving enough money to Katrina for a taxi; and so on.” Overcoming a mega-obstacle early on, talking about it, and learning from it together, gave the family confidence. They recounted, “Maybe we would be able to pull off this crazy adventure travel thing after all.”  

We Came, We Saw, We Left draws you into the rhythm of the road–into spaces where kids don’t go off to school and parents don’t go off to work. It shows that on a family gap year, things get mixed up at the edges while bonds of togetherness grow stronger around every unexpected turn. 

While there are many other worldschooling memoirs out there, these first four will get you started. Full of inspiration, perspective, poignancy, and humor, they might just be a litmus test for you: Could this lifestyle be for me? Is it something I want to do for a summer? A year? Or, perhaps I’m selling everything to buy a one-way ticket? 

All of these books are available as e-books at Bookshop.org, Barnes & Noble, or Amazon. There’s still time for a great summer read! And if these whet your worldschooling appetite and you need help figuring out what to do next, you can check out our book, too. 

The post Four Worldschooling Memoirs to Get Your Wheels Turning appeared first on Wonder Year Travel.

How to Market A Book

A few weeks ago, we finished the first marathon and sent our manuscript to the printer. We immediately had to decide how many books to print in the first run. This felt like a really consequential decision for us and we did not have a solid basis for choosing a number – 2000, 5000, 10,000? We did not want to have stacks of unsold books that would gather dust in a California warehouse. Nor did we want to print too few books and not be able to fulfill orders if sales exceeded our expectations.

We gathered as much intel as possible from our editor, the sales team and our own research and assumptions and put our best guess on paper. That decision positioned us on the starting line of our second marathon, introducing Wonder Year to the world and activating channels to sell our book.  

Whoa, where to begin? Should we start slow with a jog or hit it hard from the beginning? According to book marketing wiz, Naren Aryal, “to be a writer today is to be a marketer.” Looks like marathon #2 would be just as important as marathon #1. He argues that authors should start building their platform yesterday. Oops. 

We’d have to establish Wonder Year as a brand and the three of us as authors. We’d have to associate Wonder Year with long-term family travel and worldschooling. And then, connect with people who are curious about family travel to the book. 5-4-3-2-1: let’s go! 

Miles 1-3:

Establish a Website. For many authors, the website is the foundation of their platform, and this was certainly the case for us. We launched a fairly basic website in March 2022 and built out many more features over the following year. Our site had a book landing page, pre-order buttons, a blog, contact page, newsletter sign-up form, photos, and branded artwork. We wanted to be sure the

website did more than promote the book. It was important that it was also a valuable resource for current and prospective traveling families.

Miles 4-10:

Consistent Quality Content. With the website launched, the next order of business was to load it with helpful information about relevant topics. We are writing about topics like making the decision to travel, funding long-term family adventure, closing up home life, working on the road, and what it feels like to be a long-term traveling family in motion. We brainstormed topics of interest, like destination inspirations, a discussion on how to choose destinations and created a schedule to publish blogs, with a goal of posting at least one per week.  

Miles 10-14:

Social Media Platforms. The matter of social media was definitely a hard nut for us to crack. Each of us maintained a blog during our respective travels, but none of us was particularly active on social media anymore. We did not have thousands of followers. We had some moments of doubt and insecurity about putting ourselves out there so publicly, seemingly self-promoting, which felt antithetical to our purpose with Wonder Year. Yet, we knew it was imperative and we understood how effective it is to share information and build community through social platforms. 

We pushed on and picked up our pace a bit. We found joy in sharing tips, tricks and wisdom, knowing that our content was designed to inform others rather than spotlight ourselves. We diversified our posts with videos, photos, motivation Mondays, Tips Tuesdays, Where in the World Wednesdays. Later, we learned how to effectively present information in a variety of formats on different platforms.Now, we have started to see steady, organic growth across several months of concerted effort. 

Miles 14-18:

Strategic Partnerships. Wonderwell, our publisher, provided us with a framework to organize our partner outreach campaign. We brainstormed a long list of organizations, nonprofits, and influencers. We looked for those who share an interest in one or more of the Wonder Year themes–travel, education, family, inclusivity, global community, outdoor adventure and sustainability–and began reaching out. The process of building partnerships is a bit improvisational, more art than science. Our goal and hope is to find shared purpose with a set of public, private, nonprofit, and individual partners and appeal to their customers, stakeholders and members together.

Miles 18-22:

Media and Publications. Many authors, including us, use a public relations professional to assist with outreach to traditional media. Publicists know the ropes and how to pitch a story. However, because we are family travel and worldschooling experts, we expanded the media/publications list by identifying specialty outlets in these sectors. We are thinking broadly about local and national outlets including magazines, podcasts, radio shows, news sources and other print or digital media sources that connect with the Wonder Year journey. 

Miles 22-26:

Pre-launch. The six weeks before book launch are going to be dizzying. Testing our endurance, we’ll have to dig deep and keep running toward our goal of bringing a book to the world that will inspire and help families to get on the road together. We’ll be calling on partners, followers, and our personal connections to help spread the word about Wonder Year. We’ll ask folks to follow, like, repost, refer a friend, tag, pre-order and otherwise put good Wonder Year juju out there.

On September 5, 2023 Wonder Year: A Guide to Long-Term Family Travel and Worldschooling will hit the shelves. We appreciate your cheering from the sidelines and your encouragement along the way. We just have one more question for you: Have you ordered your copy? If not, you can right here!

Opportunities abound! Podcasts, magazine features, social media events, as well as the traditional book tour!

The post How to Write a Book: The Second Marathon appeared first on Wonder Year Travel.

A stack of books that have inspired me to learn more about learning

Active Learning

Active learning was a buzzword that is now part of the canon. Active learning methods ask students to engage in learning by thinking, discussing, investigating, and creating. This learning modality may be easier to incorporate with worldschooling than in traditional classroom teaching. Essential to active learning is timely feedback for learners and discussion opportunities to suss out big topics. Extended projects or themes of inquiry also require active learning. Students access prior learning and incorporate data and new ideas into their mental framework. For example, many worldschooling families find themes of interest for their whole family, while others encourage each child to discover their unique interests that are then woven throughout destinations: monkeys, ice cream, plastics, art. When the student does more work than the instructor, it’s active learning. When the student creates their assignments, it’s active learning. When the student finds connections and begins an organic discussion, it’s active learning.

Experiential Learning

A Wonder Year approach saturates your learners with high-impact learning opportunities. Educational research illustrates the important relationship between approach and retention, or what the learner remembers over time. Retention rates differ between more passive activities, such as watching a demonstration or observing a cultural event, and even more active ones. These might include reenacting an historical event, planting a garden, baking a cake or using a foreign language to find a bathroom. The more involved the learner becomes, the deeper the retention. 

Running one’s hand along the chiseled stone, and peeking through the arrow holes helps to use all the senses in learning.

Think about that time in middle school when you presented a science project to classmates. Maybe it was asking them to taste chocolate, lemons, salt and arugula to learn about sweet, sour, salty and bitter taste buds. Chances are you remember way more from that exercise than from a lecture you passively listened to on the same topic. What does this mean for worldschooling? It means you can ease your mind about withdrawing your kids from a formal school setting. They’re likely to learn and remember more from their multi-sensory travel experiences than from a year in their more typical classroom.  

One of our favorite educational “classics” is Joseph Cornell’s Sharing Nature with Children. There are three versions out there now, with some that focus on different ages and angles. We recommend Sharing Nature with Children II (best for ages 8-10) first published in 1968. He highlights easy ways to build a connection between your child and the natural world.

Bloom’s Taxonomy

Another “hot” topic in educational discourse these days is HOTS, formerly known as critical thinking skills. HOTS refers to the Higher Order Thinking Skills of Bloom’s Taxonomy of Educational Objectives. Studies show that the higher thinking skills of analysis, evaluation, and creation are more easily accessed by experiential learning, apprenticeships, and field trips. It is in the stages of reflection or in creating a presentation that those higher thinking skills are engaged. Once you read on, you’ll see that these HOTS sound a whole lot like the worldschooling aspect of a Wonder Year.

A Wonder Year approach saturates learning opportunities. You can give your kids a project and let them teach you, their siblings, or their peers. You can discuss the political context of the space race at the Kennedy Space Center. Your kids can pay for groceries in foreign currency. And, when you’re just not sure about this path you’ve chosen, and you need a pep talk for the active, kinesthetic, deep-learning of a Wonder Year, revisit these research-backed concepts and realize how easy learning opportunities are to find. The hot topic topic in educational theory is all around you!

More than anything, extended time on the road can help nurture curiosity for all there is to learn from the world.

Growth Mindset

Carol Dweck popularized this term with her 2016 book, Mindset: The New Psychology of Success, How We Can Learn to Fulfill Our Potential. Growth mindset, as opposed to fixed mindset, is the idea that your talents and abilities can be improved through hard work and perseverance. When individuals with a growth mindset are presented with challenges, they use problem-solving strategies to overcome them and successfully complete their tasks. 

Research has shown increased brain activity and synapse building through mistakes rather than success. Think about how often people limit themselves by saying, “I can’t do math.” Or even, “My kids are great readers, so I don’t need to think of ways to enhance or encourage their reading.” There are always more ways to learn and avenues to grow. Mistakes and struggles help us learn and build our cognitive capacity. A growth mindset is what allows us to realize our potential. This is an excellent topic for worldschooling parents because it’s based on cutting-edge research and lends itself to individualized instruction.

We hope this primer helps pique your interest in these current hot topics related to worldschooling education and educational theory. In July, we’ll share some ideas for how to use (or not use) AI in your worldschooling plan. Things are changing quickly! Stay tuned.

Mom, what’s this mural all about?

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Africa Is a Diverse Continent, Not a Country

Shots and visas and passports, oh my!

When you browse the shelves of the travel sections, you might find a book on family travel in Tuscany or cycling through Vermont, books that hone in on the specific mode or geographical area. However, when it comes to African countries, they tend to be clumped in travel books that try to cover the entire continent. I can’t recall a guidebook that tries to cover all of Asia, but you do see guidebooks for the entirety of Africa.

I can only guess the cause of this different treatment: not enough travelers to warrant the specific country or regional guides? Ignorance that Africa is not a country but a diverse continent? Maybe a bit of each. Yes, you read that right: many Americans believe that Africa is a country, and many others can only name three or four countries on the continent. For this and many other reasons, African countries are prime for worldschooling opportunities

Our family’s go-to guidebooks are Lonely Planet, and they do have specific country guides to the two countries we will visit this summer. 

Learn More Before You Go

The Global North and ChatGPT (yes, I’ve been playing around with it) have a lot to learn about Africa. As a credentialed social studies teacher, I’ve found that most American students learn about Ancient Egypt, colonization and the triangle trade, apartheid, and basic geography. Some newer textbooks include sections on ancient kingdoms of Ghana and Mali. So, there are huge gaps in how modern history is taught. One way to fill those gaps is to read some of these fantastic and award-winning books for young people to learn from this diverse continent. 

For the younger reader 

Black Gold by Laura Obuobi and London Ladd is one of my favorite picture books, as well as Water Hole Waiting by Jane Kurtz, co-authored with her brother Christopher Kurtz. The Anna Hibiscus early reader series by Atinuke, based in Nigeria, is wonderful. This depiction of extended family compound life and the relatable trials and tribulations of a young girl and her raucous younger brothers will begin to set context for modern life in Western Africa.

For middle school students

There are three books that detail the modern refugee. There’s the National Book Award-winning graphic novel, When Stars are Scattered by Victoria Jamieson, Omar Mohamed, and Iman Geddy; Long Walk to Water by Linda Sue Park; and Lost Girl Found by Laura DeLuca and Leah Bashoff.

For high schoolers and older 

Older kids might appreciate Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, or the nonfiction emigration story half set in Ethiopia, Cold, White Sun, by Sue Farrell Holler. Zimbabwean author Tsitsi Dangarengba has two wonderful and award-winning semi-autobiographical novels suitable for YA readers, Nervous Conditions and The Book of Not. Violet Bulawayo’s We Need New Names will also leave you changed. Trevor Noah’s Born A Crime is an insider’s look at race relations and growing up in South Africa. Available on audiobooks, his masterful telling would work well for PG-13 and above.

I’ve also found this wonderful booklist created and peer-reviewed by Social Justice Books. 

Can we enter with these Ziplocs?

Immunizations and Health

When we arrived at our local Passport Health travel clinic here in Colorado, we were presented with a long list of decisions. Malaria medication? The rabies series? Typhoid as pills or shots? This is a very different set of questions than you’d face for a trip to Europe, Australia, or Central America. When we told the nurse we would be staying in a suburb of Nairobi to attend a wedding, her eyes got wide. She offered us broad-spectrum probiotics, antibiotics to carry just in case, and digestive guards to take for the one week we were staying and eating in a smaller town that does not cater to Westerners. We then told her we would continue on to Egypt, she admonished us to not even THINK about swimming in the Nile. Schistosomiasis, she said. In all seriousness, she described snails that enter your skin and worms that penetrate your feet. 

Many countries that have active Yellow Fever outbreaks require this vaccination both to enter and exit. I’ve never heard of anyone testing the system with a vaccine waiver, but I’d love to learn more.

These warnings might make some think twice about travel to Africa, but I look to Instagram and see families like the @traveling_zolks, @house_of_bey_family, @tinboxtraveller, and @awaywiththesteiners to ground myself in perspective here. I’ve also been to regions with similar health risks and realize that with some research and maintaining good health prior to arrival, most places are just fine to visit. Our stomachs are stronger than we think, and quick action if symptoms begin can head off most issues.

Credit Card Fraud and Entry Visas

Be sure to give yourself plenty of time to organize entry visas and make sure your credit cards will work. While I was trying to pay online for our entry visas, my bank kept declining the charges. After the third or fourth round, I needed to be on the phone with my credit card company to pay for the visas from the government website. These protections are put into place for good reason, I’m sure, but be aware that it’s imperative to let your credit card company know your travel plans and be ready for some extra calls while you’re planning your trip.

The Egyptian visa service warned of fraudulent sites that charge you high rates for fake visas. 

[Update: the visa “service” we used was actually a scam! They were the first hit that came up on google, asked all the right questions, asked for new photos without glasses, and charged the correct amounts. At the final hour, when our service disappeared and we had no visas, our safari company pushed our new visa applications through. Check, check, check and do some online searches to make sure your service is legit.]

Visiting Wild Animals is Expensive

Once we decided to go to Kenya, I was shocked at the cost of the safari. The more I researched, the more I understood why you get what you pay for. The high cost of good safaris pays for the conservation of the wild spaces and animals. 

Planning done, the journey begins.

This privilege is confusing. Our Kenyan friends have never been to Masai Mara or the Sheldrick Elephant Orphanage just 30 minutes from their home. But if you look at any travel plan to Kenya, both places are in every list of top 5 things to do in Kenya. So, if Westerners didn’t come to pay the high prices, a key source of funding for care and conservation would dry up. But the high prices keep the locals from seeing their own country. What would you do?

I’ve been reading that African conservation areas were some of the hardest-hit places during COVID because most funding comes from tourism. So, although I’m still questioning my own ethics, we’ve decided to visit Sheldricks WITH our Kenyan friends and we are going to Ol Pejeta Rhino Preserve and Masai Mara after the dowry festivities. We will pay for mid-range safari camps with open eyes, try to understand how sustainable travel practices help preserve wild spaces, and look for ways to make this safari more inclusive.

Poverty and Economic Disparity

Africa, like many other parts of the world, can put the Western traveler face-to-face with economic disparities. Africa is home to some of the wealthiest individuals as well as some of the world’s poorest and fastest growing economies. Travelers are often surprised by the modern cities and high tech malls, as well as children begging with little on their backs. We are expecting our stereotypes to be challenged. We are researching some NGOs to visit, like Ubuntu Life, and will participate for the first time with Pack for a Purpose. We are ready to shake up our worldviews, break open our stereotypes, and ask some hard questions.

Packing

Sleepily arriving at passport control in Kenya.

Packing for this region has some unique considerations. I’ve read that wearing blue and black colors can attract the tsetse fly, which can harbor sleeping sickness and other health concerns. Bright colors, including white, can make the wild animals notice you and change their behavior. So, I guess there is a reason to wear that stereotypical khaki. A professional travel guide turned me on to Travel Fashion Girl website, which offers practical ideas like these to get you started.

You might need more warm layers than you think. Don’t assume you’ll be hot every second, as many wildlife viewing areas are at high altitude, and deserts get cool at night. Also, in many areas, especially Muslim regions, women need to cover shoulders, knees, and collar bones to be culturally sensitive. We are bringing scarves to cover our female heads for visits to holy sites, although I’m sure we can buy them there. In many more areas showing more skin can attract unwanted attention, not to mention a sunburn. We are currently hunting for breathable long sleeves and pants, and packable wide-brimmed hats.

Sometimes you also need to know what NOT to pack. Some of the world’s strictest bans on single use plastic are found in Africa. Rwanda and Kenya have luggage searches when you enter the country. Our safari company told us that they have heard of tourists being fined for bringing plastic bags into the country! Although we love and support the concept, I often travel with a few ziplocs around toiletries. Many other African countries, like Morocco and Tanzania, have partial bans and fines. I appreciate the exercise of rethinking these packing habits.

I can’t wait to share our journey to Kenya and Egypt real-time on social media and as stories from the road in this blog. Planning this trip to Africa is getting me more and more excited and interested in this diverse continent. Kenya and Egypt have long been on a someday bucket list, but an invitation to a dowry ceremony moves it to now, to once-in-a-lifetime, to “hang the cost” and we’ll figure out how to pay for it later. As a returned Wonder Year family, we’ve worldschooled and traveled to Central America, Asia, and Europe, but Africa, South America and Antarctica are still open for discovery. How easy will it be to slip into our old full-time traveling family personas? How different will it be to travel with older teens? How will this time in Africa change my worldview?

The post Planning a Family Trip to Africa appeared first on Wonder Year Travel.

Behind the headliners of Rio de Janeiro and the Amazon lies what National Geographic calls Brazil’s best-kept secret: the Pantanal.

Home of the social media sensation, the capybara

Located primarily in the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso do Sul, the Pantanal also crosses the border into Paraguay and Bolivia. At around 68,000 square miles – 20 times the size of the Everglades – it is the world’s largest tropical wetland area and largest flooded grassland savanna.

Getting there isn’t easy. Our family of four arrived at Campo Grande Airport via Rio de Janeiro then Sao Paulo, followed by another five hours by road to reach our pousada (inn). We visited in September, toward the end of the Pantanal’s dry season. The wet season, loosely corresponding to summer, has higher temperatures and humidity – and many more mosquitoes. Our timing was no accident, as the roads in the region are also more passable when the waters recede.

Some questioned why we were traveling with children into the region (ours were the only kids at the pousada). Still, we all found the area fascinating, with loads of worldschooling opportunities in the twists and turns of both waters and conversation. If you’re ever able to visit, you might study:

The climate and hydrodynamics that govern the region

The floodplain, fed by tropical rains and their runoff, is defined by seasonal shifts between phases of standing water and phases of dry soil. Water fluctuations between the phases range from two to five meters seasonally. Locals do their best to build structures above the high watermark, but we did see photos of past guests roaming the pousada grounds in shin-deep water.

Morning conversation, quite a view

Phenomenally diverse fauna

Over 260 species of fish, including stingrays and piranha, swim in the often-murky shallows. During the dry season, 650+ species of birds congregate around the remaining water sources. Our sightings included hyacinth macaws, toucans, crest-headed kingfishers, caracaras, savannah hawks, ibis, heron, jabiru, roseate spoonbills, and rheas. On land you might find anteaters, capybaras, anacondas (yes! saw a huge one!), jaguars (elusive! didn’t see any!), turtles, caiman, and armadillos. We particularly enjoyed the river otters: four feet long versus their smaller cousins back home, they are both quick and fierce.

Armadillos of the Pantanal

Conservation dynamics

According to The Nature Conservancy, “The strategic location of the Pantanal makes it more vulnerable to the advance of large scale agriculture, cattle ranching, water pollution, dams and transport navigation, thereby increasing the pressure on the local habitats.” Despite being one of the most-preserved wetlands in the world, less than 2% is under federal protection. There’s much to learn about public and private initiatives aimed to guarantee its long-term sustainability. The Nature Conservancy (https://www.nature.org/en-us/get-involved/how-to-help/places-we-protect/pantanal/) and World Wildlife Fund (https://wwf.panda.org/wwf_news/?324090/Journey-of-Water-in-the-Pantanal) can help get you started.

If you’re planning travel to The Pantanal, here are some of our favorite resources:

• https://www.nationalgeographic.com/travel/article/exploring-pantanal-brazil
• https://www.nationalgeographic.com/travel/article/brazils-best-kept-secret-the-pantanal-wildlife-biodiversity-wetlands
• https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/999/
• https://www.pantanalescapes.com/about/about.html
• https://national-parks.org/brazil/pantanal-matogrossense

And if you have them, bring binoculars! You’ll likely use them here more than anywhere you’ve ever been.

Where the dirt road ends…

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