Ep 186 w/ Rachel Rudwall - From STA Travel to 80 Countries: Rachel's Journey as a Global Storyteller

In this episode of the Winging It Travel Podcast, I sit down with Rachel Rudwall, who is also known as Rachel Roams. Rachel is an Emmy-nominated on-camera Host, Producer, Camera Operator, Writer, and Award-Winning Photographer. Rachel has travelled to all seven continents, lived in three countries, and journeyed through over 80 nations. Rachel is also a Fellow of the Explorers Club and has an extensive social media following. I met Rachel last year at TravelCon, where she gave a very inspiring talk that captivated me, so I was eager to have her on the podcast for a conversation.

From her early days in Ohio dreaming of the wider world, to landing a life-changing internship with STA Travel, Rachel’s story is one of persistence, curiosity, and following her passion for exploration.

Rachel shares how her time with STA Travel opened the door to a career in travel media, taking her from study abroad experiences in Spain and Scotland to a globe-spanning role as a video producer and host. We dive into the challenges and lessons of producing content before the days of YouTube dominance, what it takes to capture and hold an audience, and why storytelling always begins with putting the listener or viewer first.

We also explore the reality behind the glamorous world of travel media — the grind of producing content, the countless hours behind the scenes, and the need to love the craft deeply enough to push through the hard days. Rachel discusses building her creative career in Los Angeles, collaborating with other storytellers, and carving out her niche in a male-dominated industry where persistence and proof of concept were crucial.

On a personal level, Rachel reflects on how travel has evolved for her as a mother, from multi-month shoots to family adventures across Italy and beyond. She offers powerful insights into balancing work and family life, finding joy in simple experiences like visiting playgrounds and local grocery stores, and instilling a spirit of adventure in her child.

This conversation is packed with travel inspiration, career lessons, and practical advice for content creators, adventurers, and dreamers alike. Whether you’re fascinated by travel TV, curious about breaking into storytelling, or simply love hearing about epic adventures across 80 countries, Rachel’s journey will spark your wanderlust and leave you inspired.

Rachel Rudwall

Website - https://www.rachelroams.com/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/rachelroams/?hl=en

X - https://x.com/RachelRoams

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Timestamps

00:00 The Power of Collaboration in Creativity

01:31 Embracing Travel: Overcoming Fear and Finding Joy

03:50 Introduction to Rachel Rudwell: A Journey of Exploration

12:10 Early Travel Experiences: Family Road Trips and Cultural Awareness

14:31 Defining Moments: The Internship that Changed Everything

20:55 Navigating the Media Landscape: From Intern to Storyteller

25:04 The Art of Storytelling: Learning from Experience

33:23 Proof of Concept: The Importance of Persistence in Content Creation

37:41 Creative Roots: Photography, Writing, and the Journey of Expression

41:54 Rediscovering Playfulness in Adulthood

46:21 The Joy of Travel and Family Adventures

56:18 Cultural Connections Through Travel

01:04:08 Moments of Reflection and Self-Discovery

01:10:24 Travel Tips for the Adventurous Spirit

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Winging It Travel Podcast Credits

Host/Producer/Creator/Composer/Editor - James Hammond

Contact me - jameshammondtravel@gmail.com 

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Mentioned in this episode:

Check out the new Smart Travel Podcast

This week's show is supported by the new Smart Travel Podcast. Travel smarter — and spend less — with help from NerdWallet. Check out Smart Travel at the Link below:

Smart Travel Podcast

Check out the new Smart Travel Podcast

This week's show is supported by the new Smart Travel Podcast. Travel smarter — and spend less — with help from NerdWallet. Check out Smart Travel at the Link below:

Smart Travel Podcast

It's so valuable to acknowledge not only the people who are kind of behind the scenes, the unsung heroes, but that being in collaboration with other people makes the end product better, almost always. And often I work in isolation. I'll be the only person on a project and I'm filming and I'm writing and I'm doing all the things and I can do it, but it isn't my preference to work solo. It's not where my best ideas are born. It's not where my sort of fullest bodied.

bodies of work are born. Working with other people, we become better. And ideally, we're all working toward the same goal with the same sort of good intention. Because if we do that, then really anything's possible.

Okay, last question is if someone's listening right now and they're a bit nervous about traveling maybe to a place that they've been before or a different culture, what one or two senses can you give them to maybe get them to get a flight booked and get out there?

There are a lot of reasons to overthink doing anything, walking out the front door in the morning. But once you do it, it's much easier to be out there. And I will say that every trip I've come home from, I relish having had those experiences and those memories, whether things were perfect the whole way or not. I mean, my trips have never been perfect the whole way, if we're honest. You heard about me almost missing that train. But I would also say that I believe everything in life is either a good experience or a good story later.

If it is both, you're having an amazing day. So go out there, live the experience, you'll come home with some of your favorite lived moments and some of your funniest stories.

Welcome to the Winging It Travel Podcast, your weekly ticket to the world, dropping every Monday and hosted by me, James Hammond, proudly part of the Boy Escape Network. This is a travel podcast that throws out the itinerary and dove straight into the raw, real and unpredictable essence of global exploration, chasing moments over milestones, those spontaneous encounters, immersive sounds and unforgettable stories. Whether I'm hiking up volcanoes in Guatemala,

camping under the stars in British Columbia.

met incredible people, seen breath taking places and collected unforgettable stories. I now get to share them with you, alongside some of the most diverse and well travelled guests from around the world. Expect engaging conversations that bring fresh perspectives and inspiring travel tales. There are also raw, reflective solo episodes where I share personal insights, practical tips and honest stories from the road. This is a podcast for travellers, dreamers, backpackers and anyone who's ever thought, what if I just went for it and travelled. If you're looking for stories to tell, tips to share,

and experiences to inspire, then you're in the right place. There's so much travel content coming your way, it might just spark that trip you've been dreaming about for years. You can find Winging It, a more fantastic travel podcast from around the world at voyescape.com. The link is in the show notes. Let's go and explore the world. Hello and welcome to this week's episode where I'm joined by Rachel Rudwell, also known as Rachel Roames. Rachel is an Emmy nominated on camera host.

producer, camera operator, writer and award-winning photographer. Rachel has traveled all seven continents, lived in three countries and journeyed through 80 plus nations. Rachel is also an Explorer's Club Fellow and has an extensive social media following. I met Rachel last year at Travelcom where she gave a very inspiring chat which engrossed me and she somehow managed to remember me out of an audience of five to six hundred. When I went up to her to meet her and shake her hand to introduce myself, I was pretty blown away.

So from then I was like, do you know what? I need to get Rachel on the podcast. Let's talk some travel and get some great content out there. It's a great episode. Lots of tips, lots of stories, lots of nuggets there to take forward into your life and into travels. So let's get stuck into the episode. This is Rachel Roames. Rachel, welcome to the show. How are doing?

I'm hanging in, how are you?

Not too bad, thanks, great to see you. Tell the listeners where you're based right now.

based in Portland, Oregon, the Pacific Northwest of the United States?

one of my favorite US cities.

where we happen to meet, actually.

Indeed. Yeah, yeah. I think Portland's got that unique vibe, right? I don't know what it is. Something about it I love.

Yeah, I mean, a tagline employed by the city and many of its residents is keep Portland weird. It has like a real funky sense of self. mean, it's sort of like anyone's free to be whoever they arrived on this earth to be or decided to be. On top of that sort of creativity and funkiness, there's amazing food and drink and the lands are incredible. So for me, it's a veritable playground of things that make a person happy.

So many things there. Yeah. If I wasn't in Canada and I had to pick somewhere to live in US, it'd be Portland, I think. I think my partner would say the same. Yeah. Portland for the win. bit of context for people. We did meet last year at Travelcom. I've got a question straight off the bat. I'm going to jump straight forward with it because I really want to know. So, a bit of context for people listening. I was watching Rachel do a speech towards the end of the event at Travelcom and she's probably speaking to about...

500, 600 people, maybe more in this room, huge room. great speech, loved it, inspiring. I was like, right, James, I've got to go and introduce myself afterwards and say hi, because I just love the speech. I love people who talk really well. So I'm really interested in that. Anyway, I got up to Rachel and say, Hey, look, I'm James. I'm from Winging It. She goes, Oh, hi. Yeah. You sat to the left of me on the edge. I'm like, uh, yeah, I did. I was like, how on earth amongst the sea of people did you spot me there? She goes, well, I tend to clock the engaged people.

And my question is how do you do that when you've got a whole speech to plan? You've rehearsed it, you're talking it, you've got to maybe ad lib some of it because you've got to react to some people laughing or whatever and you're clocking people. How do you clock people who you think are engaged in the chat and why do you think some people are and some people are not?

So that's two distinct questions, the first of which I think is easier to answer as a human being who just enjoys connecting with people. And that is you clock people who are paying attention, who are engaged, who are nodding or laughing or whatever, because that's what you would do in a conversation anyway. So if you were sitting with a group of your friends and you're sort of looking around and you're watching their facial expressions, you're reading the room, this is just a larger context of the same sort of thing.

But additionally, you get so much energy, so much good, good energy from people who are paying attention, who are engaging with you. And sometimes there are people who are paying attention who come up and chat to you afterward and you're like, wow, you were very stone-faced. I'm so glad that the talk actually resonated. I didn't hear you listening. As for why some people may not be listening, mean, sometimes it's not their subject matter. Sometimes there's something going on at home. Sometimes they're realizing that.

By attending this event, they're missing all their work emails and they're overthinking it. There are a million different reasons that someone might not be able to show up as fully engaged. But when people do, and when you're up on a stage and you're speaking and you see those people, they're a lifeline. They really energize you and they let you know, I'm in flow. People are with me. We're on the adventure.

Yeah, I was really energized. think after that, was like, oh yeah, like that's great. That nugget there, was writing things down a little bit as well. was like, oh yeah. So for me, I just love people doing talks to a big audience because there's a skill. It's a real big skill, right? It's a bit like podcast in a way. You're going to have to keep people now interested to keep you going, you know, for the conversation. And then also when to stop, when to speak, when to give a bit of space, you know, all this sort of stuff is a real big skill, isn't it? To talk really well and engage a big group.

It is, it's something that takes practice. I mean, it's like all things, you either are or aren't feeling naturally inclined, but no matter who you arrive on this planet to be extroverted, introverted, you can practice being your best communicator. And actually that's sort of what my talk was about. It was about video storytelling specifically. So video production, digital media, content creation, all of that. But the premise was that good storytelling

is not about you, the person telling the story. And so as a podcaster, you would know that too, because you know your audience at this point and you're providing an adventure for them every time that you invite somebody new on the show and have a new conversation. Anybody who's tuning in, this sort of superpower of becoming a better storyteller is available to all of us. And one of the main takeaways that I would share with anybody tuning in is the best stories. Even if they're from the perspective of the person telling the story,

They put the audience first. So think about when you're having conversations with your loved ones. You talk differently to a parent than you do to a child. You talk to your friends differently than your work colleagues. You're already sort of priming yourself in every conversation you have for becoming a better storyteller. So that is available to you as long as you start paying attention.

And that was the biggest takeaway for me. I was like instantly, I think even the week after I was doing my YouTube, I was like, right, I need to stop saying me, I, I, me. It's like we, you, like we're all in this together as the audience, right, for the YouTube. Yeah, it sounds so simple, but I was like, holy crap, I've been saying like, I'm going here and I'm doing this. I'm like, oh yeah, so I'm gonna make that change straight away, which I did, and I've not changed since.

Love it. And it takes hearing it. mean, frankly, it took me learning from people who were already skilled in storytelling to learn that it's not about me too, right? So we're all learning that together. And once it clicks, once you hear it, it's suddenly something that you carry through much more easily.

Yeah. And I think it's a change for the better because I think it just has improved my content. So there you go. And also in life, you know, like when you start, like you say, start to talk with friends or family and you, you don't always talk about yourself. You want to ask them questions and what are they up to? Right. It's that underrated skill or question to ask is how is someone doing?

Right? Yeah, to see someone else. I was talking with somebody about this, wedding last week. One of the things that I loved, he's this very engaging person. I mean, he had everyone sort of wrapped around his finger. He was incredibly charming and he was many people's favorite person in the room, I think probably. And the thing that I noticed about him was he called people by name and not just fellow guests of the wedding, but the people who are working on the service staff and all of that.

That's another superpower that is available to all of us to actually acknowledge people. Say I see you, thank you. Whatever it looks like in a given context, that for me was something that was worth calling out is this person choosing to see other people. That I think was the true magic. And that was why people loved him because they felt seen by him. Not just because he was sort of a sparkle in human form, but because he made them feel like they were as well.

So underrated. the name thing is another skill. If you can clock people's names and remember names, that is another skill, which I'm not great at because you need strategies to try and remember, right? Cause we, so many people day to day.

That's why I'm pointing to myself. Anybody who's not watching, you're gonna see. But look at the name tag at the checkout counter at the grocery store. I mean, it is sometimes as simple as that. Or saying when somebody is, you know, crossing your path in whatever capacity. What's your name? Thanks, Mark Pouls. Thanks, Amelia. to use my names that are just coming to mind. I don't think I know Amarcus or Amelia, but thanks to all the Marketers and Amelia's listening in today.

Do you ever do that at the supermarket when you get the go for the checkout? Because every supermarket attendant has got a name tag. So I sometimes say it it shocks them. ⁓

Every

single time, they're like, how do you know my name? Like, it's on your name tag. Yeah. ⁓

I'm so good. Right. Let's go back to you though. Now we said that I want to know in the early days as a child was travel a thing for you and your family growing up or was that something that came on later as you transitioned into adulthood?

Travel

took a different form when I was growing up. So I grew up in the Midwest of the US in a state called Ohio, and we did road trips. We'd road trip up to Michigan. We'd stay at a family friend's cottage. So it was something like eight hours in the car. I have two siblings, so us three kids in the back of the Volvo station wagon just bothering each other for hours on end until we arrived. so travel with a family is expensive.

Yeah, we would go on these adventures. We would take the summer trips to Michigan and things like that. When I was 10 as well, my nana took me on my first international trip to visit cousins that are in the UK. So she took me to England and she took each of her grandkids on a trip. And so that was really eye-opening experience for me because it was my first international trip. I will say though, even though the majority of my travels growing up were close to home, the

awareness that there was a world out there was a part of my upbringing. My dad had traveled when he was younger, carried his clothes on his back and traveled for months on end, that kind of travel. My mom went to college and during college she had done a study abroad and later in life when I was in middle school, high school, she went to get a master's degree in teaching and became a world history teacher.

So there were elements around me growing up that made me aware there was a world, that made me curious about it and encouraged the curiosity. By the time I was going to college, I studied international relations and Spanish, got those two degrees. Then I studied every other romance language I could for just bonus classroom hours, because I was like, man, there's a world out there. I to get to know it.

Well, that's how it really, it began as just a general awareness of the world fostered by my parents and further developed when I started studying at the university level and then did some study abroad and it was, you know, the rest as they say is history.

It's history. Yeah. Yeah. So what was the big, like big adventure going into college years? Like was there one trip, one country where you really did get a little bit out of your comfort zone? Maybe you're traveling solo and it's like, this is the, the big adventure that I've been kind of yearning for, or it's going to change you or you realize it's changing you during the trip. Was there one of those?

funny because many things flash before me when you ask the question. The first big international trip that I took with friends, I was 19, I was between my freshman, sophomore years of college and two girlfriends and I bought flights to Europe and we traveled around for six weeks and we had many eye-opening adventures, some good, some bad. Of course. Learned a lot along.

Then my first study abroad experience was when I was 20. So the following spring I studied in Spain and that was my first time being away from home in another language in a dramatically different culture at age 20. And so that opened my eyes in a lot of ways. taught me a ton. I did a subsequent study abroad the following spring in Scotland for some international business coursework at St. Andrews University. And that was the spring.

during which I applied for this internship with a travel company. And it was with a travel company called STA Travel, which at the time was the world's largest youth and yeah. STA? The world's largest youth and student travel provider. They, think had two or three million students travel on their trips or programs every year. They had this thing called the Ultimate World Traveler Internship, which was announced when I was in Scotland studying.

During the second study abroad, applied. Apparently, I learned later there were over 1,000 people who applied. The job was they were looking, job, I say job, it was unpaid, but still. They were looking for somebody to go around the world for three months, go to 16 countries, and produce multimedia assets from around the world with the goal of inspiring other young people to travel. I got the gig. In part, ⁓ think, yeah, I know, in part.

I think because I'd studied abroad a couple of times already and like not died yet. I was like, you have all these other people who've applied and sure, we all dream of traveling the world, but I haven't died yet. You know, they were like, perfect. It's you, you're the one. But it was my first time I had to produce a video for my application. was my first time ever producing a video. And it was a whole sort of series of like learning opportunities, just getting to the interview phase of this gig.

And I ended up getting it. And so when you ask, there one thing that sort of changed my perspective, this job, internship certainly did it, changed the whole trajectory of my life. Because for me, that was the opening that showed me that storytelling was a potential pathway for me that would allow me to explore, have new experiences, and also connect people to our world in meaningful ways.

So what was the key media at that point when you joined it? Was it social media coming in or was it still like YouTube coming in maybe? is it that, what, period of the time?

Yeah, let's

No way. Wow. You're an early pioneer.

Thank you. Thank you very much.

I mean, all the original podcasters that are still going today, they're from that era, like 2005, six, seven. And I know someone here who she does the illusionist podcast. She's quite big in UK. It's Helen Zoltzman. And I said, ah, in those days, how on earth did you just even release the thing? She goes, yeah, it was a big problem. She's like, oh yeah, we can record like in person, camera, great. And then the big thing was, how do we actually get it out there into the world? That was like a big thing in those days.

Yeah, and gear was clunkier, the recording process was clunkier, everything was clunkier. It's become so much easier for people to share content with one another, which is really incredible how quickly it's evolved. But back then, it was a burgeoning medium.

And also STA Travel, I just want to give a shout to those guys. In COVID, folded unfortunately. But yeah, I booked my first ever like round the world backpacking trip with them. I booked the classic ⁓ flight thing you get, the round the world ticket. Yeah.

That's still something I've never done that I would love to do. I've never booked a round the world ticket. And for those of you who don't know what a round the world ticket is, I mean, maybe you've talked about this in every episode so far. I'm not sure, but it's a really cool way to reach multiple destinations, continents on a cheaper airfare than if you were to buy individual tickets to each of these places. And so you can get a discounted fare.

If I remember correctly, the rule is you have to go the same direction the whole time. So you can't sort of go one place and then double back. You can't zigzag around the globe, but you can do, I don't know, five, six, seven stops as long as you're going in the same direction as when you began.

best thing about it is you can change two or three of those. Um, you can change the dates. So STI would give you this like rule where, you know, let's say you've got five flights. think three are probably locked in. So what you would do is you have a leaving date. You'd leave in London this day and you want to arrive back from, I don't know, I'm going around the world here. So let's say from New York to London, those are probably set and one in the middle, but two of the five, you can sort of rejig. So what we did is we had a few in Asia where we thought, well, we're not sure how it's going to go.

we'll keep them in there and then if you can change it, can. And then, yeah, I think a day before you emailed them and say, I'll kind of change this, use my ticket. they're like, So they rebooked the flight. That was those days. Unbelievable.

Yeah, amazing. So, round the world ticket, look it up. It might still be something you're interested in if you're listening in.

Yeah. I'll tell you what I've heard it, sorry, I've heard it the most on the podcast these days is in the South Pacific or Pacific. Cause it's hard. obviously I didn't hop cause it's a big space, little islands. I think there's some airlines or some agreement in there where you can maybe book like one of these around the world tickets, but obviously it's not around the world. It's around the area. So some people try and book five flights instead of booking individually. think I've heard that a few times in the podcast.

I gotta look that up.

No, no specifics there, unfortunately for you, but I've heard that a few times on the podcast. Yeah. STA rest in peace. Okay. And so we're talking about going into adulthood here. So how did you think you're going to mix travel and career? Did you like run away with the STA internship? You did that, you completed it, completed college. Were you thinking travel is now part of your career going forward? Was that it?

Wicked up.

Yeah, but it had changed form from when I entered college and was like, there's a world, I want to participate in it. And I was studying international studies and foreign languages. I thought that the way to see the world and travel for my career would be to become a diplomat or to work for a non-governmental organization. So either diplomacy or NGO. And those were really the only pathways that I was familiar with coming out of the Midwest, not knowing people who worked in TV or anything like that.

If I'm sort of going way back in time to when I was young, young, I used to watch travel shows and be like, that's what I want to do when I grow up. But I didn't take that seriously because I thought, A, probably everybody and their mom thinks that when they watch that show. And B, how do you even get into that? I've since learned not everybody does want that path. Some people are much happier sitting on the couch watching someone else do things that might be uncomfortable. But additionally, it turns out it is an available pathway.

even if you don't grow up as like a niece or nephew of a Spielberg. So what I did is I got this internship. It opened my eyes to the potential pathway of becoming a storyteller with a focus on travel stories. And I got back to college for my senior year after this internship and was like, okay, now what? I reached out to a whole bunch of people online for...

informational interviews or informational meetings. And this is thanks to a guidance counselor at my university teaching me the term in the first place, informational interviewer or meeting for anyone who's not familiar as you reach out and you ask someone if they might connect with you for 15 or 30 minutes. Maybe you meet up for coffee because you'd like to learn more about what they do. So I reached out to all these people who worked in media production, producers of shows, cinematographers, hosts of travel programs, editors.

Mm-hmm.

A remarkable number of them replied and were generous enough to connect with me for conversations and teach me more about what they did. And that helped me to do a few things. One, learn more about the path that I hadn't studied in college, I go to film school. It helped me to align on what truly was of interest and what wasn't, which can be learning what you don't want to do, can be just as valuable as settling on what you do.

because if you can learn what not to waste your bandwidth on, it's really meaningful. And then it also helped me to build out this network of friends and allies and potential future peers. So from there, I determined that in order to work in media production in the types of shows and programming that I was dreaming of, the National Geographic, Discovery Channel, Travel Channel, all that stuff, I determined I'd have to live in one of just a few cities globally.

And in the end, the most appealing of those options was Los Angeles because it had sunshine and a lot of production.

I did not think of myself as an LA type, but it turns out in Omegalopolis there is no one type. There are many types. There is. Yeah, which is amazing. And LA is such a remarkably interesting, diverse, cool, cool place that it ⁓ was where I ended up. So when I graduated with my degrees in international studies and Spanish, I moved out to LA and began working in TV production almost as soon as I arrived because of one of those.

informational interviews in which someone said, okay, so I'll give your info to somebody at my production company and if they have a show coming up, they can reach out to you and hire you. And lo and behold, that's what happened. And I worked my way up in media production from there with a focus on travel stories, on remote subcultures, on docu-style storytelling. So that, like I was saying earlier, I could use storytelling as a means to A, explore, and B, connect people to the world.

which is a ⁓ really hard thing to master. my question is like, where did the storytelling aspect come into it? Where did you learn that? Or how did you get tips doing that?

I learned from people who were better than I was, people who had lots of experience. I learned by doing. And I mean, as true with podcasting being an example, you learn to be a better podcaster with every podcast that you record probably, right? Every conversation you have, you get better, every edit gets tighter. That'll be true for whatever folks who are listening in do for their work or their hobbies. Every time you cook a new

Mm-hmm. 100%.

dish, it's new to you, it might be a little uncomfortable, and then you cook it again, you get a little better. I learned storytelling from people who are already storytellers, people who are directors of photography, camera operators, producers, all of that, by working my way up in that world and being around smart, capable people, starting at the lower rungs of the ladder, and then getting increasing responsibility to do things like go out in the field and learn to be a camera operator and learn to be a field producer.

to work in the edit bay with really skilled editors and see them at work and provide what are called the string outs, where I would shape the stories and I would drop all the footage into a sequence and make what I thought would be generally the episode and then the editor would make it look and sound really good. So being around people who were already working in that space, who had more skill than I did, who would give me increasing amounts of responsibility.

Yeah.

Each time that I had done a good job on the previous project or day or whatever, that was how I learned by doing.

interesting you say that about the editors. went, cause I studied music in London, right? So I went to, uh, four years at music college, which is a contemporary music college is called BIM equivalent to maybe Berkeley in the U S but, um, one of the sort of semesters was production. So went into the recording studio and you got like, like, it's like professional level producers in the music industry. And the first, one of the first things this guy said is like, look, I know you guys are shit hot, your instruments. get it.

don't disrespect the guy over here who's mastering and editing because he'll make you sound even better. Okay, that's the first thing that guy said.

I love that. It's so valuable to acknowledge not only the people who are kind of behind the scenes, the unsung heroes, but that being in collaboration with other people makes the end product better. Almost always. And often I work in isolation. I'll be the only person on a project and I'm filming and I'm writing and I'm doing all the things and I can do it, but it isn't my preference to work solo.

It's not where my best ideas are born. It's not where my sort of fullest bodied bodies of work are born. Working with other people, we become better. And ideally, we're all working toward the same goal with the same sort of good intention. Because if we do that, then really anything's possible.

I think that's why I TravelCon because as a podcaster, I am doing this all my own. I do miss that sort of collaboration because I guess even podcasters have co-hosts right? Co-hosts of podcasts I love because I love the rapport and the chat and you can obviously share the jobs, post-production and stuff like that. But TravelCon is good because you meet all these people that you understand what I'm talking about or what I fear or this technology is really hard to master. you sort of have this like little group of people where

You kind of all in the same boat, different streams of podcasting or video editing or whatever it is, or yourself by talking or doing producing, but overall content creators, I suppose. And then you kind of come together and thrash out all your problems. And it's quite nice to be in that group, it?

It is and it's so meaningful to be able to be candid with each other, to share learnings so that, I mean, because if you're feeling precious about sharing a vulnerability or like other people are going to laugh at you for having it, or people are precious in a way that's more gatekeeping because they want to protect what they perceive as scarce resources, it's a really different vibe. But TravelCon for me felt very much like a space in which people are invited to share, be open.

lift one another up, look for potential co-conspirators in the projects that they're working on, all of that. And so that sort of environment that invites people to leave some of the ego at the door and step in with the awareness that they are gonna learn and grow, that's a really powerful energy.

Letting ego step aside is also another underrated skill that people should at least attempt to master.

Yeah, it's a practice for us to all sort of, because ego is a voice that is in all of our heads and it can provide meaningful commentary. can inspire us to drive toward a goal, but it can also either make us think we're less than or more than. And neither of is helpful, right? So at the end of the day, it's helpful to have goals, but it's also helpful to remember that

really none of it's about us, that everybody's the hero in their own story. We all got that main character energy in our own heads, but no one else thinks we're the main character. No one else is even thinking about us at all. Which is really freeing you. It's freeing when you realize it's not about you. Then you can try to loosen ego's grip a little bit and say, chill out over there, I hear you. I appreciate what you're going for, but this is not helping me.

And let's stick with your career and we'll come back around to travel as we're here. Was there one particular part of that learning, you know, in the fields behind the camera, was it one of those things that really piqued your interest and you thought, you know what, I'm going to try and stick to that niche and go down that road. Or did you try and keep as general as possible?

What I really wanted to work my way up to was hosting my own travel programming. But it became clear quickly that no one was just going to hire me because I said, I'll be good at this, I swear. I had to learn to be a storyteller from people who are already storytellers, and that was behind the camera. Learn what made a good story in the first place. Then, while I was producing on shows for network TV, I also started to go to on-camera host.

So...

classes weekly, so I invested in courses that taught me everything from red carpet hosting to reading from a teleprompter to you name it. And from there, because no one was hiring women to be travel hosts, it was the era in which it was just men eating things or men chasing ghosts. Now it's all ghosts all the time.

But no one was hiring women to host travel programming, even though women are out there traveling. And so then I met a gal in my host class who also traveled a lot. And we began producing and shooting and hosting and editing content together. And for a couple of years, we put out a weekly episode of a YouTube series that amassed a large following. And through doing that grind of work that was unpaid,

sort of full side hustle energy. That was what landed me and her, both of our first TV shows. So we got a TV show as a result of building the thing, the proof of concept and saying, we have a hundred episodes, we have this many millions of views or this many followers. And it couldn't really be disputed whether we'd be capable of doing the thing. We were already doing it. So that was the goal when I moved

to Los Angeles was to get to a point where I could be hosting content, which is for me supremely fun because I actually get to try the food and talk to people and not have a camera between us and, you know, like try the dance or the activity or whatever thing. And it's a fun, playful, vulnerable space. I really enjoy that a lot. But in order to both be adaptable and also a more capable storyteller, knowing every side of

production has been invaluable.

like what you said about the proof of concept. think this is a key thing for anyone doing anything really in life. What I get quite annoyed at with people is they don't give it time. I think podcasting has this problem. There's loads of travel podcasts out there, loads of other podcasts, there's millions, right? There's like three and a half million or something, right? About a three and a half, four million, I think only 10 % of what they call current. So that means releasing an episode in the last two or three weeks. So there's like 90 % of podcasts out there, which is like two and a half million, whatever it is, just not doing anything.

But it's probably because they, I don't know, I've got to be too harsh here, but maybe because they thought it's not the right route to go down, maybe they're better at something else. But a lot of people do give up, I think it's before episode three, you think, wow, I didn't make any money till episode 200. And like, ah, so there's the proof of concept, right? So.

It's such a grind though. It's easy to see the operational and be like, you listen to a podcast that is somebody that you've never met, but you trust that person as an expert and they have great conversations and you see that they're succeeding and they have brand deals or whatever. And you go like, that's what I want to do. But you can't just arrive at that place. It takes a tremendous amount of work. And so you do have to really love the thing almost to bizarre degree to pursue it just

for the love and the belief of the thing. Otherwise, that's when it falls by the wayside. And it's okay to learn along the way that it's not for you. Like I said early on, mean, as meaningful to learn what's not for us as it is to learn what is. But it is a real grind being whether you're a podcaster or you're a content creator in a different form and lots of these travel accounts on Instagram or TikTok or whatever, people don't see the wild amount.

hours that go into it, they see the aspirational of being on the trip, but not the amount of emails and editing and all that stuff that people are doing behind the scenes. So it is important to realize that it's gonna be a ton of work. If you wanna work in media production or storytelling or become an influencer or any of that, it's a ton of work. But if you love the work enough that even on the hard days where you hate the work, you still love the work, then it might be for you.

What a great first half from Rachel there. So many tips, nuggets, stories. I love the way she speaks. It's super inspiring. And I can't wait for you to see or hear part two. But before we crack on for the episode, please take a moment to rate and review the podcast five stars on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or whatever app you use to listen to the podcast. It really helps the podcast get a bit of traction. It's free and it only takes a minute or two. Second of all,

If you'd like to donate some money to the podcast production costs, you can buy me a coffee for $5 at buymeacoffee.com forward slash winginit. The link is in the show notes. That really helps me too. And finally, bird of mouth, please spread the podcast to your friends, family, and get them to tune into the winginit travel podcast. Hopefully they'll love the content and come back for more. As I have plenty more guest episodes, episodes, and immersive audio episodes too. Thanks so much.

Let's get back into the second part of my interview with Rachel Rudwell. Yeah, that's the key thing. Do you love it? I keep saying underrated in this episode. I never said underrated in the last 300 episodes, but that's another underrated thing is do you love it? Yeah. I guess I love these conversations. That's why I do them, right? I'd sort of do half and half, like long format and short format just to get both audiences, which is another question coming later. But yeah, I think if you love it and your YouTube.

example, which I do YouTube as well. I love what you said about speaking with people, trying things, trying to capture those moments. I don't particularly love the editing and post-production, but I think the trade off is I love doing that side so much that I'm willing to put up with this side and I do have a bit of skill with that, right? So that's the compromise that people might have to discuss with themselves, I think.

Guilty, Your Honor. Same.

But hey, if it's worth it in the end, it's worth it. Right. I think the key point is you've got to stick at it. So yeah, that's a good trait to have. I've got here an interesting question. Was photography your first creative first love?

I think photography was the first, photography and writing were the first sort of media that I pursued or forms of communication that I pursued that probably led to me having a real shot at getting that internship. Because before I had to produce that application video, I had done these study abroad programs, I'd done this trip through Europe with my friends and I would send email updates to family members where I'd tell the stories and then I'd shoot photography and I'd

send back pictures, and so I had sort of a sample body of work, photography and writing. That when it came time to make a case for myself as being a capable storyteller for this world traveler internship, I wasn't just pointing to one video total. I was pointing to the other things, the photography, the writing. If I go way, way back in time, I've always enjoyed being creative. I mean, I did, I used to do charcoal drawings as a kid.

I've always loved music. I've loved singing. I played some instruments poorly, but that's because I liked singing more. So for me, think music, writing, when I was an angsty, existential teenager for numerous years, dark, foreboding times, writing, creating collages, like creating wax works and art class, stuff like that. that, not wax works, like a bust, not like a.

like Dolly Parton bust, but more, I wish. like mixed media, stuff like that was both a really powerful form of communication because I loved it, but also ⁓ like a lifeline for me when I was younger. So photography being my first love, maybe not. Probably one of the first things that lent itself to making a living as a storyteller, yeah. But the creative bent existed before that and in different forms that.

were never for public consumption, but were very much what kept me tethered to the planet.

Yeah. And do you find our generation interesting because we grew up before smartphones and videos. Okay. The great example is your kids, right? When your kids grow up, I think they're going to be dominated by these things, phones and video, right? And they might just see you through social media, but for us growing up, there was no social media in that sense. So all we had really was magazines, people writing. Blogs came in as well, like Nomadic Matt, who we both know. He came in early doors and started to write blogs about travel.

And also photography has always been there. So do you think we're the last generation to kind of see those as really valuable or do you think they still hold a bit of value?

I mean, I think they still hold value, tremendous amount of value, because to work with your hands to do something tactile is a very different experience. At the same time, it's probably true that anyone who's young now or in the future will learn more ways of being creative that are digital versus physical or tactile. So the creation of AI art or whatever it is. I mean, even the act of writing.

Like do people still learn, not penmanship, but do people still write in their classes in high school, in elementary school? I don't actually know. We had to learn cursive. I'm sure that's not a thing anymore. So to create with one's hands, I think will forever be important, but not necessarily prioritized. And I'm just as guilty of it. I mean, I don't create with my hands nearly as often as I do with digital tools. I do have some vision boards that are next.

required outcome and just like sit down whether it's a journal and a pen or or a magazine and a pair of scissors and a glue stick and see if anything fun happens.

find that fun. That is fun, isn't it? I know people are different, but I think either playing an instrument because I grew up with music or just getting drawing. I'm crap at drawing. I'm really bad, but I do love the process of just like, I may try and copy, you know, draw my photo there. Let's try and draw that. I do find that quite fun. I know exactly. Yeah. I accept it.

You don't have to be good at it. That's the-

And how do we forget that? Certainly I forget that. But when we're adults, we're more wired for efficiencies and for things that we already know how to do. And so being bad at things, not knowing how to do things is uncomfortable. But I have a three and a half year old and his whole job is to like learn new things, learn how to do things, learn how things work. And you better believe I never see him going, I'm so embarrassed. I'm not good at this. He's just like, sometimes he gets frustrated.

if he tries something 10 times and it hasn't worked yet, but he's not in a head space where he thinks he has to be good at something the first time or that there has to be a perfect outcome.

Exactly. I think we need to get back to those times if you can. It's really hard as an adult. I get it. you almost feel like you're wasting time, don't you? If you go back to that mentality of, you know what? I'm really rubbish at this. I'm going to spend two hours doing it. But it doesn't matter. It's fine. It's like that flow state you get into that again, can't be underrated.

It unlocks so much too. I should do it more. Frankly, as a result of this conversation, hopefully it inspires me to spend more time each week to do it. I've been taking voice lessons because I used to love singing and do it more often. Then over time, it became a mental block for me where I was like, well, if I'm not using it professionally and I don't sound like Adele yet, why would I do it? But I sing in the shower, I sing in my daily life. I have the best time. just don't terrified of letting anyone hear it.

That didn't used to be true. And so as a gift, my husband got me some one-on-one voice lessons with this absolutely incredible soul and jazz singer in Portland. And every time I step into the space, I'm scared and excited and I like feel my pulse ratchet up and we spend an hour and I step out into the world and there was no specific required outcome. And I am so energized because I did a thing that requires me to show up.

be creative, have a sense of play. And it's not for my work. And it's not a thing that is in order to be productive, which in our late stage capitalist world is sort of like how we assign value to ourselves and others is how productive can you be. That's not the point of being humans on this earth. Like it's not just productivity. And so to create a separation between creative pursuits in your daily life and say like, what if I were just creative for play?

Again, cooking. What if I just tried to cook something new? Decorating the cake badly, took markers to a piece of paper. I started making in the pandemic cards for friends. I would draw on the front with colored pencils. Sometimes they were really bad and I sent them anyway. I should do that again. Frankly, that was really fun. You can hear me smiling. I'm so happy when I think about it. Some of them were bad, but I liked doing it.

funny

So anticaptist that is, you're designing your own little car instead of buying it. Is there a better activity than just sitting in a car? I don't know where you can get this activity anywhere else, but you've got the music on really loud and you're, you are yelling out those, those tunes, right? I'm actually trying to think of a scenario, unless you're professional singer on stage or you're doing a gig, maybe shower might be another one where you can literally just bang out a tune. Yeah. Loud and no one, no one hears, no one cares, but you're just releasing that energy. Is there better, like some of your favorite songs, is there better activity? Not sure.

It's so joyful. You can sound however you sound and you just feel it reverberate through your very bones. Like what it is to be alive is moments like that. A beautiful sunset, a perfect bite of a meal and singing your favorite song loudly, unabashedly.

Yeah, that is an activity people should at least do once a day. People probably drive to their job, just get in the car and sing their heart out. Why not?

They're too busy listening to podcasts like this one. So we're going to go pause, hit pause. Don't exit out, but do hit pause. Turn on your favorite song. This is a music break. We'll see you on the other side.

Yeah, I'm sorry, yeah.

Okay, so ⁓ we're back to travel and yeah, after the break. The person just banged out a three minute tune in the car, which is fine. They're releasing their energy. So we're to go around to travel to inspire them even more. You've been to 80 countries, I think, or you call them places, which is probably a better term. Where do we start with this? How does your travel look like these days compared to maybe what you're doing in STA days? I guess it's much different with a child.

If you're doing pleasure travel, guess work travel comes into it as well. Yeah.

So definitely it looks different. When I first started working in media production, I would be in the field for two or three months at a time on a project. That, for obvious reasons with a three and a half year old is not sustainable. So that's sad. I mean, to be fair, there were people in the field back then who would, they'd be in the field and they'd have families back home, but it was always men. And it's still very much frowned upon for a woman to, a professional or unprofessional woman to leave the home if she has.

a child or children at home. But for me, that pace, that sort of type of travel schedule doesn't feel appealing now. And so I will work a fair amount remotely in pre-production on media production projects, then it will go on site for something or on location for something, and then it'll come home and I'll do post-production for that project. And so I try to keep...

projects to the five to ten day range and often there there are shorter stints within the US that are five days long. Sometimes an international trip is really hard to jam into ten days because three of those are traveling to and from these remote destinations. But I do a couple big international trips for work each year, a couple big international trips for pleasure each year, and then a lot of

much at all. I did just get back from a trip to Italy with my family and we were gone for 10 days, my husband, my kid and I. And it was supremely fun. Our kid is a really good traveler. It took almost 24 hours to get to and from multiple flights, about a hundred thousand buses, if I had to guess the number of a lot of trains, a of, lot of transit. And there was even a moment where we almost missed a train at Rome's Termini station, the main station.

yeah, huge station.

What I would like to say is no fault of our own. We got there almost an hour early, plenty of time. They don't put on ⁓ the board your platform for your train until 10 minutes in advance. So 10 minutes in advance of departure, we start to scan our tickets to go through the gates and they're not working. Then people are getting jammed up and everyone's getting frustrated. And you see the minutes ticking down until the departure of your train, which has just been listed with its platform, right? We finally get through by going a different

gate way down the way. We walk as fast as we can to our platform, or so we think. We follow all the signs to platform two east. We get to the platform, it just says two. We try to get on the train and this lady working for Train Italia, we must have been the pthieth confused tourists to try to get on this train. She's like, this is a not platform two east. Go, this is a not.

She just starts screaming. She is pissed. And we're like, what do mean? We followed the signs. She's like, you have to go back to the gates, around platform one, and all the way down. There are no more signs. The signs have stopped. So I blame the lack of signage. We're like, what do you mean all the way down? She's like, just keep going. So at this point, we have about two minutes until departure. A three and a half year old, tall though he may be, he's not as tall as I am, or as my husband.

We are sprinting and we're among other confused tourists who are adults with much longer legs than a three and a half year old sweating. It's 97 degrees. It's unseasonably hot in Rome. And I will say, bless my child. He ran as fast as his little legs could carry him. I would have carried him if I didn't have our bags and my husband had our bags and we travel light, but we're all sprinting and we're all sweating. And my kid's going, mama, I'm tired. And I was like, me too.

to buddy keep it up I'm proud of you and he was like I'm proud of you mama and I'm not even exaggerating when I say our train was like a third of a mile away from the terminal and we got there and the doors closed behind us and the train left at that instant. I share all this to loop way back in time to when you asked me about travel and what it looks like these days. I travel with my family.

I travel for my work. I try to instill the same love of adventure into my kid as I do with projects that I produce. And it's really supremely cool to see this small human find a sense of adventure and he'll wake up and say things like, it's a beautiful day today. Are we going on an adventure? Or like, mama, can we go to the airport today? And I'll be like, not today, bud, but thanks for asking.

So are you still like a backpacker at heart? that what your instinct is?

Don't get me wrong, if a client's like, we're gonna put you up in a nice hotel, I'll be like, sounds good. But, but I have spent the vast majority of my career looking for the deal. And so that meant sleeping in a lot of hostels, it means eating a lot of delicious, wonderful, and sometimes questionable street food. All the moments leading up to this have been seeing as much as possible without breaking the bank.

And that still feels true, because life is expensive and life with a kid is expensive. And so if I can live that more adventurous cause, I'm not going to buy first class tickets probably ever in my life. I guess I don't want to speak for future me, but, Nabra, I'm much more like, how many adventures can we get for this dollar versus can I have the swankiest experience?

same as me. Yeah, exactly the same as me. also Italy, just a point. I know, I, the thing with a hotel, right? You're right. If someone at work is going to say, look, we'll pick up in hotel. Like we went to India this year and with our network and yeah, five star hotels. Great. If you're paying for that, you better be in that hotel most of your trip. Cause otherwise you're paying for something you're not going to see. So I'm like, well, yeah, a bit of comfort is nice, but it's not going to be too expensive because you want to spend that money on the adventure or the trip or the.

activity right? Surely.

Yeah, and I've learned what for me is worth spending the money on and what isn't. So if it's a matter of like a hotel room that is $200 more per night or $200 spent on like a glacier trekking tour that I'm only gonna have a chance to once, I'm gonna do the glacier trekking tour and sleep in a bed that's pretty hard for the night instead.

Exactly. Exactly that. I just want to say for Italy, getting trains is a nightmare because they're the same number. And I totally get your problem here. We went to Italy to do like a, the micro nations thing. We tried to do trains around to Andorra and all that sort of stuff. But yeah, we had the same problem. think it was like the Italian word for platform's bin. I think it's bin, right? It's the Italian word for binaria. Yeah. So it says bin two, bin two. Like, well, they're the same. So it is potluck if you're going to...

Go for one of them so I totally get your pain.

We even had on the return back to Rome, we had tickets from this city called Arezzo back to Rome's Termini Station. And it was one train, no changes. We had our tickets, we scanned them, we got on our train. And part way through the journey, the train stopped and said, this is the final stop in a city called Orte, which is like an hour and a half away from Rome's Termini Station. And we're like, what? And it's like final stop. So everybody gets off the train, which is

the train we were supposed to be on, which has no changes. And we're like, what happened? Nobody knew. Because it was a weekend, there was no one working from train Italia. The next trains that were supposed to be coming through to go to Rome's Cherenie station were two hours later. We ended up speaking to some folks in my very broken Italian and they're better than my Italian English and learning that the train just stopped and didn't continue for the day. Like it just changed schedules.

Tryna tell ya.

But there were Italians who had tickets for a train that didn't exist. It just never. And I was like, well, God, I'm glad it's not just us being dumb. It's like train Italia just decided like these trains don't need to be a thing today.

It's the most satisfying reason when you hear locals going, do you know what? We don't know either. You're like, what? ⁓

I'm

off the hook. Yeah, he was like using the hand gesture as he was talking to the one train Italia guy who stepped onto the platform, bless him, another train and the guy was like, Kit Kats, so Kit Kats. And the guy's like, I don't know what to tell you, bro, just get on the next one. Like, sorry, we decided those trains weren't gonna be a thing today.

So the lesson here is if you're traveling in Italy, Trent Italia, they have strikes, have cancellations. It is all a real thing. So you need a bit of time and a bit of luck.

Just talk to the guy with the colorful hand gestures who's standing next to a nun, then we'll help.

That was who helped us. This is real. Yeah.

Yeah. Do you have like a favorite area of the world you like traveling in for leisure?

anywhere with vast expanses of space. I like big, big spaces, huge mountain ranges, things like that, because they are inspiring and they're beautiful. And I like to hike, so there are ample challenges for me in these big spaces. But also I am very appreciative of places that make me feel small that remind me of just how big it all is. Because it's very, very nice to feel small in the face of things that are greater.

I've got a photo vision board here of me in Langtang Valley. And if you want to feel small, go and walk the Langtang Valley track and then you realize how small you are in Nepal.

Nepal is so high on my list. I've wanted to do some of the top there forever. The only part of the Himalaya I've been to is Bhutan and there's a big truck I'd like to do there too, but I'd love to go to Nepal and do some

How was Bhutan? That's my number one on my list. Hopefully this year maybe.

It's beautiful. Yeah, there's ⁓ loads of protected ⁓ nature. mean, I think it's like 70 % of Bhutan is protected area. Himalaya. A culture that is remarkably visible.

still in the modern era where you see people dressing in the traditional dress, because it's just what they wear around the capital city when they're going to the market and stuff, even young people. So they could go to a whiskey bar and listen to rock, but be wearing the traditional garb. And then you've probably heard, but if you haven't and folks listening in haven't, there's this sort of charming notion of instead of gross national product, they measure gross national happiness. So what is people's overall sense of wellbeing? So there's a lot to love.

Happiness.

I will say there are a lot of chilies there in all the food. So if you haven't gotten primed yet on eating spicy food, there will be chilies in probably every meal, and this will be a chance for a thrill.

Okay, I do love chilies. I'm one of those people who likes to think they can handle them. Maybe I can't. But that's from Nepal and India. Just a little bit of experience.

I

actually think, ⁓ I think my time in Bhutan helped me be able to handle them. Cause I have like all Northern European heritage where like pickled hair, not, not chili pepper energy. So digestion for the, the Northern lands doesn't involve a lot of hot, spicy food. But being in Bhutan and being forced to eat chilies in every meal, I think sort of primed me in a way I wasn't prepared for. Cause I was always like, I feel great the next day. That's the question. And so all in all, a great trip.

Do you have a country or a culture that really resonated with you?

⁓ That's tough. There are a lot of places where I'm thinking of right now where people have been just remarkably receptive and hospitable and kind. And for me, that's always so rewarding where people are like, if you try even in a basic form to speak the language, people will suddenly bring you into their shop or their home and get you tea and introduce you to their mother-in-law and like,

So there are so many places where culturally people have just been remarkably hospitable that that's what comes to mind, whether it's North Africa and Morocco, it's Latin America, like all through the Caribbean, where people sort of have their front door open and they're sitting on the stoop and they're chatting with their neighbors. And there are lots of corners of the globe where that exists. I think probably in the latitudes where there's a warmer climate as well, people leave their doors open. I think that leads to an openness of behavior too, sort of a necessary.

leaving of the home because the house gets really hot and people interact. so I don't know if there's one place where the culture resonates that immediately comes to mind, but there are so many places where I've been in awe of how welcoming people

And talk to the people, how do you ensure that you are integrated into people of a certain place you're traveling? Do you do like walking tours? you book like local tours, like local artisan tours, like food tours? How do you get stuck into the local culture?

I ask people like, where's a good spot to get a pastry? What's a good restaurant? Like, I also, if I'm walking around, I walk away from the main squares. walk a few walks away and you'll start to see more locals existing than if you're in the big square where all the tourists go to get the photos. And to be fair, like go to the, go to the, go to the Coliseum.

talking about Italy, go to the Coliseum, check it out. But also if you just wander into the neighborhood nearby, you'll see more people that look less like you with your fanny pack and your camera and maybe more like they live there and then sort of figure out what they're up to. So that's a way to get integrated is like ask people, what do you recommend? Where do you go? Like see where the locals go. Another thing is a parent that I don't think I would have appreciated and probably it would have sounded creepy if I said this.

four years ago when my kid didn't exist yet. But turns out that if you seek out a playground in a place, assuming you have a child, if you seek out a playground in a place, it's a great place to meet people. And so you go and your kids interact and they start playing together and they're not worried about language barrier and they can interact. then you start talking to the parents or the grandparents who were there and like there was this.

sweet lady that I was speaking to whose name is Sara. And Sara, she's the grandmother of a kid who was at the park in Rome a week ago. And she was like, she seemed to believe I have better Italian than I do, because I followed a percentage of what she was saying. But we had this big conversation and are now friends and she follows me on Instagram and like she showed me all these cute pictures of herself on adventures. And that's because we went to a local park.

that wasn't just a spot where a bunch of tourists go, but rather where people go sort of spend the hot afternoon in the shade of the trees and the ruins of this old Roman bath complex. And we got to talking to local people.

tell you what, that is a unique travel tip on the podcast. That, I don't think I've heard anyone else say playgrounds.

One more, go to the grocery store. ⁓ my God, get, A, you get loads of new interesting treats and snacks. And if you have no idea what it says, but it looks like it might taste good, try it. And you're saving money because you're not eating at a restaurant all the time. And you might end up talking to some fun folks. So go to the grocery store. Don't always go to the restaurants. These are ways to integrate yourself locally in ways that are like low, low barrier to entry.

Like a local one.

Walk further from the plaza, talk to locals and ask what they recommend, go to the grocery store.

Okay. And what's your rule on... This is a leisure travel still. Going to a new place. Do you go back to places that you love or do you try and get one or two new ones in a year?

are true. mean, I'm continuously excited by going someplace I haven't been before, but I am old enough now to recognize that I'm not going to see it all, which is kind of a relief. You cannot see everywhere in the world. can't see every inch of our planet. That takes the pressure off. So I'm now much more comfortable with returning again and again to places that I love, like Italy. Italy, this is my fourth or fifth trip. I guess if I were in Europe, that would not be that many times in a lifetime, but coming all the way from the

the Pacific Northwest. Each trip is a long one. And every time has been amazing because I get to new experiences. there are places that Mexico City, Japan, there are many places in the world where I would return over and over, given the chance.

Okay, we're going to wrap around back to where we can find you and do a quick fire travel question feature at the end. I've got one slightly deep question about travel. What's a moment on your travels that made you question who you are?

I think there are moments on lots of different trips I've had that made me question, sometimes in ways that made me feel expansive and connected, and sometimes in ways that made me feel lonely or homesick, isolated. And it sort of is one of those scenarios where you say context is everything. Like how long have I been on the road? Do I know anybody? How far am I from anyone that I know? Because

I could be in the, I'm thinking of this cool expedition I did to the Peruvian Amazon, a canoe expedition a couple years ago. And we were on the banks of this river in the middle of the jungle and telling stories and singing songs and people were speaking in a native language. And then I speak Spanish. And so we were sort of like translating, doing our best to translate with local guides and the local people and singing songs and sitting under the stars and feeling like this is an environment that is unfamiliar to me because I'm from

the Midwest of the US, but my heritage is like Northern Europe. I felt so connected. It felt like I understood this landscape as the lungs of the earth. It felt lush. It felt inviting. Yes, there were a of spiders and venomous snakes and things like that, but I felt really connected to place and to people. And like we were all there together and what a beautiful thing it was. There was a moment in Antarctica where I had another project and I was traveling solo, but I was surrounded by people.

because I was on an expedition ship with a couple hundred people, 150 people or something. And I remember feeling really, really lonely at the ends of the earth. And by no fault of place, the place is one of the favorite places I've ever been. But just a moment in time where I think I probably felt insignificant and far away. questioning who I am is something that I think is a continuous act. think that the older I get, the less tightly I hold to who I was supposed to be. More time I spend on this planet.

the less tightly I hold to one specific idea of who I'm supposed to be.

Yeah. I love your Amazon example where that sort of experience and way of living is kind of looked down upon in this like Western captives world. might look down on that sort of way of living, right? But how on earth can you do that when you're literally in, like you say, the lungs of the world? Yeah. And there's people around you singing songs, native people, stars. mean, it get

It doesn't. And my husband, I'm reminded of this moment where he, like Gordon Ramsay was on the TV and it was a travel show for Nat Geo. And he said something, these people in this remote corner of the jungle had cooked a meal that looked just really beautiful. Remote meaning like no outpost of civilization, air quotes nearby or anything like that. And they're sourcing from the land. he's like, and look at this incredible meal in the middle of nowhere.

My husband was like, it's not the middle of nowhere to them. It's the middle of everywhere. Like what an out of touch thing to say. The middle of nowhere. It's the middle of their everywhere.

Yeah, their life, their existence. ⁓

Whole

existence is based in that place. And that's why they have such a beautiful connection to it, knowledge about it. And so the experience that I had in the Amazon was one of deep connection because I was there with the people who are the best stewards for the place and the best people to invite me in and what a blessing to be invited.

Yeah, amazing experience. That's awesome. Okay. Before we wrap up with the questions, where can people find you to maybe check out some of your work? It could be social media, web, anything you want to share.

You can find me at RachelRomes, R-A-C-H-E-L-R-O-A-M-S. Say hi anytime I'm on all the platforms. RachelRomes.com is my website too.

Does that have your speaking recordings like TEDx and stuff like that?

Yeah, there's some speaking recordings on the website. There is a tab on the website that should lead you to work samples for on-camera hosting, another one for speaking, and then you can find some social media work from there as well.

fair to say you know what you're doing you are ME nominated so you should know your stuff.

I'm learning. Here's the key. I'm learning.

Yes, we're all learning. Yes, every day is a learning day, Okay, to wrap up the episode, it's quick fire travel questions. You might not like some of these. These are your favorite things you've seen worldwide. So I'm going to start with... It's travel question time. Top three favorite places.

Patagonia, Japan, Mexico City.

it. Three places you've not traveled to that be next on your hit list.

Greenland next on my hit list as opposed to top a bucket list, right? Because I mean, if I'm just like dreaming big, I'm going to say Nepal.

Okay, dream big, why not.

Yeah, yeah. So Greenland, Nepal.

man. Okay. And what about three of your favourite cuisines?

Indian food every time. Japanese food. My husband saw a little sushi shaped like a salmon nigiri Hot Wheels at the grocery store last night and he almost bought it for me. And I think it was a missed opportunity. Amen. Italian food. Having just come back from Italy, like they can do no

Yeah. Okay. Are you a sunrise or sunset person? Sunset. What about a favorite walk or hike?

I really liked this multi-day trek called the W that my husband and I did in Southern Chile in Patagonia. I also loved, we hiked up Kilimanjaro for our honeymoon and ⁓ that was rad.

Okay. And tomorrow, if you could go and live somewhere for a year, they've not lived in before, because I think you lived in three countries, I think, I saw in the bio. Where are you going to live?

Amsterdam.

Because the brother and sister-in-law on my husband's side, they lived there for a couple years with their girls. We went and visited them while they were there. Don't tell Amsterdam this, but the times I had been before, I didn't love it. Probably because I'm like, I'm not good at drugs. And I was just seeing the touristy fun where people go smoke pot. We visited them and I was like, what a rad place. an amazing sort of community city, amazing place to be based, but also jumping off point for adventure with young kids.

Okay. That actually leaves nice as the next question. Has there been a place or two they traveled to that you didn't like?

Hard

time in India. So even though it's my favorite food in the world, it was not easy for a blonde woman to travel there. And I had a hard time in China. Similarly, I was very much sort of an alien life form there and people treated me like it. My sister-in-law is from China, my nieces are half Chinese. Like my husband has had amazing experiences in China. My brother-in-law lived there for seven years. They've had such different experiences. But for me, sort of traveling solo for a month through China, I was like, I get it. I'm not like you.

Okay.

Wow, that's interesting. Okay, that's that's high on my list. That is the like solo travel in China. Yeah, okay

Fascinating. The history, the cuisine, like there's so much that's fascinating. I just was gawked at a lot. Like people would come up and take pictures in my face and then just walk away. And I was like, I feel so violated.

Okay, and for rest of time, if you can only have one view, what are you looking at? Okay, what's the backdrop of-

My husband and my kids. You

about the world. You didn't get to know the world, but I don't care where I am. If I get to look at my two favorite people, at whatever age they are, I will be happy anywhere.

it. Okay? If you could sit somewhere with a cup of coffee to watch the world go by for an afternoon, where are going to sit?

In

the mountains. I'm picturing this little Swiss style cabin my husband and I stayed in for our 10 year wedding anniversary in Kosovo last October. Having a hot coffee looking out over the Danaric Alps in Kosovo is dreamy.

Wow, that does sound dreamy. I'll have to research that. Okay, few more questions. We'll come back around to landmark one in a minute. What about three favorite cities?

Mexico City, Edinburgh, Marrakech. One landmark that comes to mind, I don't know if it's my favorite, the ⁓ thinking about tracks that we've done around the world, the Torres, so the towers, these three rock spires that are visible in Torres del Paine National Park in Chile. They're visible if you do a day hike, they're visible if you do the W or the O circuit. So my husband said to me today, he's like,

Okay and landmark

If money were no object, we were talking about Jeff Bezos' stupid wedding. He was like gonna basically run out Venice, whatever. My husband's like, but really, if money were no object, where would you get married? I was like, I don't know. Some place like in front of the Taurus, in Taurus del Paine. Like a place where just nature's doing its thing, you know? So I don't know if it's my favorite landmark, but it's top of mind. It's a place that is so dramatic that it's hard not to feel amazed by being here on our planet.

Yeah, nature is incredible, isn't it? Okay. Last question is if someone's listening right now and they're a bit nervous about traveling maybe to a place that they've been before or a different culture, what one or two sentences can you give them to maybe get them to get a flight booked and get out there?

There are a lot of reasons to overthink doing anything, walking out the front door in the morning. But once you do it, it's much easier to be out there. And I will say that every trip I've come home from, I relish having had those experiences and those memories, whether things were perfect the whole way or not. I mean, my trips have never been perfect the whole way, if we're honest. You heard about me almost missing that train. But I would also say that I believe everything in life is either a good experience or a good story later.

If it is both, you're having an amazing day. So go out there, live the experience, you'll come home with some of your favorite lived moments and some of your funniest stories.

stories.

Well, Rachel, I love your radiance and your passion for travel. So thanks coming on to the podcast. It's great to meet you in person last year. It's great to get you on the podcast to meet you again a year and a later. So thanks for coming on, having a chat. And in a weird way, I quite like podcast episodes where I feel like there's more that I've not heard. gives scope for bit of intrigue, a bit of, oh, maybe I should check her out and see what she's doing. So I think that's a good thing to have on a podcast episode. So thanks for coming on.

Thanks for having me.

Thanks so much. Appreciate it. Thanks for tuning in to the podcast episode today. If you've been inspired by today's chat and want to book some travel, if you head to the show notes, you'll see some affiliate links below which helps support this podcast. You'll find Skyscanner to book your flight. You'll find Booking.com to book that accommodation. Want to stay in a super cool hostel? You'll see Hostel World down there too. You'll find Revolut to get your travel card sorted. Click the GIGSKY link to get your eSIM ready for your trip.

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