I felt called to Peru for various reasons. In April 2023, I read the Celestine Prophecy - a spiritual classic - which left a significant impression on me. It's about a young man who's drawn to Peru, and has a series of synchronistic encounters with different individuals in his travels that each have a wisdom message to impart. A book about travel as a tool for spiritual development, SOLD! 

We began to have momentum onboarding property partners based in Peru through Postcard Travel Club in the winter of 2024 who were committed to responsible travel. I took this as my green light that the timing was right to cruise on down to see what life lessons were waiting for me. 

I arrived to South Africa in September 2023 fresh off the heels of a Business of Conservation Conference hosted by the Africa Leadership University in Rwanda. My days preparing to depart were filled with foreshadowing of what I would get to explore deeper during my visit.

With many representatives from various South African private reserves present at the conference, there appeared to be a bit of a friendly sense of competition that existed between Rwanda and South Africa. Jokes were made about how nice it must be for South Africans to have escaped the loadshedding headaches, which are regular rolling blackouts due to insufficient generation energy capacity, that has haunted South Africa since 2007.

My recent whirlwind nature and community-based tourism exploration of Rwanda was motivated by a few different elements. When I visited Vietnam for a bike tour in 2019, I was wowed by the ways in which tourism was creating an amazing economic development and cross-cultural exchange opportunity within the country. And yet, as I visited some of the littered beaches, and observed who was running the tourism establishments, I wondered about the environmental impacts, and the distribution of the wealth that was created by this “boom.”

Sometimes in life, you follow the threads, and are not really sure where they are taking you, but trust in time the tapestry will weave itself together, and you will say, “Oh, that is what I was building, isn’t that interesting?!” Over the past year, following divinely woven threads of beauty and cultural curiosity led me to discover a perfect tapestry of these two themes in the annual International Folk Arts Festival in New Mexico.

The theme of “beauty” emerged as a guiding principle I committed to prioritizing in my life in November 2022. At the time, it felt like a continued shedding of my historical draw to function over form, and practicality over delight.

Where do I begin to capture my reflections on Morocco? It is a place where you can’t help but experience sensory overload as you make your way through the maze of the medina (city center), but at the same time, it is the most culturally rich place I think I have ever traveled to.

In a matter of hours you can find yourself grooving to Afrobeats, practicing your rather rusty French, learning Arabic calligraphy, appreciating wafts of Moroccan spices, admiring the vibrant carpets crafted by the Berber people in a souk (or market), and indulging in a body scrub unlike any other in a Hammam.