“Two roads diverged in a wood and I – I took the one less traveled by.” - Robert Frost

I don't think I've ever been able to relate to any quote as much as I relate to this one. I've always liked to be unique. I didn't have much of a choice starting at birth. There aren't many Gerty's left under the age of 85, but never cared. Truth be told, I love it. I like being different, standing out, surprising people. Which is exactly what I did when I chose to delay school centered learning and entered the real world for a year.

During my sophomore year of high school, I knew I was going to take a gap year. I didn’t know where I would go or what I would do. All I knew was that I wanted to explore the world.

After my dad graduated high school, he took a post-grad year at King’s School Bruton in Somerset, England. There, he met Peter Robinson and Antony Shewell. They became some of my Dad’s, and now our family’s, greatest friends (along with one of his Professors David Hindley who we now refer to as “Uncle” Hindley). When Peter and his wife Kate had their daughter Kim, they asked my Dad to be her God Father.

Eighteen years later, Kim came to stay with my family for the first part of her gap year. Seeing her pictures and listening to her tell us stories of her travels, I was inspired. Two quick years later, it was my turn. Before I knew it, I was hopping on a plane to Madrid.

My first few days in Spain were really hard. I’m not going to sugarcoat it and say I was just jet-lagged. For the first five days I wanted to go home. What do you get when you mix a six hour time difference with the culture shock of everyone speaking a different language then add in anxiety?

The one thing that made the big difference for me was Hunter Hayes. To say he’s my favorite singer is not enough because he's so much more than that (but that’s a whole different story for another time;). In the spring of my senior year, he released his tour dates for the UK. My immediate thought was, “England and Ireland aren’t too far from Spain.” SO I bought tickets for his shows in Manchester and Dublin. I told myself that I absolutely positively could NOT go home until I saw those concerts. Thank God for that. I was so engulfed in my anxiety that I couldn’t see that it was the transition (not the trip) that would be hard.Granted, I still struggled unbelievably hard to understand what everyone was saying all the time but at least I was having a grand ole time!

I am beyond glad I decided to stay. I learned so much about myself and how to survive as a functioning human and do actual adult things. Okay, I’ll stop rambling now. Here are some things I learned:

1. How to save money

Yes, I did in fact fund my own travels. I worked at a daycare during the school year and then at a girls camp during the summer. I actually ended up coming home early because I was running low on mula and I asked my parents if I could borrow some money and they were like, “LOL no.” So I was like, “LOL OK I’m coming home early then.”

2. How to find the cheapest ways to travel

GoogleFlights and GoEuro were my bffs <3

3. Hostels are loud- BRING HEADPHONES OR EARPLUGS

People in hostels generally sleep from midnight until 7AM and they don’t care who else in the room is still sleeping they just get up and get their travel on. If you are a light sleeper (like me), make sure you take a sleep mask (people like to turn on the main light even if it’s only convenient for them) and some earplugs or headphones with some white noise or music to block out the noise (I usually listened to a youtube video of waves on the beach).

4. Food is expensive

I didn’t buy many souvenirs so people kept asking me where all my money went. “I either ate it or I visited it.” On those rare occasions that I was traveling with people and they picked a nice restaurant I didn't want to be rude but the whole time I was wishing I was at Lidl grabbing a sandwich or some microwave noodles.

5. You get v mature

At least I did. There was something rewarding about planning and traveling by myself that made me mature a LOT. I did everything for myself and that made me grow up.

6. It is possible to survive without a phone

I went the whole six months without a phone and I survived to tell the tale. Hard to believe, huh?

7. There is so much more than home

Just by looking at a map you know that obviously the world is massive. But something inexplicable happens when you are learning about something in school and all of a sudden it’s not on a page in a textbook but right in front of you and you realize how much more there is to this world. I saw 12 different countries and that felt like nothing when I looked at a map of all the continents.

And with that, I hope I've inspired you at least a little bit to go out and explore our beautiful planet while you can.