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For my entire life, I have always imagined packing my bags and leaving wherever I was living for the great unknown.  After some minor trips here and there, I kept letting college, love, work and life in general get in the way.  I left a state park position in Central Florida (Leesburg/The Villages area) to promote to a County Park Manager position in Gilchrist County area, which is very close to my home town and was an area I spent a bit of time in growing up.  My move motive was primarily to put me closer to a guy I was dating at the time, not so much the job, even though it met my career goals (to be called and asked to apply to a position vs the traditional I seek them out style).  I moved there in May 2010, the guy I was dating dumped me in October after he “changed his mind,” so I was in an area that I really wasn’t crazy about, in a job that was just OK and guy-less.  It felt like starting over, plus my direct supervisor resigned and the new one was all right, but did not understand park life.  That’s a story for another time.

A year later, my dad had a heart attack (and thankfully lived, barely).  That was a reminder that we aren’t always promised tomorrow and I am a firm believer in not having regrets. 

I made some small trips over a couple year period, like to North Carolina to go skiing with a friend and to New York for the same purpose with my brother.  A taste of travel always drives the wanderlust people to crave it more.  

I truly am a restless soul unless I travel fairly often.

In early 2012, I met a guy online, even though I really was not looking for anyone.  I knew I wanted to travel so I had been doing the online dating thing just to avoid meeting someone serious.  You know, I was going for the “if I’m semi looking, I’ll never find it” instead of the “hit me out of nowhere” method.  Well, despite my desire not to get into a serious relationship, I ended up marrying him, the man of my dreams, a few years later. 

Epic fail, LoL, but hey, I’ll take it.  This is a perfect example of everything happening for a reason (my move back to the area, the job, failed relationships, etc). 

One thing about this perfect man is his understanding of me.  We had only been dating about five months when I was back to hating my job and needed a short vacation.  I decided to take a trip to the panhandle (St. Joe area) and met up with my folks to go scalloping.  This was a super fun trip!  However, I probably won’t do much scalloping in my future because it wasn’t worth the effort, haha. 

Apparently we were late in the season and they had been harvested a lot already, then you have to clean them and cook them.  It was a sad, pathetic amount for three people, but we had a lot of fun and I chuckle about it every time I think about it.  This is what the best memories are made of, silly trips and wonderful fails.

Anyhow, on this quick trip of mine, which was about a three hour drive, my mind started racing (along with my little red Toyota Celica) and I started wondering why I couldn’t take all of my savings, my little car, a bag of clothes and go on a journey.  To where?  Who knows and who cared?  Not me, just anywhere!  One problem though: I had an awesome new-ish guy in my life who was not in any position to do this kind of thing with me.

Several things happened that motivated me it was time to go: 

• My parents were understanding and knew of my life long plans;

• My amazing boyfriend said if I needed to do this, he was supportive even though he couldn’t go with me;

• My job was not fun at all;

• I got super-duper sick during a tropical storm and stayed at a friend’s vacant house, coming to the realization of how much I liked being away from the park (I had to live on site while working there, meaning on-call 24/7);

• Lastly, my friend offered for me to move there rent free (pay electric) so I could keep an eye on the home AND have a place to live. 

Oh yeah, a song played on the radio giving me a faith-based support, too.  Done deal! 

I gave my two week notice and that was that! $10K saved in the bank, hardly any monthly expenses, a nearly free place to live, an economical car, supportive family, friends and boyfriend and an open map in front of me.  What more could a free spirited 27yo want?

While I realize there isn’t a lot of travel information in this post, I feel it is important to share some background on how I got to this point where I did some of my biggest traveling, and just a little insight on me as a person.  My next posts will be about my actual road trip and subsequent journeys over the next four months of 2012.

Road Trip Part 1:  Georgia & Tennessee

Road Trip Part 2:  Kentucky & Indiana

Road Trip Part 3:  Chicago, St. Louis, Memphis, New Orleans & Florida!