surfer girl goes global

You can’t just read the guide book. You’ve got to throw yourself in, eat the food, use the wrong verbs, get charged double and end up kissing complete strangers – or is that just me? Stop asking questions. Go and do it! -Dr Who, Series 1 Ep7

I guess that’s kind of my philosophy for life. I use pop culture as philosophy. My name is Colleen, I’m 26 and I call my trusty 60L backpack my home, or whatever floor it’s contents are strewn about on home. I used to call a beautiful hay coloured, sticker covered, 1985 Nissan Bluebird home but unfortunately our time has come to an end. I’ve discovered that’s just how it goes when you’re travelling, nothing is permanent.

Definitely not a guidebook, my blog is a testament to my life on the road – however long that lasts. It started when I was a kid I wanted to be an astronaut, an exchange student, adventure and travel, new things and new places. I was always really independent. When I was 15 I signed on for a trip to El Salvador to work and live in an orphanage for a month one summer. It was an amazing and life changing experience and only solidified my need to travel and the realization that I was destined for more than just Winnipeg.

After high school I worked and saved and flew to New Zealand for a year long working holiday. Alone on the other side of the world for the first time in my life I was ecstatic, I did everything I could regardless of the consequences and loved every minute of it. Since then I tried university but it wasn’t for me, bored of Winnipeg I moved out to the West Coast so I could try my hand at surfing. Unfortunately it’s hard to get to a surfing spot from Vancouver and while I did get out on the waves a handful of times with long winters and an abundance of mountains within 20 minutes drive from the city snowboarding became my passion.

I knew it wasn’t going to last because I had a friend’s wedding in Australia looming in the near future. I decided I would use the trip there as a springboard for my next great adventure and began figuring out what I wanted from my trip. I would live and work in Australia for two years and then if the money held up I would travel through South East Asia, Nepal to Trek the Himalayas, China to take the Trans-Siberian Railway across Russia, to Israel to work on a Kabbitz, Egypt, Morocco, Europe and just keep going as long as I could.

I’m not much of a planner and as much as I read and researched I ended up in Melbourne in August 2008, with my snowboard, $1000, and no real idea what I was doing. I must have done something right because a year later and I’m still here, back in Melbourne after almost a year of calling Queensland’s Sunshine Coast home.

I love the adventure of travel - sightseeing, photo ops and drinking foreign alcohol but as I’ve grown older it’s become more about going out there and actually experiencing how other people live. Growing up in Canada you have so much and never really have to worry about anything. We know that there are so many people out there who live every day with the possibility of dying be it from disease or war or poverty but we’re so far removed it’s more of an afterthought. I just want to go out there and live it and see it and be a part of it and help in whatever way I can.

I still have no idea how things are going to work out but I have had and continue to have an amazing time despite brief periods of homesickness, loneliness and boredom. It’s just part of the lifestyle. I love it and in the end I wouldn’t ask for anything else, well…  maybe more money.

Come experience the joys and pitfalls and people and places of life on the road in Australia and beyond.