What Do People Take Home After Travelling With You?

“If you’re not playful, it won’t be fun. And if it’s not fun, it won’t work!”

I used to say I became a tour guide because I wanted to get paid to travel (and that was true.) But these days, I think more about what people take home after travelling with me. The photos, obviously. Probably some sand in their shoes and hopefully all their belongings. But what else? A little more confidence? A deeper connection to the places we’ve visited? A renewed sense of wonder? The realisation that they can do something they’ve spent years telling themselves they can’t?

I can’t decide what an experience will mean to someone else but I can pay attention to what I bring to it. That’s got me thinking about the question that keeps coming up in personal development and business circles: What’s your why?

In my life, I’ve been many things. A tour guide is just one of them. I first left Australia at 23 and came home four years later. I spent those years living out of my backpack, learning languages and diving into different cultures. I’ve never been particularly drawn to following the traditional tourist trail and lining up at all the famous spots. I’ve usually been more interested in what happens around the corner, off the beaten track.

I worked as a lifeguard in the States, then backpacked through Brazil for six months, only leaving because I had to. I caught a bus to Argentina, where I was running out of money and got offered an unpaid job running a hostel in Mar Del Plata, in exchange for bed and breakfast. Of course I said yes (although I’d never heard of the place!)

I’ve always enjoyed being in local areas, including places where I couldn’t speak the language. There’s something about having to find another way to connect that I love. Having said that, I also love that I now speak multiple languages. They’ve opened the door to friendships and relationships that simply wouldn’t have been possible if I’d only spoken English.

Those experiences stay with me when I’m guiding people whose first language isn’t English. Following a conversation, understanding instructions, joining in with a joke or finding the words to ask for what you need isn’t always easy. I know what that feels like.

From South America, I flew to England, where I worked for cash for six months, running cafés, working in pubs and clubs, and setting up ‘bed and breakfasts’. Then I decided to fly to South Africa, stay with a host family in Stellenbosch and get my TEFL qualification so I could keep travelling.

I spent a few months in South Africa seeing friends, then travelled through Swaziland, now Eswatini, to Mozambique, where I made more friends. We hitchhiked from the south to the north of Mozambique and into Malawi. Months earlier, I hadn’t even heard of some of these countries. Now I was travelling through them, meeting people and letting those encounters change where I went next. For me, that was a big part of being a traveller: leaving enough room for the places and people I met to create the journey.

I got a visa to work in the UK and returned to Brighton. After being poached while working in bars at events, I got a job in event management. From there, I visited mates around Europe and eventually got a job as a tour guide. I trained in Egypt, then spent about three or four months running different tours there before being flown to Turkey for a six-month season.

That meant a week hiking in the southern mountains and staying in homestays, followed by a week aboard a gulet, sailing the Mediterranean and running day trips from the boat. Yes, it was as good as it sounds. After Turkey, I moved back to Brazil. And, without even mentioning the many side trips in between, I eventually returned to Australia, four years after I’d left.

I left with $3,000 and came home with $3,000. As guides, we averaged one pound an hour and lived on tips, only receiving our wages at the end of our contracts. So yes, a six-month contract meant no wages until the six months were over. Probably part of how I managed to come home with money!

I didn’t come home intending to stay. But life did its lifey thing. I ended up teaching swimming, running a kitesurfing school and working in schools supporting migrants and refugees. Then I got my teaching degree and became a teacher.

I also created a successful school-holiday business, getting kids out of their comfort zones by teaching them to ride longboards, with a twist! Land paddling was a hit, the sessions were always sold out, and I loved running my own business. I loved watching kids find their balance, have a go and discover they could do something that had felt daunting at the start.

I worked across all sorts of subject areas and continued travelling here and there over the years. But after teaching face to face through COVID, and having some personal stuff kick me up the arse, I started asking whether this was really what I wanted my life to look like. Eventually, I chose to move out of my rental, move into my van and hit the road again. I called three companies and got three jobs. I’ve been back guiding ever since.

Alongside all of that, there’s been a lot of deep inner work. I’m fairly alternative, and I’ve explored and studied plenty of ways of understanding myself and how I move through the world. Through that work, the question keeps returning: What’s your why? So, I think it’s a question worth asking guides. Or anyone, really. Why are you doing this job?

There are plenty of honest answers. Money, freedom, travel, a change of scenery, the chance to spend more time outside. Maybe you’re just good at it. Initially, I wanted to get paid to travel. When I returned to guiding after the pandemic, though, my answer was different. I wanted to see where I might land next. I felt called to move on, but I didn’t know where, or what that next chapter might look like. Rather than picking a new place and continuing to do what I’d already been doing, I chose to start again and trust that the universe had my back.

My why changes as I do. But as I’ve got older, I’ve realised that money alone doesn’t give me enough reason to keep doing a job. The work needs to mean something to me. I’m grateful to work for Intrepid because I see care for people and places in the work we do. I doubt I’d still be guiding if I felt I was working for a company that consistently put profit ahead of both.

And I’ve come to feel that, for my why to stay meaningful and sustainable, it needs an element of service. Something beyond what I get out of it. A way of bringing my presence, passion, energy and heart to the people and places I encounter. Service doesn’t mean giving every bit of myself away. I need rest, boundaries and fair pay too. I know how much harder it is to bring patience and enthusiasm when I’m exhausted. But I need to know that my work contributes something bigger than me.

I love Australia. I love its nature, its people, its cultures, and the fact that there is always more to learn. And I love showing people this country through my eyes, sharing what I know while continuing to learn myself.

I do my best to live in awe. I still get excited when I see a kangaroo. If there’s a joey in the pouch, I’m stoked. I love the birds, dolphins, turtles, whales, trees and blossoms. I love joining First Nations-led tours, walking on Country and listening. Even when I’ve done a tour many times, I’ll happily go again. There is always something I haven’t noticed, understood or heard before. I never want familiarity to become a reason to stop paying attention.

And I love people. All types of people, of all ages, from all walks of life. I love hearing their stories. Seeing their eyes glisten when something moves them. Watching someone climb a hill they didn’t know they could climb, or put their face in the water and snorkel for the first time. Sometimes I get to witness a person surprise themselves. That’s a pretty special thing to be part of.

My why now includes being of service to the people on my tour and the country I get to call home. And maybe, just maybe, something from our time together stays with them. Maybe they go home and make the change they’ve been thinking about. Maybe they start getting excited about the birds in their own backyard, or the squirrels running along their fence. Maybe they breathe a little deeper and remember how to calm their nervous system when things get hard. Maybe they remember what it feels like to live in their body and to notice what’s around them, rather than spending the whole day caught in their thoughts.

I might never know, and that’s okay. But I do know how much certain people and encounters have changed my life, so maybe I’ll play that part in someone else’s life.

I’m just as passionate about our internal landscape as I am about the world around us. I feel how closely connected they are: what’s happening inside me affects what I notice, how I listen and how I meet the people in front of me. Through Adventurous Souls, I want to connect with guides and explore that connection. To understand our why, recognise the gifts we bring, and consider how we can offer them with care.

Every guide brings something different to the tour. I’ve written about this in the Five Guide Elements. The reality is that we are not one element; we are a dance of all five. We are storytellers, listeners, organisers, navigators and friends. Your gift might be knowledge, curiosity, steadiness, humour or warmth. Or it might be your enthusiasm for a bush chook (brush-turkey) as you excitedly let people know that they’re related to dinosaurs!

My mate Bob, the Tawny Frog-Mouth (R.I.P Bob)

These are questions I keep coming back to. If you’re a guide, or someone thinking about what you bring to your work, maybe they’re worth sitting with too.

·      When do I feel most alive in my work? What am I doing, and what am I sharing? 

·      What do people come to me for? What might that reveal about a gift I take for granted?

·      Who benefits from the way I show up? My guests, my colleagues, local communities, the places we visit? 

·      What do I hope people carry home? How do my everyday actions help make that possible? How do I lead by example?

·      Has familiarity dulled my curiosity? How can I look at things again with fresh eyes? 

·      What do I need to care for in myself so I can keep offering that gift?

·      Has my why changed? Am I giving myself permission to change with it?

Like I said before, I began guiding to see the world. These days, I want to help others fall a little more in love with it (and hopefully themselves) along the way.

What’s the gift you bring to the people who travel with you?