I view exploration as more than first ascents and speed records. I am intrigued by the landscapes, languages, gender barriers, and borders constantly shifting to keep us apart. I am a Fellow of the Royal Geographic Society and the Explorers Club. In 2015, I was chosen as a National Geographic Adventurer of the Year. I was a flag carrier for WINGS in 2014. I became a member of the Society for Women Geographers in 2020.
Yet, these institutions meant to bring us together continue to isolate us, creating a false hierarchy of who is worthy of the term traveler, adventurer, and explorer. In reality, all of us who engage with cultures, languages, and landscapes outside our home borders are explorers of this home planet. Some of these institutions are designed as gatekeepers to decide whose stories are worthy and whose perspectives are centered. For over a century, the term explorer has had a particular image: white and male. Women were not allowed to be members of The Explorers Club, which accepted me as a Fellow in 2017 when I was born.
The Society of Women Geographers was the US answer to the Explorer's Club ban on women's membership. Unsurprisingly, those iconic explorers who first joined women were white. As were the original members of the RGS. Yet women everywhere were exploring. An incredible book, Three Centuries of Travel Writing by Muslim Women, explores precisely this. Why are these women—the counterparts to Isabella Bird or Freya Stark—not household names? It is the same reason they aren't today: gatekeepers. Who decides who writes or photographs the story? This invisible barrier in media, exploration, storytelling, and the outdoor industry is something I am still unlearning and relearning today.
My first job working in the outdoor industry was in Germany at twenty. It was a dream job that found me leading hiking trips in Austria and Switzerland and guiding kayaking trips in the Black Forest. It opened up the world and brought me back to my love of the outdoors, which I had grown up with, such as camping, horseback riding, and bike riding around my North Dakota neighborhood as a child.
I have lived and worked in Beirut, Paris, Germany, Wales, Scotland, and Afghanistan. I have traveled to 34 countries, typically spending weeks, if not months, in Namibia, Borneo, Bali, Ukraine, Morocco, Turkey, Costa Rica, Argentina, Laos, South Korea, all of Western Europe, and beyond. Most of these countries I have been a repeat visitor to often. My daughter, now in her late teens, has spent years traveling with me. We spent her seventh-grade year living out of a suitcase studying rewilding and wildlife conservation in 18 countries. The privilege of a blue passport has granted me access, and the discrimination and racism baked into the passport rankings is something that I am working to raise awareness about.