Featured image: Sandra Hemmink in Egypt

A widow follows her intuition into a life of solo travel

by Amanda Burgess

Diving back into a life of travel after you’ve lost a partner or loved one to death or divorce can feel daunting. Your world has shrunken, and you feel adrift on the ocean of your grief. Going off into the Great Unknown on your own or at all seems…too much…too soon. It’s too big and too scary. You don’t want to be alone, even while travelling. Even if you loved it before. You’ve learned how scary and overwhelming alone can be. 

It takes guts and grit to allow the joy of travel to coexist with the pain of your grief – no matter where in your healing journey you find yourself. This is something I’ve experienced first-hand, as I lost my husband to pancreatic cancer in July 2018. While it didn’t take me long to begin travelling again, it wasn’t until January 2020 that I drummed up the courage to set out on a solo adventure in Bali, Australia, and New Zealand – and learned how travel promotes healing. Through the JourneyWoman community of the wise, experienced and well-travelled, I discovered other women like me, and have told a handful of their stories. 

Each time we address this topic, it resonates deeply with women travellers who have experienced loss. This month, I sat down with a different crop of JourneyWomen to glean when they began travelling solo again, what it took, what they learned, and how it helped them heal. 

“Solo travel can be so cathartic and revealing about oneself – there is more time to be self-reflective. We all have this amazing strength, and once we tap into it, the sky is the limit”
-Sandra Hammink.

Here she was, driving on an Italian highway with a tiny map in her hand and no real clue how to get to her accommodations. Since she didn’t speak Italian, she couldn’t read the road signs. Tears of frustration threatened to fall. That moment was the turning point.

“I said to myself: You either trust your intuition and have faith that you will reach your destination or die at the side of the road crying! I eventually managed to find my lodgings, and that was the start of a journey that challenged my fears, highlighted my strengths and set me free from thinking I needed to depend on others to move forward with my life,” she says. “I learned that I was going to be okay on my own. Yes, it would be hard, sad, and maybe even overwhelming at times, but it was never going to be dull.”

Hammink urges all women travellers who have experienced loss to tap into their intuition, as it helps us to access our strengths and confidence.

“Solo travel can be so cathartic and revealing about oneself – there is more time to be self-reflective. We all have this amazing strength, and once we tap into it, the sky is the limit,” says Sandra Hammink. “I think when you trust in your intuition and strengths, you fortify your confidence and from there, achieving all your life desires is possible. To bravely challenge yourself to go out there, on your own, inevitably opens your heart to the amazing person that you are.

Her first trip to Cuba had been an act of desperation, but it had reignited the fire that had smouldered within her to travel since she was a little girl. Her experiences in Cuba and Italy sparked a deep love of solo travel and marked the start of a new life of growth and exploration.

“I realized because I had lost one of the most precious things in my life, I had nothing to lose. Subsequent trips taught me how strong, self-sufficient and independent I am – and let me tell you, those are such great gifts to receive,” she says.” The most gratifying thing I learned to love about travelling solo is the freedom it gave me to come and go as I pleased.  Equally gratifying was the opportunity it gave me to meet so many people and make life-long friendships. Something that, had I not been travelling alone, I would not necessarily have experienced.” 

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