In this episode, I speak with Julie Gaver about group travel for women. Julie is an entrepreneurial speaker, corporate trainer, and coach. She is well known for her high-energy presentations and ability to connect with audiences in memorable ways. A master storyteller, Julie uses a witty blend of theatrics and experience to make learning fun!

Julie is also the author of the three-part women’s book series Must Love Shoes and challenges her readers to see life’s meaning, lessons, and humor. The launch of her books stimulated such interest that Julie ultimately created a niche market designed for women, which encompasses personal and professional development opportunities, domestic and international retreats, book club discussions, and unique social events designed to bring women together for fun, learning, and camaraderie.

In addition, she is the proud founder and director of “Soles of Love in the Garden,” a passion project which has collected and distributed over 27,000 new shoes and winter boots to local children in need over the past twelve years.

Are you ready? Let’s Roam!

You can find her at:

Julie Gaver Discovery – https://juliegaver.com/
Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/julie_gaver_lifestyle/

Transcript

Here is a transcript of the podcast. Please keep in mind this was done via AI, so there are typos and mistakes. I tried to catch as much as I can, but it is definitely not perfect.

Beth  0:10  

Welcome to the roaming Yeti podcast where we share stories and tips to inspire you to roam your neighborhood and the world. I’m your host and head Yeti Beth Schillaci. In this episode I speak with Julie gave her about group travel for women. Julie is an entrepreneurial speaker, corporate trainer and coach. She is well known for her high energy presentations and ability to connect with audiences in memorable ways. A master storyteller, Julie uses a witty blend of theatrics and experience to make learning fun. She’s also the author of the three part women’s book series must love shoes and challenges her readers to see life’s meaning, lessons and humor. The launch of her books stimulated such interest that Julie ultimately created a niche market designed for women which encompasses personal and professional development opportunities, domestic and international retreats, Book Club discussions and unique social events, designed to bring women together for fun learning and camaraderie. In addition, in all her free time, she is the proud founder and director of social love in the garden, a passion project which has collected and distributed over 27,000 New shoes and winter boots to local children in need over the past 12 years. Are you ready? Let’s Roam.

Beth  1:35  

Welcome back everyone to the roaming Yeti podcast today I work on in a different direction. I’m so excited. I have Julie gave her who is the owner of Julie gave her discovery, where among other things she offers group travel to women. So I think this is a really interesting topic

Beth  1:54  

to talk about women traveling in groups in groups. Sounds weird.

Beth  2:01  

But So Julie, tell me first I’m sorry. Hello, how are you? Thank you for joining me.

Julie  2:10  

I love the fact that you’re excited. She just jumped right in. I did that I get ahead of myself all the time. So it’s gonna be a good, good interview.

Beth  2:21  

It’s you know, I’m you everyone always worries, they’re gonna be the one that messes up. It’s always me. So, tell me a little bit about Julie gave her discovery in general. Oh, okay.

Julie  2:35  

Well, Julie gave her discovery is kind of what I refer to as my third bloom, I have been a career corporate trainer and professional speaker, and, you know, nearing the end of that season. And so Julie gave her discovery is really a series of opportunities for women, I, as she said, I coordinate group travel on both domestic and international. I love planning events that are health and wellness related things that are kind of home and garden and lifestyle related. And I still do a lot of kind of personal and professional development. But most of my work now is geared primarily towards women.

Beth  3:21  

That’s great. And, and I’ve, I’ve sort of watched some of this evolution, and it’s been really fun to watch. Watch it. So I’m excited we get to talk about it. How long have you been taking groups on on trips?

Julie  3:35  

Well, my first trip was 2014. And so it’s pretty close to being 10 years now. And my first trip was a group effort or a partnership with a friend of mine named Kelly beach. And Kelly and I had been friends for for several years. And she loves Italy. And she’d been to Italy a number of times. And I was getting to the point where I wanted to start organizing group travel. And so we had our first partnership and our first group travel adventure in 2014. We primarily stayed in the kind of the Tuscany area, if you will more the rural area spent, you know, a little bit of time in Rome, because you know, we flew in and out of Rome. And then two years later in 2016. We took a second group to Italy. And so then at that point, I decided it was kind of time for me to branch out geographically and so I began adding some additional trips and areas of the country to visit and partnered with another friend of mine Connie Hall. Connie and I have been friends and have known each other since high school. We reconnected and con he and I both also share a love of travel. And we complement each other well. And so it’s been a great partnership to, you know, to sponsor these kinds of trips.

Beth  5:12  

Yeah, I mean, I, I knew it’s been a while, but I didn’t realize 2014 was the first one. So yeah, I mean, you, when I’m gonna call you an expert, I know you won’t take the you won’t take the mantle, but I’m gonna give it to you. So in addition to Italy, like Where else have you guys gone?

Julie  5:33  

Well, like I said, we’ve we’ve been to Italy twice. And then once Connie and I partnered up together, we did a trip to Ireland, which was amazing. Last year, we went to Paris, France with a group of ladies and they deserve the probably the award, all the women that we’ve taken on trips, because that was a trip that was supposed to have happened in 2020. And it was rescheduled five times, five times five times, yes, we had lots of hope, this thing was going to end. And so finally, in the spring of last year, we were able to take that group who hung in there with us, to Italy, or I mean to Paris, and it was amazing. We are getting ready to take a group of 15 to London, the end of April. And so those have been so far, those have been the international trips, I took a trip took a group of women to Waco, Texas a number of years ago, that was one I just did on my own. And then this past fall, Connie and I took a group of ladies on what we call the islands of New England tour. And so that one was really special to we hit, you know, Martha’s Vineyard and Provincetown, and, you know, all of those great islands in that area that just offers so much in the way of, you know, fun activities. So that was this past fall.

Beth  7:11  

Oh, nice. Yeah. In your opinion, like, what makes traveling with a group of women so special? Like, what? What’s sort of that? I don’t know that. But you get that feel like what makes it so special? And important

Julie  7:25  

that? I mean, that’s a good question. And actually, I kind of get asked that a lot can men come now? And my answer is no. And the reason I think the women travel is so special is because we relate to each other on a much different level, when we are together. When women travel together, it just feels freer to me, it feels lighter, you know, they laugh more, they’re adventurous. And, you know, with every group that we have taken, even though most of the women do not know each other before, you know we depart, by the time they come back, they are good good friends. And I would go as far as to say some of them are like sisters now. And that doesn’t happen when you are on a group travel adventure with mixed gender. You know, and it’s, it’s an interesting thing to note, I had, you know, someone say to me one time, oh, my husband’s been promising he’s gonna take me to Ireland, one of them said, my husband’s gonna take me to Paris, you know, we’re going to do that some day. And, you know, years pass? Well, how’s that working for you? You know, because a lot of times, we do get promises like that from our spouses or significant others. And for a number of reasons, it just doesn’t happen. And I love the fact that so many of the women who travel with me, you know, have just made the decision that it’s important to them, they want to be an adventurer, and so independently, they just say, you know, I’m in, and it seems like the ones that do that just embrace the whole adventure, you know, to a whole different level. Right?

Beth  9:16  

And, and what if someone’s considering, and there’s someone out there and they’re like, oh, this sounds really good. Yeah. What should they? I mean, there’s a lot of groups. So what should they consider when, when looking to travel with a group of women?

Julie  9:31  

Well, I think with and I can’t speak for other groups. Honestly, I, this whole thing started because I traveled with another group, and it was not all women, but I had originally traveled with a group and there were many things that I enjoyed about that trip. But there were many things too, that I remember thinking. If I began doing this, I’m going to do it differently. And so I really can only speak to what people People can expect if they travel with me. Sure. And I guess first and foremost, you can expect it to be a pretty amazing group of women. And, you know, this sounds really harsh. But you know, I make no bones about the fact that you have to be someone who plays well with others, if you’re going to travel with us, that I mean, you know, group travel is different than when you’re just going off with your family or whatever, you have to be able to, you know, to mix well with others to not be too demanding, or to not have so many special needs that it takes away from the group dynamic. And keep in mind, you know, my career, my professional career has been in a corporate environment where we talk a lot about, you know, team building and team work, and how do we get along with others and that kind of thing. So that’s an important part of it. For me, I have on very rare occasion, you know, chatted with someone who may have been interested in the trip, and just really felt strongly that it probably wasn’t going to be a good fit. And so we have a very honest, you know, conversation that maybe this is not the trip for you. And, you know, I’ve certainly recommended, you know, other options for people that I don’t think are a good fit. But for me, I’m looking at, you know, the greater good and the group as a whole. And you know, that’s an important part of it. Because for many of these women, like going to Paris, for example, we’re going to London, or wherever it is that we go, it’s a once in a lifetime thing for them. And so, you know, I take that very seriously, I want to not ruin the dynamic because of perhaps difficult people, and my partner feels very strongly about that, as well. And so we’ve been very fortunate, in that way, that, as I said, so many of the women don’t know each other before we start, but by the end, you know, they’re like, good friends. And so, you know, there’s a number of things that we do leading up to that, to ensure that, you know, the first one is, once we have the group assembled, and we will never take more than 17. In fact, we do not take more than 15, if it’s an international trip, okay, that’s our role. If it’s a domestic group, or a domestic travel trip, we will not take more than 17. And the reason for that is because, you know, we don’t want to be a group tour, you know, there’s a whole different dynamic that comes into play when it’s a really large group, you know, and it’s harder to maneuver. And it’s harder to give people kind of the personal experience and the personal service that is very important, you know, to Connie, and May. And so that’s part of it, it’s a small group, and more intimate group. The second thing is, it’s important for us, particularly with the international groups, not as much domestic, but with the international groups, we want them to have been able to meet each other, before we go, you know, in my mind, traveling out of the country can be scary for a lot of people. And there’s a certain comfort that comes with at least having met or gotten to know some of the people in your group, before you actually show up at the airport. And so for every international group, we will have what we call meet and greet with lots of fun with those. They’re always thematic. And then it gives us an opportunity to get to know them. Because we ask questions like, you know, why are you going on this particular trip? What are you most looking forward to? And so it gives us an idea of how we can, you know, meet that expectation. It gives the women an opportunity to get to know each other. And, surprisingly, they have so much in common, right? Because for most of the group, the common thread is that they know me, and but but they don’t realize how much they have in common. And so that’s really cool when you’re at the meet and greet and they’ll start talking and oh, I didn’t know that, oh, I am too and this kind of thing. And you know, Connie and I just sort of sit back and sort of watch that magic happen. It’s, you know, you feel like match.com for travel. And we’ve had, you know, we’ve had situations where you know someone wants to run room with somebody in order to keep the cost a little bit more, you know, powerful for them. And so there have been times when, quote, unquote, strangers have roomed together. And so again, it’s important for us, you know, as the matchmaker, but also we want you to get to know each other before you room together, you know, hey, you know, we’re grown women, you know, this is not like a college dorm. And so we want to make sure that people are compatible, if that is an option that they, you know, choose to room with someone. So, so yeah, there’s a lot of things that we do to ease, I guess, anxiety, or, you know, apprehension about going on a trip, particularly with us for the first time. You know, some of our travelers are becoming sort of our regulars are seasoned, and so they know what to expect. But when we put a trip together, we, we create it, and this is really Connie’s gift. She is so good at this, we’ll look at how can we create something for everyone? So our trips, regardless of where we go, will include a little bit of art and culture and maybe architecture and history. It’ll have gardens? Oh, that’s my thing.

Beth  16:30  

I was gonna say, Who’s whose choice request is that? Yeah.

Julie  16:35  

For me, that’s my favorite part. And so and our group loves to shop, you know, and I love to shop, I buy a lot of my holiday gifts, you know, when I’m traveling. And so we like to make sure that whatever your interest is that you will have an opportunity to do some of that. And you know, free time to is extremely important. Well, that

Beth  17:03  

was that was gonna be one. That’s one of my questions, because as the social introvert that I am, yeah. I know that about you. Yeah, exactly. Everyone knows everyone who knows me. Like, having that. Being social and having the structure is great. But having that just that little bit of downtime to recharge, like, you just need to recharge by yourself, and then get back on it. So every you know, you’re not, you’re not going from sunup to sundown, is what you’re saying.

Julie  17:33  

Right, right. That’s correct. Yeah, you know, we’ve learned as we’ve gone along, I think in the early years, we would plan a trip. And, you know, we just like, wanted to make sure everybody had the fullest day possible, when they got to see everything and was like, the biggest bang for their money, you know, this kind of thing. And then, you know, some of the feedback that we got early on was, you know, we would love to have a little bit more free time, so that we can also pursue depending on where we are, you know, some things on our own. And so we took that to heart. And our trips now have, I think, a really nice healthy amount of free time, specifically, for two reasons. So travelers have an opportunity to go make arrangements and do something on their own, that perhaps we have not included in the tour, but also to address the fact that many people are, you know, more private or more introverted, or, you know, they need that kind of time alone. And so, the feedback that we’ve got now is that it’s much more balanced between, you know, group activity, and then you know, do your thing and, you know, sometimes if it’s a long portion of the day that you know, they have free, that’s the night we’ll have a group dinner so we can kind of get back together. Or if we’ve been together a lot on some tours throughout the day, that might be a night that everybody’s on their own for dinner. But what you find is that even though you’re a quote, unquote, on your own, you know, little groups develop, and it might be two or three want to try this restaurant and, you know, a couple others want to try this one. And then you know, we’re all texting each other and kind of sharing Oh, this was great sending pictures to each other. It really is. It’s so fun. So fun to witness that.

Beth  19:43  

And I mean, do you then have do you have like reunion events? Or do you how do people keep in touch because it seems like a lot of friendships are made so

Julie  19:51  

well. We do not organize that because you know when you’ve been when you’ve been creating events and travel events for such a long time, it would be virtually impossible for me to do that. But what happens is, the women of particular groups will decide that they want to get together. And because, you know, the camaraderie was so great, the women that traveled to Paris last year, formed a very special bond, and they continue to get together and do fun things, you know, as well as there’s a retreat that I hosted a couple of years ago and Bethany Beach, that’s something else that I do, in addition to the travel, and the last group that I took to Bethany beach really connected in such a special way. And they get together on a regular basis and plan events and, and I don’t plan those, that’s the great thing. I just, you know, they sent it out

Beth  21:01  

to attend. Oh, yeah.

Julie  21:06  

And, and obviously, I can’t attend them all. But I love being able to come to some of those. And again, it just, it just makes your heart feel so happy to even just sit back and observe the way those friendships developed. And it’s because of travel. Yeah, you know, it’s because of sharing this common adventurer just does something for women.

Beth  21:34  

And that leads me to the next next thing, like, you can tell by the excitement of your, of how you’re talking and stuff that it’s a joy, but like, Why else do you like I mean, it’s a lot of work on your part to put these together. So you know, why do you enjoy that so much?

Julie  21:51  

Well, I, I have always had a wanderers heart. But I didn’t have the opportunity, because of a number of reasons to travel the way I had hoped to. I, my husband, and I raised two sons who love travel, and they’ve been all over the world in some pretty amazing places. And so for the longest time, I kind of traveled vicariously through them. And my one son, and not only travels, but he’ll go live in other countries. And so then I get to travel there, because I go visit him, you know, I reached a point in my life where I was just like, you know, I’m not going to get those opportunities to travel to these places that I want to travel. So I’m gonna do what I can to create it. And, you know, I felt that way about many things in life. If it’s not happening for you, then you make it happen. And as I said, I’ve been very blessed in my life to connect with and be friends with women who complement me well, and you know, can make that partnership work. And so that’s why I do it. That’s the benefit to me. For Connie, and I, I mean, we’ve become very close friends because of these travel adventures. And, you know, we literally will be at the airport, you know, waiting to board a flight to come home from a trip. And we are sitting there brainstorming the next traffic. So that makes sense.

Beth  23:31  

No, it does as someone who likes to plan their vacation next vacation while on vacation.

Julie  23:37  

Oh, yeah. Yeah. So yeah, it does as much for us as it does for the women who travel.

Beth  23:46  

Yeah. I mean, well, I would hope so. Because it’s like I said, it’s just sitting here thinking the logistics of just trying to get a family somewhere. Yeah. Let alone 15 to 17. Yeah. I mean, yeah. Yeah. That’s your leadership skills. Right there. Well,

Julie  24:08  

you know, I sometimes feel like, I’m a den leader. I’m constantly cutting counting heads. And again, I think that’s why Connie and I are such a good fit. She is everything I’m not. She is organized and structured. And she has a very calm demeanor, and she loves spreadsheets. And, and, you know, I always tell her and I know people, you know, and so, you know, that’s kind of fun, but I do when we are traveling somewhere, particularly if we have people in our group who, you know, don’t travel a lot. You know, you feel a great sense of responsibility and ownership to make sure you know, they don’t get lost or something like that. So I feel like I’m coming steadily, you know, kind of looking around real quickly counting heads and trying to figure out who we’re waiting on that kind of thing. So, yeah,

Beth  25:08  

well, and even beyond the getting lost, like you said earlier, like these are once in a lifetime trips for a lot of people. So making sure that that expectation is met is like To me that’s, that’s why I couldn’t do it like, but that’s why you’re so good at it is you you know what they’re looking for. And you can you can plan those activities.

Julie  25:30  

Well, I hope so. Now we’ve we’ve had very good luck with that so far. So thank you.

Beth  25:37  

Yeah. And what are some of the like, activities, or at least your favorite activities that you’ve done on?

Julie  25:46  

Well, I’m glad you didn’t ask me what my favorite trick was? Oh, no, that’s

Beth  25:49  

coming up. Oh, no. Well, let’s, let’s start with that one.

Julie  25:56  

You know, I, people often ask me what my favorite flower is. And I’m going to respond to the question, what’s your favorite trip? And the same way I respond to the flower question. And that would be That’s like asking me which of my sons I love more, right? You just don’t, you just can’t and don’t love one more than the other. Each trip that we have taken so far has been so memorable and so special, for different reasons. Sometimes it’s the connection that formed between the women is you know, even more on one trip than the other. Sometimes, it’s just that the areas that we travel are just so incredibly beautiful. But a lot of times, it’s because the trip has really special meaning for me. And the Paris trip was extremely special. Not just because it took us so long, we waited so long for it to happen. It’s been on my bucket list for a long time. But the Paris trip included a once in a lifetime. I hope not once in a lifetime. I hope I’ll be there again, but an opportunity for me to fulfill a dream and that was to visit Monet’s garden. So you barony you know, I hear it different ways some Stasia barony some say as you Rene, but I had to fight back the tears the whole time we were there. It was everything I had hoped for we getting kind of choked up now. It was everything I had hoped for and more. Just being there and feeling like I am standing on hallowed ground, seeing gardens that are so beautiful that, you know photos don’t do it justice. And so, you know, that trip in particular was really special for me. We had an amazing trip in Ireland to I mean, there was just so much about the Ireland trip that was special. For good for funny, kind of not so good reasons. And for really good reasons. I’ll tell you a funny story. This is kind of like when things go wrong. So Ireland trip, we traveled to many different cities, towns, and we would stay a couple of days. And then we would move on. And we were with the same tour guide, Name column mazing, young man, very entertaining. And we were together on a bus, you know, traveling to these different towns where we would stay. And I remember we had had this beautiful travel day on the Ring of Kerry and column had just finished talking to us about things that we he wanted us to know and filling us with all kinds of great information. And then he stopped talking and then over the intercom system. He turned on some Celtic music. And we were all and we had a really nice big bus for us so we could really spread out and I remember sitting there and I had a window seat and I was just looking out the window as we make this trip around the Ring of Kerry and it takes your breath away. And I don’t know if it was the music playing the scenery. The fact that I was so deliriously happy because everyone on this trip was just like amazing and meshing and it was they were loving it. But I had this moment to like I had been there before. And it was emotional. I mean I was like I don’t cry Julie Don’t cry joy, you know kind of thing. And so we’re having this moment and then a little bit later on One of our travelers yells up to the front, Julie, Julie, come back here. And what had happened is one of our travelers got very, very carsick.

Beth  30:11  

Oh, no

Julie  30:12  

and threw up. And this is the funny, amazing part. Now, if you were traveling with a group of men, and someone got sick, I just know from my own experiences with my kids used to come in at night and go Mom, Mom, I’m gonna be sick and throw up, my husband’s they’re gonna, I’m gonna be sick. Oh, that’s awful, you know, you know? Instead, what happened was, you know, we let you know, column, no, he pulls over. And, you know, we, you know, take her outside, and we begin to kind of wash her off and clean up. But the thing that happened after that is what still warms my heart. It was like a team building activity. I mean, everybody was like, one woman got up, and she was scrubbing down this and another woman, you know, like, took her purse list, scrubbing down that and fixing everything and making it better. And it was just such a beautiful moment of, you know, I got you girl, you know, that kind of thing. And so needless to say, after that, she sat in the front of the bus. But, um, you know, but and we do, you know, we do ask for all kinds of information at the beginning, you know, so that we can anticipate that, but we were not surprised that she had a tendency to be carsick. So that was a little bit of a surprise. But when I still look back on it, you know, is kind of funny, but yeah, it’s really endearing to see how everybody just, you know, kind of helped her and loved on her. And it was, it was just really cool.

Beth  32:00  

Yeah. That is amazing. And I’m sure that made her as I’m sure she was embarrassed. And that, you know, seeing everyone sort of, come on. Yeah. Oh, you can imagine feel better. Yeah, as someone who I don’t get carsick, but will sometimes, but as someone who gets motion sickness, I feel feel for. Yeah, yeah. The reason I stay off roller coasters? And so like, what other so you don’t have a favorite destination? That’s fair. I’ll let that one. let that one slide. I mean, it is it’s like picking. Yeah,

Julie  32:34  

I mean, there’s, there’s special moments with every single trip. I’ll give you another example. When we went to Paris. In addition to Giovanni, which was my personal favorite, one of the things that we arranged was a dinner cruise on the sin river. And so, you know, the women really dressed up that night. And, you know, we had two tables because of our size. And, you know, we start off going up the river. And there’s music playing, and the waiters are bringing our food, and it was just this glorious experience. So they go up so far. And then they turn around, and they come back. And by the time we’re coming back, it’s nighttime. And where we docked and got on this boat was real close to the Eiffel Tower. And, you know, the only word I can think of is magic. I mean, as we’re like, getting closer and closer, you know, the lights of Paris, you know, on either side of us, and there’s the Eiffel Tower, you know, all in blinged out and blinking. And, oh, it was it was just an absolute highlight of that trip. And the food was exquisite. And yeah, that was definitely one that I will remember for a really long time.

Beth  34:05  

It sounds amazing. Yeah. I mean, do you find any? Like, as if a woman’s looking to do you feel like there’s a person’s personality traits? You know, do you have suggestion for what women should? You know, you know, they don’t have to be adventurous. You’re not? Oh, I don’t think you’re mountain climbing or anything. Yeah. I’m one of those trips, but like, what? What do they need to know about themselves? So you know what I mean? Does that make sense?

Julie  34:33  

Yeah, I think the biggest thing that I personally look for is that they are open and they are flexible. Because whether you’re traveling alone, or whether you’re traveling with a group, you know, things can happen and you can’t anticipate everything that happens and so, you know, if you are the kind of person that Add, you know, just can’t handle, oh, this happened. And so here’s what we’re going to do instead, you know, it’s probably not a good thing, you know, you’ll be so focused on Oh, but I wanted to do this well, you know, sometimes things happen. And, you know, this is the challenge, not really a challenge. But this is, you know, kind of what we’re looking at for the, for the London trip that’s coming up. When we planned this trip, Queen Elizabeth was still living. And she had the nerve to pass away. And so the week that we are in London is the week leading up to the king’s coronation. Okay, so we are leaving the airport, we’ll be flying home the day of the coronation, which, you know, we feel will be good, because we’ll be like, heading out of dodge as everybody’s, you know, kind of gathering, you know, to watch what’s happening. So, you know, and as we said to the women who are traveling with us, the the bad news, if there’s any, is that it’s going to be crowded, it’s going to be more crowded than it probably would have been if, you know, the Queen was still living, and it was just a normal week, in the year. But the good news is that London is gonna be gorgeous, it is going to be so blinged out and so beautiful. And I’ve been to London before and you know, it’s a beautiful city. And I can just imagine, you know, the flowers and all the the grandeur and the hoopla and everything that we’ll be able to say, when we’re home, we were a part of history there during a really, really important time in history, you know, so, so there’s that. So just being open, being flexible. And trusting, I think is an important part of it. And I’ve shared this many times to Connie and I take, you know, their safety and their security very seriously, just as we do our own. And that was kind of the challenge, you know, with the Paris trip, you know, happening during COVID. You know, there were many times when it’s like, ah, should we do it? Should we not? And then, you know, things would happen? And we’re like, No, you know, we want them to be safe. We want, you know, things to happen the way they should happen. And so, you know, in many times, we just decided it’s better to wait and make sure it’s amazing. Then take that risk, and we’re so glad that we did.

Beth  37:52  

Yeah. Yeah, it’s it. I mean, that’s a big, people want to feel comfortable and safe. And yeah, that’s scary enough going. Anywhere

Julie  38:03  

in there. But yeah, can happen here to anything that happened here. But you know, we do. We do take it extremely seriously.

Beth  38:13  

Yeah. Any any other stories you share good, bad, ugly? Well, probably good. We

Julie  38:24  

had some we had some great things. You know, a lot of times some of the stories or things that happen behind the scenes that most people don’t know about. As I mentioned, I took a group to Waco, Texas a couple of years ago, because at the time, I was like a huge fixer upper, you know, person. And I remember I was just posting something on Facebook about I was watching, you know, fixer upper. And I thought I’m gonna go there someday. And I put that on Facebook or something and everybody’s like, I want to come I want to come I want to come I’m like, Okay, let’s do it. But that was a great trip. I think we had 17 on that group I believe. And you know, everything was all magnolia. You know, we read Magnolia the farm, we went to the restaurant we you know, went to the their bakery in the coffee shop and we did a lot of other you know, really cool things. But I remember one of the things that I wanted so badly for them to experience was that we could eat at their their restaurant Magnolia table. And that was trickier than I expected it to be because they don’t take reservations. You know, it’s so so crowded because everybody that comes to Waco wants to eat at Magnolia table. And so someone had told me that if you go and put your name man that it can take two or three hours till you get seated. And so I got up and Ubers to the restaurant. and put my name in. And of course, we had 17 people. So we’re not talking a table a for a little bit of a bigger deal. And so I put my name in, and then I Uber back to the hotel. And we were scheduled to go on a tour of just drew a blank, but it’s the home and gardens where Chip and Joanna were married. And so we were on a bus and we were heading out to this tour. And I get a call saying your table is ready. And I’m lying to myself. Are you kidding me? And it was like, you know, half an hour later that I like, that wasn’t good advice, whoever told me that. So I explained it to them. And so anyway, to make a very long story short, I when we came back after the tour, we went to the restaurant, everybody stayed on the bus. I went in and I mean, I was schmoozing, like I have never before. And I was laying it on thick and explained it. And they were so nice. But they said, Well, you know how don’t get off the bus. We have a gift shop that can hang out there. We’ll probably have to put, you know, we’ll see you but it’ll be in little small groups. And so it may take a while I said that’s okay. I just so badly wanted that to happen. And so we were in there hanging out in the gift shop and like within 20 minutes or so. They texted me on the phone. And when I went up front, they said, you know your tables are ready. And I said okay for how many? And they went everyone and I’m like everyone, like Yeah, and here we walked in it was too long tables. Oh, no. And we were all together. And it was it was really an incredible meal. And so that was very memorable for me. But no one probably even remembers that that was on the trip because it was more like behind the scene. Right? Right kind of stuff. But yeah, I mean, there’s always funny things that happen. I remember once when I was on one of the Italy trips with Kelly, we had just gotten off the air, you know, the plane. With Kelly, we actually rented vans and drove to our location as opposed to having a driver. Now, with Connie, we do drivers we don’t drive anymore. But I remember we were all standing outside the curb. And you know, we were loading all these women onto these two vans, and we have all the luggage and there was you know, a Italian man watching this whole thing. And I remember he looked over at me and he goes in very broken English. That a whole lot of woman that a whole lot of woman. And I just laughed and I thought, you know, you can’t make this stuff up. So yeah, yeah, good. Good. Good times.

Beth  43:13  

So you have a London trip coming up. Is there anything else planned? Or? Your Yeah, everything quiet for now?

Julie  43:22  

Um, yeah, if I tell you too much, I’d have to kill you. Okay, well, we don’t want no, we, we are not taking a trip this fall. We take two trips a year, we do a spring trip and a fall trip. Last year, of course, was London in the spring, the New England area in the fall. This fall, we were planning a couple of options for a trip. And my older son has accepted a four month or I’m sorry, a six month assignment in Singapore. And so I’m going to visit him in the late summer, early fall. And so Connie and I talked and we just decided, because of all of that maybe we’d be better if we just don’t take a trip this fall. So we are planning a spring European trip. And we haven’t quite yet decided where we’ll be going in the fall. But I will keep you posted.

Beth  44:20  

Excellent. Yes, I will definitely I will post in the show notes on the website, links to the website and everything so people can sign up for that newsletter and make sure they’re, they know what trips are coming up.

Julie  44:36  

Yeah, you know, I’m embarrassed to say particularly with you being a website and a marketing person, my website is so so out of date. It’s one of those things I have great intentions but when it comes to events, I have so many events all the time that it’s hard for me to keep it updated. The best way to keep apprised of really any events, plus the travel events is really two on my Facebook page, gave her Facebook page as well as my newsletter. You can subscribe to the newsletter by just going to Julie gaber.com. And signing up that way.

Beth  45:19  

Great. So people can find you. Yeah. All right. So what I didn’t tell you is there’s a pop quiz at the end of this interview. Okay, and I like to give everyone I love it. What is your favorite? I always say road trip snack, but any like, what’s your favorite? Travel snack?

Julie  45:39  

Shut up. Oh, my goodness. Well, I would like to say that it’s something healthy.

Beth  45:48  

It should never be anything healthy.

Julie  45:51  

Thank you for that. Well, my favorite roadtrip snack, I guess would be a blend of salty and sweet because I have a real sugar addiction. So you know, you’ll you’ll see me with my Coke or Pepsi. Although right now I’m kind of off of it. So I’m doing really well. It’ll be interesting to see when I go to London, I’ll probably fall off the bandwagon so far. It’s not funny. But I like like those mixes to have like the nuts but you know, have m&ms and that good trail, like a trail mix. I do love a good trail mix. That would probably be by my favorite go to snack. Excellent when I’m traveling.

Beth  46:33  

So I think you already answered the question for next plan trip. You have London and then you have personally then you have Singapore, right.

Julie  46:40  

I personally have Singapore. And then in the spring, April of 2024. I will tell you, we’re going to we’re going to be in Europe again.

Beth  46:50  

Yeah, great. If you had a daydream trip, like the trip that you your dream trip, what is your dream trip?

Julie  47:01  

To take someone or to go myself for

Beth  47:03  

you know, we’re being selfish here for you. Okay,

Julie  47:07  

well, I’m going to give a shout out to a good friend and a mentor that I had named Elliot pan steel. And he did a trip when he turned 60. That is my fantasy trip. He took a couple of weeks. And he did it solo. I’ve always wanted to do a solo trip in that regard. And I haven’t, and he basically had no destination, no end destination. And the trip was all going to be about the journey. And so he would get up in the morning. And he would make a decision to drive like four or five hours in any direction. He just got up in whatever mood he was in, he decided to do that. And then he would spend the day in whatever town or city or whatever he ended up in. And he would ask people that he came into contact certain questions. And one of the questions was, if you only had one day in your town or city, what is an absolute must see? And then he would normally do those. And then he was an art sky? And so he would say what are the arts and cultural things that happen in your city that you think are special? And then the last question he would ask would be, what recommendations do you have for someone in life 2.0, you know, he was turning 60. And he was that’s what he called kind of the retire but not retired phase, right. And so then he would do those things, he would spend the rest of the day there doing those things. And then every evening when he would get to his hotel, which you know, he couldn’t book in advance because he didn’t know where he was going to be right. He blogged about his adventures. And he had a little bobblehead that someone had given him that was a likeness of him. And so in the pictures that he would post on his blog, you know, post that night, it would show his little bobble head, you know, in these photos. And I mean, I could not wait till the end of the day so I could read his adventures. And as I mentioned to you at the very beginning, I have such wanderlust. And the idea of being able to do that just does something for me. So that would be my dream trip. And I don’t know where it would be. It would be in the country because I’d like to drive it. But you know, now that I’m getting to be the age that I’m getting, I can just imagine my sons that’s not safe bomb. Do that. You need to tell us where you’re going, you know, that kind of thing. So it may remain a fantasy.

Beth  49:45  

We’ll see. Well, if you do that, please come back and tell us that story.

Julie  49:51  

I will because you know I’m a talker. I guess I’ve just proved it. And you can bet that if I am traveling by Myself I will be talking to anyone and everyone that would listen to me so

Beth  50:03  

we’ll just get you to do it from the road. Then it when you go on this road trip, what is on your travel playlist? Oh, good

Julie  50:15  

question too. I like well, I listen to contemporary Christian music. That’s what I listen to pretty much my radio in my car all the time. But then I like good oldies, you know, I would probably be listening to lately, I’ve been listening to like, 70s music from like, my years when I was in high school and college, and just listening to that music just makes me feel kind of young again and happy. And so I would probably play that kind of music. Nice. Yeah. Yeah.

Beth  50:50  

That See, now I know, when it’s time for you to go on that. I’m just gonna send you a gift, bag of trail mix and, and favorite playlist, and you’re good to go with the big cheese and

Julie  51:03  

all that good stuff. Well,

Beth  51:07  

thank you so much for your time. This has been interesting. This has been really interesting. I hope people who have been thinking about that dream trip, but maybe don’t have the people to go with, you know, seek out a trip like this and, you know, get out there.

Julie  51:24  

I hope that it inspires them to do so. And I also hope that they’ll you know, come check us out and see what we have to offer. We love adventurous women, so there’s always room.

Beth  51:37  

Excellent. Well, thanks for your time.

Julie  51:39  

Thanks for that.

Beth  51:40  

Thanks again to Julie for sharing her expertise. These trips sound like an incredible experience. Everyone should get out there and try. Please head over to the show notes on the website at the roaming yeti.com to find links to follow Julie, and thank you for listening. I hope these episodes inspire you to get out there and roam even in your own neighborhood. Please subscribe so you don’t miss future episodes. And if you like what we’re doing here, please leave a review and a rating. Also to help support us. Please head to yetitoshop.com to pick up some roaming Yeti merch. Talk to you soon and keep growing