get to know me

Hi! I’m Heather (she/her), a 27-year old autistic woman who loves travel, the arts, and culture. I want to use this corner of the internet to share about my experiences traveling, with hope that it helps other autistics (and those that travel with them) to feel more prepared and excited about taking a trip. Whether near or far, traveling as/with an autistic person generally requires some extra considerations. I’ve been learning a lot recently about myself, particularly in regard to my needs whilst traveling, such as how to overcome certain challenges, and what aspects of travel I particularly enjoy. I hope to share all of that and more as I write posts for this blog!

Recently I moved from the US to the UK, so that’s obviously a BIG big change. It has come with challenges, no doubt, but it’s something I’ve been wanting for a long time, so I’m incredibly excited to finally have this opportunity. I’m living with my partner, and after being in a long-distance relationship for over two years, it’s wonderful to finally be together. Before we got settled in our flat in England, we took a vacation through Italy and Spain. We were traveling for a total of about 3 weeks, so that definitely added a lot to my travel log! I can’t wait to share more posts about those adventures. For now I’ll just say that the Mediterranean coast is STUNNING, Italy does this incredible thing with pistachio cream stuffed in croissants, and the rain in Spain falls mainly at the bus stop when you’ve forgotten to bring an umbrella. We bought so many umbrellas. Rarely had one when we needed it… c’est la vie!

My first experience with international travel was a college study-away trip in 2019. It was an amazing experience for me, and honestly a pretty stress-free way to travel overseas for the first time. All of the planning was taken care of by the Spanish professor who led the trip - all I had to do was show up to the airport on time and follow the schedule she made for the three week trip.

All my travel experience before that was in different states, mostly the ones surrounding Pennsylvania, where I’m from. I spent summers at a camp in Ohio, visited out-of-state friends, spent time in different cities between destinations, and I love it all. I haven’t been everywhere yet, but each trip I’ve taken and place I've visited holds very special memories for me. I’m excited to share more about them through this corner of the internet, and hope you enjoy reading about it!

I love going to new places to see and experience new things. Change and the unexpected can be overwhelming, so I definitely plan out my excursions in advance, and I try to think of everything. But for the most part, I just want to see old buildings, go to museums, and order lattes in as many languages as I can (so far I can order coffee in Spanish and Italian, working on German). I also love food, whether it's trying cultural cuisine or just looking for a non-chain restaurant in another American city, I love finding a good lil' restaurant that makes me wish I could take it back home. Remind me to tell you sometime about that one Peruvian restaurant I went to with my mom in Philadelphia... it was amazing!

Besides travel and world cultures, I also love reading, cooking, dancing, playing Animal Crossing and other “cozy” video games, listening to true crime & paranormal podcasts, and watching Spanish-language series on Netflix. Since being diagnosed with autism as an adult, I’ve had a hard time identifying “special interests.” Sometimes I feel like I have a ton, and other times I feel like my interests aren’t a special level of interest. But as I’ve read more about sp/ins (special interests abbreviation) I can safely say that, along with international cultures, along with travel and language studies, are sp/ins of mine! Some others I think make the list include Sailor Moon, mail/letters, mystery stories, and learning Spanish. Embroidering might be up there too but, that obsession comes and goes in waves. Maybe my next embroidery project will be to do outlines of states/countries I’ve visited…

That’s all for today, folks! If you want to leave a comment I would love to hear your feedback! Have you gone to any of the places I mentioned? Tell me what country or city is at the top of your travel list!

Love and lattes,

Heather

P.S. I have a list of topics for upcoming posts, but if you want to expand that list you click here for my suggestion box form:

Suggestion Box

If you would like to leave me a tip, click here for my Ko-Fi page

Buy Me A Ko-Fi

Thanks for reading!