My Story: 'My Motive Is To Encourage Indian Moms To Take Up Solo Parent Travel As Doable Lifestyle'

My love for travelling started when I was a child with planned holidays that we took as a family. I was always interested in history and culture. I moved out of home at 19 and started venturing out on my own within India. I found that I really enjoyed travel. My interest in backpack travel began after I married an Army officer in 2008, we explored India's length and breadth from the Siachen base camp to Ladakh and Pondicherry together. Later, we travelled outside India on backpack trips.

When I was pregnant in 2014, I desired to travel alone to a foreign country with my baby Arianna before she turned two. My family was concerned about this decision to travel alone, but I assured them that we would make it work. This dream materialised when she was a year old and I took off to Germany with her for a backpacking trip as a solo parent.

So far, I have travelled to 17 countries and multiple destinations within India. We prefer travelling within a budget and backpacking across destinations. Along with my family, I have been to countries like New Zealand, Stockholm, France, Finland, Denmark, Norway, Dubai, Bhutan, etc.

Travelling As A Solo Parent

As a solo parent, I have travelled with Arianna to Germany and Spain, apart from various places across India, where I have camped, gone overlanding and on island trails. Outside the country, I travelled across Cologne, Hamburg and Frankfurt in Germany in 2016, while staying at youth hostels, taking public transport exclusively, and made her try local foods when she was just a year old. I wore her in a baby carrier, travelled with a rucksack and a pram all through these cities, and had an incredible experience.

Following this, I took her to Barcelona in 2019 and made her experience historical and cultural places while trying local foods and staying in a bed and breakfast when she was four years old.

During these trips, I also made mistakes and learnt a lot about managing a child while travelling. More than anything, I have really bonded with my daughter without anyone around, and she has learnt to steer clear of any misconceptions and stereotypes about people who don't look anything like her.

Beginning Of Backpacking Indian Mama

I started blogging in 2018 and began documenting my travel experiences for my daughter to read when she grows up. Soon, the word travelled, and many mothers and young parents wrote to me asking for tips to backpack with their kids. This was when I started creating content exclusively around solo parent travel. I now try to help mothers by giving them tips and tricks to plan itineraries, pack effectively, manage food on the go, find accommodation options across the globe, and motivate them to travel with their kids.

The real impact of my travels has been hearing from Indian mothers across the country that they found the courage to travel with their kids after reading my travel blogs and watching my content on my Instagram channel. They now return from their trips and write to me saying my tips really worked when they travelled. For me, this is my biggest win!

My motive is to encourage Indian mothers to take up solo parent and backpack travel as a doable lifestyle. I want to see mothers across India travel as solo parents safely and confidently and I am doing this by creating a community of backpacking mothers in India. To make this happen here is what I have begun:

My venture: A group trips initiative called #BACKPACKWITHMOM where I take along other mothers and kids to different destinations and make them experience travelling the way I do. The first group trip venture happened in December 2021 to Meghalaya, where I collaborated with a tour company called 'Freefolk', and took along six moms and seven kids across four destinations in the state, and gave them unique experiences like camping in the cleanest river in Asia, visiting the cleanest village in Asia called Mawlynnong, ziplining on the Indo-Bangladesh border, tasting local cuisine and experiencing local stays and food all through the trip. I plan to curate many more trips to different destinations to showcase the beauty of backpack travel with kids. The response to this venture has been incredible as I am inundated with trip requests. I will be organising more such group trips this year.

If you too have an inspiring story to tell the world, send us your story at mystory@thelogicalindian.com