Wanderer of the Week: Kate Jones

This traveller “accidently” moved to Germany, and snuck into a ritzy Monaco hotel to listen to Lana Del Rey in concert. Kate Jones, you’re awesome and our Wanderer of the Week!

Name: Kate Jones
Age: 24
Home base: Australia
No. of countries visited: 7

What I do when I’m not travelling (aka occupation): I’m a freelance writer, so I’m normally glued to my laptop or a book, if not cooking something up in the kitchen.

My next stop: I just found out, Canada! I’ll be there for the summer and I’m incredibly excited.

My wildest and craziest adventure was: Accidentally moving to Germany. I left Australia to work in the South of France as an au pair for three months. Three months came, but I never went back. After my working season finished, I left for Germany with only my suitcase of summer clothes, just as winter began. I’m still in the middle of that adventure, but luckily I’ve now got something warm to wear.

Weirdest thing I’ve ever eaten or drank: Escargot – I recognize that’s not terribly exotic, but I just can’t wrap my head around someone first thinking, ‘That slug wearing armor – bit of garlic and butter, I bet it’ll be delicious’. What!

I’ll never forget that time: Sneaking in to see Lana Del Rey on Monaco Bay. A wonderful au pair friend and I snuck around the back of some ridiculous hotel where it met the shore so we could overhear Lana in concert. Then we found the only place doing food at 2 am and had amazingly dodgy pizza and burgers at some little fast-food bistro right by the Monte Carlo.

Most memorable meal: Champagne and rose cake. Oh. My. God. The whole family was together in Provence, it was gloriously sunny and I don’t think I’ve had a more luxurious combination. If I were a lady of leisure I would eat that every day and be super happy and get wonderfully plump. Until then I think I’ll save it for birthdays.

One thing on my bucket list is: Publishing a cookbook. I have always been obsessed with food, and doing food writing really just means I get to be obsessed under the guise of ‘professionalism’. In a dream world, I would be best friends with Nigella Lawson, though I’m happy to just channel her in the kitchen, for now. …But I bet she likes champagne and rose cake.

Three things I always pack:

A book. Travelling solo often means dating a good book over coffee in some wonderful little café (which happens to be one of my absolute favourite ways to relax).

Chargers. My phone is my lifeline; especially if I’m somewhere I can’t speak the language. The phone gives me access to a bilingual dictionary, constant photos and directions (phew!).

A Sense of Adventure: Flinging yourself into another world can sometimes be scary, and my friends have certainly been on the receiving end of more than one frantic ‘what the hell am I doing’ Skype call. But it’s often the crazy, daunting things that can give you the most amazing experiences.

My travel advice: Say ‘Yes’. This is the advice my mom gave to me as I left Australia (along with a lot of ‘stay safe’s and ‘take care’s). For me the point of travel is to see and experience all the weird and sometimes terrifying things of an unfamiliar world. But saying ‘Yes’ to little things seems the best way to experience far more than you could ever plan.

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