Next Tribe

What are the best souvenirs? According to Dawn Janecek, they are ones that will stay close by forever to remind you of your adventures. I like to joke that being an adult is hard, and for this we deserve stickers. Tattoos are simply the grown-up version—and travel tattoos make especially good ones because each comes with a story. NextTribe creates small group travel experiences for women 45 and over. If you’re ready to stop waiting and start going, we’d love to have you along.

In the mountains and villages of southern Mexico, curanderas, weavers and a mezcal maker opened a door into traditions that still shape daily life. I knew about palm readers, tea-leaf readers and face readers. Until I went to Oaxaca with NextTribe last month, I didn’t know there were egg readers. In the Zapotec healing tradition, a curandera—a healer and spiritual guide—passes a raw egg over your body to draw out its energy.

A century ago, when women were confined to strict roles, Rose Knox built a formidable company and showed the world they could have adventures on their own. The desire of women, including NextTribe’s members, to travel adventurously with other women is a wish at least a century old. That joy was as real in the 1920s as it is today. I found it reflected in the writings of Rose Knox, the intrepid, widowed, self-possessed, highly successful female entrepreneur of the first half of the 20th Century.

Without even asking for it, Jane Shlaes recently got hired for a new job that brings together much of her expertise and passions. In fact, she didn’t even know she was auditioning for it. Last fall, Jane traveled to Greece with NextTribe and right away, trip leader (and NextTribe COO) Jeannie Edmunds was impressed by the way she interacted with others. “She was an ideal traveler: fun, engaging, personable, yet very sensitive to the needs of the whole group,” says Edmunds.

She was broken by grief. But on a trip to Japan, Becky Austen found a way through her sadness by practicing an ancient Japanese art. From an early age I was a wanderer. My feet mapped every street of Sea Cliff, New York, the one square mile village where I grew up, always ending at the beach, looking out over the harbor.

You may not choose a flight for the shopping alone, but the right airport can make an extra hour before departure or a layover feel like part of the vacation. The best airport shopping combines variety, convenience, atmosphere, and local character. Whether you enjoy fashion, beauty, regional food, or craftsmanship, these eight airports offer very different reasons to arrive early. Or if you have a choice of where to make a connection, this may help sway your decision.

Travel is one of life’s greatest joys. Unfortunately, it’s also one of the times when we’re most vulnerable—not just to pickpockets, but to scammers, hackers, and thieves looking to steal our digital identities. Despite spending years working in information technology, I’ve never had one of my online accounts compromised while traveling. I don’t think that’s luck; I think it’s because I’ve made digital security a habit. That doesn’t mean I haven’t been targeted.

Najwa Klostermann isn’t just a frequent traveler, she’s a super frequent traveler. She’s done seven trips with NextTribe in the last year and a half, with Turkey coming up next month and Argentina and South Africa in 2027! That’s in addition to all of her other travels: solo, with family and friends, and sometimes with new friends she’s made on NextTribe trips. Born in the US, her parents immigrated from Iraq in the 1950s.

My quest to experience Japan originated quite a few years ago and ran through unexpected places– Hawai’i and South Carolina. My mother—and her mother—grew up in Hawai’i, an unorthodox upbringing for a Scottish family. They landed there because the family traveled to Hawai’i to raise cattle on the famous Parker Ranch. When my grandmother was young, the family moved to Honolulu to live in Manoa, adjacent to the mountain.

When Dawn Janáček took a work assignment in India, she was going for the adventure. She came back with so much more. In 2004, I went to India for work, and I was genuinely excited about it. This wasn’t something I was dragged into—I wanted the assignment. I wanted to see it for myself. And Bangalore doesn’t ease you in. NextTribe takes small groups of women ages 45+ on fun, transformational trips.