"Of all the books in the world, the best stories are found between the pages of a passport" 

Before I start I would like to say that I am not affiliated with Trek America, all views/opinions are my own and I just want to share my experience with you all and hopefully give you an insight into what my trip involved if you are looking to do one yourself, which I would definitely recommend!

** I would also like to add that if I state any activities that I took part in, I will be going into more detail with these in a future post. 





Sunday 26th May 2019 

The day I was flying out to the USA to start my American adventure with Trek America for just over 6 weeks. This was a trip of a lifetime, a trip I had been counting down for just over a year and the day was finally here! I was flying from Leeds and Bradford airport down to Heathrow London and then onto Newark airport. 

I Arrived at Leeds Bradford airport just after 7am and said my goodbyes to my parents and headed through security. This was the first time I had ever flown on my own before so I was slightly nervous, but once on the plane I was settled and felt fine. Once landed at Heathrow I did have a fair few hours to wait as my next flight to Newark wasn't until 4:45pm so I wandered around duty free and other shops and made a few purchases, I bought the Urban Decay Reloaded and On The Run palette, By Terry lip balm gloss and a Ted Baker beach bag and flip flop set. I had some lunch and then just rang my mum for a little bit to pass time until it was time to board the place. I boarded the plane and take off was around 6pm due to a little delay on the runway. I actually really enjoyed flying by myself and plus there was no one sat in the middle so that was a little bonus and gave me a bit of extra space. Once landed at Newark I was meeting a guy called Shaun who was also doing the trip with me. I made my way through security and collected my luggage and texted Shaun to say that I had arrived and he was waiting for me at the other side, we met up then it was time to get the shuttle bus into New York City. We had a few days in NYC before the actual Trek America trip started so we were staying at the Amsterdam Court Hotel in Times Square. The location was great and it was a lovely little hotel. 



We woke up the next morning and it was time to explore New York City! I was so excited, we headed off to the Empire State building and bought tickets to go to the top. The views were amazing and it was a nice clear day! We wandered around Times Square and then went to Central Park as the weather was lovely and had lunch near by at Shake Shack. We walked to the Rockefeller but we didn't go up as we had already done the Empire State Building earlier on in the day but we stopped to have drinks at one of the bars just in front. That evening we headed to Planet Hollywood for food! The next day we planned to get on the subway and go to the 9/11 memorial. Afterwards we headed to Brooklyn Bridge as we wanted to walk across but unfortunately it started raining quite heavily so we only went so far. It was then time to make our way back to the hotel to collect our luggage as we were heading back into Newark to our hotel to meet the people who will be joining us on our trek! 


We got on the Newark airport bus which took us to the airport, we then had to get on the air train to take us to the area where we got onto our hotel shuttle bus. Once we arrived it was time to check in and head to our rooms! Once we had sorted a few things out we headed downstairs to get food and wait for the others to arrive! I was so excited to meet everyone as I had been previously speaking to quite a few, a couple of months prior to the trip starting so I couldn't wait to meet everyone.  They arrived and we all welcomed each other, it was strange that had all finally met after all that time and it was starting to sink in that we are in America now and we have 6 amazing weeks ahead of us and couldn't wait to see what the trip had in store for us. We all decided to have an early night as we were up early in the morning to meet the rest of the group and for the trek to start, so we all headed to our rooms. Me and Rach were room buddies and we settled down in bed for the night, then what happens.... our phones started alarming and we looked to see that we had a notification to say there was a tornado warning in the area. We opened the curtains and could see the lightening in the back group and we were all messaging on the group chat about its our first night here and we ended up getting that messaging, it was pretty scary but so funny! 




Wednesday 29th May 2019

The first day of trek! We headed down to the lobby and met up with our trek leader and a few new people who were joining us on the "Southern Sun". We filled out paperwork and got to know each other a little by playing a little memory game where we had to say our name and 1 thing we liked or a hobby then go round in a circle remembering what each person said and saying it out loud. Now I'm not going to lie, I hate doing this like this and felt so under pressure but it broke the ice between us all and at least we remembered everyone! Then it was time to head outside load up the trailer and hop into the van, we are travelling to Philadelphia! Our first stop was at the most famous Rocky steps. Obviously you have to run up these steps just like in the film so we did and a few others filmed us doing so, then we had our photo taken at the Rocky statue. 



We then had a few hours to wander around Philly ourselves. We went to Elfreths alley, saw Independence Hall and we also took this time to stop off for lunch and try out Philadelphia's famous Philly Cheese Steak sandwich, there are many places where you could get this from but our trek leader recommended us to go to Sonny's.



This night was our first of many camping nights. We were staying at Cherry Hill Park. Now this was the part I was worried about, I have never camped in my life or even set up a tent haha! All I was thinking was how am I going to cope for the next 6 weeks. But it was fine! Joel (our trek leader) showed us how to put them up and what to do with all the cooking equipment and it was much easier than what I thought. Once all the tents were set up we went to the pool for a bit, yes they even had a swimming pool! But then it started getting a little cloudy so we decided to head back to camp and we get settled for the night and Joel made us our dinner for the evening, we were having chicken pesto pasta! We all felt so comfortable with each other and it was only day one. 



Thursday 30th May 2019


This day we were heading into Washington DC and celebrating Courtney's birthday! We starting playing a game in the van where we counted how many American flags we could see, ALOT! I swear we got to over 100 haha. Once we arrived we had bike tour that was already included in our trek, but unfortunately I did not take part in this as I can not ride a bike, ok don't laugh but it's true haha! So I decided to sit out and have a wander around as there was a food court/little shopping centre near by. Once the others arrived back from the bike tour we headed over to the Smithsonian National Air & Space museum and looked around there, we had our first of many McDonald's for lunch, then me and a few of the girls decided to walk to the White House, but it was closed off due to something that had happened. Whilst we were out it started to rain and we got drenched! Luckily I had brought my waterproof jacket but I was still soaked and my trainers were like puddles. We had to take cover at the Lincoln Memorial and meet up with the others until Joel came to pick us back up to take us back to camp. Joel arrived with pizza for us and we were all dry and celebrated Courtney's birthday with cake and balloons! 


Saturday 1st June 2019

We were travelling to Ocoee today! We stopped of at a Bass Pro Shop, a shop which is really American, that sells hunting/camping/outdoor things. Me, Rach, Hayley & Courtney decided to go try some samples of Moonshine. We arrived out our campsite - Adventures Unlimited we even got a complaint when we arrived for "taking someones space" although none of their stuff was there so we just set up our things. This is where we also did our optional paid activity of white water rating along the Ocoee River. The majority of decided to do this so once camp was set up we headed down and got put into our groups. Once the rafting was over we were went and just wanted a nice warm shower so we headed back to camp to get changed and tonight's dinner was going to be chicken fajitas! This campsite was very busy! We sat around camp having drinks, playing ring of fire and listening to music, it was so much fun! We even had a few drunk guys come over who were staying on the campsite too.


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