Open Road: A Midlife Journey Through The US National Parks With Toby Neal

How can travel help us as we search for a new direction in mid-life? Why does nature offer us insight into ourselves and experiences that go far beyond the physical? Toby Neal talks about her experience of the US National Parks. Toby Neal is an award-winning USA Today best-selling author of mysteries, thrillers, and romance, as well as travel memoir under T. W. Neal. She’s also a mental health therapist and the author of Open Road: A Midlife Memoir of Travel Through the National Parks of the USA. Show notes * Why mid-life is a time to reassess what you want to do with your life — and how travel can be a catalyst for change * Some of the beautiful places in the US National Parks * Spiritual aspects of being in nature when the veil is thin * The physical and mental challenges of travel — and dealing with fear and anxiety along the way * The comfort of the familiar when traveling * Recommended travel books You can find Toby Neal at TobyNeal.net and on Instagram @authortobyneal You can also listen to our discussion about Wild and Beautiful Hawaii in episode 11. Transcript of the interview Jo: Toby Neal is an award-winning USA Today best-selling author of mysteries, thrillers, and romance, as well as travel memoir under T. W. Neal. She’s also a mental health therapist. Today we’re talking about Open Road: A Midlife Memoir of Travel Through the National Parks of the USA. Welcome back to the show, Toby. Toby: So good to be talking with you again, Joanna, thank you. Jo: I’m very excited. On our last show we talked about Hawaii, and today we’re on the open road, which is very exciting. Before we get into the national parks, I want to dive straight in and ask you, because you open the book with a discussion of midlife. What is it about midlife that made you want to escape and go on the road? Because I certainly feel this need quite often, at the moment, as I go through this myself. Toby: The subtitle is A Midlife Memoir of Travel Through the National Parks and I felt that it was tough to follow up my first memoir, Freckled, I needed a reason, in a framework, to talk about how I had reached midlife. The biggest thing that was happening was that my initial quest to have a ‘normal’ life had resulted in a physical breakdown by the time I was 50. I talked about that moment in a doctor’s office laying on my back when I was having this physical assessment and looked over and saw this calendar of the national parks of the United States. It was a picture of Bryce Canyon, which is very iconic. And I had this moment of just intense longing to not only be somewhere else than where I was physically but where I was physically, if you know what I mean, on the two levels of taking my body somewhere and getting a different body back. The body that I had given up in my quest for normal middle-class life, 12 years of achieving all my degrees and working three jobs and finally owning our home and achieving all the things that I wanted to as a child who grew up with an unstable home and in poverty. So, it was this reckoning point where I could continue going down the road I was, and I knew that my life would be shortened and impacted, or I could live a more risky life and try to fulfill my dreams.

Om Podcasten

Escape and inspiration about unusual and fascinating places, as well as the deeper side of books and travel. I'm Jo Frances Penn, author of thrillers and non-fiction, and I'll be doing solo shows about my own travel experience and interviewing authors about how travel inspires their writing. Interviews cover places to visit and tips for travel as well as thoughts on modes of travel like walking, cycling, and travel by train and other modes. Plus book recommendations for every interview so you have things to read on the move.