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Reaching 50
We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.
– T. S. Eliot
What’s on your bucket list?
Photo safari in Kenya? Fly fishing on the Amazon? Sampling a Michelin three-star restaurant in France? BASE jumping Angel Falls, you adrenaline junkie? Whatever it is, it is safe to say there is probably travel on that bucket list.
Dr. Tracy Carrington’s bucket list is full of travel plans and dreams, and she’s thisclose to completing one of them. A Fort Worth native, Tracy is a lifelong traveler. Her first travel memory is of a road trip to Colorado with her family when she was three years old. Although she cannot remember specifics, she assumes there were some side quests involved.
“My parents were always sure to include some historical sites in our road trips. We never just passed through a state without learning something about it or visiting a place of historical significance.”
Tracy and her sisters learned a lot through the years because their parents prioritized travel.
“We would do a long road trip every summer,” Tracy remembered. “From the time I was very little, my dad would put a mattress in the back of our Suburban, and we would hit the road. I remember a trip to Echo Canyon and the Four Corners. We drove to Florida one year and went to Disney World, and one year we drove to Maine and took a ferry to Nova Scotia. They took us everywhere, and they always made sure my sisters and I learned about every place we went. We were never ‘just passing through.’”
After graduating from Fort Worth Country Day School, Tracy attended the University of Colorado to run cross country and track before the University of Tennessee’s track and field team recruited her as a pole vaulter. As an SEC conference champion and All-American pole-vaulter, Tracy traveled all over the country.
Tracy moved from Tennessee to Michigan to earn her doctorate in kinesiology, specializing in performance coaching. She worked closely with the MSU Athletic Department, traveling with various teams. “Michigan was a surprise to me,” Tracy says. “I moved there to do a job and study. But I really fell in love with the whole state. I thought I had seen colors before, but the trees in the fall are just unbelievable.” She returned to Fort Worth after finishing her dissertation and opened her own practice, Mind Game Performance.
As a natural explorer and adventurer, Tracy’s role as a self-employed sports psychologist is a perfect fit. Not only does she control her own calendar, but she also has plenty of opportunities to attend conferences and continuing education seminars. She piggybacks her own side quests onto these work trips, be it bagging a nearby mountain peak or visiting a local beach.
While Tracy usually has a big trip in the works, she’s always open to travel opportunities that arise. “Stan and I like to have at least one ‘high commitment’ trip in the works,” she said. “We like to do one every two years or so. It gives us time to plan and save properly. We also like to take some low-commitment trips. That might be a quick skiing weekend in Colorado. Or one time we flew to Las Vegas, rented a car, and drove to Zion National Park to camp and hike for a few days… we always keep ourselves open to random possibilities. It doesn’t always work out timing-wise, but if we get invited to go to a show at Red Rocks or something like that, we’re generally at least open to the idea.”
Back to the bucket list. A few years ago, Tracy’s son asked her how many U.S. states she had visited. After thinking about it a bit, she replied, “It might be easier to count the few I haven’t been to.” And that got her thinking.
“It’s not something I’d contemplated before,” Tracy said. “It hadn’t been a bucket list item or anything, but what if I could get to all fifty states by the time I turn fifty? The more I thought about it, the more it turned into one [of her bucket list items].”
Tracy has been to over a dozen different countries and 49 states. Her favorite travel destinations include the Wind River Range in Wyoming and Big Bend National Park. “When you see the Wind River Range, you just know that God spent a lot of time there,” she said. “The scenery is absolutely breathtaking. It is true wilderness. It’s so remote, we went days without seeing anyone outside our party. As for Big Bend, I remember being blown away by the fact that there is something like that in Texas. It seems like a different world. Stan and I spent our honeymoon there, and it will always be very special to me.”
She continued, “I’d like to get back to Bryce Canyon and Zion. I’m always looking for excuses to go back to Wyoming and Montana. I haven’t spent enough time exploring the Pacific Northwest, either. It’s so pretty up there, but I just don’t know it very well yet. But where I really want to go is Alaska. It’s my 50th state, and I think maybe I’ve saved the best for last. It seems like a really special place to finish it off.”
Tracy turns fifty next year, and plans are underway for a very special trip to that last frontier. “It’s impossible to see it all, of course, but we will hike, climb, and camp as much as time allows,” she said. “I have always wanted to go there and have actually had to turn down a couple of opportunities for practical reasons. I love mountains and wilderness, and Alaska has more of that than anywhere else. I can’t wait!”
And after that? “I’m not sure what will be next after Alaska. Ages ago, my son and I came up with the idea of going to the Lofoten Islands in Norway to see the fjords. I’d like to do some guided hut-to-hut hikes in Europe. Rock climbing and backcountry skiing are always high on the list.”
Travel is the greatest gift we can give ourselves. It fosters well-being and connectedness. It clears the cobwebs from our minds and engenders a childlike wonder at the unknown and the unexplored. It does all of this because it is the opposite of routine.
