Kenia in the Middle

I’m currently sitting in the Chicago airport on my layover so, the time has come to reflect on my travels and give my recommendations. Let’s start with the positives. This experience has truly opened my mind more than I thought it needed. I met amazing people and gained more hands on experience doing something I’m passionate about. Traveling on my own is something I’ve wanted to experience for a long time and now that I have I 100% plan to do more trips like this in the future. Another thing I wanted to mention is that I’m so grateful to have gone into this already having prior travel experience, thanks to my parents. They’ve already given me so many opportunities to gain the knowledge I need to make it on my own. One thing I consistently heard throughout my trip is, “Omg you’re only 18 and traveling on your own? You’re so brave.” Without my parents I wouldn’t have the confidence to be taking these kinds of trips at my age, which is something I recognized while being away. I know you both are reading this so thank you for that. I can’t wait for my next trip! Anyways, let me tell you a bit about Puerto Rico. If you are ever thinking about going definitely go. It’s such a lively place filled with plenty of activities. The food is a bit expensive but as I’ve said before they don’t really have a choice. I really loved the area I stayed in as well. I was able to walk or catch rides everywhere I went which made transportation super easy and inexpensive. The hostel I stayed in was great as well. Compared to other hostels people were telling me about I think I had a pretty good set up. There was air conditioning, wifi, a fully functional kitchen, a cute rooftop, showers, and lockers in each room to store personal belongings. However, the staff wasn’t always super nice and not very helpful, but other than that I had no problems staying there. Moving on to the one and only negative about this trip, I spent more than I should have. If you guys didn’t know I booked this trip and found CRES through a company called IVHQ. Months prior to booking this trip my mom and I did research making sure it was a legitimate company and would provide me with all that I was looking for. Originally we were going to do all the research on our own and basically plan my own experience but I found the specific project I ended up doing and it felt like a perfect fit. While on the trip I realized I could’ve planned the whole thing without all the additional fees, because I am fully capable of doing research on my own. I made a note in my phone of every single thing I paid for then did the math for the scenario if I didn’t go through IVHQ and learned that I could’ve saved about $1,000. All the money that I worked for on my own for months. Another terrible thing I learned is that all the money for the “program fee,” goes to IVHQ. None of of it goes to the actual organizations that they are “working with.” Lastly, they were very unorganized with getting you to your accommodation, checking in, and telling you anything about what you’re actually doing. I only learned what CRES was about 5 days before I left. The only reason I decided to go through this program was because of how organized and fully planned out it seemed to be when I was originally researching but once I got into the process of paying for everything I realized it wasn’t that organized after all. Although I did spend a bit more money than I should’ve, I don’t regret anything because of all the positives I gained in the end. I know now that I don’t need to go through a program to travel like this. I’ve already started researching other organizations to work with next summer so I know I can do it without the help of a company like that. Lesson well learned. Overall, I’m beyond content with my experience this summer! Once again thank you all for taking the time to go along on it with me. I’m gonna add a ton of extra pictures from the trip that I didn’t share on here!

Xoxo,

Kenia Lyle