An Australian 15-year-old, with Hungarian roots, on an adventure around the world
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What is it like to be a teenage world traveller, whose every possession is in a backpack, who has no home in the conventional sense, and who writes fiction and blogs about her experiences? Réka Kaponay left her home in Melbourne with her family when she was 11, she has visited 34 countries, and she is not planning to go home yet, travelo.hu writes.
“Our journeys started in Australia, and we travelled around the country with my parents and my twin brother,” says Réka. They visited the sacred sites of the Aboriginals, and their Dreamtime mythology made a great impression on the then 10-year-old girl. She named her blog Dreamtimetraveler, which she started in 2012, to chronicle her adventures around the world.
“In 2012, we sold everything: our house, our car, our furniture, bought suitcases and backpacks, and on June 7, we got on a plane to California,” Réka recalls the beginning of their journey.
They explored the US in a trailer. Originally, they only planned to stay for six months, but then decided not to go home at all. They spent the next six months backpacking in Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Chile, Brazil, Argentina, and Paraguay. Then back to the US, and on to Europe. First, they travelled around the UK, then, on their way to Morocco, they arrived in Spain, where she began working on her novel, Dawn of the Guardian, which has since been published.
Taking up travelling was a family decision. “Our parents asked me and my brother whether we wanted to go home and go to a traditional school, etc., or if we rather kept on travelling. We said that we wanted to explore the world,” says Réka. They had been homeschooled before, as well, so the transition was not difficult.
“We travel with very few things, everyone has their own backpack, plus one or two suitcases. On the summer of 2015, we walked El Camino. When you are walking 20-30 km a day, for 38 days, you really start to pay attention to what you’re carrying on your back. You realise that you don’t actually need many things.
