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Phyllis Stoller has a BA from Tufts University, an MA from New York University and a Finance Degree from the University of the South Bank, London England. Phyllis Stoller founded and managed for 16 years, the largest tour operator for women in North America. She was voted top in women’s travel by Travel & Leisure Magazine,the first to receive this honor. Phyllis has appeared on The Today Show, CNN, Lifetime TV for Women and others. She is a consultant on marketing to women.
Phyllis now resides in New York City and London, England and is affiliated with ECPS Consulting Corporation in New York. She prides herself on her family: husband, Eric, a ‘keeper’, sons Nick (comedy writer and director of Forgetting Sarah Marshall) and Matt , a progressive political strategist who works with liberal Democratic candidates. Phyllis can be reached at Phyllisnycity@gmail.com.
Past Articles
TRAVEL TIPS FOR TOMATOES
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History of Women Traveling Looking
Back and Looking Forward
There is documentation of women traveling in early Christian times: the Abbess of Egeria who in the 4th century traveled from France to Palestine and Egypt using the Bible as her guidebook is the first. Then there are those brave ladies who masqueraded as men with the Spanish Conquistadors (with all that gold, there must have been women). As colonies spread from England, Spain and the Netherlands, wives and daughters of colonial masters found their way into a new lifestyle overseas.
Some of these women even traveled just to shop like many of our friends. Souvenirs from Amelia Edwards (1831-92) are priceless Egyptian statues, and ancient jewelry today in museum collections. And then there were the poor and dislocated like Boxcar Bertha, a hobo and grifter during the Depression who rode the trails throughout the US. Some were wealthy. Born to rich parents with a top Oxford degree, Gertrude Bell spent her life in the East and is credited for drawing the boundaries of modern day Iraq. She was a friend of TE Lawrence and knew more about the Middle East than almost anyone in the British Government during WWI. The book, ‘Gertrude Bell’ is excellent.
So where is women’s travel today? There are some small companies, which organize tours for those of us not as intrepid as these gals. The one I will recommend you check out is www.womenstravelclub.com. I founded it in 1992, sold it in 2006 and was invited back this week as a visiting ‘professor’ to add new trips and events. We will be running more groups to Ixtapan Spa through the Club, and invite all the 3T’s to join us. Women’s Travel Club has 3 trips with space left this year: China in October, Egypt in November and Tuscany for Thanksgiving.
One word of warning: the site for www.womenstravelclub.com will be dramatically enhanced by the end of the Summer, so look now and look again in September!
As usual, feel free to email me at Phyllisnycity@gmail.com
Follow me on Twitter @Phyllisnycity and on Facebook under my name.
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Some kooky early women travelers were: Lady Hester Stanhope (1776-1839) who left England for Turkey, took up Turkish dress after her clothes were lost at sea and traveled the Middle East calling herself ‘Queen of the Desert’. She died in a Lebanese monastery and never returned to Europe. Her diaries rest in the British Museum and much of her advice is good for us today. Dress down to avoid attention, watch out for spoiled food, and bring your own chamber pot!
What is interesting about these women is they were not so different from us. They traveled for excitement, for writing ( Freya Stark – 1893-1993) or drawing opportunities later photographic experiments, to get out of dull lives or grief . They wanted to see how others lived as part of a social experiment or to lecture about progressive beliefs.
Some like Dame Rebecca West (1892-1983) traveled in Yugoslavia pre WW II to witness the advent of the Nazis. By the way, her book Black Lamb, Grey Falcon is considered the best travel book ever written! All 1100 pp of it. And Jan Morris ( b. 1926), who became a women mid way through an illustrious writing career and still turns out fabulous travelogues from shall we call it a unique point of view.
