Invisible no more: The rise of the 50+ solo woman traveler

The seeds of Rita Morgan’s wanderlust were planted in her youth. She began falling in love with travel while crossing the United States on annual family camping trips. Morgan started planning for future travel in her 20s, and when she retired in 2007 at the age of 55, she sold her home and personal possessions and departed for Australia and New Zealand for five months. She’s been traveling non-stop ever since.

“I like to be on the go,” Morgan says. “It’s been 15 years of nomadic life and as long as I keep up with people, I don’t consider myself an older traveler, yet.”

It’s not just Morgan: Mature women travelers are having a moment. Whether traveling alone or independently with friends on organized trips, members of the 50+ female set are selling homes, donning backpacks and signing up to adventures that take them out of their comfort zones and into places that nourish their bodies and souls.

For my part, after feeling like I’d become invisible in midlife—being ignored in lines, talked over in meetings, having served my “procreation purpose”—emerging out of the shadows feels like coming into my power as a mature woman.  As a travel writer, I regularly dine at a ‘table for one, thanks!’, and enjoy my own company, which, despite occasional comments by neighboring diners, is not a courageous act: It’s as it should be.

Too often, solo female travelers have been made to feel that it’s strange or even perilous to be on a journey on one’s own; that we’re either compromising our safety, in need of assistance, or to be pitied. The secret that so many mature women are learning and sharing among ourselves is that, in fact, the opposite is true. And whether the travel industry recognizes it or not, we’re out here playing hard and having the time of our lives.

“It’s time to relinquish the stereotypes and attitudes of the past and embrace the wisdom that these mature women bring to travel. Women over 50 are adventurous, curious and empowered to make their own financial decisions.”

- Carolyn Ray, CEO, JourneyWoman

Recently, I experienced the freedom and joy of solo women coming together during a stay in the Swiss Alps, when I befriended another solo female traveler, Anna, a widow from Zurich. We were sitting next to each other at breakfast and struck up a conversation where I invited her to join me for a day hike. We wandered past bewildered cows coping with an early alpine snowfall, and agreed to meet for fireside après and dine on classic cheese fondue, complete with de rigeur shots of kirsch, laughing our way through dinner in three different languages.

A global study of 1,000 mature women conducted in December 2022 by Canadian travel publication JourneyWoman™, found that women over 50 are empowered, prefer to travel alone, and are seeking adventurous experiences in bucket list destinations.

And according to a recent US study conducted by the Coca-Cola Group and Mass Mutual, women aged 50+ represent over $15 trillion in purchasing power in 2023, and are experiencing the largest population growth over the next 10 years. We are the new Golden Girls.

Of course, women traveling solo is not new. Take 19th-century pioneers like Austrian Ida Pfeiffer and British explorer and naturalist Isabella Bird, the first woman admitted to the British Royal Geographic Society. They both broke convention and traveled widely, producing books and journals detailing the people and places they met along the way. They and other intrepid female explorers blazed the trail for 21st-century women, whose ascendency and purchasing power ought to prompt change in the mindset about who constitutes an “adventure traveler”.

But despite the increasing number of mature solo women hiking, paragliding, cycling and kayaking around the world, many 50+ female travelers don’t feel that the travel industry understands their needs.

The JourneyWoman™ survey found that 70 percent of respondents over 50 feel ignored and undervalued by the travel industry. Concerns include the lack of age-appropriate and diverse photography and marketing materials, a desire to see more appropriate terminology to describe older women, and more emphasis on mobility and accessibility requirements.

“It’s time to relinquish the stereotypes and attitudes of the past and embrace the wisdom that these mature women bring to travel,“ says Carolyn Ray, CEO of JourneyWoman™. “Women over 50 are adventurous, curious and empowered to make their own financial decisions.”

The study also noted that 96 percent of respondents make the travel decisions in their household—a forceful indicator that this cohort has both the desire and the dollars to fund adventurous explorations around the globe.

Teri McCoy, a 51-year-old Canadian woman of color living in the Ottawa region, laughs as she laments how youth can be wasted on the young when it comes to travel. With grown children and a successful career, McCoy has the resources, motivation, and time to pursue her travel goals, but is frustrated at not seeing herself portrayed in many adventure travel operators’ marketing materials.

“It’s a missed opportunity for travel companies,” she states. “I have the means and I would go anywhere there’s a tour.”

The freedom of solo travel can come with a cost—usually in the shape of the single supplement charged by many tour operators to cover lost revenue or additional single-occupant hotel rooms required on group trips.

Women-only trips are Jennifer Haddow’s bread and butter. Her Canadian company, Wild Women Expeditions, has been steadily expanding its roster of international adventure trips to meet the needs of her majority 50+ solo women client base, who are looking to book big bucket-list adventures around the world.

Haddow agrees that there’s an undercurrent of bias against valuing women of a more mature age. She also notes that the people in charge of the adventure travel industry are overwhelmingly men who may not see 50+ women as fit for adventure travel opportunities.

Many mature women travelers are also interested in experiences that re-anchor them to their core identity, which can often get waylaid by life and devotion to career or family. Whether hiking to Everest base camp or kayaking in Antarctica, Haddow likens it to a “Stella got her groove back” phenomenon, where clients are seeking transformational journeys that reconnect them with their inner adventurous selves.

Organized group tours appeal to women like Marillee Carroll, a 74-year-old living in southern California. She finds comfort and camaraderie in exploring with other like-minded travelers, particularly if safety is a concern. Mature solo women are as concerned about safety as their younger cohorts, and use the wisdom of experience and intuition to recognize the value of traveling in a group.

“Some women are fearful about going on trips by themselves, but that shouldn’t stop them,” Carroll says, recommending that first-timers try going on a small group trip to get comfortable. Carroll’s experiences as a Lifelong Learner on two round-the-world Semester at Sea journeys, a multi-country study program, were life-changing and introduced her to women of all ages and new ports all over the globe.

There can be safety in numbers. “It’s important to be aware of your surroundings,” McCoy notes, adding that, whether alone or solo in a group, she’s never regretted stepping outside of her comfort zone and into her curiosity as an “introverted extrovert” woman of color.

The freedom of solo travel can come with a cost—usually in the shape of the single supplement charged by many tour operators to cover lost revenue or additional single-occupant hotel rooms required on group trips. Many mature travelers aren’t keen to share rooms with strangers, and chafe at the additional charges levied on solo travelers.

Rachael Gavan, Head of Travel for Wilderness Scotland, acknowledges that it’s a challenging issue for both operators and travelers. In small market towns or villages, there are a finite number of hotels and accommodations, and they prefer the maximized income that double occupancy brings.

That said, in 2022, 50+ solo female travelers comprised 37 percent of Wilderness Scotland’s clientele. The company is responding to this demand with curated women-only itineraries, including booking entire lodges so there are no extra charges or single supplements.

Whether traveling alone or joining a group, the journey of a solo mature traveler is marked by freedom, curiosity, camaraderie and far less hassle than in the past. At 70 years old, Rita Morgan finds people are easier to meet, and more friendly and willing to help when she travels solo—and she’s been doing it for 15 years. “They’re often surprised to see me traveling on my own, and curious about why and how I do it. It makes for great conversations.” Channeling the spirit of traveling pioneers, it is clear that today’s mature solo women travelers are embracing their wanderlust and blazing new trails in the pursuit of transformative and life-affirming adventures.

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