SPEAKERS

Michaela Potter is a freelance designer through Wanderlust Productions who has managed to interweave travel throughout her life. Having picked up a backpack for the first time in college, she was inspired to then take a “gap half-year” after graduation, a concept common in other cultures. That experience inspired her to incorporate traveling career-breaks throughout her career, including three months in Nepal & SE Asia in 2001, a summer volunteering in Peru in 2006, and another three months in Oceania & SE Asia in 2007.

As editorial and creative director for Meet, Plan, Go! and the Briefcase to Backpack blog, she now uses her experience in non-profit management, video production, and design, along with her passion for travel, to bring the concept of traveling career breaks & sabbaticals to the American culture.
Website: Wanderlust Productions | Twitter: @wanderlustprod

When journalist Christine Maxfield landed a position at a national travel magazine in New York, she thought that she’d arrived. Now she’d finally be able to sip cocktails with foreign correspondents abroad and interview mysterious sources in exotic locales—not! When she realized that she was going to be stuck reporting from her desk more than ever, Christine quit her magazine job, gave up her adorable apartment, stuffed her goods in storage, and took off on a yearlong solo trip in 2011 providing volunteer work around the world. This adventure led her to teach orphans in Kenya, live with a Bedouin tribe in Jordan, teach English to Tibetan Buddhist nuns in Nepal, mend fences on an aboriginal cattle ranch in Australia, shuck oysters on a black-pearl farm in French Polynesia, save baby sea turtles in Guatemala, teach music to Roma (gypsy) kids in Romania, and more.

Now she’s back (for the moment!) and working on a book about her experiences, while also encouraging others to follow their own wanderlust dreams. As a seasoned journalist who’s been on staff at Philadelphia magazine, Men’s Health, and Arthur Frommer’s Budget Travel, as well as contributed to many more, Christine blogged about her crazy adventures at CompassMag.com. She looks forward to sharing her volunteer planning secrets with you!
Website: Compass Mag | Twitter: @compassmag | Facebook: facebook.com/compassmag

ABOUT YOUR HOST

In July, 2008, after more than 4-1/2 years of intense planning, Rainer Jenss sold his house, put the family’s possessions in storage and left his job to do something that many people dream of, but very few actually dare to carry out: travel around the world for an entire year together with his wife and two young sons.

Before putting his professional expertise and personal passion to the ultimate test to travel around the world for a year with his family, Rainer was a Vice President and thirteen-year veteran of National Geographic. He helped relaunch National Geographic Kids in April 2002, and as its publisher, grew the publication to be the most widely read children's magazine in the world..

During the yearlong journey, Rainer reported for National Geographic Traveler's award-winning Intelligent Travel Blog, posting a weekly column about the experience and offering an inside look at life on the road traveling together as a family. Rainer continues to report on family travel as a Special Correspondent for National Geographic Traveler’s Intelligent Travel Blog, is a regular contributor to Global Traveler magazine and speaks at travel shows and conferences around the country.