Why I Started Likeminded Group Travel — And Why Travel Has Always Been My North Star

A note from Kelsey Fuller, Founder of Likeminded Group Travel

There's a moment I keep coming back to.

I'm standing on the deck of a liveaboard dive boat somewhere in the Coral Sea, the Great Barrier Reef stretching out beneath me in every direction. The water is impossibly blue. The world is completely quiet except for the sound of waves. And I remember thinking — this is it. This is what life is supposed to feel like.

I'd booked that trip alone. Flown to Australia alone. Showed up to that boat knowing nobody. And somewhere between the first dive and the last sunset, I felt more like myself than I had in years.

That trip didn't just check a bucket list item. It cracked something open in me. And it's a big part of why Likeminded Group Travel exists today.

It Started Long Before Australia

My love of travel goes all the way back to a post-college decision that probably seemed a little crazy to the people around me at the time. Instead of settling into a traditional career path, I packed my bags and moved to Chile. I spent months working in hostels and bed and breakfasts across the country — immersing myself in local life, learning the rhythms of a place completely different from anything I'd known, and meeting people from every corner of the world.

It was my first real solo travel experience. And it changed everything.

Ten Years in Hospitality

After Chile, I built a career in hospitality — specifically in hotels — nearly a decade of learning what it means to make people feel truly welcome. Then the company I was working for went bankrupt. And as destabilizing as that was, it gave me something unexpected: a moment of stillness in which I had to ask myself a question I'd been too busy to sit with.

The answer came quickly. It was never the buildings. It was the people.

The Trip That Showed Me What Was Possible

Around the same time, I found myself at a significant crossroads in my personal life. I needed something. Then I saw it — an Instagram travel influencer I'd followed for years was hosting a group trip to Morocco. Something about it called to me. I didn't know anyone going. I just knew I needed to be on that trip. So I booked it.

What happened in Morocco I can only describe as soul-nourishing. But more than the destination — it was the people. A group of strangers who showed up individually and became, over the course of just a few days, something that felt remarkably like community. I came home with a renewed sense of self, friendships I still cherish, and absolute clarity: this is what travel can do. And I want to help other people experience exactly this.

And Then There Was Australia

If Morocco showed me what was possible in a group, Australia showed me what was possible alone. I booked a week-long liveaboard on the Great Barrier Reef and made that dream a reality. Then I made my way to Melbourne — a city I fell in love with almost immediately. I made incredible connections there and felt completely at home. Australia holds a very special piece of my heart. And I have every intention of going back.

Why Likeminded Group Travel

All of these experiences — Chile, Morocco, Australia, a decade in hospitality, years of creating personal experiences as an Airbnb host — led me here. I believe we are all so much more alike than we are different. We just have to create the conditions to find that common ground. Travel creates those conditions beautifully.

Because life is meant to be lived fully. And I can't wait to help you do exactly that.