18-year-old close friend is getting kicked out by her abusive mother and has decided to travel alone across America until she finds a place she wants to settle in.
Over the past year, I've made a new friend at work that I have fallen in love with as a person. She's one of the closest people in my life now. She comes from an abusive home life with her mother and is recently getting kicked out having until mid-October this year (2021) to prepare to move. She doesn't have too many close friends here outside of me and another girl. A dancer and poet at heart and in practice, she has abruptly decided to travel across the country until she finds a place she "falls in love with to settle and maybe go to college." Her words. She plans on doing so upon making a purchase of a new/used camper van with some initial help from her Dad and will be stopping at in various places for a couple months at a time to find work while living out of the van so she can minimize expenses, continue to fund the trip, and still make payments toward paying off her vehicle. She will have about $10k in savings and has some camping experience but has never been outside California. She has some family spread out across a few places in the state and country but not many she's too familiar with. She's also not too concerned over Covid as she says that she's young and vaccinated now. If description matters, she's tall (5'11"), Caucasian, kind of stands out a bit not only due to height but due to her unique bohemian fashion choices and partially shaved haircut, and she's part of the LGBT community.
What do you guys think of this situation? She is thinking of starting off in Northern California where she was born, then moving onto Oregon, and then likely Idaho next, and perhaps at some point Ohio and North Carolina sometime in the farther future. Is it feasible and safe for her as an 18-year-old girl with marginal experience and a month of preparation time to do this? What advice would you give her to prepare her properly or even delay this decision? What advice would you give her loved ones that care for her and worry over this? I really want to trust her and I don't want to restrict her from being herself. It's what I love about her, but she's still so young and quite sensitive in nature. And both I and her family and other friends truly worry for her over this. Please. Any advice you can offer at this time would be deeply appreciated. Thank you, guys.
***Note: This is actually a bit of a sensitive topic for me as my childhood best friend was an avid hiker and outdoors and camping enthusiast that eventually wanted to travel the world in similar fashion to the Rolf Pott's vagabonding philosophy. Sadly, he passed away a few years ago when he slipped on a tricky path on Mount Baldy in California after saving another hiker's life. Although I grieved, he was at a point in his life where he was doing exactly what he loved and I am ok with that. But this situation with my current friend is different. Much more worrisome, tbh.
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