Sharon Elder has visited 38 countries … she thinks. 

She has slept on the Great Wall of China, done yoga with howler monkeys in Costa Rica, caught Covid at 12,000 feet above sea level in the Himalayas, tasted the fresh seafood of the Azores and attended a buffalo-slaughtering ceremony in Indonesia. 

After all that, it’s hard to keep track, but there’s one thing she knows for sure — there’s no place like Wareham. 

“I love it here,” said Elder, 63. “I like to travel all around the world, but Parkwood Beach is my forever home.” 

Her Parkwood Beach home is filled with souvenirs of her travels, including a painting of Burmese fishing boats, a Turkish teapot, Portuguese pottery and a Nepalese prayer wheel. 

“I forget what some of these are now,” she said, pointing to a wall of masks from Panama, Indonesia, Costa Rica, Arizona, New Orleans and Nepal. 

She keeps her power cords in a case from China.

However, not all of her furniture is from her travels.

“I think that was from HomeGoods,” she said about one of her bookshelves, which was filled with travel guides.

Elder moved to Wareham in 2008, when she became a chemical engineer for Johnson & Johnson. She is retiring from that job in September in order to embark on her greatest adventure yet: A 16-month worldwide tour only using methods of travel that existed in 1920, the year that the 19th Amendment was ratified and women got the right to vote in all 50 states. 

The purpose of the trip is to raise awareness of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 5: “Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls.” 

“Me traveling by myself has been empowering and inspiring to people I have talked to about it,” Elder said. “I want to be a living example that women can do anything.” 

Elder also wants to promote “slow tourism” — a relaxed, sustainable form of travel focusing on everyday life and the more intimate aspects of a country’s culture. Most countries, Elder has found, live life at a slower pace than Americans do. 

“In this country, we take a very short view of life,” she said. “Something has to happen right now. … I feel very connected to nature, and I think going to those types of villages and connecting with those people helps me connect with nature, and how life used to be. There’s a rhythm of life that the people who live that way are very much in touch with.”

Elder has been planning the journey since summer 2020. To pay for it, she is selling her car and boat. 

She plans to volunteer in all of the places she visits, and fundraise for three charities: World Bicycle Relief, which donates bicycles to people in developing countries; the Mattapoisett-based All Hands and Hearts, which provides global disaster relief; and International Volunteer HQ, which offers volunteering opportunities in over 50 countries.

Elder was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2007. After so many people reached out to help her, she decided to “pay it forward” by helping others. 

“When you look at pictures of women from around the world,” she said. “It can appear that we don’t have a lot in common, but just by sitting down and having tea or a meal with someone, or walking with someone for a couple of days, that’s how you find out that we all have the same lived experience. And I think we need more of that in the world today.” 

On Sept. 10, she will begin her journey in Porto, Portugal. From there, she will take a “leisurely” 175-mile walk along the historic Camino de Santiago pilgrimage route. Joining Elder will be a friend and fellow cancer survivor who walked the Camino with her in 2016. 

“There is something about walking side by side that opens people up,” she said. “You’re all there for the same purpose.”

Once she reaches the city of Santiago de Compostela on Oct. 1, Elder will bike over 300 miles to Bilbao, Spain, then take a ferry to Portsmouth, England. (She is considering visiting the town of Wareham, England as well). She will visit relatives in Northern Ireland, then hike on the Isle of Skye off the coast of Scotland. After that, it’s back to Spain, then a train trip to a Johnson & Johnson plant in Leiden, Netherlands, where she will give a speech. 

Her plans for Christmas are “up in the air.” She will either be volunteering to help earthquake victims in Turkey or Ukrainian refugees in Poland. For her, the new year will begin in Antwerp, Belgium, where she will board a cargo freighter to Cape Town, South Africa. During the month-long voyage, she will live and eat alongside the freighter’s crew. 

“I’m looking forward to that downtime to do journaling and absorb what happened in Europe,” Elder said. 

How did she get passage on a cargo ship? “A guy called Arnie” secured her spot on board. 

For 35 days, she will trek from South Africa to Zanzibar. She is most excited to see wild lions in person. 

“I have a cat,” she said, “so I’m kind of a cat person.”

She has never feared for her safety on any of her travels, and isn’t afraid now. 

“Because I travel so much by myself, I listen to my intuition,” she said. “I’ve traveled enough to know that if something doesn’t seem right, I’m not going to do it.” 

From Zanzibar, she will meet up with another friend in Tanzania to volunteer at a rehab hospital. She is considering climbing Mount Kilimanjaro and visiting Masai tribal villages. This would happen in April 2024. 

After that, she plans to go to “somewhere in Asia,” but does not have transportation. Her itinerary from April to December 2024, the end of her trip, is still undetermined.

“I want to help people, especially women and girls, around the world,” Elder said. “Travel fills my soul.”

Starting in September, Elder will post updates about her travels to her blog, sharoneldertravels.com, and on Facebook and Instagram. 

To contribute to her World Bicycle Relief fundraiser, visit tinyurl.com/y9n9a4cz.