Selecting Assignments Where You Desire
No one else can tell you where to go as a travel nursewell, not unless you’re married. You are free to fly with the wind to the most exotic and out-of-the-way places like the rural areas of Oklahoma, Texas, Nebraska or Iowa, or enjoy an assignment in the metropolis of New York City, Miami, Los Angeles, or Phoenix. Travel to the beaches of Southern California, Atlantic City or Hawaii. Assignments can also be found ranging in areas from the Virgin Islands to the great state of Alaska.
You might have to change companies, but so far I have gone every place that I have wanted to visit. This is easier done if you have more than one specialty, like medical intensive care, surgical intensive care, cardiovascular intensive care, and emergency room, or telemetry, medical, surgical, step-down and rehab.
What other career will allow you to be a snowbird when you are thirty-five years old instead of sixty-five years old? When it comes time to make a move, my husband selects what state he would like to go to, then I put my state into the mixture and we submit to those hospitals and see who gives us the best deal. My son would have a choice, but he just wants to go to Washington, where his girlfriend is. For the summer, I wanted Nebraska and hubby wanted Iowa; we went to Iowa. For the winter, I wanted Florida, hubby wanted southern Texas: I’m writing this chapter in Florida. And yes, next summer we plan on spending it in Washington State.
Miniature Vacations
One of my favorite aspects of travel nursing is the mini-vacations. These are little two nights away to some place a little farther than you could go on a day trip.
When I was in Central California, my family and I went to San Francisco one day then up the Pacific coast highway to the Redwoods. The first night we stayed at a small motel on the outskirts of San Francisco in an older fishing village.
The second night we stayed in the Redwoods. The trees were gorgeous, with their red and green colors. The Redwood Trail is also the site of the road picture on my first travel nursing book, Highway Hypodermics: Your Road Map to Travel Nursing.
While on assignment in Iowa, we toured the bridges of Madison County and John Wayne’s birthplace on one road trip, and later made a trip to Minneapolis, Minnesota to watch the Twins play baseball and visit the Mall of America.
One assignment in Tupelo, Mississippi not only took us to the site of Elvis’s birthplace, but a day adventure took us to the place where he lived and died, at Graceland, in Memphis, Tennessee. On a bigger adventure, we spent some time a week before Christmas at the Opryland Hotel in Nashville and had the extraordinary experience of Christmas in Nashville. While in Nashville we explored many sites, such as the Ryman Auditorium, the Country Music Hall of Fame, and took in a show at the Grand Ole Opry.
See The United States
When I started out as a traveling nurse, I had been east of the Mississippi River once, and that was for less than twenty-four hours. Now I can say that I have not only crossed the mighty Mississip, but I have even made it to the Eastern Time Zone. In the last two years alone I have been from the beaches of Pismo, California to Southern Miami Beach, and from the swamps of Louisiana to the lakes of Minnesota.
If water and beaches are not your thing, then how about an amazing sunset in the Arizona sky? Or you can take in the breath-taking view from the top of the Colorado mountains.
How about a goal of seeing all the National Parks that the United States has to offer? You can visit the Everglades, the Appalachians, The Rocky Mountains, Yellowstone, The Grand Canyon, and Yosemite.
Are you into history? How about a trip through the history of the United States, from Washington D.C. to the Battle of New Orleans, the Battle of Shiloh, or the Alamo. Don’t forget to visit the many military museums, including the Smithsonian, the Air Force Museum in Pensacola, FL, and there are several battleships to visit.
For more information on travel nursing, check out Epstein’s travel nursing website at: www.highwayhypodermics.com