Besides reading, my favorite hobby is Travel. I love seeing new places, visiting old ones, learning about history, culture, and I’ll own it, Disney World too. No shame here! Recently I took a trip to Ireland.

For me, vacations are a departure from the everyday when it’s all about enjoyment and adventure. Maybe it explains my love of literature and writing, too, because characters are rarely ordinary and tend to find themselves in extraordinary situations.

So, I started thinking about Fairy tales—like I do—and travel. Granted, at the time most of these stories were conceived, travel was a dangerous undertaking and therefore rare. Even royals who went “on progress” stayed for months at a time because it was so arduous.

And fairy tales were no exception…if you were female.

Girls who traveled got eaten by wolves or betrayed by jealous servants. Was there a princess who ever left a castle voluntarily? Meanwhile, princes practically tripped over single women of marriageable age whenever they galloped out on their steeds. Then I remembered The Snow Queen.

The original story found here barely resembles the Disney version. Gerda travels from place to place, facing danger all to save her childhood friend, Kai. It’s one of the few instances that I know where a girl saves a boy and purposely goes on an adventure. It’s a beautiful tale, but hardly fun. In stories, travel is for a purpose not for pleasure.

In short, fairy tale characters don’t take vacations. Isn’t it strange that one of the most fanciful art forms we share doesn’t believe in time off? Honestly, there was no time, but I do my best to always insert a little whimsy.