a life after trauma.
The young traveler who built a life on the road
Riley had always been fascinated by maps.
Growing up outside Portland, Oregon, she was the kind of child who could spend an afternoon tracing highways across a paper atlas while imagining where each road might lead.
Her parents, Claire and Mike Harper, initially assumed it was simply a childhood obsession.
It wasn’t.
By her teenage years, Riley had developed a clear idea of the life she wanted. She didn’t dream about an enormous house or an ordinary nine-to-five routine.
She wanted movement.
She wanted national parks, mountain roads, quiet campsites and the freedom to decide where she would wake up next.
At 17, she bought an aging Ford Econoline van with money she had saved from part-time jobs.
Her father helped with the mechanical work. Her mother helped turn the interior into something resembling a tiny
