travel

Story·Meilan Steimle, age 12 — A girl with overly intellectual parents seeks sisterhood on a school trip to Yosemite, but finds bickering cabinmates, indifferent leaders, and a bed-wetting incident instead.

Story·Marie-Rose Sheinerman, age 12 — An eleven-year-old returns from Russia to New York and is detained at customs, intensifying her desperate longing to reunite with her parents and her city.

Story·Abby Lustig, age 11 — A girl races along the beach following a dolphin, sprinting through sand and tide pools to keep up with the graceful creature before having to leave for the airport.

Poetry·Sarah Wood, age 12 — A poem captures the last night before a friend moves to Ireland, from joyful evening to tearful goodbye as she disappears in the rain.

Story·Natalie Bettendorf, age 13 — A family's annual August trip to Mission Beach in San Diego brings together two close families for a day of racing to the ocean, splashing, and summer traditions.

Story·Lily Strauss, age 10 — A Montana girl raises money to visit her beloved horse Missoula, who has been sent to Missouri to work as a therapy horse for children with disabilities.

Poetry·Nastassja Carusetta, age 13 — A daughter anxiously awaits her mother's return from a road trip, memories of their last night together mixing with dark fears about what might happen.

Story·Brooke Fallows, age 11 — A girl remembers her grandfather through visits to a train station and Olvera Street, then recounts his death and what he taught her about time and memory.

Poetry·Stella White, age 11 — A girl lies in her father's childhood bed in London, watching trains pass and imagining his life decades earlier in the same room.

Story·Hannah Ogden, age 13 — A family drives through the night to grandparents' house after eviction, their old truck barely making it as a girl reflects on loss and uncertain futures.