Our Scholars are lucky enough to get to travel the world with an international explorer and photographer. As a writer and photographer, Himraj Soin has founded his own magazine, The Outdoor Journal, and he's also had his work featured in Vogue, Vice, Runner’s World, National Geographic Traveller India, Reader’s Digest UK, and Condé Nast Traveller India.

‍Before Baret, Himraj was a Director at Ibex Expeditions, an award-winning adventure travel company based in India, where he planned and guided mountain, safari, and cultural journeys. His expeditions have taken him to Tibet, Mongolia, Bhutan, Nepal, Borneo, Madagascar, Peru, Morocco, Namibia, Argentina, Chile, Siberia, New Zealand, Antarctica, Iceland, Croatia, Tanzania, Ecuador and the Galápagos, and Svalbard, among others. So far this year, he's accompanied our Scholars to Patagonia, Andalusia, and the bayous of North Carolina.

We talked with Himraj about what it means to be a world traveller, and how to make the most of a year—and indeed, a life—abroad. Our conversation is below.

What drew you to Baret? What convinced you to join?

Having grown up in a family of mountaineers, explorers, and artists, my childhood was filled with adventure—climbing ropes and rappelling devices hung from my baby crib, carabiners filled kitchen drawers, and maps were scattered throughout the house. I learned the importance of responsible travel at a young age, along with a strong desire to travel to remote places and understand the need for them to remain protected. My bedtime stories were those of legendary explorers and adventurers like Ernest Shackleton, Bertram Thomas, George Mallory, and Jane Goodall—plotting and mapping in seek of the incredible unknown.

This adventure-infused upbringing charted me on a course of expedition leading around the world—something I’ve been doing since I was 21. Every summer, I led educational trips—epic expeditions that took me all around the world, where I got to share some of my passions with my students: adventure storytelling, photography, and conservation.

So once I found out about Baret, it sounded like a perfect fit, though I was nervous and fascinated by the idea of doing an entire year on the road. I was also captivated by Baret’s format, between home base cities and Fellowships. So I took the plunge, and it’s been pretty far out so far!

What compels you about being a Fellow?

I’m lucky and privileged to have had a life full of travel and, more importantly, amazing mentors. I feel it’s my duty to now pay it forward—whether that’s teaching a student something new in an Afternoon Option, pushing them outside their comfort zone during an arduous hike on a fellowship, helping with their capstone projects, using the power of film, art, and ideas while showcasing the Mountainfilm festival, and most importantly, having a blast while sharing this experience together.

Although our gap year will physically come to an end, there are things about these experiences that do persist, for a time, and some that persist forever, if you let them. The memories will inevitably fade into blurry fragments, anecdotes, and photographs, but the personal growth, the passions and interests, and the connections cultivated and developed this year have the potential to follow our cohort for the rest of our lives. And that’s a pretty special thing.

Tell us a little about your background as an expedition leader. What drew you to it?

I find leading student expeditions to be some of the hardest and most fulfilling work I get to do. I’ve been lucky to have gone on many an expedition while growing up, all while witnessing my father, a mountaineer and an explorer, lead them. When I finished college in Colorado, I started leading student trips for National Geographic—something that was always a dream of mine. To guide students and adults, teaching photography and conservation, planning experiences, all while getting to explore the most stunning parts of the world—it's wild to even call it a job.

What is your approach to your journalism? What sorts of stories are you interested in telling?

I used to be an adventure travel journalist for 10 years, co-founding an independent outdoor sports, adventure travel, and environmental news publication called The Outdoor Journal. As a writer and photographer, I covered international destinations, conservation issues, extreme adventure sports, athletes, gear, maps, and more.

As a visual storyteller, I believed in using my powers for good. Armed with a pen and camera, shooting and writing about people and places—especially in underreported areas of the world, and in particular BIPOC voices whose tales were often overlooked—was important to me.

If you had one thing to tell young people who are interested in writing and photography, what would it be?

If I had to give young writers and photographers just one piece of advice, it would be this: don’t wait to tell stories that matter to you. You don’t need the perfect camera, a big platform, or a famous byline to begin. What you need is curiosity, empathy, and the willingness to really see people and places.

And for photography, in the age of the smartphone, how do you take a picture that also shows your values—who you are and how you want the world to be? It’s not about the eye only, but also about vision.

Be patient—strong storytelling isn’t built overnight. It’s built by showing up again and again, staying curious, and caring deeply about the stories you’re telling.

What has been your favorite moment of the year so far?

There have been so many special moments—and they all have to do with watching scholars grow. There’s something incredibly powerful about seeing a student go from being hesitant to speak up to asking sharper questions, taking creative risks, and really owning their ideas.

A moment that stands out in particular is our first fellowship in North Carolina. We landed in Charleston during a coastal flood warning and were greeted with terrible weather conditions, causing us to change our itinerary. After roughing it out for a few days, we were then greeted by the most beautiful blue skies, sunshine, and starry, galactic nights. We camped, kayaked, stargazed, cooked, and shared this special experience together.

Another special moment was getting to Ushuaia, the southernmost city in the world, and embarking on a long Patagonian hike up to glaciers. There are words in languages intricate enough to describe situations such as “a long car ride ending with getting ice cream,” but no language is thorough enough to describe the feeling of being alone in a natural landscape long abandoned by humans, in a family of once-strangers you’ve learned to love in such a short time, on a day more beautiful than any the guide had seen all year, meditating in the sunlight by a brook under snow-streaked fjords, accompanied by the sweetest mountain dog throughout.

What are you most looking forward to this year?

Apart from momentous experiences like climbing Mount Kenya and exploring new cities for me, like Istanbul and Nairobi, I’m most excited to experience graduation together.

I’m eager for students to watch for the actions that also answer the questions they had about our time with Baret—the intimate conversations we strike up with complete strangers after learning how close you can get to someone so quickly; the lifestyle changes, like biking to the store instead of driving or ordering the meatless option at a restaurant, influenced by witnessing ice from melting glaciers crack and float quietly out to sea; and the ways we might challenge ourselves and our families to create change after meeting the experts and communities pleading for it.

I look forward to looking for the art, the activism, the love, and the passions that bloom from this year in the years ahead. Baret has been and will be a special time with a truly special group. And even when it may one day feel like a distant memory, it will be there, a part of us.

‍