Exposure to different places and cultures changes you. At age 43, my friend Tisha Tate booked a flight to Peru and joined a group to hike the Inca Trail, which led to Machu Picchu. It took four days to go 26 miles — a journey up and down original Incan staircases, in high elevations (the highest nearly 14,000 feet at Dead Woman’s Pass), all the while sleeping in tents with no “real” bathrooms.