When Elysabeth Lamoureux embarked on travel podcasting, it wasn’t about beaches, airports, and Instagram-worthy sunsets for her. It was about walls, those unseen ones we are born between, and how courage it requires to bring those walls crashing down. Her new project, Four Walls Podcast, is a rich, passion-drenched exploration of how travel shatters comfort zones, redraws identities, and expands what “home” even is.
Boarding Pass of a Small Town
Lamoureux hails from a tiny Washington town where, by her own description, “there’s not a lot to do there and it kind of creates a place of comfort where if you give yourself a chance you don’t really grow and expand after a certain point.” It resonated for her early on.
“In middle school I knew I wanted to leave,” she recalls. With encouragement from coaches and family, she moved out of state for college, her first leap beyond her four walls. That decision sparked what she now describes as a blossoming into her current self: “a very frequent traveler that truly wants to go all over the place.”
Her work is built on that ethos, that spending a year, a month, a weekend, outside is the best transformative passport that you can possess.
It’s Not About the Souvenirs, It’s About the Stories
Most podcasts are virtual online guidebooks, packed with restaurant recommendations and travel advice. Lamoureux’s strategy for Four Walls, however, is far from a box-ticking, landmark-checking endeavor.
“Number one is for individuals to listen to this podcast and say, Wow, I can do that too,” she says. “Do it scared, do it by yourself, do it however you have to, but go.
“Anticipate food discourse and travel shout-outs, yes. But beneath it all are tales, raw, chatty conversations that reveal the larger truths. “Going traveling for the first time by yourself, traveling in your thirties, discovering the world is a lot larger than it seemed, that’s what it’s like, I want people to learn,” she says.
Reducing Border Controls and Checkpoints
Lamoureux is painfully cognizant of the hurdles that prevent individuals from ever getting on their first flight. “There are going to be things getting in your way of traveling,” she says. “Who you are, where you’re from, how you appear, your budget, your schedule.”
Her solution? Representation and relatability. Four Walls will have multiethnic travelers of all income levels, relishing both the highs and lows. “I want people to know traveling isn’t about being classy all the time,” Lamoureux contends. “Sometimes it’s a $30 hostel, a 48-hour journey condensed into a weekend, a room shared by strangers, and it’s still delightful for being some place new.”
Transform a Podcast to a Passport Stamp
Lamoureux’s ambitions for the microphone are merely a starting point. She views Four Walls as an online space where listeners network, exchange advice, and even discover traveling partners.
“There’s definitely going to be a community being formed,” she describes. “A place where individuals are going to be able to reach out for advice, write-in for advice, or even submit their own travel stories.” And indeed, Lamoureux states it outright: if you’ve got a story to tell, the door is open to the podcast. “All they have to do is message me on social media.”
Inclusivity is Four Walls’ lifeblood: destroying divides, opening doors, and proving to the world it’s not for a few, it’s for all of us gutsy enough to exit our four walls.
Episode One: Destination
Our maiden Four Walls Podcast is live, and our audience gets their first taste of Lamoureux’s vision: intimate, inspiring, and not fearful of knocking down walls we are bound by. Because at times, it takes more courage to walk through a front door, then across a sea.
