Dry Grad Thailand: Teaching Youth How to Have Fun Without Alcohol

How an alcohol-free graduation trip to Thailand transformed reluctant teens into confident adventurers.

What is a Dry Grad trip you ask? It’s an opportunity for young people to travel internationally with an alcohol-free host, experiencing life-changing activities in a safe environment. When our youth travel, there is a lot of peer pressure to fit in. Regular social groups are back home, and the need to fit in with new people in a new place is strong – often alcohol is the solution. A Dry Grad trip removes the alcohol, providing the opportunity for healthy choices.

In Thailand, we were surrounded by unhealthy choices… in Railay Beach, we walked by menus listing different alcohol and marijuana concoctions while we sought out rock climbing, snorkeling, cooking classes, and the beauty of bioluminescence. We swam with sea turtles, made silly TikToks, had a disco tuk-tuk food tour, explored the endless world of fresh fruit smoothies, walked through caves full of bats, and had hours of belly-roll laughs observing monkeys. We did island life right for 6 days and had 2 nights in Bangkok. That was the first half of the trip.

The second half was just as great as the first, but in an entirely different way! Heartstrings we did not know we had were pulled in multiple directions. It’s very common to have an elephant sanctuary experience in Thailand. The typical excursion to a sanctuary is about 4 hours. We volunteered for 6 nights and 5 very full days. This was not an experience for the faint of heart. We were on the elephants’ time schedule, which meant up at 6 am for feeding time. There were 19 elephants at the sanctuary that were rescued from circus performances and logging. We got familiar with their traumas. We harvested banana plants, we picked up poop, we cleaned out lakes (odd but true). Our accommodations had no air conditioning (in July Thailand heat), we shared bathrooms, and had limited wifi. I got to experience this with my son. My son got to experience it with his mom and 4 other teens.

It is incredible to hear what the teens had to say about this trip. Lily, from Alberta, Canada, was gifted the trip from her grandmother for her high school graduation. Lily was VERY reluctant about coming. She almost did not make it on the plane, had anxiety being away from her parents, had anxiety being in ocean waters, and as the group host, I have to admit I thought maybe this whole grad trip thing was not a good idea. At the end… Lily was jumping off boats… diving underwater with sea turtles and wanting to return the following summer on a two-month volunteer commitment, completely solo. Lily admits that if she was traveling with her regular social group, she would not have made healthy choices and attributes the Dry Grad trip as being instrumental in her life direction.

Watching these teens evolve over a 2-week span has made me realize that HOOKED has to offer an annual Dry Grad Trip, as this opportunity is helping shape our youth. I had a mother say to me, “What a cool program. You are teaching our youth how to have fun!” If we don’t teach our youth how to have fun, someone else will…