As the summer has reached its peak, more and more people are catching the travel bug. But if you are a woman travel enthusiast — single or otherwise — perhaps you may find that your friends’ schedules don’t match yours or, maybe, your husband is just too busy to accompany you on a vacation. So does that mean you miss out on long tours with your gal pals? The answer is no!

Stash your backpack, go online and log in to www.wowsumitra.com. A unique online travel club by one-time travel writer Sumitra Senapaty, WOW (or Women on Wanderlust) arranges all-women trips abroad and within the country.

Started about six years ago, WOW has taken members to destinations as diverse as Ladakh, the Andaman Islands, South Africa, Kenya, eastern Europe, Greece, the Mediterranean, China, Egypt, Turkey, Bhutan and Morocco.

Supriya Bhatia (38), a dentist from Delhi, says, “Being a single woman, I’ve had a problem planning my trips. One can’t always get the timing right with friends and family isn’t always available. I came across WOW in 2005 and found it to be right up my alley.”

It’s the whole safety-in-numbers idea that appeals to women who travel with WOW.

“You can make new friends and visit exciting places,” says Supriya, who has been to Egypt, China, Greece, Ladakh and trekked and rafted with WOW in Uttaranchal.

“It gives women freedom. They are neither wife, nor mother, nor a sister or daughter or a grandmother in the Indian context. They are themselves. And since it is an all-women group, society is not asking questions,” says Sumitra.

Surprisingly, not many women from eastern India have travelled with this club.

“Hardly any women from Orissa, Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand or the Northeast have travelled with WOW. I think women from these parts have not become as independent financially, or, perhaps, have not started leading independent lives. We should get more from Bhubaneswar or Calcutta,” says Sumitra.

“Lots of Bengali and Oriya women living in Delhi or Mumbai have travelled with WOW,” says Preeta Pradhan (49), a regular traveller with WOW.

So, what is the profile of women who travel with WOW? Surprisingly, the age of the typical WOW traveller varies from 26 to 65.

“They are single, divorced, married, homemakers, professionals, and self-employed women. But one thing is common to all — they are financially and mentally way above average and share a common passion: travel,” says Sumitra.

It’s no wonder then that Sumitra’s business is website driven. Facebook and Twitter are perfect forums for women to find WOW and connect with like-minded individuals.

“These forums are popular with our target audience. It’s easy to reach them through this media,” says Sumitra.

The idea for WOW occurred to Sumitra about six years ago when she used to travel extensively as a writer. “Women I met on various occasions told me I was lucky and said how they too wanted to travel without any strings attached. So, I decided to share some of my luck with them by providing a platform that would give women an opportunity to travel.”

Sumitra also arranges “Mom and Me” trips for women who want to travel with their children. The tours are meant for mothers with busy husbands and small kids, who normally cannot get away for holidays.

“The itineraries are designed in such a way that there is something for the kids, with some amount of educational content, and at the same time, a chance for women to get away from the kids, to do their own thing, and yet spend enough quality time with their kids. These tours are not of too long a duration, and to destinations that are not too expensive,” says Sumitra.

Some of their trips, however, can be out of reach for women who don’t want to pry open their purses too wide. A forthcoming trip to China, with Lhasa and Tibet, for 10 days and 11 nights would cost you Rs 66,000 on a twin share basis, excluding flight fares.

“I was initially hesitant about going on a WOW trip, because it seemed to me that the prices were rather steep and I was apprehensive about being with an unknown group of people. Then a Ladakh trip was scheduled. It was a short one and was listed for a time when I was free. So, I jumped at the opportunity,” says Preeta.

While WOW has been on this exciting ride for six years, it’s been just six months that Nutan Thangan (38) of Periplus Travels struck upon the idea to start a web-based travel club for women.

“There has been a big boom in single women travelling abroad. But in India, the concept is still at the nascent stage,” says Nutan, who launched the Facebook page Women Only Travel in India recently. “We are planning a trip to Ladakh during the Hemis festival in July.”