Kirsty Man­ning grew up in north­ern New South Wales, Aus­tralia. She has degrees in lit­er­a­ture and com­mu­ni­ca­tions and worked as an edi­tor and pub­lish­ing man­ag­er in book pub­lish­ing for over a decade. A coun­try girl with wan­der­lust, her trav­els and stud­ies have tak­en her through most of Europe, the east, and west coasts of the Unit­ed States as well as pock­ets of Asia. Kirsty’s jour­nal­ism and pho­tog­ra­phy spe­cial­iz­ing in lifestyle and trav­el reg­u­lar­ly appear in mag­a­zines, news­pa­pers, and online. She lives in Australia.