I booked a $200 flight to Panama on a whim, then decided to move there. I found the community I was missing in the US.

Chrysten Crockett moved from Atlanta to Panama City and said she's staying for good.

Courtesy of Chrysten Crockett.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Chrysten Crockett, a Cleveland native who moved from Atlanta to Panama City. Crockett, 36, owns a content marketing agency that she now runs from Panama. The following has been edited for length and clarity.I have no kids and I am not married, so I decided to take a leap and travel. I was like, "Let me try this travel thing out while I can."I've always been nomadic in a way; I went from Ohio to New York to Charlotte to Atlanta. Then I thought, let's try out another country this time. I didn't really know where I wanted to live; I just knew I wanted to move.I had a list of countries I wanted to check out. Costa Rica was on the list, along with Brazil, Colombia, and others.Then I met someone who knew I was going to be traveling and they said, "Have you ever considered Panama?" I said, no, actually, I haven't. I went home that night, looked up Panama City, and I was like, "Oh wow, it's a big city. I didn't know that. Let me look up flights."Flights from Atlanta were around $200 one-way. I booked a flight that night.Panama was the first stop on my trip, and when I got there, I fell in love. I was blown away because I had never been, and I didn't know much about the country. It opened up an opportunity to explore a new place — and it's also very beautiful.So it was an easy yes when I got here. When I got off the flight, I was like, "Oh my gosh, I love this place already. I can live here."After Panama, I explored a little bit more of Latin America, but nothing hit like Panama, so I came back.