Hey Mrs. Strong! :)
I just realized my answer never went through...

There is no way (yet) to message privately on Steemit, but there is the Steemit.chat to do that. It requires a separate login, though, and not everyone may be there. There are a lot of channels that you could join to chat, connect and learn, though. I am @followyourjoy there, but don't really hang out there a lot.

Following you now and looking forward to updates from your travels! :)