Perks of travel nursing career?

The pay is quite nice. Traveling is too and if you like a place you can typically extend. If you hate it -- finish out the contract and move on. You're not stuck anywhere. You don't have staff meetings and crap like that to deal with. You're not there to change the paradigm of nursing or revamp their policy book so you don't have a lot of the garbage that goes with being staff on a unit. You're there to do the job and go home. 

The downsides come from being a hired gunslinger. You don't have a say in policy, etc., and you are expected to follow policy and procedure at that institution -- which can be markedly different from other places. Some people have a really hard time with that whole "But we did it THIS way at my other hospital." Nobody cares. You're not at the other hospital. Just do the thing. Bring your experience and knowledge but recognize that you are the variable and the staff are the constant. You're not there to be the knight in shining armor that saves their department.

The expectations for competence and flexibility are very high. You're a hired gun. You don't hire Doc Holiday then spend three weeks teaching him how to shoot. You might get one shift (or less than a full shift) of orientation. It's: "Here's the lockers, here's the med room, here's the supply closet. Go. Call me if you have any questions." You have to be able to hit the ground running. Which means you really want to have some solid experience before traveling. Nobody likes being the dumb kid at school and nobody likes the team member who just can't get it together. You have to be SUPER independent. Not that you'll always be left swinging in the breeze; not at all. But you have to be prepared to be a dependable resource from the get-go. 

If you like meeting new people, it's great for that. I've met some truly fantastic people while traveling. I've met some real clowns too. You see the breadth and depth of the profession when you travel. 

Overall, I'm a fan of traveling. The paychecks are great and I like not being tied to any one place. I get along well with people in general and I like change. I like not having to deal with the minutiae of running a unit, being charge, staff meetings, and all that jazz. 

You get to travel but you never get to plant real roots since you’re always on the move