There will be ones off on road trips to Galway, inter-rail excursions around Europe, rave-ups in Ibiza and more festivals being attended than you can shake a 3-litre bottle of cider at.

In the run-up to summer, our minds invariably wander from our workplaces or classrooms.

And so it was for the English girls who set off on the trip of a lifetime to South America less than a month ago.

Many of them were gap year students who were still figuring out what they wanted to do with their lives.

For some, university was their destination in September while others had planned to start careers.

Tragically, five of those girls lost their lives on Saturday when the bus they were travelling on was hit by a truck in Ecuador.

Indira Swann, 18, Emily Sadler, Rebecca Logie and Lizzie Pincock, all 19, and Sarah Howard, 26, were just half an hour from their destination at the end of a 10-hour journey.

They left the UK at the end of March and spent a fortnight studying Spanish in Quito before leaving on Saturday for the village of Puerto Lopez, where they were due to build sanitation facilities for a creche.
The bus crash is a real-life horror story for the family and friends the girls left behind.

Despite the shock and sorrow that must accompany such a loss, Indira's father was not consumed with bitterness and regret when he spoke to the press.

Cotton wool

Some parents would lament the fact that they had let their child go off on such a trip. But Indira's dad realises that you can't keep your children wrapped in cotton wool forever and that, occasionally, horrible things can and do happen.

He said of Indira: "She was so generous, so caring. We were so proud of her, she was her own person and she was independent.

She was 18 years of joy. An intelligent, kind and generous person, who had her whole life ahead of her. Her happiness was infectious.

"She did the travel with our full blessing and with our knowledge of the risks, which are quite minimal. Her motivation was to help people and enjoy life. We have no regrets about her going other than the final outcome."

He seems so happy that he was blessed with his daughter for 18 years, rather than venting anger at the cruel way in which she was taken from him.

It's inspiring that despite being completely grief-stricken he made mention of the 'minimal' risks involved in such an adventure and that he has no regrets 'other than the final outcome'.

People have to live their lives and not be paralysed with fear about what 'could' happen.

Indira, who was due to begin a degree in King's College, London, this autumn, was having the time of her life in Ecuador.

On a Facebook entry days before her death, she wrote: "I'm loving the chilled out vibe here, there's music everywhere and the people are very smiley - even if I have no idea what they are saying."

Having learned of her death, her parents came home early from their own holiday and discovered an e-mail which Indira had sent them just before she set out on the ill-fated bus trip.

It read: "Thanks for being so great and giving me the opportunity to do this. But also for giving me such a lovely home that nothing could stop me wanting to come back."

When newspapers are regularly filled with stories of the complete breakdown of relationships between children and parents, it's uplifting to read of the relationship Indira enjoyed with her folks.

That relationship was possible because her parents gave her the trust and freedom to go off and experiences people and places which would have been impossible at home.

Awful things happen every minute of every day and there is no escaping them.

The unknowable

We can't know what will happen five minutes from now, or one mile down the road, never mind on the other side of the world.

It isn't necessary to venture to foreign continents to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. The recent, tragic death of schoolgirl Nicola Murray at Ballygawley is testament to that.

Rebecca Logie's dad, Robin, said: "Rebecca lived life to the full. I don't want anybody to be put off by what happened - it was an accident."

He continued that he hoped his daughter's death would not discourage young people form following their dreams.

To die in a bus crash in Ecuador was a shocking, horrible conclusion to the girls' brief lives - but at least they were 'living' when they died.