Solo travel | Tips & tricks
- Mar 3, 2017
- 5 min read
Whether you’re an adventurer, a culture geek, a language enthusiast, the chilled type, the active type, a foodie, a photographer or a newbie; in these tips, I have aimed to cover as many bases as possible. All these tips and tricks are my holy grail of travel and I use them without fail wherever I go.
Do your research
Most people won’t book a flight somewhere without at least knowing a minimal amount about a country. None the less… you can never know too much. Every time I book a round trip I get a wave of anticipation, I will sit until 3 am searching Tripadvisor, Pinterest posts, magazines and Instagram to gather a basic consensus of where I'm going, what there is to do and what I should be avoiding according to other travellers before me. I look for appealing restaurants and shops and keep them as a backup in case I have nowhere to eat or shop.
A tip I learned from my mum is to always note down some important numbers such as the British Consulate, addresses of pharmacies, supermarkets and taxi firms as to prepare to incase something goes wrong. This is due to my fear of things going horribly wrong on holiday, but I also think its sensibility as well, these 5 minutes jotting addresses and numbers down could save you a lot of trouble while abroad.
After researching you can confidently land in a country knowing you understand the basics of the place your going, what you want to do and how you’re going to spend your time, with this plan you can go with the flow and stumble upon your own little wonders in new places, whilst following a trodden path.
P.S. Along with researching, I also suggest preplanning your journey from the airport to accommodation, whether that's learning local public transport routes, timetables and facilities, pre-booking a taxi which is always cheaper than catching one from the airport, or renting a car that's ready for you to drive on arrival… no one wants to be stressed 30 minutes after stepping off of the plane because they don’t know how to get to where they’re going!
Learn some phrases
This kind of ties into the tip above, I’m lucky as I have a natural aptitude for the memory of languages and although fluent in none I seem to have an incredibly strong memory for useful phrases and numbers that I've learnt abroad or from people. My best suggestion is to learn basic, polite, friendly and useful phrases that apply to finding your way, buying things as well as food and drink.
Yes most people globally speak English, I think the only place I have heard about where English is sparse is The East in deep parts of Thailand and Cambodia, but regardless of this locals appreciate and respect you more for the extra effort you have put in, and even if you can’t pronounce things properly give it a go and you’ll soon hit the learning curve! My best suggestions for learning phrases are buying phrase books, looking at Omniglot, learn from locals, or if you have the time, enthusiasm and effort give the apps Duolingo or Babbel a go.
Use your phone!
I hear so many people promoting the idea of going abroad and ‘switching off your phone’. However I do not agree, in the UK my phone is what distracts me and often lowers my productivity whereas abroad my phone is my lifeline. My iPhone is my favourite tool of all to take photos on and I think often iPhone photography can be just as striking as a full DSLR, providing you have the apps and knowledge to edit it well. It’s my lifeline to home, and as much as I like the independence of travelling I still text or call my parents every couple of days to keep them updated and let them know I'm okay. Find my iPhone is a feat of ingenuity, not for finding my iPhone because I never lose it but because my iPhone is always with me, and therefore my parents can find me... again I am catastrophising but to prepare for the worst eventuality I would leave my apple password with my parents in case I went missing and they can find my iPhone (me) online! Lastly, the maps app is my saviour, on my last journey to Athens I spent most of the time wandering aimlessly with little purpose or goal as to where I wanted to be, and what I wanted to see. Nonetheless when I was trying to find something and my paper map failed me instead I could buy data, use maps and set back off again with my sense of anxiousness from being lost settled and forgotten about.
Without mentioning too much I would always recommend staying in an Airbnb over a hotel any day, your host is most likely a local and can give you invaluable tips and advice and ultimately has more invested in you as a guest than a hotel would, for you, as a customer. It is often cheaper, more private and personal. You are able to understand and experience what it is like to live in the place you are travelling to, during your stay, and appreciate the destination for more genuine reasons than the average tourist. I often rent a whole property as I enjoy my privacy and independence (as I'm sure you’ve gathered) but renting a room is the better option for some as it offers more support and the opportunity to forge invaluable friendships.
Manage your money
I don’t know about you, but to me when I'm abroad I feel as if foreign money is monopoly money, has no value and I just use notes all the time so end up with unbearable amounts of change in my purse.
Something I have done since my first ever trip abroad without my parents is manage my money, for fear of having none. When I was 14 and went on my first ski trip with my school, they advised us to divide our money into labelled envelopes, for each day, so we could control how much we were spending and had a conscious understanding of spending during ‘solo’ travel. To this day I do the same; I will change my money before heading to the airport label each envelope and split the money based on roughly what my plans are for that day. Some days I spend all, and some days I spend none so the money carries over. This means that unlike my poor management of money in day to day life (oops), that I am never short of money while I travel. I often hide the envelopes while I'm out in an empty bottle or the insole of my shoe, as crazy as this sounds, so it isn't stolen or lost and I am not carrying around lots of money with me!
My final suggestion is to get a travel money card, these are readily available in travel agencies, at the post office or even online I believe and although I very rarely use them and forget the pin (keep it saved on your phone) it leaves me enough leeway with a few hundred pounds in case anything crops up that would leave me broke and incapable while abroad, without the worry of losing my bank card!
As much as all of the above seem to be basic to travelling, you’d be surprised how much you can forget or lose or run into whilst your travelling. These lessons didn’t come easily to me and only after many disasters while travelling did I formulate my own routine and habits whilst travelling, and I'm still learning! I hope that at least one of these helped or gave you some insight and helps propel you further along the road to your next journey!
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