Over the past two decades, I've made various trips to countries like Georgia, Colombia, India, and Palestine, more often than not alone — just the way I like it. The feeling I get from arriving in an unknown land is seriously addictive, and the people I meet along the way are part of the reason I continue. While solo travel has become increasingly popular in recent years (there are currently over 9 million #solotravel posts on Instagram), it's certainly not a new phenomenon, with adventurers like Martha Gelhorn and Freya Stark paving the way for women with a serious case of wanderlust. For me, it started right here in the UK.
I’ve always been curious, and rarely able to stay in one place for a prolonged period of time which is why from the age of 15 I’d sneak off from the small Midland’s town I grew up in to my aunt’s little bungalow on the Dorset-Devon border during school holidays to meet her for beach BBQs, fossil hunting, yoga and daily swims in the frigid sea. These trips continued until I was able to save enough money to venture outside of Europe for the first time, solo, at the age of 19. Guatemala, Belize and southern Mexico were my destinations of choice — countries I knew nothing about aside from the gorgeous music and hand-painted handicrafts I’d sold while working at a Latin-American store Lyme Regis — all I knew was simply that I wanted to experience them first hand.
Looking back, I’m sure some of my wanderlust stemmed from childhood films showcasing jungles, mesmerising wildlife or moody moorlands. Movies like Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, The Jungle Book and one of my all-time favourites, Willow, which captured my imagination, and for as long as I could remember, I had an overarching desire to explore, learn from and to connect with people from differing backgrounds, world’s away from the surrounds I grew up in. I longed to head out into the world and swim in adventure, taste curious fruits I never knew existed, walk in landscapes I’d only ever read about, and meet people from countries beside the one I was born in.
Now, almost 20 years later, having backpacked, holidayed, and lived in many different countries alone, from Sri Lanka and Nepal to Colombia and Armenia, I have honed how best to travel solo. And while I still adore travelling with friends and family on short trips, I have learnt that when I head off to travel for an extended period with an aim of really getting into the soul of a place, I mostly enjoy doing so alone. It is the best way to drink somewhere in and experience it in its entirety while going with the flow.
On my last trip, while listening to peacocks mewing, and watching the last of Sri Lanka’s monsoonal rains trickle off coconut palms, fast-filling rice paddies below, I pondered on just what it is about solo travel that is just so addictive, and why I keep returning for more. These are the most important lessons I’ve learnt.
Local connection is important
While it might feel like the easiest option to hang out solely with fellow travellers, it’s important to connect and make friends with local residents. Since travel is a privilege not everyone can partake in, one of the most important parts of it is to get to grips with the cultural history and psyche of a country, town or village through the people that actually live there.
Talk to everyone you meet: in shops, on trains or buses, and ask for local recommendations. Try to make friends with people you would never otherwise have had the chance to meet. For example, I'd never would have found an ancient bat-filled cave in the countryside close to Jardin, Colombia, without stopping to chat with a local farmer who took time out of his day to show me inside.
Take local transport
Forget being seamlessly transported in an air-conditioned minivan overflowing with fellow foreigners and opt for a local bus or train instead. I’ve found that it’s on these journeys where the magic really starts to begin; meals are shared, stories are told and people really are eager to connect. A lot of travellers shun bus travel, seeing it as basic, arduous or dangerous — but I absolutely adore sitting on a crowded bus, with no AC, windows open, watching the scenery outside speed by. Guatemala, Sri Lanka, Bolivia and India have some of the most scenic bus journeys in the world.
There’s always so much excitement too; in Sri Lanka you might see hawkers boarding to sell peanuts wrapped in textbook pages, or hot corn being whipped out of wicker baskets; school children cramming into every space; kids holding cardboard boxes of kittens.
If you want to experience real life in any country, I always recommend jumping on a local bus for a few hours — it’s my preferred way of travel and everyone should give local buses a chance.
Always have a back-up fund
In some countries, quite often the room I had pre-booked wasn’t quite what I was expecting: sometimes the lock on the door didn’t work, the room was dirty, or on one grim occasion I was greeted by a group of men watching porn in the lobby and so I didn’t feel comfortable bedding down there for the night alone. These unplanned events sometimes meant I had to find a place to stay at the last minute, and in the process, forking out more than I had anticipated in order to feel safe.
Safety is always paramount, so being able to switch up your place of lodging at the last minute should be factored in the form of extra funds. I'd recommend setting aside an emergency fund of around 10 percent of your weekly spend if possible.
It can get unbearably lonely
When away from friends and family for a prolonged period of time it can get incredibly lonely, especially when travelling to less popular countries or along routes away from the usual tourist hotspots because you'll less likely meet people to connect with. Off-the-beaten track in places like India or Armenia, loneliness can make you feel like you’re being smashed against the sand by a ginormous wave — it takes your breath away. If and when this happens, try booking a room in a family homestay or hostel, or join a group lesson or tour.
Taking surf lessons at Weligama Bay on Sri Lanka’s south coast for example, or a wine tour in Tbilisi (I adore the country's Saperavi and dry amber Rkatsiteli), will ensure a dose of human contact and you may even make friends.
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But, it’s ok and also completely normal to feel lonely at points, it gives you time to look inwards and reflect. I did some of my best thinking during a three-month stint in India where I was really pushed out of my comfort zone.
Try not to be distrusting
Travelling alone, especially as a woman, leaves you open and vulnerable in any country but it's important to stay open to new experiences. Try to lean into your instincts and realise that if something feels off or wrong, chances are it probably is, so steer clear of situations that don't sit well. One of the harder aspects of travelling as a solo female is that in pretty much every country you'll be alone in a car, cab, or tuk tuk with a man and this can feel scary, especially at night. Some of my scariest experiences have been in transit after dark when a driver randomly decides to go off down a side street because he needed to use the bathroom. As it can be hard to communicate with a language barrier, often I’ll have no idea what’s going on and have felt utterly vulnerable. The same goes for landing in a new country in the dead of night, or if a flight gets delayed; suddenly you’re in the hands of an unknown male driver in an unknown land.
To feel more in control take registered cabs and transport where possible or try to buddy up with fellow solo females when travelling at night. I haven't used travel apps to aid this process yet, but have heard good things about Meetup.
Remember that people come and go
The nature of solo travel means that fellow travellers are always on the move – and usually in different directions. People have pre-arranged plans: flights booked, and other countries to explore, so even when you meet someone you instantly connect with, a time will likely come when you have to say goodbye and that can be pretty sad.
Though remember that these days staying in touch is simple, and you never know who else is just around the corner. I'll never forget meeting a British couple in the wilds of Brazil's Pantanal while sleeping in hammocks, only to bump into them again in a small town on the east coast of Australia - sometimes the world feels incredibly small.
Buy a local SIM card
I used to travel without a SIM, and remember one long bus journey from Hampi to Bangalore, in India, where around half way through the nine-hour journey I had the sudden realisation that no one in the world knew where I was or what I was doing. I was literally uncontactable. While that's kind of pleasing in a lot of ways, it's also kind of unwise as a woman travelling alone in the middle of a country as vast as India. Now, if I’m staying in a place alone longer than a couple of weeks, I’ll always buy a local SIM card and stay contactable. Usually, it's easy to pick one up at the airport when you land, otherwise check out phone shops when you get to the town or city you're staying in.
Don’t buy all the gear
There's endless backpacks, gadgets, clothing and accessories aimed at world travellers, but much of it is pretty pointless since wherever you are in the world you can buy most items. Way before the invention of luggage dividers, I would split my tops, bottoms, dresses and underwear into separate tote bags as this was the only way to simplify packing a backpack, and I’ve used this method ever since because I don’t believe in buying things for the sake of it.
As a solo traveller, packing light is the way forward, and as a woman I always want to be able to move easily, swiftly and independently which means condensing items and only taking the essentials. For me, this always includes a good book and a Victorinox penknife which comes in handy for pretty much everything since it contains scissors, a corkscrew, a bottle opener, and a range of blades that are good for cutting fruit, while on the move.
Go with the flow
At home in the UK, I'm incredibly organised in terms of my planning my days and weeks but when travelling solo, I rarely have a rigid plan before heading off into the unknown. As a traveller, it’s likely that you’ll land in countries like India with a plan to stay for a couple of weeks and end up becoming utterly hypnotised by hand-carved temples, paper-thin dosas and colourful festivals and want to stay for much longer. Similarly, Georgia’s brutalist architecture, comforting cuisine and swimmable lakes could very easily get under your skin, keeping you in situ for longer than anticipated, so being open to change, slowing down and going with the flow allows for experiences you might never have imagined and that’s a real highlight of travelling alone.
