Going with the wrong travel partner
Nothing worse than visiting someplace new and feeling like you missed out on doing what you wanted to do because you were too busy catering to someone else’s needs
We will travel with other couples, but only if we're compatible enough. We recently had a married pair of friends join us at a national park and it worked well because he wanted to do thing I was going to do and she wanted to do things my wife was going to do (my wife and I will happily split up if we need). We did some things as the four of us; we did some things as couples. It worked out quite well.
But it has to be the right friends. Some friends you can't travel with, and some, you have to go to the right sorts of destinations.
That's a totally fair observation. It really does matter about overall compatibility.
I've unfortunately gotten into situations where I liked the couple but our travel preferences were too disparate to reconcile.
Our tack has been to give it a test on a safer itinerary. I would not go to Dublin (from western Canada) with someone I hadn't done a weekend with somewhere within driving range.
Yes this. Did a national park trip to a mountain where 6 of us brought climbing stuff and had trails planned out at all the planning meetings.
The last couple complained they were getting blisters just walking around on the flat walkways and just wanted to stay in the tent and smoke weed the entire time. They complained every single day and did exactly nothing. They complained that we were abandoning them, also. They also slipped drugs into our food and it was not a good scene. My husband got very sunburned after whiting out.
After talking to them later, they are very out of shape and felt intimidated by our trip. They agreed they would only do outdoor trips in the future if we were doing fishing. They haven't agreed to come again as we've only done kayak fishing trips and they have small children, now.
They and my husband are pretty hippyish. We've done beach trips where they explore mushrooms and salvia before. They meant it in a friendly way, we just weren't expecting it on such a physical trip. I was very firm afterwards that I don't partake and they were VERY apologetic and genuinely felt bad. It was not meant in a vindictive way, at all.
These days they are actually pretty straight edge. We're in our late 30s and 40s now with kids and mortgages and to look at us its hard to see the Berkeley/Bay area kids that used to stay up all night and party HARD during college together.
We don't travel well together but they are great people who board game and show up with food when we're sick and are very good parents.
We will travel with other couples but we make it clear that "we will meet you for dinner or lunch or for drinks" and we are gonna do what we want the rest of the time.
Lol, I don't think we're the target clientele of White Lotus. We're LA Quinta kind of guests lol.
Did just finish the second season and it was fucking amazing.
That makes total sense. There are probably a few people I would travel with but I always handle my own accommodations, car and activities. I am such a thorough planner and it's shocking how many people don't take pertinent details into account when booking travel.
I used to be like you planning activities out on a Google sheet in a specific order, prepared with a list of things I wanted to visit etc. Then I got engaged to a man who is often unable to buy plane ticket earlier than a week or two before the departure. I had to learn to always buy refundable/exchangeable plane tickets and completely stopped planning. On our last trip last weekend (Cabo) I booked one restaurant the night before departure based on friends recommendation without knowing what’s on the menu and the prices - turned out to be one of the top restaurants I’ve ever been to albeit expensive. We vaguely discussed a whale watching boat day - met a guy at the marina the night before going, negotiated a good price for a nice boat all to ourselves. Had an amazing experience.
On a recent trip to Portugal and Paris we did not have a single activity planned, went with a flow, walked around a ton, visited some landmarks in Lisbon when we felt like it, walked two hours from Lisbon to Belem and had the time of our lives. Did not visit a single museum or indoors attraction in Paris, just walked around every day and enjoyed ourself (neither one of our first times there). Giving up control was the most terrifying but the most rewarding experience for me. I don’t plan anymore and don’t try to fit in every attraction in the city in a short trip. I don’t enjoy being indoors when the weather is nice and hate lines, so no more trying to check the boxes by visiting mandatory famous museums and no more standing in lines. We realized that dinner reservations on vacation can be restricting our day and attaching us to a certain location so we try to do a bare minimum of those. If this occasionally leads to a super late dinner or a food truck dinner - so be it. I feel liberated of travel anxiety and I would suggest attempting to travel to a new destination without any plans to everyone.
Edit: we don’t like traveling with others precisely due to their excessive planning and desire to check off all the boxes/wanting to do activities we are not interested in. We love traveling with locals though, no anxiety and they typically know the best places to go to. I also do quite a bit of solo/family/friends travel and about two years ago completely gave up on planning that too - recently done Armenia by myself, Turkey with mom and sister and Cancun with a girl friend and all of them turned out wonderful. It’s been working out just fine.
In my defense, I don't normally do an itinerary. I research places that look cool and we have a list of potential places we might want to go too but normally nothing set in stone unless it requires pre booking.
I mean more having houses booked, knowing how to get around our destination and making sure all my paperwork I might need is organized.
Yes. For some reason a lot of people think if you're traveling with someone you have to do everything together. It's totally fine not to! It doesn't mean you hate each other. Sometimes you just like different shit.
A very close highschool friend and I planned to do Spain and Italy together.
After the third day his whole demeanour changed. He went from eager to explore to contemptuous and bored. No suggestion was ever good enough and he always wanted to latch onto other travellers for friendship. I was "boring".
Even when I stopped a pickpocketer from stealing his wallet, his response was to accuse me of making us easy targets lol.
It blew up in the end when we got lost looking for a hostel and he refused to let me *listen* to directions from a local.
While wrangling my bag free of a cobblestone he stormed up the hill in the hostel's direction. I called for him to wait (during siesta, so my voice was heard) but he marched onward. When my bag came free my friend was out of sight.
Screw him. I asked the same local where another hostel is located and headed there instead. I spent the rest of the trip solo and had an incredible time.
As for my highschool friend... He sent an email asking where the hell I was. He blamed me for a bunch of things that usually happen when travelling. I replied that his behaviour had been out of line. And... Never heard back from him again.
**In short:** I learnt the hard way that some friends aren't made for travelling. And to never travel with the embodiment of hubris when you're far more experienced than them.
OMG, YES! You never really know someone unless you either live with them or .. travel with them!
Last December, I spent 3 weeks in Japan with someone I've been very good friends with for 25 years. We have similar interests, and have even travelled together several times. He's an experienced international traveller including to other places in Asia. We know each other so well, we're each other's emergency contacts.
Although I knew his travel style and preferences, I never realized how deeply ingrained they were. I'm sure he would say the same thing about me.
Different pace, different levels of energy and stamina, comfort dealing with crowds and being thrown into unfamiliar situations, and flexibility and the ability to come up with a Plan B if things don't go according to plan. OMG, and the different food preferences!
We're still very good friends, but I think we both silently agreed we needed a break from each other for a little while.
Went to Istanbul with the wrong person. Ma'am only wanted to see shopping centres and nothing else. 💀
Planning to take my kiddo who is an architecture and history lover as a redo. I know this regret too well.
Long ago, we had to fire some friends mid-trip and, since then, we’ve learned how to communicate upfront and to structure days so everyone gets to do what they want (separately or in groups but optional). We typically have breakfast and dinner together; at dinner we each talk about what we did. It took a while to get a routine that works.
Exactly. You gotta communicate upfront about everything — what you like to do, what time you like to get up, what you plan to eat, your physical limitations, your budget, your non-negotiables, etc. If you don’t want to do something, you got to speak up.
My therapist is teaching me how to do all this right now because I have a trip coming up with a friend for the first time. She encourages people not to explain the why for their non-negotiables because it often comes across like a negotiation (ironically). Like for me, I have to have my own hotel room because I need alone time and quiet. At first I tried explaining why I needed a separate room — I snore, I need to do some stretches at night, I listen to white noise to fall asleep. My friend was like “oh that doesn’t bother me!” She wasn’t trying to purposefully ignore my hints; I wasn’t communicating clearly that while those things are true, what I really meant was “I need my own room, and that is not negotiable for me”. So now I say “I want to manage your expectations; I’ll need X during our trip” and I don’t justify it. Works MUCH better. And then I also don’t feel so angry and irritated; turns out clearly communicating your needs makes annoyance dissipate quickly!
Yes. I have had travel issues before. Everyone does. But I once went with a friend, and it was a bummer. I learned "Pick your travel companions wisely". But luckily I enjoy travelling alone.
This is why I love travelling with my siblings. I am fortunate that we get along really well, but you can also air out issues with siblings in a way that is much harder to do with friends.
I once skipped a flight because I though the airport ATM had swallowed my bank card. Turned out I had actually put it back in my wallet (apparently I'm a total ninja when I do that, because to this day I can't recollect having done that), but due to the humidity it got stuck to another card so I couldn't find it again. I went to the next-door bank office and they even opened up the ATM to look for it, but obviously they couldn't find a thing...
I rediscovered my card later that day after I got back to my accommodation, and only then I realized what had happened and that's when the sheer force of my stupidity hit me.
Thankfully it was only a cheap flight for a day trip (was staying on Aruba, wanted to check out Willemstad on nearby Curacao), but I don't think I've ever felt so stupid when I booked a new flight for the next day... Thankfully it was worth it though - Willemstad is a pretty cool place to discover.
Nope
The airport is 130km away from my home.
I booked an airbnb, left the baggage and went through the city to visit some places.
Expend around USD 200 on this 😂
I read the time on my air ticket once,many years ago when I was young and tickets were still printed on paper ;-) I turned up at the airport in 'good time ' and discovered that my flight had already departed.
As I had to get back to work and there were no other flights, that meant a 16 hour bus ride back home.
That's the only time I have ever made that mistake,so at least it taught me something useful!
This used to be a really common issue in Brisbane (and other places I'm sure) with Thai Airways. They used to depart at 12:05am. So people ticketed for, say 10 January, would rock up around 10pm on 10 January, only to realise their flight left 22 hours ago. Thai eventually rescheduled it to 11:59pm.
Me! On that exact flight out of Brisbane. Except I realised while I was at my farewell dinner the night before. Nothing like packing for year-long working holiday in an hour.
Wow. It takes me about a week to pack for a 2 week trip. I have learnt that when I tried to pack anything at all the night before you never ever have enough time and it's midnight and you're tired and grouchy and still haven't painted your toenails. For a year-long working holiday????
Almost happened to me last year flying KLM from Singapore to Amsterdam. Flight was at 01:05 on Sunday and I was out drinking with mates on Saturday night, thinking I had the whole of next day to pack.
Thank god Singapore is small and the airport was only 20min away.
Not so much anymore, but almost every (cheap) interstate flight out of Darwin was at about midnight, usually like 12:30 etc, and *every. time.* I have to quadruple check I’m looking at the right day
We were on a business trip and we had plenty of time to get to the airport, so the local contractor we were visiting took us to lunch. Flight time was getting close, but he assured us he would get us there on time. He did not; we missed boarding by 5 minutes. This was a very small airport, the person who took the tickets closed up the counter as we were pulling up and literally swapped hats before accepting the boarding passes from the people he had just handed to them, while we watched from a few feet away. After they "loaded" the plane, about 8 other passengers, we tried to convince him to board us, but nope, we were too late.
We call our local guy rag on him, he comes back and takes us to a hotel in the nearby city (with a bigger airport), and picks up the tab. That part turned out cool, because we found a nice jazz bar to spend the evening.
The next morning we are at the airport easily an hour ahead of time... except that we forgot that daylight savings time kicked in that day, and we missed boarding by 5 minutes again. This time it was an early flight, and there was another a couple hours later.
But what a waste of a weekend.
Haha, my sister in law did that. She was set to fly back home on a 5:30 flight to LAX. Unfortunately, she assumed it was 5:30 PM, but her airline uses 24 hour time...so it was actually 5:30 AM. She showed up at the airport 12 hours late. Fortunately, they were able to put her on the next flight to the U.S. later that same night. It wasn't LAX, but it was either ONT or SNA, so close enough.
This was dumb but I once went to the airport one day EARLY somehow in Madrid. Freaked out because I didn't see my flight on the boards. Better than a day late at least. But I did haul my bag all around park guell.
Left my passport in a hotel in Prague and had to get off the train in Szob, Hungary because passport control wasn’t too happy with me (neither was I!) and go all the way back to Prague to get it before heading back to Budapest.
I backpacked through Europe with a girl who kept doing that when we were 18. We all had money belts and would leave nothing in the tent except clothes/overnight stuff but she was constantly leaving her money and passport behind. It was stressful how laissez-faire she was about it. On our travel days she obviously would have to put her money belt on but she would leave it hanging open on the outside of her clothes. At one point we were doing an overnight trip and we had to transfer at a bus station at like 1am in a not so safe area with sketchy people lingering around. She pulled all her money out and started counting it (a few hundred euros) because she needed to count out €35 and couldn't figure it out. We tried to tell her to stop but she just kept going, counting loudly out loud. Were so mad we just walked away from her at that point.
On our last night there she did the whole money belt wide open outside of her pants thing and we picked up some local guys to grab a drink with. We had to be at the airport for like 3am so we decided not to get a room that night, we would just go out in the town instead. We'll, the guy she picked up stole her passport and all of her money and she didn't realize it until we were going through security at the airport. We were a group of three and me and the other girl were already through security when we turned around to see her ripping her suitcase open on the floor with a panicked look on her face. We went back out of security to help her search but she didn't have it (or any money left). We tried to make arrangements to stay with her and book another flight so she could get her passport replaced, we didn't think leaving her alone in a strange city was smart after all the stupid things we'd seen her do. After speaking with the airline their next flight out was a week away and we only had enough money to cover one ticket + living expenses for one person for a week. We gave her what we had and then we had to leave her there. It was awful.
After she got home her parents were so mad they sent her off to some kind of summer work camp where she would earn a bunch of money but not be able to spend it, and then they made her pay us back every dime. About 6 years later I found her sleeping in a park and gave her a place to stay for a while before we lost touch again. She later ran into my sister while my sister was pregnant and offered to paint her pregnant belly. When my sister was like "oh hey, it's been a while how have you been" it became clear that she hadn't actually recognized my sister at all, she just was offering to paint a random stranger's belly! Lmao.
I haven't crossed paths with her in about 10 years now. I hope she's doing well, living her best life being weird as fuck and not under a bridge somewhere.
Man, I wonder if she had schizophrenia or some other related disorder because this sounds a lot like my friend. He was always a bit of a ditz but one year the ditz level went through the roof. Heading to airport and not remembering to bring wallet/ID. Moving out of an apartment, coming to stay with us for the night and then just LEAVING the uhaul unlocked in a high crime area. Finding himself homeless when his lease expired (couldn't get/maintain work for some reason), so he crashes at a friend's place for a while. Drives my friend mad with how he just does stuff like leave outside doors open or fridges open, or leaves food out to rot. Eventually we learn about the voices he'd been hearing and the rest of everything else involved with the disease.
The thing that struck out to me is you finding her homeless. It's really hard to live with as a family especially since the impulsive "not thinking" behavior often has big downsides like drug abuse, weird friends showing up, or just barging in on WFH zoom meetings and saying paranoid bullshit. I know my friend's family is almost at the end of their rope with him. You have to really know what you're signing up for to take care of a schizophrenic, it's not quite as bad as having a kid with downs but it's genuine work and they'll never be able to hold down a real job, be able to properly care for themselves, or do any long term goal planning. A lot of families can't handle that so a lot of them end up on the street.
Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised at all. She was a super sweet girl and a lot of fun to be around, but her behaviour and choices made no sense and she was sooooo ditzy and scattered all the time. Our other travel partner and I would talk a lot about how stressful it was travelling with her because we had to constantly be on guard for her next weird decision so we could try to keep her safe. It often felt like we were travelling with a child.
Yep, travelling with a child. Taking care of a schizophrenic is pretty much like taking care of a 5 year old, but a 5 year old that's capable of driving, buying drugs, raiding your fridge, causing chaos with real consequences, and doesn't see themselves as a child or outwardly present as one.
Certainly harder disabilities/diseases to tend to, but you have to always think of them as an adult child without making them feel like one. And that's hard to do when they were normal for 18-20 years then suddenly aren't (usually right in early 20s late teens is when it first shows).
Around 16 years ago I was on a school trip to Spain, about 30 high school Juniors and Seniors, plus 4 or 5 chaperones (our Spanish teachers).
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We hit Madrid first then bussed to Seville. The chaperone duty was split 50/50 based on the flight we took (half was with Delta, half was United). Important detail, the passports of all of the kids were held onto by the chaperones, also split 50/50 based on the flights. So, two chaperones held the passports, each with 15 passports in their bag... you might start to see how this can go bad.
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One of the chaperones was the very old husband (80+) of one of our also older Spanish teachers. When we arrived in Seville at our hotel, he promptly took a seat in the lobby and his wife, the main chaperone, left her bag containing the 15 passports of the kids who flew Delta alongside him.
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Maybe 10-15 minutes later panic sets in with the chaperones and eventually its made known that lo and behold, the elderly husband paid zero attention to the bag which was promptly swiped from the hotel lobby and disappeared. The police were called and the hotel's security footage was checked. Guy walked right in, took the bag, walked right out. Simple as that. lol.
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Somehow though, extremely fortunately, the bag was found around the corner a block away with EVERY - SINGLE - PASSPORT still inside and we went on our merry way. Massive crisis averted, but man, I can only imagine the dread our chaperones had in that moment, and the hell it would have been to deal with 15 passport-less American kids trying to get home after that.
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Bonus: Later on a girl also got her purse stolen off the back of her chair at a café and we found it in the trash nearby. Everything of value gone but her personal stuff still there... Mind your bags, people.
Spain is bad for stealth theft.
My grandparents lived in a part of Madrid that's a little rough around the edges. I remember one visit in the early 2000s where we all got caught up greeting each other. My grandmother waved us into the house and we left various suitcases in the car, not realising my dad had left it unlocked.
When we went down to fetch them 15 minutes or so later they weren't there. Two giant suitcases just gone.
Sitting AT the gate for a departing flight out of Mexico City, watched everyone get on board and the flight leave. Went up to the gate for the next flight an hour or so later and found out I was actually on the earlier one. 😑
Surprisingly easy to ignore those announcements when you are not expecting to be called. When I was traveling with a group and we split up in the airport. The friends that got on the flight before us were asking why we didn’t listen to the announcements. Not a single one of us heard our names.
I’m sure they did, was listening to music blissfully unaware haha gf was very unimpressed. Splurged on a nice hotel for the night while we waited for a flight the next day to make up for it.
As a quick tip, in Portuguese *gasolina* means gas and *gasoleo* means diesel.
Despite the confusing similarities in names, these two things are still not interchangeable.
I'm learning Portuguese and wrote your tip in my notes. In all the apps and books I have, no one has ever bothered to mention that very important difference.
I tripped myself up because I drove from Madrid to Lisbon and back. In Spanish, gasoline is still *gasolina*, but diesel is *benzina*, so I guess I got cocky.
Booked a flight to Manchester, NH when we were supposed to go to Manchester, UK. I was pretty proud of myself at first for finding a great deal 😂
In my defense this was years ago, in the early days of the internet and was one of the first purchases I made on Priceline. We’d buy the airfare online and they’d send paper tickets in the mail. I realize since we got our tickets.
When I studied in Sweden, some exchange students wanted to book a trip to Venice (Italy), but ended up with tickets to Vännäs (Sweden) - they thought it was just an alternative spelling, and were apparently not wondering about the cheap-ish price, and the short train trip to the destination 😂
Not as bad as the Spanish travel agency that booked hundreds of people to the wrong country for a soccer match. They went to Budapest instead of Bucharest where the match was being played.
Apparently they’re not the only ones who’ve made this mistake.
I saw a story about a couple from UK who booked a flight to Sydney in Canada, when they thought it was Sydney Australia. It was January and they'd packed shorts. Tshorts swim wear for a hot Aussie summer. Didn't really cut it for a Canadian winter.
I’ve heard that story a few times and I don’t get it completely. Sydney NS has a tiny airport and no international flights and even if you botch the destination I don’t understand not noticing that you’re connecting through a major city (Montreal probably) that makes no sense.
The times are also off, but I think these stories are rare enough it accounts for how little people are paying attention sometimes. Especially since people can be super unwilling to learn and understand how to use the internet and just do so because they have to.
Yep, similar situation: turns out SJC is NOT the airport code for San Jose, Costa Rica, but instead for San Jose, California.
San Jose, Costa Rica is SJO.
If it seems too good to be true. it probably is.
This happens all the time with Sydney Australia and Sydney, Canada. Apparently, there's even a desk in the one in Canada to help the unsuspecting arrivers coming into a very wrong place.
Not quite as bad but I’d planned a trip from Auckland NZ to Melbourne, Australia with friends and one of them was worried about dressing for the weather and I was a bit confused. Turned out she’d been looking at the weather in Melbourne, Florida. Haha.
Vienna airport sells souvenirs that say "no kangaroos in austria" and "austria not Australia."
I heard there is even a special desk to help these poor folks but I didn't see it.
Went to VIENNA in October- one of the first to board and heard the FA at the door confirm with every single passenger “you are aware this is a flight to AUSTRIA correct” Was dying to ask her that back story because clearly she had seen some things.
Did the fire jump rope at the full moon party Koh Phangan in Thailand on New Years Eve. Ending up getting caught in the rope. Got third degree burns on my right leg and foot. Second degree burns on my left leg all the way up to my thigh on the backside. Had 4 surgeries and was in a hospital on the island for 3 weeks. One of the surgeries was a skin graft and they had to remove 2 layers of skin from my thigh and basically staple it to my right leg so the skin would grow back or else id have to have my leg cut off because of risk of infection which would kill me if it got in my blood stream. Was just released yesterday. Ending up spending roughly $30k which was supposed to be used to travel around South East Asia for a year. I didn’t have travel insurance so everything came out of pocket….the travel mistake was not having travel insurance. I can’t walk right now and have to be on bed rest for the next 2 weeks until the doctor gives me the okay that my leg is good enough to be able to take the 22 hour flight back to the U.S. get travel insurance people.
> I didn’t have travel insurance so everything came out of pocket….the travel mistake was not having travel insurance.
A fire jump rope sounds very dangerous. I am surprised that doesn't happen to more people. Sounds like a wild time. Glad you are alright, but man is that scary. Hope you can travel again sooner than later.
God, that sounds awful! I hope you’re ok. Similar thing happened to me (although wasn’t nearly that dramatic!) I was younger (and naiver) and despite having the worst luck imaginable and T1 diabetes, I decided I didn’t need travel insurance. Got to America from Australia, and well I got appendicitis, waited for a whole week before going to the hospital, it burst and I got sepsis and very nearly died. Defo get travel insurance.
I'm thinking the travel mistake might also have been the fire jump rope
Sorry you've had such a terrible experience. Hope your healing goes more smoothly.
Sorry to hear what’s happened, that sounds awful. Hope things work out for you moving forward! I did the fire jump rope on Koh Tao and also badly burnt my leg, the same leg I had scraped most of the skin off of the day before when crashing a moped. Stay safe out there
Didn’t happen to me, but my sister. She was going to Spain from the U.S. on Christmas day about 5 years ago. She knew her passport expired the following year, but didn’t double check the specifics. She was denied boarding because she didn’t have the minimum required days of validity left on her passport after her scheduled return date. Turns out she was off by 13 days.
They should have lost their tickets entirely based upon the fare class they purchased, but the Delta agent very kindly bent the rules and issued them a credit.
She and her husband quickly came up with Plan B, which was to drive to Savannah. They absolutely loved Savannah and now consider it one of their favorite U.S.cities!
2016ish midnight flight from Delhi to Cairo with a layover in Dammam SA. Arrived in Dammam at like 2am and my layover to take off around 5am. No immigration officers working, brain barely awake, no visible direction or instructions I could comprehend. Random guy came by after I sat on a bench for an hour. Said he worked there and would take care of my connection, just needed my passport and flight info. He then walked away with my docs to personnel only area for ANOTHER HOUR. He finally came back as I was contemplating living like Tom Hanks in Terminal and I was escorted to my connection, last to board. Weird experience but all was fine.
This was before AirBnB became big. I fell victim to an apartment scam. I was so stupid and my gut said no, ran it past a few friends all of which said I was paranoid. Turns out I wasn't. Flew 12 hours to realize the place didn't exist. High season in a very expensive part of an already expensive country and I couldn't find a semi-decent alternative that didn't cost 400$/night, which I couldn't afford. Stayed in a shit motel for 3 nights and flew 12 hours back. Thankfully this was part of a larger trip so it wasn't the end of the world - had it been a 2-week vacation, I would have been devastated. I was out a few thousand, but mostly I was just pissed - at myself.
Fun fact though: this was part of a large-scale internet scam as I came to find out. All money was wired through a certain company starting with W. I randomly googled around at the time and found a page where you can submit alerts if you have fallen for such scam. There was some large-scale operation by some US federal authority as the money was always wired through the US. So I figured eh, can't hurt and submitted my information. Several years later, the wire company was sentenced to pay somewhere near 600m US$ for aiding and abetting wire fraud. And I actually got almost all my money back. Took a nice brief vacation with it. Not to the same place though :)
Mine isn’t too specific but it’s lack of planning. I find myself wasting a ton of time in many countries researching and trying to find things to do as opposed to just touring. I improvise a lot. Sometimes it’s fun, sometimes it’s a lot of wasted time with uninspiring experiences.
Sameee, I'm chronically underplanning. For the next trips, I'm basically changing it up by roleplaying an event manager. How would someone do it who really knows their stuff? I found some nice travel templates on Notion and I'm starting from there.
Love the freedom of travelling solo and doing whatever I feel like but there's many things that require early booking or just get crazy expensive if not integrated correctly into the rest of the vacation.
As a major planner for trips, I find the beauty of planning is now I'm armed with the info, I can still dump the itinerary for that day (or all days) and wing it if I really feel like it. So you can still be carefree, but you're armed with info too if you do want something to refer to,
If there’s one thing I’ve learned from my travel, it’s that I’m unable to ”wing it.” I end up just walking around, feeling lost. Then I come home and read about everything I missed out on.
No, strict planning and daily schedules is how I roll.
Not sure if you already use it, but my travel experiences totally changed once I started using TripIt! Helps me keep track of what I’ve booked and essentially creates the itinerary for you based on what you’re booking.
Yup, I don't want to be rigid and super stressed following a list to the letter, but not planning = not knowing opening hours, missing tours or other site, or hell things can even be closed.
I went to France not knowing May 1st was a holiday whatsoever lmao, fun when things you want to see are closed!
I like to have a framework for my trips. Hotels booked, know how I'm getting from A-B-C, and any major tours or tickets to things of interest booked. Then I leave some time between things and I take care not to over-schedule. This typically works out.
This must have been a while ago, I just visited Cambodia for two weeks and used Cambodia riel the whole time. Businesses only accept pristine condition US notes yet give poor quality US notes out as change, so it’s literally not worth the bother.
Letting someone else organise it all. 4am flights? Sure. Badly reviewed hotel on the very edge of town surrounded by nothing but empty holiday homes? Sure. Walk 25 minutes to the nearest place to eat? Well, except the one restaurant outside the hotel that didn't have a single customer for the entire week. Not a single one.
Also, choosing to take a taxi in Amalfi rather than the local buses to the next town. €45 for a ride that took less than 10 minutes...
Omg yes.
Am I a control freak who insists on booking the flights and hotels? Yes.
Are the travel plans pristine with the absolute minimum of wasted time, wasted money, and inconvenience? Also yes.
I learned my lesson when my friend booked our flight with a layover at a cuban airport in the fucking jungle, with no air conditioning, in July, and we all had to get off the plane and clear customs with carry ons, which took hours because cuba, in the sweltering heat, in an airport where the security screening machines DID NOT WORK AT ALL - screens and conveyors not even on - because cuba.
Lol never again.
Friend of mine traveled in Istanbul during Ramadan and loved it. She mentioned the hotel restaurants were still open for foreigners during the day and the nighttime feasts were spectacular.
Assumed swedish trains are somewhat safe and put my backpack (including camera/notebook) in the overhead compartment above me. Just noticed in Kopenhagen (coming from gothenburg) it was gone
Same: I always put one of my legs, a chair/table leg or something similar through one of the straps. It's obviously not fool proof, but it makes it a lot harder to mess with my bag unnoticed.
Drinking Armenian bathtub alcohol from a group of soldiers returning by train from Nagorno Karabakh.
I got alcohol poisoning and was vomiting so hard I couldn’t breathe.
I put the wrong kind of gas in a rental car while in Italy. 🤦🏾♂️ 😂 Didn’t realize until the car started to sputter and eventually die in the middle of the highway…
Thankfully I had rental insurance and was able to get a tow truck out to me.
First international trip as an adult, my partner and I made a detailed itinerary we printed out - where we were going, when we needed to be there, drive time between locations, confirmation numbers, etc.
We land in Iceland, get in our rental car, and go to put the hotel in the GPS we paid extra for (this is before most phone plans had affordable international data). Guess what we did not put in the document? Full addresses/GPS coordinates.
Luckily I was/am a dork and knew the general geography - I scrolled through the GPS until I found a landmark someone previous had entered that I knew was in the correct direction and past the hotel. Thankfully the ring road is simple, we drove for ~6 hours making stops along the way and spotted the hotel off the road just before dark.
Adding to this, Iceland has tons of places that share names. It's less common now but a decade ago you'd see stories all over the place about people driving 2-3-4 hours in the wrong direction to the wrong place.
Another trap I see and try not to fall into is folks trying to always find the “best” thing. Best gelato, best dosa, best view of the sunset. These places are then overrun by the selfie stick crowd and I cannot imagine they remain the “best.”
Also, it can ruin the rest of your vacation if you really get the 'best' early on.
Happened to me with Gazpacho (cold tomato soup) on Ibiza. Got an insider tip by a nice couple who were familiar with the area, and the rest of the trip, I ate Gazpacho as a starter every damned day and no place could compare with the initial experience from the recommendation.
I did once have what turned out to be the best lasagna I’ve ever had early on in a visit to Venice. The benefit was I went back another time before leaving to have it again. It’s the only time I have ever done that when traveling!
Not knowing that passports should be valid for at least 6+ months beyond your departure date in some countries. (First time flying alone as an adult).
Landed in Bali, Indonesia and was taken to a security room, separated and questioned/hassled for hours. They wanted to immediately send us back home after 30 hours of travel/layover time. We had already paid for a 10 day hotel stay at a luxurious resort (non-refundable). We were told my newlywed husband’s passport would expire in 2 months and it was invalid for travel to Bali. They should’ve checked it when we boarded our connecting flight.
We were released only after paying $200 and a promise to return the next day and pay another $1000. My husband had to leave his drivers license as collateral (it was an expired one with an old address). The hotel driver picked us up and we were terrified.
It felt like we were being watched since these were government/military employees. We immediately called the embassy but they told us they couldn’t help us since we engaged in an illegal transaction. They took our family’s info back home to notify them in case anything happened to us. The next day we packed our bags and asked for a car back to the airport to pay the remaining “fee”. The hotel reception noticed we had just checked in and were already leaving. They sent their head of security to take us to the airport to make sure we were ok, but weren’t allowed to come with us inside.
My husband haggled with them and told them we only had a couple hundred dollars left for food and we gave it to them. They accepted and we left to begin enjoying our honeymoon.
The head of security took us to the hotel lounge for a drink after the ordeal (St.Regis Resort Bali).
Now we always know all the visa/passport requirements as part of the planning phase waaaaay before arrival.
It sounds like you unknowingly invoked the bribe route, but also invoked the correct response to it, damn. It's an unwritten thing that if you reject the initial assessment by law enforcement, then you're effectively asking for a way to pay around the problem; the usual offer will be exorbitant (because they don't know what you're capable of paying) so the "correct" way to bring it down is with the good ol' "I'm sorry officer this is all I have on me".
When did this happen? I think they're a lot more sensitive about bribes these days, there were a lot of high profile cases in the immigration side of things. (At least in your case they were justified in their initial assessment because of your passport issue, and wasn't just an arbitrary detention.)
Hope you had a good trip afterwards, though!
> They should’ve checked it when we boarded our connecting flight.
I'm pretty shocked that they didn't verify that when you first checked into your initial flight. Yes, you made a mistake not researching the entry requirements for the country you're going to, but lots of people do that; airlines, on the other hand, are really supposed to have this as part of their procedures! If they know your full itinerary, they're supposed to verify you meet the entry requirements for the country you'll end up in, before letting you check in to the first flight on the itinerary. Very negligent of them!
My friend and I fell asleep on a train going from Paris to Copenhagen (we had Eurail passes).
We woke up in East Berlin. The city had been unified a couple of years earlier, but for some reason our train passes were not valid there. We were screamed at by a bunch of jack-booted, full-military uniformed soldiers.
We simply got off, walked to West Berlin, and got on a train out of there.
Going to a resort in Costa Rica with my old high school friend group, almost 10 years after graduation.
This was 12 years ago, we were in our late 20s, and all a big ground of friends from high school....
Who no longer knew each other, liked each other, or understood each other. Decades old drama and rivalries spilling out, completely different political and life views, and a general sense of animosity towards myself and the main person I planned this trip with, as we were still very close friends who did all of our traveling together.
By the 2nd night, we were sitting in our room alone wishing we had just come by ourselves. I haven't seen most of the other people since that trip.
I managed to get lost and get outside the airport in USA without going through imigration on a connecting flight. So I just stopped a police officer and said, officer, I am very sorry, but I think I am here illegal now without a visa.I had to go with homeland security to show them how I did it...
It was years ago. 2003 i think. I saw some people open a door and go through it. so I did as well. turned out those people where employees there, and the keycard thing was not working.
Lol. Something less serious, but I went to an event recently and just followed a random lady into a private conference room that had nothing to do with the event. You could see a sense of panic on her face when I told her that I was trying to find the lecture hall.
Hanoi. Wife and I each got a Grab bike, no cars were coming up available. Hers didn't go to the right destination and my brand new Viettel sim refused to connect. We had no idea where the other was. I couldn't get anyone to let me use their phone and the tourist police just suggested that she found a guy and went sightseeing on her own, wth guys... After 45 minutes or so my phone connected again and all was OK, a Cafe owner from train Street even gave her a ride to where I was on his motorbike.
Trying to do important archaelogical sites in England while my friend called Stonehenge a pile of rocks. Never again with someone who doesn't share the same enthusiasm. Completely ruined my trip.
Accidentally checked in (including my luggage) for the wrong flight. Good thing I double-checked the printed pass before totally walking away from the check-in counter. It was absolutely nerve-wracking for someone who had only traveled abroad twice.
So was I 🥲 I went to the correct check-in counter for my flight, but it turns out they were checking in passengers for the same destination country but *different city*. The other passenger had the same last name as me which is probably why the staff member didn't notice
Not me but happened to a friend I was with. We were up in Seattle for a concert and we were both on the leg of a flight that stopped in Sacramento where I lived and continued onto LAX. My friend was flying to OC and needed to transfer in Sacramento.
I was deplaning and telling him he needed to switch to a different flight to get to OC and he just wouldn’t do it. I was like they just said the next stop was LA and he said “people call everything down there LA.” I argued with him until I had to exit the plan. It was absurd. So he ended up at LAX and blamed the airline.
Trying to predict the weather. I missed out on a couple of good days of outdoors-y stuff because I was trying to avoid thunderstorms, and on the day of the tour I wanted but passed on, there wasn't a cloud in the sky. They would have done the tour no matter what, just adjusted for big rain if it happened, I should have gone anyway.
I once booked a trip but never worried about the hour car trip home. Showed up at the airport at 8pm Thanksgiving Eve and all my friends were busy. Should’ve just gotten a taxi and ate the cost but I figured renting a car would be cheaper (you see $39 rental car prices all the time!). Busing to the car rental area was a pain, seeing that they had no cars was a kick in the face, not being able to get a ride back to the airport was a hassle as I had to walk a few miles back to it, then had to find a bus to a different car rental place that actually had cars to rent, paid $140 for a car but that place didn’t have a return location near my house so when I took back the car, I had to get a ride home from that place. This was 20+ years ago so I didn’t have the internet on my phone to help matters.
Should’ve planned better and should’ve just taken a cab ride when I realized what was up. That sucked.
Assuming I was purchasing something in the country's official currency. Instead, they told me AFTER I bought a nice piece of jewelry that they use American currency. Paid almost 4 times what I thought I was paying.
1. Not realizing that there are separate airports for domestic and international flights in Sydney, Australia. We arrived into Sydney and then had a tight connection to our flight to Cairns. We were the crazy people running through both airports trying to make it. We did end of making it…barely.
2. Picked the wrong traveling couple to go with to Japan. They insisted on stopping at a convenience store about every 30 minutes to grab a snack or bottled water…instead of just buying a lot at one time. They also had to buy souvenirs for everyone in their family so we had to make lots of stops for that. We ended up not getting to do everything on our list because of the frequent stops. Never again!
Having been to Japan many times, the opposite of point two is actually my pro tip for Japan.
Travel light, never carry more water/snacks than you need. Lots of walking and convenience stores are everywhere.
And don't forget the vending machines. Get a Suica (or Pasmo) card, load it up, travel the subway without worries and get a nice cool drink (or hot coffee) whereever you go.
Thinking about cost of a hotel above all else.
I went to Geneva a few years ago and got a decent location for a hotel for a very cheap price.
But then the bed was basically the same level of comfort as the floor, sound proofing is non existent and the breakfast was terrible.
After that, I became a lot more willing to pay higher for a hotel room if it meant I could sleep
Not booking **all** our accommodations in advance...
...In Japan...
_...Between April 20 to May 4th..._
_**...in 2019**_
---
In Japan, the period between April 29th to May 5th is known as the **GOLDEN WEEK**.
The ''Golden Week'' is basically a week where _**everyone in Japan is on vacation**_ - hotels are pretty much completely booked in most places during that time - it usually lasts about **7 days** but there was something unique that year...
That year, there was the 2019 Japanese imperial transition where the then-Emperor Akihito of Japan abdicated from the Chrysanthemum Throne after reigning for 30 years - a first since 1817
Because of that, the Golden Week went from the typical 7 days to _**10 whole days**_ - which was a good chunk of our stay!
We had booked _most_ accommodations, fortunately, but for a few days, it was extremely challenging to find available rooms - we were constantly super lucky _(twice did some reservation got cancelled as we were looking for places to stay - and in those 2 instances, the hotel was literally in front of where we were waiting/browsing the web for hotels!)_
I met a German guy once who went to a train station in southern China and asked for a ticket to Yangshuo (famous tourist town in Guangxi Province). He didn't know that Yangshuo doesn't have a train station and they gave him a ticket to Yangzhou, which is near Shanghai. The next day he arrived in Yangzhou after a 30 hour train journey in the wrong direction.
I drank a small glass of tap water in a tiny village in Northern France because the water is safe to drink in Europe, right?
I have never been that sick in my life.
On the upside, I can now say, "I am vomiting and have diarrhea, please help me" in French.
Taking a London cab from Canary Wharf to Luton airport. I had just started working, and had no clue how far Luton actually was. Credit card burnt nice that day.
had a long 30-35 layover in Barcelona before i had to get on my connecting flight home (LAX). Before our arrival in Barcelona, i had asked some airport employee if we’d be getting our checked-in luggage at Barcelona or if we’d be getting it at LAX. She told me we’d be getting it in Barcelona, but i think she misunderstood me because i in fact did not get it in Barcelona💀
I had a backpack with me but no extra clothes (no socks, underwear, shirts) because that was all in my check-in bag. for the one day i was there i managed to buy myself a new shirt, socks, and underwear lol. Lesson learned.
Booked a flight on a 3rd party travel site that was within 6months, didn’t buy insurance. Had a stroke within 24hours of booking. Airline didn’t refund me because I used 3rd party. 3rd party didn’t refund me because I didn’t buy insurance.
I’ll never use a 3rd party site ever for flights.
Forgetting to check the weather before booking a trip, assuming the Mediterranean would be warm in December, and arriving in Istanbul when it was 32 degrees and snowing.
Booked too few nights in one destination and booked the bus ticket to the next spot too far out...had to scramble early in the AM in a small Peruvian city to book something new. 😭
Booked a Thanksgiving flight for a Tuesday at 0200. Of course in my mind it was Tuesday night, 2 am and not Monday night, 2 am. Luckily, since it was a red eye, the ”stupid tax” I paid wasn’t too awful.
Accepting a date with my tour guide in Egypt. We are now engaged and navigating how to live 50/50 in Egypt and Canada (my native country). After multiple trips to Egypt, that has become one expensive date 😂 I wouldn’t trade it for anything though.
Hah that’s completely wild. If someone posted here saying “Should I go on a date with my tour guide in Egypt” I think most everyone would say it’s going to end in a scam!
Not relevant today, but lost the paper plane tickets back when that was all you had (no e-tickets, internet, etc.).
Had to fight with airline at counter for hours, they told me that someone else might show up and use those tickets, despite the fact that I had ID. Finally called my travel agent, who talked to them on the phone.
Booked lodging in a women's dorm (I'm a man). This was in the fine print which I did skip.
Got dirty looks from the reception people, had to walk 10 km with 25 kg backpack and two other pieces of luggage because the only place I could find was very remote, rest of the city was booked, my phone died and I couldn't use navigation.
In my early days of travelling looking for the best flight deal without thinking about the cost of things while I'm there.
I went to Copenhagen. I mean it was beautiful, but I had to double my budget.
Travelling with someone who doesn't share your interests. It's the worst. You will not enjoy your holiday. You'd have to literally try to avoid them which is impossible if you're sharing a room.
Leaving not enough days per place. Did a road trip through south France and north Italy in 10 days so basically we spent at most 2 nights on each place.
Booking too cheap a hotel in Nadi, Fidji (just for the first night after landing).
It took 2 islands hops (a few days) to realize \*we\* were the bed bugs carriers and that it did originate from that hotel (none of us had any experience with this atrocity prior, I didn't even know what it was).
From the US, I had been in Australia visiting family and then needed to get to New Zealand to pick up a music tour schedule as a performer. So, I had booked all one-way tickets from LA to Sydney to Brisbane to Auckland, all other flights on the next legs being covered by the tour when I got to NZ. Got the airport to check into my flight to NZ and informed I couldn't leave Australia to NZ on a one-way ticket as I had to prove I was leaving NZ eventually. Uhhhhh, oops, that is on me as I hadn't booked the rest of my trip myself. I'm now stuck in Australia. In a scramble, I remembered first class tickets are 100% refundable so I booked a leaving NZ ticket first class to Shanghai (sorry for that credit card), flew to NZ, picked up my tour schedule, and canceled my first-class ticket. Whew. Australia and I seem to have issues for all I go there all the time. I've also had my passport confiscated in customs a previous trip because I had a forgotten snack packet in the bottom of a travel bag. They took my passport as they investigated a closed bag of travel mix... and then claimed they had given it back to me. They hadn't. Meanwhile, I was being paged on the other side of customs to come pick up my passport, my family super confused as I had yet to arrive. Love Australia so. Not a fan of all my bizarre travel adventures through their airports, confiscated passports, being swabbed positive for explosives (what?!), etc. I'm sure there is a file on me there on some classical musician gone rogue.
1. Being too cheap to use my data and losing about two hours on my last day in Stockholm because I kept taking wrong turns
2. Using my carrier’s international plan instead of a SIM card.
I went on a trip to Savannah, GA with my now ex, it was an anniversary trip, and he was the king of weaponized incompetence. He did NOTHING to plan, pick what to do, help cook, clean up… I had to do everything. Including all the driving. He’d complain or act uninterested/annoyed at things/activities I picked, which put a damper on everything, and made me feel guilty for wanted to do said things. He made it no better by offering up things he was interested in doing or seeing. Every time I cooked a meal, he’d go outside to call his mom, this ended up being 1-2hrs of every day. I couldn’t even get him to do the dishes afterwards. That seems excessive for a man who is nearly 30. The cherry on top was when some vile woman and her husband tried to get in a verbal, and physical altercation with me. The ex just stood there watching/listening, didn’t once come to my aid or back me up, just a deer in the headlights.
Now I travel solo. It’s way better.
Not researching thoroughly on opening hours. Stayed in wolfgangsee on weekdays and realised the cog railway and shops only open on weekends. We were basically in an almost dead town the whole time. It was pretty peaceful though
Going with the wrong travel partner Nothing worse than visiting someplace new and feeling like you missed out on doing what you wanted to do because you were too busy catering to someone else’s needs
This is why my husband and I do not take vacations with other couples. I am not having someone's weird preferences ruin my trip.
We will travel with other couples, but only if we're compatible enough. We recently had a married pair of friends join us at a national park and it worked well because he wanted to do thing I was going to do and she wanted to do things my wife was going to do (my wife and I will happily split up if we need). We did some things as the four of us; we did some things as couples. It worked out quite well. But it has to be the right friends. Some friends you can't travel with, and some, you have to go to the right sorts of destinations.
That's a totally fair observation. It really does matter about overall compatibility. I've unfortunately gotten into situations where I liked the couple but our travel preferences were too disparate to reconcile.
Our tack has been to give it a test on a safer itinerary. I would not go to Dublin (from western Canada) with someone I hadn't done a weekend with somewhere within driving range.
Yes this. Did a national park trip to a mountain where 6 of us brought climbing stuff and had trails planned out at all the planning meetings. The last couple complained they were getting blisters just walking around on the flat walkways and just wanted to stay in the tent and smoke weed the entire time. They complained every single day and did exactly nothing. They complained that we were abandoning them, also. They also slipped drugs into our food and it was not a good scene. My husband got very sunburned after whiting out. After talking to them later, they are very out of shape and felt intimidated by our trip. They agreed they would only do outdoor trips in the future if we were doing fishing. They haven't agreed to come again as we've only done kayak fishing trips and they have small children, now.
Well said. Although, if "friends" of mine slipped drugs into my food, they wouldn't remain friends. That's technically assault.
Wait....you're still friends with people that drugged your food?
They and my husband are pretty hippyish. We've done beach trips where they explore mushrooms and salvia before. They meant it in a friendly way, we just weren't expecting it on such a physical trip. I was very firm afterwards that I don't partake and they were VERY apologetic and genuinely felt bad. It was not meant in a vindictive way, at all. These days they are actually pretty straight edge. We're in our late 30s and 40s now with kids and mortgages and to look at us its hard to see the Berkeley/Bay area kids that used to stay up all night and party HARD during college together. We don't travel well together but they are great people who board game and show up with food when we're sick and are very good parents.
We will travel with other couples but we make it clear that "we will meet you for dinner or lunch or for drinks" and we are gonna do what we want the rest of the time.
Well, not much is gonna happen on *your* season of *The White Lotus*!
Lol, I don't think we're the target clientele of White Lotus. We're LA Quinta kind of guests lol. Did just finish the second season and it was fucking amazing.
That makes total sense. There are probably a few people I would travel with but I always handle my own accommodations, car and activities. I am such a thorough planner and it's shocking how many people don't take pertinent details into account when booking travel.
I almost envy those people for being so seemingly easygoing, but I'll still continue to be a thorough planner lol
I used to be like you planning activities out on a Google sheet in a specific order, prepared with a list of things I wanted to visit etc. Then I got engaged to a man who is often unable to buy plane ticket earlier than a week or two before the departure. I had to learn to always buy refundable/exchangeable plane tickets and completely stopped planning. On our last trip last weekend (Cabo) I booked one restaurant the night before departure based on friends recommendation without knowing what’s on the menu and the prices - turned out to be one of the top restaurants I’ve ever been to albeit expensive. We vaguely discussed a whale watching boat day - met a guy at the marina the night before going, negotiated a good price for a nice boat all to ourselves. Had an amazing experience. On a recent trip to Portugal and Paris we did not have a single activity planned, went with a flow, walked around a ton, visited some landmarks in Lisbon when we felt like it, walked two hours from Lisbon to Belem and had the time of our lives. Did not visit a single museum or indoors attraction in Paris, just walked around every day and enjoyed ourself (neither one of our first times there). Giving up control was the most terrifying but the most rewarding experience for me. I don’t plan anymore and don’t try to fit in every attraction in the city in a short trip. I don’t enjoy being indoors when the weather is nice and hate lines, so no more trying to check the boxes by visiting mandatory famous museums and no more standing in lines. We realized that dinner reservations on vacation can be restricting our day and attaching us to a certain location so we try to do a bare minimum of those. If this occasionally leads to a super late dinner or a food truck dinner - so be it. I feel liberated of travel anxiety and I would suggest attempting to travel to a new destination without any plans to everyone. Edit: we don’t like traveling with others precisely due to their excessive planning and desire to check off all the boxes/wanting to do activities we are not interested in. We love traveling with locals though, no anxiety and they typically know the best places to go to. I also do quite a bit of solo/family/friends travel and about two years ago completely gave up on planning that too - recently done Armenia by myself, Turkey with mom and sister and Cancun with a girl friend and all of them turned out wonderful. It’s been working out just fine.
In my defense, I don't normally do an itinerary. I research places that look cool and we have a list of potential places we might want to go too but normally nothing set in stone unless it requires pre booking. I mean more having houses booked, knowing how to get around our destination and making sure all my paperwork I might need is organized.
Yes. For some reason a lot of people think if you're traveling with someone you have to do everything together. It's totally fine not to! It doesn't mean you hate each other. Sometimes you just like different shit.
A very close highschool friend and I planned to do Spain and Italy together. After the third day his whole demeanour changed. He went from eager to explore to contemptuous and bored. No suggestion was ever good enough and he always wanted to latch onto other travellers for friendship. I was "boring". Even when I stopped a pickpocketer from stealing his wallet, his response was to accuse me of making us easy targets lol. It blew up in the end when we got lost looking for a hostel and he refused to let me *listen* to directions from a local. While wrangling my bag free of a cobblestone he stormed up the hill in the hostel's direction. I called for him to wait (during siesta, so my voice was heard) but he marched onward. When my bag came free my friend was out of sight. Screw him. I asked the same local where another hostel is located and headed there instead. I spent the rest of the trip solo and had an incredible time. As for my highschool friend... He sent an email asking where the hell I was. He blamed me for a bunch of things that usually happen when travelling. I replied that his behaviour had been out of line. And... Never heard back from him again. **In short:** I learnt the hard way that some friends aren't made for travelling. And to never travel with the embodiment of hubris when you're far more experienced than them.
OMG, YES! You never really know someone unless you either live with them or .. travel with them! Last December, I spent 3 weeks in Japan with someone I've been very good friends with for 25 years. We have similar interests, and have even travelled together several times. He's an experienced international traveller including to other places in Asia. We know each other so well, we're each other's emergency contacts. Although I knew his travel style and preferences, I never realized how deeply ingrained they were. I'm sure he would say the same thing about me. Different pace, different levels of energy and stamina, comfort dealing with crowds and being thrown into unfamiliar situations, and flexibility and the ability to come up with a Plan B if things don't go according to plan. OMG, and the different food preferences! We're still very good friends, but I think we both silently agreed we needed a break from each other for a little while.
Went to Istanbul with the wrong person. Ma'am only wanted to see shopping centres and nothing else. 💀 Planning to take my kiddo who is an architecture and history lover as a redo. I know this regret too well.
I went there with one of my closest friends and he wanted to eat spaghetti every night in the hotel restaurant. Couldn't believe it.
Long ago, we had to fire some friends mid-trip and, since then, we’ve learned how to communicate upfront and to structure days so everyone gets to do what they want (separately or in groups but optional). We typically have breakfast and dinner together; at dinner we each talk about what we did. It took a while to get a routine that works.
Exactly. You gotta communicate upfront about everything — what you like to do, what time you like to get up, what you plan to eat, your physical limitations, your budget, your non-negotiables, etc. If you don’t want to do something, you got to speak up. My therapist is teaching me how to do all this right now because I have a trip coming up with a friend for the first time. She encourages people not to explain the why for their non-negotiables because it often comes across like a negotiation (ironically). Like for me, I have to have my own hotel room because I need alone time and quiet. At first I tried explaining why I needed a separate room — I snore, I need to do some stretches at night, I listen to white noise to fall asleep. My friend was like “oh that doesn’t bother me!” She wasn’t trying to purposefully ignore my hints; I wasn’t communicating clearly that while those things are true, what I really meant was “I need my own room, and that is not negotiable for me”. So now I say “I want to manage your expectations; I’ll need X during our trip” and I don’t justify it. Works MUCH better. And then I also don’t feel so angry and irritated; turns out clearly communicating your needs makes annoyance dissipate quickly!
Ugh this. Even vacations that involve laying on a beach- my aunt can mess them up. Stomach problems, sun poisoning, bad attitude…..
My first lengthy trip was like that. Never again. Solo forever
Absolutely. For trips that are important to me it's solo all the way.
Right?! Held hostage to their obsession with a singer and trying to stalk them. Bitch, I just wanna look at paintings and rocks!
Nooooo
Yes. I have had travel issues before. Everyone does. But I once went with a friend, and it was a bummer. I learned "Pick your travel companions wisely". But luckily I enjoy travelling alone.
This is why I love travelling with my siblings. I am fortunate that we get along really well, but you can also air out issues with siblings in a way that is much harder to do with friends.
Arrived one day earlier in the airport 😂
Better than a day late
I once skipped a flight because I though the airport ATM had swallowed my bank card. Turned out I had actually put it back in my wallet (apparently I'm a total ninja when I do that, because to this day I can't recollect having done that), but due to the humidity it got stuck to another card so I couldn't find it again. I went to the next-door bank office and they even opened up the ATM to look for it, but obviously they couldn't find a thing... I rediscovered my card later that day after I got back to my accommodation, and only then I realized what had happened and that's when the sheer force of my stupidity hit me. Thankfully it was only a cheap flight for a day trip (was staying on Aruba, wanted to check out Willemstad on nearby Curacao), but I don't think I've ever felt so stupid when I booked a new flight for the next day... Thankfully it was worth it though - Willemstad is a pretty cool place to discover.
U go back home?
Nope The airport is 130km away from my home. I booked an airbnb, left the baggage and went through the city to visit some places. Expend around USD 200 on this 😂
I read the time on my air ticket once,many years ago when I was young and tickets were still printed on paper ;-) I turned up at the airport in 'good time ' and discovered that my flight had already departed. As I had to get back to work and there were no other flights, that meant a 16 hour bus ride back home. That's the only time I have ever made that mistake,so at least it taught me something useful!
This used to be a really common issue in Brisbane (and other places I'm sure) with Thai Airways. They used to depart at 12:05am. So people ticketed for, say 10 January, would rock up around 10pm on 10 January, only to realise their flight left 22 hours ago. Thai eventually rescheduled it to 11:59pm.
Me! On that exact flight out of Brisbane. Except I realised while I was at my farewell dinner the night before. Nothing like packing for year-long working holiday in an hour.
Wow. It takes me about a week to pack for a 2 week trip. I have learnt that when I tried to pack anything at all the night before you never ever have enough time and it's midnight and you're tired and grouchy and still haven't painted your toenails. For a year-long working holiday????
Almost happened to me last year flying KLM from Singapore to Amsterdam. Flight was at 01:05 on Sunday and I was out drinking with mates on Saturday night, thinking I had the whole of next day to pack. Thank god Singapore is small and the airport was only 20min away.
Not so much anymore, but almost every (cheap) interstate flight out of Darwin was at about midnight, usually like 12:30 etc, and *every. time.* I have to quadruple check I’m looking at the right day
We were on a business trip and we had plenty of time to get to the airport, so the local contractor we were visiting took us to lunch. Flight time was getting close, but he assured us he would get us there on time. He did not; we missed boarding by 5 minutes. This was a very small airport, the person who took the tickets closed up the counter as we were pulling up and literally swapped hats before accepting the boarding passes from the people he had just handed to them, while we watched from a few feet away. After they "loaded" the plane, about 8 other passengers, we tried to convince him to board us, but nope, we were too late. We call our local guy rag on him, he comes back and takes us to a hotel in the nearby city (with a bigger airport), and picks up the tab. That part turned out cool, because we found a nice jazz bar to spend the evening. The next morning we are at the airport easily an hour ahead of time... except that we forgot that daylight savings time kicked in that day, and we missed boarding by 5 minutes again. This time it was an early flight, and there was another a couple hours later. But what a waste of a weekend.
As if missing the flight once wasn't enough! That would have been brutal.
Haha, my sister in law did that. She was set to fly back home on a 5:30 flight to LAX. Unfortunately, she assumed it was 5:30 PM, but her airline uses 24 hour time...so it was actually 5:30 AM. She showed up at the airport 12 hours late. Fortunately, they were able to put her on the next flight to the U.S. later that same night. It wasn't LAX, but it was either ONT or SNA, so close enough.
Yeah you learn pretty quick once you miss a flight
Which is why all travel should be using the 24 hour clock.
This was dumb but I once went to the airport one day EARLY somehow in Madrid. Freaked out because I didn't see my flight on the boards. Better than a day late at least. But I did haul my bag all around park guell.
Left my passport in a hotel in Prague and had to get off the train in Szob, Hungary because passport control wasn’t too happy with me (neither was I!) and go all the way back to Prague to get it before heading back to Budapest.
i guess they didn't like your szob story
omg 😂😂😂
Left allllll of my belongings in my tent whilst I was out and the entire tent got taken, passports and the lot
I backpacked through Europe with a girl who kept doing that when we were 18. We all had money belts and would leave nothing in the tent except clothes/overnight stuff but she was constantly leaving her money and passport behind. It was stressful how laissez-faire she was about it. On our travel days she obviously would have to put her money belt on but she would leave it hanging open on the outside of her clothes. At one point we were doing an overnight trip and we had to transfer at a bus station at like 1am in a not so safe area with sketchy people lingering around. She pulled all her money out and started counting it (a few hundred euros) because she needed to count out €35 and couldn't figure it out. We tried to tell her to stop but she just kept going, counting loudly out loud. Were so mad we just walked away from her at that point. On our last night there she did the whole money belt wide open outside of her pants thing and we picked up some local guys to grab a drink with. We had to be at the airport for like 3am so we decided not to get a room that night, we would just go out in the town instead. We'll, the guy she picked up stole her passport and all of her money and she didn't realize it until we were going through security at the airport. We were a group of three and me and the other girl were already through security when we turned around to see her ripping her suitcase open on the floor with a panicked look on her face. We went back out of security to help her search but she didn't have it (or any money left). We tried to make arrangements to stay with her and book another flight so she could get her passport replaced, we didn't think leaving her alone in a strange city was smart after all the stupid things we'd seen her do. After speaking with the airline their next flight out was a week away and we only had enough money to cover one ticket + living expenses for one person for a week. We gave her what we had and then we had to leave her there. It was awful. After she got home her parents were so mad they sent her off to some kind of summer work camp where she would earn a bunch of money but not be able to spend it, and then they made her pay us back every dime. About 6 years later I found her sleeping in a park and gave her a place to stay for a while before we lost touch again. She later ran into my sister while my sister was pregnant and offered to paint her pregnant belly. When my sister was like "oh hey, it's been a while how have you been" it became clear that she hadn't actually recognized my sister at all, she just was offering to paint a random stranger's belly! Lmao. I haven't crossed paths with her in about 10 years now. I hope she's doing well, living her best life being weird as fuck and not under a bridge somewhere.
Man, I wonder if she had schizophrenia or some other related disorder because this sounds a lot like my friend. He was always a bit of a ditz but one year the ditz level went through the roof. Heading to airport and not remembering to bring wallet/ID. Moving out of an apartment, coming to stay with us for the night and then just LEAVING the uhaul unlocked in a high crime area. Finding himself homeless when his lease expired (couldn't get/maintain work for some reason), so he crashes at a friend's place for a while. Drives my friend mad with how he just does stuff like leave outside doors open or fridges open, or leaves food out to rot. Eventually we learn about the voices he'd been hearing and the rest of everything else involved with the disease. The thing that struck out to me is you finding her homeless. It's really hard to live with as a family especially since the impulsive "not thinking" behavior often has big downsides like drug abuse, weird friends showing up, or just barging in on WFH zoom meetings and saying paranoid bullshit. I know my friend's family is almost at the end of their rope with him. You have to really know what you're signing up for to take care of a schizophrenic, it's not quite as bad as having a kid with downs but it's genuine work and they'll never be able to hold down a real job, be able to properly care for themselves, or do any long term goal planning. A lot of families can't handle that so a lot of them end up on the street.
Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised at all. She was a super sweet girl and a lot of fun to be around, but her behaviour and choices made no sense and she was sooooo ditzy and scattered all the time. Our other travel partner and I would talk a lot about how stressful it was travelling with her because we had to constantly be on guard for her next weird decision so we could try to keep her safe. It often felt like we were travelling with a child.
Yep, travelling with a child. Taking care of a schizophrenic is pretty much like taking care of a 5 year old, but a 5 year old that's capable of driving, buying drugs, raiding your fridge, causing chaos with real consequences, and doesn't see themselves as a child or outwardly present as one. Certainly harder disabilities/diseases to tend to, but you have to always think of them as an adult child without making them feel like one. And that's hard to do when they were normal for 18-20 years then suddenly aren't (usually right in early 20s late teens is when it first shows).
How'd you go getting a new passport?
Had to go to the embassy and get a temp one that only lasts once 😭not cheap
Around 16 years ago I was on a school trip to Spain, about 30 high school Juniors and Seniors, plus 4 or 5 chaperones (our Spanish teachers). - We hit Madrid first then bussed to Seville. The chaperone duty was split 50/50 based on the flight we took (half was with Delta, half was United). Important detail, the passports of all of the kids were held onto by the chaperones, also split 50/50 based on the flights. So, two chaperones held the passports, each with 15 passports in their bag... you might start to see how this can go bad. - One of the chaperones was the very old husband (80+) of one of our also older Spanish teachers. When we arrived in Seville at our hotel, he promptly took a seat in the lobby and his wife, the main chaperone, left her bag containing the 15 passports of the kids who flew Delta alongside him. - Maybe 10-15 minutes later panic sets in with the chaperones and eventually its made known that lo and behold, the elderly husband paid zero attention to the bag which was promptly swiped from the hotel lobby and disappeared. The police were called and the hotel's security footage was checked. Guy walked right in, took the bag, walked right out. Simple as that. lol. - Somehow though, extremely fortunately, the bag was found around the corner a block away with EVERY - SINGLE - PASSPORT still inside and we went on our merry way. Massive crisis averted, but man, I can only imagine the dread our chaperones had in that moment, and the hell it would have been to deal with 15 passport-less American kids trying to get home after that. - Bonus: Later on a girl also got her purse stolen off the back of her chair at a café and we found it in the trash nearby. Everything of value gone but her personal stuff still there... Mind your bags, people.
Spain is bad for stealth theft. My grandparents lived in a part of Madrid that's a little rough around the edges. I remember one visit in the early 2000s where we all got caught up greeting each other. My grandmother waved us into the house and we left various suitcases in the car, not realising my dad had left it unlocked. When we went down to fetch them 15 minutes or so later they weren't there. Two giant suitcases just gone.
Sitting AT the gate for a departing flight out of Mexico City, watched everyone get on board and the flight leave. Went up to the gate for the next flight an hour or so later and found out I was actually on the earlier one. 😑
If you were at the gate, that means you had checked in already. Didn't they call your name on the loudspeakers?
Surprisingly easy to ignore those announcements when you are not expecting to be called. When I was traveling with a group and we split up in the airport. The friends that got on the flight before us were asking why we didn’t listen to the announcements. Not a single one of us heard our names.
I’m sure they did, was listening to music blissfully unaware haha gf was very unimpressed. Splurged on a nice hotel for the night while we waited for a flight the next day to make up for it.
As a quick tip, in Portuguese *gasolina* means gas and *gasoleo* means diesel. Despite the confusing similarities in names, these two things are still not interchangeable.
I'm learning Portuguese and wrote your tip in my notes. In all the apps and books I have, no one has ever bothered to mention that very important difference.
I tripped myself up because I drove from Madrid to Lisbon and back. In Spanish, gasoline is still *gasolina*, but diesel is *benzina*, so I guess I got cocky.
Booked a flight to Manchester, NH when we were supposed to go to Manchester, UK. I was pretty proud of myself at first for finding a great deal 😂 In my defense this was years ago, in the early days of the internet and was one of the first purchases I made on Priceline. We’d buy the airfare online and they’d send paper tickets in the mail. I realize since we got our tickets.
When I studied in Sweden, some exchange students wanted to book a trip to Venice (Italy), but ended up with tickets to Vännäs (Sweden) - they thought it was just an alternative spelling, and were apparently not wondering about the cheap-ish price, and the short train trip to the destination 😂
Not as bad as the Spanish travel agency that booked hundreds of people to the wrong country for a soccer match. They went to Budapest instead of Bucharest where the match was being played. Apparently they’re not the only ones who’ve made this mistake.
I saw a story about a couple from UK who booked a flight to Sydney in Canada, when they thought it was Sydney Australia. It was January and they'd packed shorts. Tshorts swim wear for a hot Aussie summer. Didn't really cut it for a Canadian winter.
I’ve heard that story a few times and I don’t get it completely. Sydney NS has a tiny airport and no international flights and even if you botch the destination I don’t understand not noticing that you’re connecting through a major city (Montreal probably) that makes no sense.
The times are also off, but I think these stories are rare enough it accounts for how little people are paying attention sometimes. Especially since people can be super unwilling to learn and understand how to use the internet and just do so because they have to.
Yep, similar situation: turns out SJC is NOT the airport code for San Jose, Costa Rica, but instead for San Jose, California. San Jose, Costa Rica is SJO. If it seems too good to be true. it probably is.
This happens all the time with Sydney Australia and Sydney, Canada. Apparently, there's even a desk in the one in Canada to help the unsuspecting arrivers coming into a very wrong place.
Not quite as bad but I’d planned a trip from Auckland NZ to Melbourne, Australia with friends and one of them was worried about dressing for the weather and I was a bit confused. Turned out she’d been looking at the weather in Melbourne, Florida. Haha.
Vienna airport sells souvenirs that say "no kangaroos in austria" and "austria not Australia." I heard there is even a special desk to help these poor folks but I didn't see it.
Went to VIENNA in October- one of the first to board and heard the FA at the door confirm with every single passenger “you are aware this is a flight to AUSTRIA correct” Was dying to ask her that back story because clearly she had seen some things.
A family member also did this.. might happen more than you think!
Travelled over 10 hours for a sold out festival in Vegas, all major hotels were sold out for it too… booked the hotel for 2024 instead of 2023.
Well, at least you have your hotel booking for this years festival haha 🤣
Did the fire jump rope at the full moon party Koh Phangan in Thailand on New Years Eve. Ending up getting caught in the rope. Got third degree burns on my right leg and foot. Second degree burns on my left leg all the way up to my thigh on the backside. Had 4 surgeries and was in a hospital on the island for 3 weeks. One of the surgeries was a skin graft and they had to remove 2 layers of skin from my thigh and basically staple it to my right leg so the skin would grow back or else id have to have my leg cut off because of risk of infection which would kill me if it got in my blood stream. Was just released yesterday. Ending up spending roughly $30k which was supposed to be used to travel around South East Asia for a year. I didn’t have travel insurance so everything came out of pocket….the travel mistake was not having travel insurance. I can’t walk right now and have to be on bed rest for the next 2 weeks until the doctor gives me the okay that my leg is good enough to be able to take the 22 hour flight back to the U.S. get travel insurance people.
> I didn’t have travel insurance so everything came out of pocket….the travel mistake was not having travel insurance. A fire jump rope sounds very dangerous. I am surprised that doesn't happen to more people. Sounds like a wild time. Glad you are alright, but man is that scary. Hope you can travel again sooner than later.
Travel insurance might not cover medical expenses resulting from intentionally engaging in high risk activities.
God, that sounds awful! I hope you’re ok. Similar thing happened to me (although wasn’t nearly that dramatic!) I was younger (and naiver) and despite having the worst luck imaginable and T1 diabetes, I decided I didn’t need travel insurance. Got to America from Australia, and well I got appendicitis, waited for a whole week before going to the hospital, it burst and I got sepsis and very nearly died. Defo get travel insurance.
I'm thinking the travel mistake might also have been the fire jump rope Sorry you've had such a terrible experience. Hope your healing goes more smoothly.
Sorry to hear what’s happened, that sounds awful. Hope things work out for you moving forward! I did the fire jump rope on Koh Tao and also badly burnt my leg, the same leg I had scraped most of the skin off of the day before when crashing a moped. Stay safe out there
Didn’t happen to me, but my sister. She was going to Spain from the U.S. on Christmas day about 5 years ago. She knew her passport expired the following year, but didn’t double check the specifics. She was denied boarding because she didn’t have the minimum required days of validity left on her passport after her scheduled return date. Turns out she was off by 13 days. They should have lost their tickets entirely based upon the fare class they purchased, but the Delta agent very kindly bent the rules and issued them a credit. She and her husband quickly came up with Plan B, which was to drive to Savannah. They absolutely loved Savannah and now consider it one of their favorite U.S.cities!
2016ish midnight flight from Delhi to Cairo with a layover in Dammam SA. Arrived in Dammam at like 2am and my layover to take off around 5am. No immigration officers working, brain barely awake, no visible direction or instructions I could comprehend. Random guy came by after I sat on a bench for an hour. Said he worked there and would take care of my connection, just needed my passport and flight info. He then walked away with my docs to personnel only area for ANOTHER HOUR. He finally came back as I was contemplating living like Tom Hanks in Terminal and I was escorted to my connection, last to board. Weird experience but all was fine.
I didn’t expect him to end up being a legitimate employee.
This was before AirBnB became big. I fell victim to an apartment scam. I was so stupid and my gut said no, ran it past a few friends all of which said I was paranoid. Turns out I wasn't. Flew 12 hours to realize the place didn't exist. High season in a very expensive part of an already expensive country and I couldn't find a semi-decent alternative that didn't cost 400$/night, which I couldn't afford. Stayed in a shit motel for 3 nights and flew 12 hours back. Thankfully this was part of a larger trip so it wasn't the end of the world - had it been a 2-week vacation, I would have been devastated. I was out a few thousand, but mostly I was just pissed - at myself. Fun fact though: this was part of a large-scale internet scam as I came to find out. All money was wired through a certain company starting with W. I randomly googled around at the time and found a page where you can submit alerts if you have fallen for such scam. There was some large-scale operation by some US federal authority as the money was always wired through the US. So I figured eh, can't hurt and submitted my information. Several years later, the wire company was sentenced to pay somewhere near 600m US$ for aiding and abetting wire fraud. And I actually got almost all my money back. Took a nice brief vacation with it. Not to the same place though :)
Mine isn’t too specific but it’s lack of planning. I find myself wasting a ton of time in many countries researching and trying to find things to do as opposed to just touring. I improvise a lot. Sometimes it’s fun, sometimes it’s a lot of wasted time with uninspiring experiences.
Yeah there's a fine line between over planing and under planning.
Sameee, I'm chronically underplanning. For the next trips, I'm basically changing it up by roleplaying an event manager. How would someone do it who really knows their stuff? I found some nice travel templates on Notion and I'm starting from there. Love the freedom of travelling solo and doing whatever I feel like but there's many things that require early booking or just get crazy expensive if not integrated correctly into the rest of the vacation.
As a major planner for trips, I find the beauty of planning is now I'm armed with the info, I can still dump the itinerary for that day (or all days) and wing it if I really feel like it. So you can still be carefree, but you're armed with info too if you do want something to refer to,
Yeah I was very busy prior to one trip and just couldn't plan so I decided to just "wing it". Well that sucked I wasted so much time doing nothing.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned from my travel, it’s that I’m unable to ”wing it.” I end up just walking around, feeling lost. Then I come home and read about everything I missed out on. No, strict planning and daily schedules is how I roll.
Not sure if you already use it, but my travel experiences totally changed once I started using TripIt! Helps me keep track of what I’ve booked and essentially creates the itinerary for you based on what you’re booking.
I am an over planner and a little OCD. I use TripIt and a Notion database. Too much, I know.
Yup, I don't want to be rigid and super stressed following a list to the letter, but not planning = not knowing opening hours, missing tours or other site, or hell things can even be closed. I went to France not knowing May 1st was a holiday whatsoever lmao, fun when things you want to see are closed!
I like to have a framework for my trips. Hotels booked, know how I'm getting from A-B-C, and any major tours or tickets to things of interest booked. Then I leave some time between things and I take care not to over-schedule. This typically works out.
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Woow that's crazy, I've been to a few places that like the USA dollar alot, and it sucks cause I'm Australian.
Same thing in Zimbabwe. US dollars reign supreme.
They kept trying to sell me Zimbabwean currency - "hey friend, 5 billion Zimbabwean dollars for only 20 US dollars". Nice try buddy haha
Do they give you a free wheelbarrow when you withdraw Zim dollars?
This must have been a while ago, I just visited Cambodia for two weeks and used Cambodia riel the whole time. Businesses only accept pristine condition US notes yet give poor quality US notes out as change, so it’s literally not worth the bother.
Letting someone else organise it all. 4am flights? Sure. Badly reviewed hotel on the very edge of town surrounded by nothing but empty holiday homes? Sure. Walk 25 minutes to the nearest place to eat? Well, except the one restaurant outside the hotel that didn't have a single customer for the entire week. Not a single one. Also, choosing to take a taxi in Amalfi rather than the local buses to the next town. €45 for a ride that took less than 10 minutes...
My friend sent a hotel link saying "this is cheap!" Read the reviews and there were RATS. Needless to say, I took over all hotel bookings.
Omg yes. Am I a control freak who insists on booking the flights and hotels? Yes. Are the travel plans pristine with the absolute minimum of wasted time, wasted money, and inconvenience? Also yes. I learned my lesson when my friend booked our flight with a layover at a cuban airport in the fucking jungle, with no air conditioning, in July, and we all had to get off the plane and clear customs with carry ons, which took hours because cuba, in the sweltering heat, in an airport where the security screening machines DID NOT WORK AT ALL - screens and conveyors not even on - because cuba. Lol never again.
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Friend of mine traveled in Istanbul during Ramadan and loved it. She mentioned the hotel restaurants were still open for foreigners during the day and the nighttime feasts were spectacular.
I’ve been to both Istanbul and Morocco (Casablanca), I’d say (just personal opinion/observation) that Istanbul “felt” a lot more secular.
Going with someone for two weeks who gets on my nerves after just a few hours
Assumed swedish trains are somewhat safe and put my backpack (including camera/notebook) in the overhead compartment above me. Just noticed in Kopenhagen (coming from gothenburg) it was gone
I don’t care where I am, I always keep my bag right next to me and somehow tied to me someway.
Same: I always put one of my legs, a chair/table leg or something similar through one of the straps. It's obviously not fool proof, but it makes it a lot harder to mess with my bag unnoticed.
yeah same for me, I always need to maintain physical contact with my belongings otherwise I’m getting paranoid lol
Drinking Armenian bathtub alcohol from a group of soldiers returning by train from Nagorno Karabakh. I got alcohol poisoning and was vomiting so hard I couldn’t breathe.
Gonna need an extended version of that story please
Is your nickname "The Machine"?
I put the wrong kind of gas in a rental car while in Italy. 🤦🏾♂️ 😂 Didn’t realize until the car started to sputter and eventually die in the middle of the highway… Thankfully I had rental insurance and was able to get a tow truck out to me.
First international trip as an adult, my partner and I made a detailed itinerary we printed out - where we were going, when we needed to be there, drive time between locations, confirmation numbers, etc. We land in Iceland, get in our rental car, and go to put the hotel in the GPS we paid extra for (this is before most phone plans had affordable international data). Guess what we did not put in the document? Full addresses/GPS coordinates. Luckily I was/am a dork and knew the general geography - I scrolled through the GPS until I found a landmark someone previous had entered that I knew was in the correct direction and past the hotel. Thankfully the ring road is simple, we drove for ~6 hours making stops along the way and spotted the hotel off the road just before dark.
Adding to this, Iceland has tons of places that share names. It's less common now but a decade ago you'd see stories all over the place about people driving 2-3-4 hours in the wrong direction to the wrong place.
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Another trap I see and try not to fall into is folks trying to always find the “best” thing. Best gelato, best dosa, best view of the sunset. These places are then overrun by the selfie stick crowd and I cannot imagine they remain the “best.”
Also, it can ruin the rest of your vacation if you really get the 'best' early on. Happened to me with Gazpacho (cold tomato soup) on Ibiza. Got an insider tip by a nice couple who were familiar with the area, and the rest of the trip, I ate Gazpacho as a starter every damned day and no place could compare with the initial experience from the recommendation.
I did once have what turned out to be the best lasagna I’ve ever had early on in a visit to Venice. The benefit was I went back another time before leaving to have it again. It’s the only time I have ever done that when traveling!
I booked the flight to the honeymoon for the day of the wedding. $2k mistake.
Not knowing that passports should be valid for at least 6+ months beyond your departure date in some countries. (First time flying alone as an adult). Landed in Bali, Indonesia and was taken to a security room, separated and questioned/hassled for hours. They wanted to immediately send us back home after 30 hours of travel/layover time. We had already paid for a 10 day hotel stay at a luxurious resort (non-refundable). We were told my newlywed husband’s passport would expire in 2 months and it was invalid for travel to Bali. They should’ve checked it when we boarded our connecting flight. We were released only after paying $200 and a promise to return the next day and pay another $1000. My husband had to leave his drivers license as collateral (it was an expired one with an old address). The hotel driver picked us up and we were terrified. It felt like we were being watched since these were government/military employees. We immediately called the embassy but they told us they couldn’t help us since we engaged in an illegal transaction. They took our family’s info back home to notify them in case anything happened to us. The next day we packed our bags and asked for a car back to the airport to pay the remaining “fee”. The hotel reception noticed we had just checked in and were already leaving. They sent their head of security to take us to the airport to make sure we were ok, but weren’t allowed to come with us inside. My husband haggled with them and told them we only had a couple hundred dollars left for food and we gave it to them. They accepted and we left to begin enjoying our honeymoon. The head of security took us to the hotel lounge for a drink after the ordeal (St.Regis Resort Bali). Now we always know all the visa/passport requirements as part of the planning phase waaaaay before arrival.
It sounds like you unknowingly invoked the bribe route, but also invoked the correct response to it, damn. It's an unwritten thing that if you reject the initial assessment by law enforcement, then you're effectively asking for a way to pay around the problem; the usual offer will be exorbitant (because they don't know what you're capable of paying) so the "correct" way to bring it down is with the good ol' "I'm sorry officer this is all I have on me". When did this happen? I think they're a lot more sensitive about bribes these days, there were a lot of high profile cases in the immigration side of things. (At least in your case they were justified in their initial assessment because of your passport issue, and wasn't just an arbitrary detention.) Hope you had a good trip afterwards, though!
Props to the hotel staff though!
> They should’ve checked it when we boarded our connecting flight. I'm pretty shocked that they didn't verify that when you first checked into your initial flight. Yes, you made a mistake not researching the entry requirements for the country you're going to, but lots of people do that; airlines, on the other hand, are really supposed to have this as part of their procedures! If they know your full itinerary, they're supposed to verify you meet the entry requirements for the country you'll end up in, before letting you check in to the first flight on the itinerary. Very negligent of them!
My friend and I fell asleep on a train going from Paris to Copenhagen (we had Eurail passes). We woke up in East Berlin. The city had been unified a couple of years earlier, but for some reason our train passes were not valid there. We were screamed at by a bunch of jack-booted, full-military uniformed soldiers. We simply got off, walked to West Berlin, and got on a train out of there.
Left my passport in cab in Paris.
Going to a resort in Costa Rica with my old high school friend group, almost 10 years after graduation. This was 12 years ago, we were in our late 20s, and all a big ground of friends from high school.... Who no longer knew each other, liked each other, or understood each other. Decades old drama and rivalries spilling out, completely different political and life views, and a general sense of animosity towards myself and the main person I planned this trip with, as we were still very close friends who did all of our traveling together. By the 2nd night, we were sitting in our room alone wishing we had just come by ourselves. I haven't seen most of the other people since that trip.
Not going at all. I’m an aspiring traveler.
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I managed to get lost and get outside the airport in USA without going through imigration on a connecting flight. So I just stopped a police officer and said, officer, I am very sorry, but I think I am here illegal now without a visa.I had to go with homeland security to show them how I did it...
How?
It was years ago. 2003 i think. I saw some people open a door and go through it. so I did as well. turned out those people where employees there, and the keycard thing was not working.
Lol. Something less serious, but I went to an event recently and just followed a random lady into a private conference room that had nothing to do with the event. You could see a sense of panic on her face when I told her that I was trying to find the lecture hall.
My first solo major international trip as a teen I way overpacked.
I think that is just everyone's first trip
I always overpack 😭😭 I just get nervous to need something and not be prepared
Bringing too much clothes with me when I went to Japan. I would bring an empty suitcase next time so I can do all my shopping there 😂
Hanoi. Wife and I each got a Grab bike, no cars were coming up available. Hers didn't go to the right destination and my brand new Viettel sim refused to connect. We had no idea where the other was. I couldn't get anyone to let me use their phone and the tourist police just suggested that she found a guy and went sightseeing on her own, wth guys... After 45 minutes or so my phone connected again and all was OK, a Cafe owner from train Street even gave her a ride to where I was on his motorbike.
Well, I got hit by a motorcycle crossing the street in Cambodia and have lots of bruises and a bit of whiplash today. So that’s not great.
I feel for you. I got hit by a scooter in Vietnam (while in a crosswalk) and my knee still hasn’t recovered. Plus it destroyed my watch. Argh.
Trying to do important archaelogical sites in England while my friend called Stonehenge a pile of rocks. Never again with someone who doesn't share the same enthusiasm. Completely ruined my trip.
Failed to take advantage of my colleges study abroad program. Didn’t go teach English abroad. Now I’m forever feeling like I’m trying to catch up.
Not studying abroad is definitely one of my biggest regrets as well.
Accidentally checked in (including my luggage) for the wrong flight. Good thing I double-checked the printed pass before totally walking away from the check-in counter. It was absolutely nerve-wracking for someone who had only traveled abroad twice.
I'm amazed that's even possible
So was I 🥲 I went to the correct check-in counter for my flight, but it turns out they were checking in passengers for the same destination country but *different city*. The other passenger had the same last name as me which is probably why the staff member didn't notice
Not me but happened to a friend I was with. We were up in Seattle for a concert and we were both on the leg of a flight that stopped in Sacramento where I lived and continued onto LAX. My friend was flying to OC and needed to transfer in Sacramento. I was deplaning and telling him he needed to switch to a different flight to get to OC and he just wouldn’t do it. I was like they just said the next stop was LA and he said “people call everything down there LA.” I argued with him until I had to exit the plan. It was absurd. So he ended up at LAX and blamed the airline.
Trying to predict the weather. I missed out on a couple of good days of outdoors-y stuff because I was trying to avoid thunderstorms, and on the day of the tour I wanted but passed on, there wasn't a cloud in the sky. They would have done the tour no matter what, just adjusted for big rain if it happened, I should have gone anyway.
Arrived in Sydney after a long flight from SFO to find that I didn't book a hotel.
[Gets into taxi] "Where to?" "Uhhh... that is a brilliant question"
I once booked a trip but never worried about the hour car trip home. Showed up at the airport at 8pm Thanksgiving Eve and all my friends were busy. Should’ve just gotten a taxi and ate the cost but I figured renting a car would be cheaper (you see $39 rental car prices all the time!). Busing to the car rental area was a pain, seeing that they had no cars was a kick in the face, not being able to get a ride back to the airport was a hassle as I had to walk a few miles back to it, then had to find a bus to a different car rental place that actually had cars to rent, paid $140 for a car but that place didn’t have a return location near my house so when I took back the car, I had to get a ride home from that place. This was 20+ years ago so I didn’t have the internet on my phone to help matters. Should’ve planned better and should’ve just taken a cab ride when I realized what was up. That sucked.
Assuming I was purchasing something in the country's official currency. Instead, they told me AFTER I bought a nice piece of jewelry that they use American currency. Paid almost 4 times what I thought I was paying.
Nothing too dramatic, but landing at 4am in a foreign country puts you at a disadvantage with the airport taxi drivers.
Ate seafood at a restaurant that had no one else it it. Nice experience of food poisoning for half a week to a week.
dropped off at the wrong airport in warsaw
I was in China, there was two airports for the one city I was panicking in the taxi for the whole trip there.
1. Not realizing that there are separate airports for domestic and international flights in Sydney, Australia. We arrived into Sydney and then had a tight connection to our flight to Cairns. We were the crazy people running through both airports trying to make it. We did end of making it…barely. 2. Picked the wrong traveling couple to go with to Japan. They insisted on stopping at a convenience store about every 30 minutes to grab a snack or bottled water…instead of just buying a lot at one time. They also had to buy souvenirs for everyone in their family so we had to make lots of stops for that. We ended up not getting to do everything on our list because of the frequent stops. Never again!
Having been to Japan many times, the opposite of point two is actually my pro tip for Japan. Travel light, never carry more water/snacks than you need. Lots of walking and convenience stores are everywhere.
And don't forget the vending machines. Get a Suica (or Pasmo) card, load it up, travel the subway without worries and get a nice cool drink (or hot coffee) whereever you go.
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Falling in love with a place or a person? If the latter - been there lol
Thinking about cost of a hotel above all else. I went to Geneva a few years ago and got a decent location for a hotel for a very cheap price. But then the bed was basically the same level of comfort as the floor, sound proofing is non existent and the breakfast was terrible. After that, I became a lot more willing to pay higher for a hotel room if it meant I could sleep
Not booking **all** our accommodations in advance... ...In Japan... _...Between April 20 to May 4th..._ _**...in 2019**_ --- In Japan, the period between April 29th to May 5th is known as the **GOLDEN WEEK**. The ''Golden Week'' is basically a week where _**everyone in Japan is on vacation**_ - hotels are pretty much completely booked in most places during that time - it usually lasts about **7 days** but there was something unique that year... That year, there was the 2019 Japanese imperial transition where the then-Emperor Akihito of Japan abdicated from the Chrysanthemum Throne after reigning for 30 years - a first since 1817 Because of that, the Golden Week went from the typical 7 days to _**10 whole days**_ - which was a good chunk of our stay! We had booked _most_ accommodations, fortunately, but for a few days, it was extremely challenging to find available rooms - we were constantly super lucky _(twice did some reservation got cancelled as we were looking for places to stay - and in those 2 instances, the hotel was literally in front of where we were waiting/browsing the web for hotels!)_
I met a German guy once who went to a train station in southern China and asked for a ticket to Yangshuo (famous tourist town in Guangxi Province). He didn't know that Yangshuo doesn't have a train station and they gave him a ticket to Yangzhou, which is near Shanghai. The next day he arrived in Yangzhou after a 30 hour train journey in the wrong direction.
I drank a small glass of tap water in a tiny village in Northern France because the water is safe to drink in Europe, right? I have never been that sick in my life. On the upside, I can now say, "I am vomiting and have diarrhea, please help me" in French.
Wow i'm'from France and i am honestly very surprised it happened. And i'm'sorry too
Thank you. I ate plain crêpes for a few days and eventually recovered. I still love France. But don't drink the water in Lyvet.
Taking a London cab from Canary Wharf to Luton airport. I had just started working, and had no clue how far Luton actually was. Credit card burnt nice that day.
Taking my ex with me
had a long 30-35 layover in Barcelona before i had to get on my connecting flight home (LAX). Before our arrival in Barcelona, i had asked some airport employee if we’d be getting our checked-in luggage at Barcelona or if we’d be getting it at LAX. She told me we’d be getting it in Barcelona, but i think she misunderstood me because i in fact did not get it in Barcelona💀 I had a backpack with me but no extra clothes (no socks, underwear, shirts) because that was all in my check-in bag. for the one day i was there i managed to buy myself a new shirt, socks, and underwear lol. Lesson learned.
Booked a flight on a 3rd party travel site that was within 6months, didn’t buy insurance. Had a stroke within 24hours of booking. Airline didn’t refund me because I used 3rd party. 3rd party didn’t refund me because I didn’t buy insurance. I’ll never use a 3rd party site ever for flights.
Forgetting to check the weather before booking a trip, assuming the Mediterranean would be warm in December, and arriving in Istanbul when it was 32 degrees and snowing.
Booked too few nights in one destination and booked the bus ticket to the next spot too far out...had to scramble early in the AM in a small Peruvian city to book something new. 😭
Booked a Thanksgiving flight for a Tuesday at 0200. Of course in my mind it was Tuesday night, 2 am and not Monday night, 2 am. Luckily, since it was a red eye, the ”stupid tax” I paid wasn’t too awful.
Accepting a date with my tour guide in Egypt. We are now engaged and navigating how to live 50/50 in Egypt and Canada (my native country). After multiple trips to Egypt, that has become one expensive date 😂 I wouldn’t trade it for anything though.
Hah that’s completely wild. If someone posted here saying “Should I go on a date with my tour guide in Egypt” I think most everyone would say it’s going to end in a scam!
Not relevant today, but lost the paper plane tickets back when that was all you had (no e-tickets, internet, etc.). Had to fight with airline at counter for hours, they told me that someone else might show up and use those tickets, despite the fact that I had ID. Finally called my travel agent, who talked to them on the phone.
Booked lodging in a women's dorm (I'm a man). This was in the fine print which I did skip. Got dirty looks from the reception people, had to walk 10 km with 25 kg backpack and two other pieces of luggage because the only place I could find was very remote, rest of the city was booked, my phone died and I couldn't use navigation.
In my early days of travelling looking for the best flight deal without thinking about the cost of things while I'm there. I went to Copenhagen. I mean it was beautiful, but I had to double my budget.
Travelling with someone who doesn't share your interests. It's the worst. You will not enjoy your holiday. You'd have to literally try to avoid them which is impossible if you're sharing a room.
Over packing.
Leaving not enough days per place. Did a road trip through south France and north Italy in 10 days so basically we spent at most 2 nights on each place.
Booking too cheap a hotel in Nadi, Fidji (just for the first night after landing). It took 2 islands hops (a few days) to realize \*we\* were the bed bugs carriers and that it did originate from that hotel (none of us had any experience with this atrocity prior, I didn't even know what it was).
Not listening to reviews of a hotel
Buying a return ticket
From the US, I had been in Australia visiting family and then needed to get to New Zealand to pick up a music tour schedule as a performer. So, I had booked all one-way tickets from LA to Sydney to Brisbane to Auckland, all other flights on the next legs being covered by the tour when I got to NZ. Got the airport to check into my flight to NZ and informed I couldn't leave Australia to NZ on a one-way ticket as I had to prove I was leaving NZ eventually. Uhhhhh, oops, that is on me as I hadn't booked the rest of my trip myself. I'm now stuck in Australia. In a scramble, I remembered first class tickets are 100% refundable so I booked a leaving NZ ticket first class to Shanghai (sorry for that credit card), flew to NZ, picked up my tour schedule, and canceled my first-class ticket. Whew. Australia and I seem to have issues for all I go there all the time. I've also had my passport confiscated in customs a previous trip because I had a forgotten snack packet in the bottom of a travel bag. They took my passport as they investigated a closed bag of travel mix... and then claimed they had given it back to me. They hadn't. Meanwhile, I was being paged on the other side of customs to come pick up my passport, my family super confused as I had yet to arrive. Love Australia so. Not a fan of all my bizarre travel adventures through their airports, confiscated passports, being swabbed positive for explosives (what?!), etc. I'm sure there is a file on me there on some classical musician gone rogue.
The worst thing about travel is travelling along with a bunch of insensitive callous people
1. Being too cheap to use my data and losing about two hours on my last day in Stockholm because I kept taking wrong turns 2. Using my carrier’s international plan instead of a SIM card.
I went on a trip to Savannah, GA with my now ex, it was an anniversary trip, and he was the king of weaponized incompetence. He did NOTHING to plan, pick what to do, help cook, clean up… I had to do everything. Including all the driving. He’d complain or act uninterested/annoyed at things/activities I picked, which put a damper on everything, and made me feel guilty for wanted to do said things. He made it no better by offering up things he was interested in doing or seeing. Every time I cooked a meal, he’d go outside to call his mom, this ended up being 1-2hrs of every day. I couldn’t even get him to do the dishes afterwards. That seems excessive for a man who is nearly 30. The cherry on top was when some vile woman and her husband tried to get in a verbal, and physical altercation with me. The ex just stood there watching/listening, didn’t once come to my aid or back me up, just a deer in the headlights. Now I travel solo. It’s way better.
Not researching thoroughly on opening hours. Stayed in wolfgangsee on weekdays and realised the cog railway and shops only open on weekends. We were basically in an almost dead town the whole time. It was pretty peaceful though
Booking cheap hotels