Navigating Abroad: Learning From My Travel History

In exactly a week from today, I will be landing in Barcelona to start my semester abroad! I am beyond excited about this adventure, but I also want to make wise travel decisions as I embark on this journey. There are two trips that I went on in the past that I learned a lot from. I want to share those lessons with you all, as well as carry them with me as I travel around Europe this semester.

Split, Croatia

In the summer going into my freshman year of college, I traveled to Croatia with my high school best friend. It was our first trip without parents and we were very excited to be able to meet people from other countries, sail around the islands, enjoy new foods, and shop around the beautiful old town of Split. While there were a lot of ups during this trip, there were also a lot of downs that taught me about traveling solo. 

My friend and I didn’t always see eye-to-eye. I think that this was primarily caused by us feeling comfortable with different activities. I mainly wanted to go out at night and meet new people while she’s more of an explore-during-the-day kind of person. This brings me to the first lesson that I learned which is to establish what you want to do and get out of the trip beforehand. Since it was our first trip without parents, we didn’t know exactly what we were doing and our plan was basically to get there and figure it out. We still did a lot of fun and enriching things but because of some of our personal conflicts, we held ourselves back from some new experiences we could’ve had.

Also because of our differences in opinion, there were times when we weren’t the safest travelers. One night we met a group of friends from Switzerland and it was an interesting night (let’s just say some people got arrested). But anyway, the next night they invited us out to a rave with them and my friend didn’t want to go because of the crazy night we’d had before. I didn’t want to waste any time so I decided to go in an hour-long Uber, walk through a new city in Croatia, and enter the rave by myself. While it all ended up being fun and I was safe, there were definitely some risks that I took that when looking back weren’t the smartest decisions.

Another part of this trip that stuck with me was our last night. We decided not to stay out late because we had to leave for our flight early in the morning, but it didn’t end up this way. My friend made a friend from England and they decided to go swimming in the ocean. She left her phone in her shoes on the beach and it got stolen. I didn’t know where she was and couldn’t reach her and I was sitting alone on a bench. Two boys approached me and I’m lucky that they were safe but they very easily couldn’t have been. I sat there all through the night with them and was furious with my friend for leaving me and also because we stayed out all night instead of going home early as we said we would. While at the time this was a very intense situation, looking back it is a fun story and learning experience.

The last thing that I learned from this trip is to have patience and communicate well with your travel buddy. Being in a new environment can be hard and stressful when you don’t know the area or customs well. I sometimes get overwhelmed when I’m in a new place and have to make decisions. It’s also very possible to make conflicting decisions with your travel partner because neither of you knows what the right thing to do is in a new place. This is why it is essential to be flexible and patient with people in new places. 

Corfu, Greece

Greece was another great adventure and learning curve. I also went on this trip with just one other friend that I met on vacation when I was 11 and ever since then we’ve made plans to travel to each other at least once a year (except COVID times). She is from England, and our different life experiences always enable us to learn from each other which is why traveling together is such a great opportunity. 

Greece went smoothly overall. My friend and I got along seamlessly. The only major hiccup was that there was hardly any transportation on Corfu and it was a trek for us to get from our hotel to downtown. We had to hike up a mountain just to get to the bus stop and then wait. There were a few times that the bus never came and we waited for an hour just to hike back down the mountain. We were successful a few times, but the frustration from the times that we failed was intense. 

I learned that I want to stay IN TOWN whenever I travel. I don’t ever want to deal with transportation. As I plan my weekend trips while studying abroad, I want to look for places to stay within the city I’m visiting. I would rather stay in a less pleasant place with a good location than a fancy place far away from town. 

Another travel tip especially for younger girls that I want to bring attention to is something fun that my parents forced me to do when I went to Croatia as it was my first trip with just one other girl. Whenever we met new boys, they made me take a selfie with the boys and send it to them right away. When they first told me they wanted me to do this I thought they were insane and people would think I was weird. But I did it anyway and let me just say, the people loved it! Every time I whipped my phone out and yelled “Selfie!” everyone would get excited to take the picture. Not only did my parents feel safer and happy, but I also have so many fun selfies to look back on. Another note: if anyone wasn’t ecstatic to take the selfie, wouldn’t that be kind of suspicious? I recommend people do this because it really just ended up being fun.

The final thing that I hope I’m conscious of while abroad is not being a klutz. For some reason, most of the times I’ve gone to Europe I’ve had some weird accident that put a damper on my trip. In my junior year of high school, I went to visit the friend I went to Greece with, and on the first day, I burnt my chin on tea so badly that it was blistering and eventually scarred. Especially as a teenage girl, this was a huge deal for me and I was insanely embarrassed when meeting all of my friend’s friends. When I went to Croatia I also had really bad poison ivy that I got the night before I left but didn’t notice until I arrived in Croatia. It was all over my face and hands and it was also really embarrassing. Hopefully, when I go to Barcelona I will be a little more careful!

Overall, I hope that while in Barcelona and on weekend trips, I am flexible with my travel companions while also setting aside time to do some specific activities and being safe. Fingers crossed that bringing attention to the problems I’ve had with traveling before will enable me to have the best experiences this time around!