TRAVEL THOUGHTS A TO Z (with a little bit of fudging).

ASIA on $10 a day? Easy. Get yourself a time machine. Even then you’ll probably have a miserable time, doing nothing, missing the sights and sounds, the whole reason for being there. You’ll probably get scurvy, bedbugs and fleas too. Work another week, another month. Save a little harder.

BE NICE. You’re on holiday. You’re not at work, dragging a plough, welding, or doing surgery. Things may and will go wrong. Your hotel may burn down the night before you’re booked in (Port Elizabeth), or catch fire with you in it (Al Raqqa). Flights get cancelled, delayed, and that’s not good. But sometimes they explode. Keep a perspective. The guy behind the desk, the girl that doesn’t understand your Swahili, they are at work. They have bills to pay. They’d love an overseas holiday.

COUCH SURFING. Doesn’t appeal to me. I do get it. Maybe a younger me would have done it, but I would just feel awkward and prefer my privacy.

DRAGGING a bulging 9kg bag through an airport because you didn’t want to pay for checked luggage is a pain. I know, because I do it sometimes.If you don’t need a tent, binoculars or a sleeping bag (lucky you) or diving and other specialist stuff, carrying your bag shouldn’t be too hard. Don’t bring the kitchen sink. But don’t come empty handed.

EARN money as you go? With a working holiday visa in places like Japan, Australia, Holland, or Canada, this is a great way to get a bit more involved in where you visit. Teaching English places like Thailand or South America will usually involve more than a month commitment, as well as more than just being born that way. Helping out at a guesthouse for free board, well, you’re just existing. And taking someone’s job, too.

FLASH-PACKER. Backpacker. Traveling. Touring. Tourist. Adventure. Pilgrim. Solo. Whatever works for you. I can’t understand what people find attractive about some places, and why they would spend some much time/energy/money on things they do. Most of them would look at my activities with a raised eyebrow. That’s fine. Some people have lots of time. Some have lots of money. We were all first timers once, and we were probably all on a budget once. But beg-packing? Just not on.

GET LOST. GPS, Google Maps, Ubers at your fingertips make it easier to get from A to B in a foreign land. Sometimes the unexpected can be the best. I was once searching for some (more) Khmer temples in eastern Thailand. I never found them, but I stumbled upon a fully operational Buddhist temple made entirely from used bottles. Enjoy the unplanned.

HITCH-HIKING, the western concept of a free ride exists in few places outside the west. In many places, paying for a lift is the norm. In some places, it can vary from person to person. If in doubt, check. “But I’m hitch-hiking” at the end of the journey won’t win you any friends. I’ve hitched rides on trucks, cars, vans, police cars, a garbage truck, motorcycles, a tractor, and even an elephant. If the owner wants money to take you there, choice is yours: pay or wait.

INTERNET v GUIDE BOOKS? Guide books, like me, are not cool. I use them. “You can get everything off the internet” cool people say. Well, yes and no. There is no shortage of info on Chiang Mai or Chicago, but when you get into the smaller towns, often the wikitravels of the world just don’t have a thing. I got used to Lonely Planet (oh so uncool) in my younger days, and they are still my preferred source. Rough Guides are a better choice for many parts of Africa. Both guide books and the internet have a role to play in travel planning.

JUST GO. One day it will be too late.

KEEP your stuff safe. Having your passport, wallet, camera stolen, dropped, forgotten doesn’t make for a good holiday. Hotel safes are good, but can’t always be trusted. Money left in bag in your room is a freebie. A fat wallet full of fresh cash in a back pocket is tempting. Money belts, if nothing else, keep all your stuff in one place, and are harder to get at than wallets and bags. Oversized and worn outside your clothes, they are known as “Rob-Me-Belts”.

LAUNDRY. The bane of our traveling existence. Grandma’s 50 baht laundry is great, until you need to catch a 6am train, and she says “afternoon.” Hand washing at the end of the day, jocks x 1, shirt x 1 is a chore but easy enough. But socks. There’s only one thing worse than hand washing socks. Hand washing jeans. Oh, and turning dirty T-shirts inside out? That’s just gross.

MONEY. Yes. Travel goes so much better with this. (Passports and tooth brushes too).  ATMS/Cash machines are not quite everywhere. There will be times when you need to stock up on local cash for some small-town adventures. Not everywhere has a beep-beep facility to pay. If you need to carry large amounts of cash, keep it well hidden. Your suitcase, wallet or hand-bag are not well hidden. Spread it out. Don’t be opening a wedge of C-notes to pay for your pad thai. Carry a back-up card.

NEVER “TRAVEL FOR FREE.” Never OK. Never. Ever. OK, some twit made a TV show out of it (if you believe TV) and any number of twits have blogs about it. People are by and large wonderful, and inclined to help. DON’T exploit that. Don’t take advantage of people’s culture of generosity and hospitality. A mission to connect with other cultures on a genuine, spiritual, non-commercial way? You’re a freeloader. Turning up expecting to be looked after is arrogant, white privilege. Imagine if the roles were reversed?

OVER-TOURISTED places are usually crowded for a reason: they are really cool. Up to 70,000 visit the Taj Mahal every day. 4,500,000 people visit St Petersberg’s Hermitage annually, because it is one of the world’s best art collection. You’re going to have share Angkor Wat or Bagan with a few people, but it’ll be worth it.

PUT the selfie stick away. Please. Forever.

QUEUEING is a foreign concept in a lot of places. Get ready for a bit of jostling. Watch your wallet/money/watch. A big backpack can come in handy! Even when there is a queue, expect to see a hand come over the top at a ticket counter.

RESPECT. Goes a long way. Cover your legs at Burmese temples, please. Use a sarong if you wear shorts. Take your shoes off at a mosque and don’t bring them inside with you. Ask if you want to take a person picture. I could go on.

STAYING in touch is easy, so much easier than before. Getting away is the hard part now. Put the Facebook down. Turn off the blog. Yes, let your Mum know your alive every few weeks, but she doesn’t need to know what you had for breakfast. I’m old enough to remember trooping off to the GPO to check for letters (none), checking the embassy for the footie scores. “Getting away from it all”, for me, includes you. Nothing personal.

THE BEATEN TRACK gets longer, wider and harder to get off day by day.  There are more flights to more places than at any point in history, to places that were once the ends of the earth. I read some of Sir David Attenborough’s accounts of his early wildlife missions, in the 1950s. He talked about going to “the main hotel” in Bali! It takes more effort to get off the beaten track now, but it can be done. Sometimes, it’s not that hard at all.


U
NLESS your instincts are useless, trust them. They are probably right. If you are out in the back-blocks, off the beaten track in a new and foreign town, you’ll need to know who to trust. Arriving after dark in a badly lit town in rural Kenya, we had taken a wrong turn somewhere, and didn’t know where our hotel intended hotel was. A big man walked out of the dark straight into us. He asked where we were going. I had a second. I trusted him. He walked us to the door of our hotel, shooing away street kids as we went. Once in Durban my instincts told me we were going to get mugged. I told myself that was silly. It wasn’t. We were.

VOLUNTEERING. Think long and hard about it. And if it involves children, don’t do it. Wanting to give back is human. In most cases, it’ll be you benefitting most, often entirely you. Nepalese are perfectly capable of building houses. Do you have specific skills, like medical? There is a reason those expensive animal volunteer positions cost a lot. It’s because it takes time and resources to look after you. And they need the money. OK, that is two reasons. Just never volunteer in an orphanage.

WHEN HAGGLING, it isn’t about life and death. Don’t pay any silly price they ask, but don’t take it personally. Yes, they are trying to get a bit more out of you. Do you want it? Can you afford it? Is the gap really a deal-breaker? Don’t try and squeeze the poor old dear dry. I once found myself in a dusty town in Malawi haggling about 3c off the price of boiled eggs! I (mentally) slapped myself, bought the eggs, and 7 years on, I’m still OK.

X, as in AIR ASIA X, is  one of many low cost carriers that have revolutionised travel in my lifetime, opening up new places and opportunities for travellers as well as businesses. Sometimes LCCs suck, but sometimes full service airlines suck too. (Aeroflot) Know your limits. Know their limits. Weigh your bag. Don’t check in late. Don’t miss your boarding, right Peter? Often they are bargains, but often though with add-ons, you’re actually saving nothing. They are great for one-way tickets, too, something legacy carriers charge silly amounts for.

YOU’LL Never Never know, if you never ever go.

ZLOTY. Polish currency. I DID IT!