Today we’ll be talking all about travel partners – why they’re important, how to pick one, and how to keep them! This comes at an important time for me, as myself and my travel buddy book our next trip, and recover from our last one!
What is a Travel buddy?
A travel buddy is somebody that you go on the majority of your trips with. People will define this as different things, but I define it as somebody you go on 50% or more of your trips with. This isn’t to say that you aren’t able to travel with other people, but a travel buddy is someone you feel comfortable enough with to go on the majority of your adventures with.
Why have a travel buddy?
There are numerous reasons why having a travel buddy is advantageous over traveling alone or even just traveling with other, random people. Safety, comfort, and finances are all big factors in determining whether or not to have a travel buddy.
The first aspect to consider in travel buddy perks, is finances. The biggest perk is in hotels. Often the cheapest hotel rooms are two queen beds, and if you are willing to share a room with your travel buddy you can split your hotel costs in half. Seeing as hotel costs are one of the largest costs to consider when traveling, this is a huge perk. Often, you can get discounts on excursions when you buy two or more tickets, and when you purchase private tours, the cost can also be halved.
Comfort is another thing to consider when you are deciding whether or not having a travel buddy is worthwhile. When you are traveling the world, it can be nice to have someone to experience things with. Also, it can get quite lonely to be by yourself in a foreign place with no one to talk to. It can be difficult to explain to family and friends how traveling has impacted you, and it is comforting to have someone who can relate to those experiences. This can be even better when it’s a travel buddy versus a random person, because you will be comfortable with someone you are used to traveling with.
However, the most important thing to consider is safety. Having a partner that is experienced with traveling can be a great benefit when trying to navigate transportation systems, cities, and airports. This helps you not to get lost. Travel problems, such as airplane delays, theft, or scams are almost guaranteed to happen at some point if you travel enough. Having someone to back you up and bounce ideas off of while traveling can be very helpful in keeping you safe. It is also true that people are less likely to take advantage of you if you aren’t alone.
None of this is to say that you cannot travel solo, or with different people. There are some perks to traveling by yourself. If you are looking to travel solo, and you are a female, I highly recommend joining the Facebook page “The solo female travelers”. But I recommend being more experienced, and you definitely have to be more conscious than when you travel with a buddy.
How to select a travel buddy
Deciding who to travel with can be a pretty difficult, and such a big decision shouldn’t be taken lightly. A travel buddy is more than, and different than, a good friend. You don’t need to be best friends with the person you choose to be your travel buddies with, and your best friends won’t necessarily be good travel buddies. There are numerous aspects to look at when deciding who to explore the world with.
Should my significant other be my travel buddy?
As someone with a long term significant other, a lot of people ask me why my travel buddy isn’t my boyfriend. They think its weird that it wouldn’t be the natural assumption for me to want to travel with my boyfriend. However, early on my boyfriend and I discussed our travel desires and interests, and decided that he wouldn’t enjoy traveling to many of the places that I wanted to go. He wasn’t as comfortable as I was with the idea of getting out of our comfort zones and exploring foreign areas. So, although we do travel together, I have a different travel buddy. People assume that this means we just don’t enjoy being around each other, or that for some reason we love each other less than if we did travel together, but that simply isn’t true.
Just because you have a significant other does not mean they need to be your travel partner, and just because they aren’t your travel partner doesn’t mean you don’t love each other. You should base your travel partner on the following criteria, not on whether or not you are dating. If you work well traveling together, then that is perfect. A lot of couples do so successfully and have a wonderful time traveling the world together. However, do not be disappointed if this isn’t what works for your relationship. Hopefully, your significant other is trusting and understanding enough to allow you to travel without them.
Travel Expecations
One of the biggest things to look at when deciding whether or not be travel buddies with someone, is your travel expectations, and whether or not they match with your prospective travel buddy. How often do you want to travel each year? What regions of the world do you want to travel to? What types of activities do you want to do while traveling? What type of traveler do you want to be? Are you more interested in hiking and kayaking for instance, or do you want to visit museums and see beautiful pieces of architecture?
To work well while traveling together, you need to have similar traveling expectations. This should be something you discuss with your travel partner before you ever head out.
Athletic Ability
Something else to think about is your athletic ability. A lot of travel is exercise, and to make sure one isn’t holding the other back, make sure you have similar athletic ability. My travel partner and i hiked 30 miles in one week – if one of us was considerably slower than the other, or didn’t like to exercise that much, this could have led to a serious point of friction, and caused us not to see as much as we wanted to. After several weeks of adventure, its possible that your feet will hurt, your muscles will be sore, and you will be tired. After all of this, small differences in athletic ability will be very noticeable. Although being of different athletic ability shouldn’t entirely stop you from traveling together, its a point of consideration when you are choosing someone to travel the world with.
Financial situation
A tough discussion, but a necessary one nonetheless, is the financial situation of both people. Regardless of where or how you travel, traveling is expensive. If you are going to travel with someone, you have to determine how much each of you are willing to spend each year on travel. Be reasonable with each other, and select a reasonable amount to save up each year. If your financial situations are vastly different, it may be difficult to travel together – one of you will either need to travel less, or finance travel for the other person. This can lead to some resentment.
If your financial situations are not similar enough, this doesn’t mean you guys can’t travel together. But it may mean that the person with a more flexible financial situation travels with different people for part of the time as well, so that neither person is limited.
Time commitments
We all have lives that limit how often we can travel, and when we can travel. If one travel partner can only travel in summer, while the other travels only in fall, it can be difficult to find time to travel together. Another issue can be, if one person can only travel for a week a year, but the other can travel for half the year. This difference in expectations and needs can lead to friction while traveling, which is never good. Unfortunately, if your time allowances have no overlap, it may be difficult to travel together, however if it is just an issue of the amount of time, this does not mean you can’t travel together. As with finances, maybe one person just travels without the other for a portion of time.
Personalities
This is where friendship comes into play. Obviously, if you can’t get along with your travel buddy while you aren’t travelling, then it will be difficult to travel together. Although you dont need to be best friends, you do need to be able to get along well and socialize together. Traveling is often stressful and tiring, so being able to get along while you are tired and irritable is essential while traveling.
You don’t need to have similar personalities necessarily, but you need compatible personalities. And personality needs differ when you travel together. If one person isn’t a good planner, it may be necessary for the other person to pick up the slack. Maybe one person is good at navigating travel and flights, while the other is better at picking the perfect hotel. This is all something to think about when choosing the perfect travel buddy. Think about the flaws in your own travel style and find someone that compliments that well.
Maintaining a good travel buddy relationship
As I’ve said before, traveling is stressful! You don’t want that to lead to misery and hate between you and your travel buddy halfway through the trip, especially if you two are also friends at home. So, having a good plan to deal with this stress before leaving is very important.
“The Talk”
Everyone’s least favorite sentence in the world is “We need to talk.” But, with your travel buddy, it is necessary to say those four little words. It is important to talk about each other’s expectations BEFORE leaving for your trip. Not only your expectations for each other, but the trip overall. You should have this talk each time you leave for a new trip to refresh each person on the goals and expectations while you’re away.
Personal space
Regardless of how much you like someone, eventually you can get sick of them if you’re around them for too long. This can be an issue on longer or more stressful trips, where you are with your travel buddy every hour of every day for weeks on end. It is inevitable that at some point you may just need a break from each other. You need to have a way to tell your travel buddy to “F off” politely without hurting their feelings, letting them know that it’s nothing personal, you just need to get the heck away from them for a bit! So, it’s important to talk about this before leaving, during “The Talk”. My travel partner and I decided that if one of us says to the other “I just need some me time”, we have to give them 30 minutes of time where they can get away from us, with no hard feelings. But that’s just what works for us, you and your travel partner need to decide what works for you!
Fighting Negativity
It’s inevitable that you will get cranky at some point while traveling (At least, it is for me. Maybe some of you are better people haha). So it’s important to have a gentle way to tell your travel partner “Hey, you’re being a b*tch. Calm down.” For my travel buddy and I, we decided on the phrase “Stay positive!” I didn’t think we would need to use it, but after I lost my credit card in the only state in the US that didn’t host my bank, my travel buddy said it to me a few times. Sometimes bad things happen while you’re traveling, and it’s good to be able to be supportive of each other and be able to help each other. This is part of how my travel buddy and I do that, and I hope it works for you as well.
honesty
A big part of “The Talk” is just opening an honest pathway of communication between travel buddies. If you can’t be honest with each other, things will fester and before you know it, you’ll hate each other. Make it clear that you can tell each other anything that’s bothering you, without the other person taking it personally. If you’re doing something that bothers your travel buddy, they should be able to tell you without it hurting your feelings. Because it’s better for them to tell you upfront than for them to hold it in and hate you for it.
expectations
The one thing that is important to discuss prior to every single trip is the goal of each trip. What are you trying to accomplish? What’s the plan? What type of trip do you want to have? Small things like how active you want to be, how steadfast the plan needs to be, how late you want to sleep in each day, and how much you want to spend on food don’t seem like a big deal, but end up being what makes or breaks a trip and a friendship. One big clarification that my travel buddy and I made was that if one of us wanted to “leave the trail” to go see or experience something, we would change the plans to fit it in. Another thing we determine before each trip, is how many times each person is allowed to change or cancel a plan because they feel uncomfortable or want to do something else, regardless of the feelings of the other person. For instance, in Barcelona we each had 3 “get out of jail free” cards, that we could use to cancel any plan during the week for any reason. This is what worked for us, but it may or may not be what works for you. Just make sure to iron out all the details before you get there!
I hope you all found this information helpful! Until next time, live free my fellow travel bugs!
Travelbug 