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Sometimes travelers get home from a trip feeling like they need a few days to physically recover from their travels. A wise traveler should cultivate a lifestyle that translates seamlessly between their time on and off the road. Here are a few health conscious habits that will help keep you in top form while traveling or at home.
• Wash your hands before eating anything. Carry hand wipes or a small tube of hand sanitizer. This is especially useful when you are traveling through places that don’t have clean safe water, or if you are roughing it and likely not to find bathroom facilities for days. Make sure to sanitize hands before touching your eyes to remove contacts.
• Always carry a bottle of water. Stay hydrated! Not only is it important to your overall health, slight dehydration can cause mild depression, mental fatigue, and headaches – all things that you don’t want to have dampen your experiences while on the road. Avoid sugary soft drinks that will add to your misery if you come down with a bought of traveler’s stomach, and stick with lots of clean water.
• Use that 14-hour flight to arrive well rested. Take some melatonin and beat jetlag to arrive ready for the day in a new place, even if that place is several time zones ahead.
• Bring along a supply of Echinacea capsules. Echinacea is a good immune system supporter and one easy way to protect you against annoying colds or flu while on the road.
• Carry a multivitamin. If you find yourself in an area of the world that doesn’t cater to your dietary needs – like my poor vegetarian companion in Eastern Europe – make sure to take a multivitamin to make up for some of the nutrients you are not getting.
• If you have a food allergy, make sure to learn a few words in the local language to avoid certain death.
• Try to maintain a regular sleep cycle. Even if you find yourself going to bed at 4am and waking at noon, try to make your sleeping hours regular. If you are constantly sleeping at different hours of the day, and for varying lengths of time, you will find that you never feel fully rested and it can leave you sluggish throughout the day.
• Maintain a regimen of exercise that fits into your on the road lifestyle. Yoga and Tai Chi are the easy and popular options. However, sometimes you might need something a little more intense than these two practices. Especially if, like me, your off the road lifestyle is remarkably active. Take up jogging. Cardio exercise is essential to good health, so get fit while seeing the countryside on your morning jog. Your racing about the town in sneakers may seem bizarre in some cultures, but it’s sure to be a fail proof conversation starter – especially with the local children who will tag along after you howling with laughter.
• Be sure to check the CDC for information on travel related health risks, or essential vaccinations for the region where you will be traveling.
(Photo credit: Scienceblogs.com)
The most difficult long-term travel question is also perhaps the most common: how much does it cost?
It’s almost impossible to answer that question because it depends where you’re going, when you’re going and how exactly you plan to travel. Tiny variations in how you travel can have a huge impact on your trip costs. Do you plan to eat street food or sit down to five-course spreads every night? Love to hit the local bars? Sharing a room? Traveling alone?
We’ve pointed to a few good, example budgets in the past and suggested that $14,000/year is a good average, but we recently stumbled across a new site, Budget Your Trip, that’s hoping to make it even easier to figure out how much cash you need for your dream trip.
Budget Your Trip is a bit like general personal finance and budget tracking websites — like Wesabe or Mint — but geared specifically toward travelers.
Plug in your destination and Budget Your Trip will show you an average of how much the site’s members spent there. Budget Your Trip also breaks down those costs into common categories — food, accommodation, water, transportation, etc — so you can see where your money is going. There’s also a handy currency converter so you can quickly see the average in local or your own currency.
The planning tools allow you to create a trip from scratch (based on, for example, how much money you have set aside) or build your trip budget using the site’s existing averages and sample budgets.
One potential problem with using Budget Your Trip as planning tool is that there’s no indication of what sort of travelers are adding their costs to the site. For example, Budget Your Trip’s Bangkok averages suggest it costs $40 a day to get by, when in fact we, and many people we know, have gotten by on far less. Have prices in Bangkok gone up recently or are not-so-budget travelers skewing the results?
Currently there’s no way to tell the answer to that question, but fortunately, fixing that is on Budget Your Trip’s short-list of coming improvements.
Laurie, who founded Budget Your Trip with her husband after the two returned from a round the world trip last year, says that there are plans to add tools for narrowing estimates according to your budget. Currently, when you “estimate costs” for a potential trip you can only search by city or country. Laurie says they will be adding additional search parameters including “budget type” (budget, mid-range, or luxury), “trip type” (personal or business) and “group size” (solo traveler, couple, or group) in the near future.
The ability to narrow cost projections by budget and group size will no doubt make the site more useful for vagabonds.
We should also point out that Budget Your Trip isn’t just a planning tool. Once you’re actually on the road you can keep track of your costs, entering the data into your budget and making adjustments as you go. For example, you might find you’re spending less than you planned in Thailand, leaving you more to spend in Vietnam or perhaps just allowing you to extend your trip.
The site also offers graphs, charts and other very nice visual breakdowns that can quickly show you where your money is going. Not really the type of traveler that keeps receipts? As Laurie says, “it may not be necessary to track your expenses to the last penny, but seeing a breakdown of what percentage you’re spending on accommodation, food, or souvenirs can motivate you to save a little more.”
For example, becoming aware of that one thing that busts your budget everyday is a great way to stop the excess spending, potentially extending your time on the road.
If, like us, you tend to avoid the internet cafes while you’re on the road then Budget Your Trip might be more useful as a planning tool, however, Laurie did tell use that eventually the site is hoping to offer a spreadsheet you download and print for offline budget tracking.
In the mean time, if you’re looking for yet another data source to help answer the age old question of how much it costs to travel the world, check out Budget Your Trip.
I recently got an email from a woman who suffers from a diagnosed case of social phobia and is worried that this might compromise her travels.
“I am afraid that my introverted personality is going to effect the way I travel, and I won’t be as opportunistic when it comes to the social aspect of traveling,” the woman wrote. “Do you have any advice? Will solo travel help me better experience my host culture and meet locals? Besides going to therapy, do you have any suggestions that may help me be a bit more outgoing when it comes to social situations abroad?”
This is what I told her:
I have always been a bit introverted, and solo travel has helped make me into a more social person. I don’t know much about formally diagnosed “social phobia” and what it entails, but I can tell you that traveling alone can really force you to break out of your shell and engage your surroundings. It’s not always easy, and there are times where you’ll be lonely and frustrated — but it’s worth it when you make connections. It is, in short, an interesting learning process, and it’s rewarding when you make breakthroughs.
My best strategy for being more of an extrovert when you travel is to go to the developing world instead of the industrialized world. In Europe and North America people might not always have time for you — but in places like Asia (which is nice and cheap) or Africa (which is not as cheap, but amazing just the same) and the Middle East, people are more likely to take note of you as an outsider and make friends. I did some of my earliest vagabonding in Asia, and it’s amazing how many people I met just by being the only white guy in a little village. There is a language barrier to overcome, of course, but that process can actually be fun, as even introverts can tackle the art of speaking simple English, utilizing a phrasebook, and/or using improvised sign language to get a point across.
Another option would be to join a formal study or volunteer program (the Peace Corps being a good example) that will give you a structured community of people you can be with, and a “business” oriented pretext to meet local people. For more info on working or studying or volunteering overseas, check out the resources at Transitions Abroad.
In addition to this advice, introverted vagabonders might want to check out Sophia Dembling’s World Hum article “Confessions of an Introverted Traveler,” including her tip sheet, “Six Tips for Introverted Travelers.”
Sovereign Man background image. Graphic: Sovereign Man website
In many ways, Jason Bourne is the ultimate vagabond: he has multiple passports, speaks multiple languages and has no permanent address.
Some PTs, or permanent travelers, are almost like real-life Jason Bournes. Minus the kung-fu skills and the CIA assassins. One case study to read is the Sovereign Man blog, written by Simon Black (not his real name).
The tone of Black’s writing style makes him seem like a darker version of Timothy Ferriss (author of “The Four Hour Workweek”). An avowed anarchist, he rants against taxes, governments, and grassroots activism. Here is a link to Brave New Traveler’s interview with Simon Black.
Some of the unsavory aspects of the PT scene is the focus on tax evasion, offshore banking, and anticipating the fall of governments.
For more nuts-and-bolts info, check out Emergency, by Neil Strauss. Excerpts from the book can be found in this post on Tim Ferriss’s blog: How to Be Jason Bourne.
Do you know anyone who has lived as a PT?
Even as vagabonders, we pick our travel destinations more often than not. We say that we want to go to Southeast Asia, or Peru, or Morocco, and to varying degrees we research those destinations and we go.
Tonight, I found myself in a new part of San Francisco. As I got off at the Civic Center subway station and walked north along Leavenworth Street, I couldn’t help but notice that the density of beggars, liquor stores, and graffiti had increased dramatically. Often described in tourist guides as “the worst neighborhood in San Francisco,” the Tenderloin feels about as seedy as one might expect. And yet, it is also known as Little Saigon, was the setting for the Maltese Falcon, and was recently listed in the National Register of Historic Places.
What drew me to this “soft underbelly” of the city was Afar Magazine’s third issue launch party, held at a speakeasy-style bar dedicated to American rye whiskey. It was only a few months ago that the last event lured me to North Beach, home of the city’s Little Italy, and I find that I am thankful for Afar providing an excuse to explore new corners of San Francisco.
Meffi, via Flickr
I remarked at the time how one of their features is to spin a globe and send a writer to an unexpected destination, such as Rolf in St. Petersburg, or writer/actor Andrew McCarthy being sent to Ethiopia in the current issue. Whether as a literary device, or simply being the location of an event you want to go to, having a destination be chosen for you can provide not only an opportunity to see someplace new, but it can challenge you to adapt to what might not be ideal circumstances.
For example, I was in Shanghai last July in order to see a total solar eclipse. Had I planned to go to southeastern China in the height of summer, or had Rolf planned to visit western Russia in the middle of winter? Certainly not. When I plan destinations, I try to take local climates into consideration in order to minimize such combinations. And yet, sometimes we are thrown into a snowy blizzard or a humid soup and therein lies the excitement of rising to meet a challenge set forth by an outside influence.
Magazine editors, professional conferences, cultural or religious celebrations, and cosmic events all provide an opportunity to see places that might not be on your list of dream destinations, yet can be just as rewarding.
First, decide you’re going to go.
The untraveled route is the route you haven’t taken yet. Or maybe it’s your old route with new eyes.
Go on foot. Bike. Horse. Rollerblade, skateboard, pogo stick.
Start climbing from Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port or descending from Roncesvalles — it really doesn’t matter. Avoid the debate and start in Pamplona. Start in Burgos or Vézelay, León or Le Puy. Start from Taizé with a chant in your head.
Go from Granada and ascend the Mozárabe, or north from Sevilla on the Vía de la Plata — or start where they merge at Mérida.
Start in Lisbon or Lubin, Lagos or Lund. Throw a dart and choose randomly. Start in Sarria and walk the last 100km. Start in Lavacolla, only 10k away.
After the war, walk to Kanyakumari, then turn and walk back to the far tip of Spain. That’s what Diego did.
Start in California, walk to the Atlantic, fly to Portugal, pass through Santiago and continue on to wherever.
Go well-prepared in the winter and hope for the best. Or walk into Santiago with the throngs on St. James’ Day, Sunday, July 25.
Try ten miles max per day for at least a day.
Go when you’re 60. Or 72. Or now.
Walk out your front door and keep on walking.
Just go.
Sometimes, despite the most careful screening, you may find yourself stuck with a travel partner that you just don’t mesh with. Maybe circumstance threw you together, or perhaps you just didn’t realize how much you differed in your travel styles until you were on the road together. But now, you’re locked into at least a few days of travel with this person. Here’s how to cope.
1) The “whatever you want to do is fine” travel partner.
This person allows you to do all the research and all the planning. He or she then tags along on your trip, but then has no qualms about criticizing your choices. At that point she”ll turn to you and ask for more options or ask you to make a last minute change in plans to accommodate her whims.
How to deal: Ask him or her for input on the travel plan, and if she doesn’t give you any, just plan the trip you want to take. If she later complains that she had no say in the planning, offer to go your separate ways for a few hours or few days so that you can each do what you want to do.
2) The clingy travel partner.
The clingy travel partner wants to spend all day every day together, which can be fine if you get along really well, want to do all the same things, or are traveling for a shorter period of time. But even your best friend can start to grate on your nerves after weeks on end together.
How to deal:Set boundaries ahead of time and make it clear that you expect to spend some time apart. If you need to be sneaky, plan some activities that you enjoy but that you know that person doesn’t like and tell him or her you’ll just take a few hours to yourself to go do the activity without him. Or plan to get up an hour before he does on a few mornings so you can enjoy some quiet time alone.
3) The embarrassing travel partner.
Sometimes it seems like the person you knew at home disappears once you start your trip. Suddenly he becomes intolerant, says embarrassing things, or acts like a drunken buffoon. No one is perfect, but if the behavior becomes a pattern, it’s easy to get annoyed, especially when people begin to judge you by the actions of your friend.
How to deal: Give your friend the benefit of the doubt and try to set a positive example through your own actions. If he or she doesn’t take the hint, it’s time to sit down and have talk. Don’t attack your friend but make it clear that his actions are making you uncomfortable and if they continue, you may not be able to continue traveling with him.
4) The cheapskate travel partner.
The cheapskate travel partner promises to pay his or her way, but then always seems to come up short. She skimps on the tip, shorts you on gas money and always fails on her promises to “get the next round.” You find your own budget stretched to accommodate her.
How to deal: You are being taken advantage of, plain and simple. You don’t necessarily need to have a confrontation though. When she asks you to spot her, just say that you are short yourself and don’t have the extra cash, start requesting separate checks at restaurants, and speak up. When it’s her turn to pay, say so, and don’t keep picking up the budgetary slack until she kicks in her share.
5) The over-planning travel partner.
The over-planner schedules every day down to the minute. He or she will spend the entire trip running from place to place, trying to see as much as possible. If that’s your style too, there’s no problem. But if you prefer to slow down and see less in favor of experiencing more, you’re going to have a conflict when your friend tries to drag you along on his mad-dash through the city.
How to deal: This is another time when going your separate ways for a few days or hours can save the relationship. Offer to spend one day rushing through the sites with your friend and then spend the next slowly wandering through the village or relaxing on the beach. Or divide up your days – mornings sightseeing with your friend, and afternoons on your own.
Photo Credit: Dave Schumaker via Flickr
Kayaking is a great way to explore a place. The skinny craft is multi-faceted: It goes through churning whitewater, along lake and estuary coastlines, and can even catch a wave. But when you’re traveling, how do know which operators are truly professional and which you should avoid?
Prices for kayak rentals and short, guided trips can be affordable for vagabonders, depending on the location. Popular tourist destinations may be more expensive, but overall rental prices are much cheaper than multi-day guided excursions. While kayak magazines, such as Canoe & Kayak and Sea Kayaker, are more likely to have articles about major expeditions, some of the outfitters mentioned may also provide rentals on a shorter term.
The best outfitters will have gear for people of all ages and sizes. Start by asking what they provide and how much they charge. Ask to look at their gear, and make sure that things look well cared for and are in good condition. You don’t need to be a professional to know. Broken rudders, banged-up paddles and frayed life jackets may be a clue that they don’t care very much about their gear. That translates to not caring much about their customers.
Doug Connor, co-owner of the Half Moon Bay Kayak Company and former member of the USA Canoe/Kayak team, has advice for kayak renters at home and abroad: “If you’re interested in renting, responsible outfitters will ask you a little about your experience so they can recommend an activity or area that matches your skill level. Good guides know destinations extremely well and can give advice with different skill levels in mind. They’ll also tell you what to stay away from—whether it’s a too-big surf break, shipping lanes, or other navigational hazards. They’ll be interested in your safety as well as the safety of their gear.”
When you first contact an outfitter, whether it’s by phone, email, or just walking up to a shop, keep some common-sense things in mind:
• If you’re calling, do they have a phone message?
• Do they return calls or emails relatively quickly?
• Do they seem to know anything about kayaking or how to operate their gear?
• Do they have a professional attitude, and are they willing to talk with you about what you’d like to use the kayak for?
• Do they seem to know their area, or are they just willing to quickly exchange money for gear and have you go on your way?
• How long have they been in business?
If you’re planning more in advance, and looking for potential outfitters before you embark on your trip, check with your local kayak outfitter. Have they been where you are going or do they have any contacts there? If you’ve already done some of your research and know what’s available, see what the local outfitter thinks. Can they tell you more about the boats a shop owner says he has, or whether particular information seems odd to them? While professional kayakers have plenty to do to keep their businesses running, they’re always happy to talk with interested people and give advice.
Ultimately, the best advice is to use common sense and be cautious. Remember, water is not our native habitat. Have you had good kayaking experiences on your travels? Please share them with us in the comments section.
As a child, you often rode a bus that crossed a bridge over a river. You would look out the window at the river meandering toward its source in the mountains, and you would wonder. You grew up, went to college, found work on another continent and forgot about the river — for a while.
You put the work on hold and returned to your home, once again riding your childhood bus across the bridge. Now’s the time, you thought. A few days later you returned to the river, found a trail, and began to walk upstream, into the unknown.
This is the true and recent story of Vagablogging commenter and grown-up child Shalabh. The river is the Sutlej, and the bridge is in the tiny town of Slapper on the Chandigarh-Manali highway in Himachal Pradesh, India. Here you can read his raw and inspiring account of the improvised trek.
Shalabh started by knowing only that he would follow the river, and that the river led to the Indo-Tibet border at Shipki La. Expecting desolation, Shalabh’s curiosity drew him into the Kinnaur and Spiti valleys — two of the world’s most magnificent trekking regions.
“People had talked about the remoteness of these places, their inaccessibility and the dangerous road over the Sutlej gorge,” he says. “I had pictured a world where one would get nothing to eat, a narrow, winding, unpaved road would lead to a village, some hovels would form a village, which would double up as district headquarters. How wrong I was! If you are reading this diary, I advise you to at least try once what you have feared a lot since childhood.”
Shalabh’s trip often runs counter to standard trekking procedure, challenging beliefs and behaviors many of us might no longer question. Here are a few examples:
Maps aren’t essential – as long as you’re informed enough to know you won’t be entering areas where maps are essential. By sticking to the banks of the river and not getting close to the Indo-Tibet border, Shalabh got by without a map or guidebook. As he explained via email: “I just consulted a political map for 10 minutes before starting and noted down some place names. I figured more and more as I went along.”
Camino de Santiago in spring without a map? No problem. New York’s Adirondack Park in winter without a map? Bad idea. Still, I think a map is always handy, especially if there’s a volatile border in the neighborhood.
Go however you want. Shalabh’s trek combined walking and buses, reminding us that no matter how much we’ve planned to walk, there’s no penalty for hopping on a bus. Especially when it’s winter in the Himalayas and you forgot to fill your water bottle.
Go whenever you want. Speaking of winter, places don’t disappear in the off-season (although you might wake up and find a centimeter of ice on your window pane).
You don’t have to make a loop. Even if Shalabh had planned to take the high-altitude crossing from Kaza to Manali prior to starting, it’s blocked by snow in the winter. He ended up backtracking with a non-stop 32-hour bus ride.
Backtracking on a trek is often seen as undesirable, but it can bring an out-and-back element of pilgrimage to a journey. Shalabh’s account suggests that the ride home was a standalone adventure, and he only hints at subzero temperatures, landslide crossings, and slow-bus camaraderie.
There’s more, of course, but you’ll have to read the story.
What rivers have you been wondering about? When will you discover where they lead? (See Scott’s post from yesterday for more on this theme…)
Relevant Reading: Climbing-high.com — “The most informative resource for all high altitude pursuits.”
Photo “Spiti Valley All in White” by Shalabh.
When one vagabonds alone, there is a sense of ease, of freedom. There is no one to answer to but yourself. Want to stop for half an hour to take pictures? Want to climb that mountain? Want to hit that bar? Want to jump off that waterfall? No problem! One just has to know what they want to do and take action.
A number of vagabonders travel with their partners or families. This opens up new levels of experiencing a place. More than one set of eyes can navigate better or see additional details in the surroundings. Traveling in pairs can be safer, and it’s harder to be taken advantage of. Not to mention that being able to share in the beauty of a place can be something special in and of itself, bringing you closer to your partner and providing rich memories that last a lifetime.
From Flickr, courtesy of yourdon
However, as soon as it’s not just you out in the world alone, interpersonal conflict is bound to occur. You want to stop and take pictures, but your partner is bored. You want to climb that mountain, but your partner is tired. Maybe they are dehydrated, underfed, underslept, homesick, not feeling well, or just plain cranky. Maybe they are just having a bad day. How you choose to deal with the situation can make the difference between something that is gotten over quickly and laughed at later over dinner, and something that lingers, builds resentment, and sets a gloom over the trip that can last for days or weeks afterward.
Of course, there are no set of rules that work for every person, couple, or family. Everyone’s needs are different. Some prefer to talk things out, others prefer to be left alone. Some need to vent their frustration and get it out of their system, and others need to be calmed down.
That said, here are a few tips that make common sense to consider in any conflict;
From Flickr, courtesy of tinkerrrbell
Following these simple tips can help anyone get through a bad situation with their traveling partners, and minimize the time spent being angry or upset with each other. Especially when vagabonding, spending weeks or months abroad in challenging circumstances, maintaining solidarity is key. While traveling alone avoids these issues, the value in sharing the world together easily outweigh such interpersonal difficulties. I know that my wife and I tend to have a bad couple of hours every week or two spent abroad, but our relationship is that much stronger for both exploring the world and weathering the storms of discomfort together.
