What’s The Best Way To Travel If You Don’t Like Crowds Or People?
If you don’t like crowds of people, tourists, or even being that social abroad, some might look at you funny. After all, it turns out that if you hope to explore this world, sooner or later you’ll find people there. We’re pretty much part of the furniture.
Yet it’s understandable why you may not wish to be a social butterfly, even if that’s just this time around. Maybe you hope to travel with a more focused, attentive experience, perhaps for creative experience or after suffering a loss. There are many reasons why you may want to do it alone.
So then the question becomes how do you stay alone, or as an insular unit without cutting off the idea of travel completely? Not every trip has to include an open plan breakfast buffet or tour groups shouting over headsets thankfully, and not every person who likes space is looking to go off-grid forever.
It’s definitely doable, it just means planning the setup a little. You’re still allowed to go places, explore, enjoy good scenery, and feel like the trip was worth taking. It’s just helpful to choose a way of travelling that doesn’t feel like a sensory overload waiting to happen, and we hope the following will help you in that process:
Drive Yourself, Even If It’s Slower
Trains, planes, and packed buses all force us into built-in proximity, and once you’re locked in, there’s not much you can do about it. Driving, on the other hand, gives you that in-between space no one else can take from you, allowing you to stop when you want, stay quiet when you want, and listen to the music you like. It might take longer. But if peace is the goal, the pace stops feeling like a problem and you can organize your travel around comfort and a wider road trip anyway. With that in mind you may be interested to:
Pick The Kind Of Stays That Let You Breathe
Hotels can be hit or miss, as even the quiet ones sometimes have thin walls or communal lounges that pretend to be optional, but aren’t, or there might be a local event you didn’t know about with many attendees taking all the rooms. For this trip the, you may find it more comfortable to think about holiday cabins, self-contained rentals, or better yet, your own small setup at an RV park somewhere off the main roads. That way you’ve achieved your own space and no awkward small talk just because you made eye contact in the hallway. After all, it’s harder to feel boxed in when you know you can leave without a checkout desk asking why.
Avoid The FOMO, Choose The Slow Version
The packed itineraries always look impressive but they never show the part where you’re too worn out to mind or if you want to make a detour that day. Travel doesn’t have to mean seeing everything, but it’s nice to focus on enough to make it feel like time well spent. If you can decide to go slower, stay longer, and skip the must-do lists, you’re more likely to avoid tourist traps and make your way, even if that’s just walking a coast or buying an impromptu daily fishing license and sitting by the local river.
With this advice, we hope you can feel much more confident traveling, even if you don’t like crowds.
