Travelling solo? Seven things you must do first

When I asked her about the safaris she'd taken in Africa, she told me, "Just wait until you get to Nairobi and find one there. It will be so much cheaper."

This seemed utterly terrifying to me. It wasn't my nature. I'm a person who plans things methodically. But I did go and buy a Lonely Planet guidebook to Kenya. And started reading it.

The couple who founded Lonely Planet started their guidebook empire back when they were young backpackers, travelling around Southeast Asia. They ran out of money in Australia, so they stayed there. And soon found that people were constantly asking them how to travel around Asia on your own.

They put together a mimeographed guide and started selling it. Today, that guide has evolved into a global empire with guidebooks of every type and description, all designed for people who want to do it themselves.

I used my first Lonely Planet as a guide when my friend and I went to Oaxaca, Mexico. I'd become obsessed with the colourful, carved figurines the locals make there and wanted to find out more about them.

I'd been on a cruise to Mexico, and partied in Ensenada, Baja. But I'd never been anywhere in a foreign country that wasn't a resort catering to Americans, or escorted by a tour guide.

I was very anxious, indeed, as we got on the plane and flew south.

But we quickly realised that my Lonely Planet provided all the information we needed. It told us how to get a van from the airport into town. How to find a decent hotel. Good inexpensive restaurants. How to hire a taxi to take us to the villages where the carvers worked.

It wasn't nearly as hard as I'd expected. It was so much fun wandering around on our own schedules - not the tour guide's; meeting the carvers personally; selecting the items we wanted to buy. I quickly realised the cab drivers were used to taking people around to the artisan villages. They knew where to go. They even made suggestions to us, which we usually agreed to.

After that trip, buying a Lonely Planet guidebook became one of the rituals for any trip that I proposed to take. Then, I read it cover to cover, to get ideas of where to go and what to do.

Nowadays, you can buy electronic Lonely Planet guides for your iPad and Kindle, cutting down the amount of space they take up in your suitcase. Personally, I'm still old-fashioned and like to have a paper one to mark up.

And the other Lonely Planet guide that's become indispensable to me is the Thorntree Forum. This is an online forum on the Lonely Planet website. It's populated by thousands of obsessed travellers who are available to answer any sort of odd, esoteric question that maybe your guidebook can't.

"Do you know how to buy tickets for the Chepe train online that runs through Copper Canyon?" is one question I asked, when I was planning our big trip last year through this Mexican canyon on the famed railway.

Turned out, you couldn't buy tickets online at all. Now, this is where a package tour definitely comes in handy, because the tour guide has handled all this for you. But I didn't need to fret. I emailed the owner of the little guesthouse at which we planned to stay where we were boarding the train. And he went over and made reservations for us.

Note: Rough Guides are the British equivalent of Lonely Planet.

2. SIGN UP FOR AIRFARE ALERTS

If you're flexible, you can go to websites like Airfarewatchdog.com or FareCompare.com and sign up for airfare alerts to places that interest you. Then, if you get an email alert about a super-cheap fare, grab it instantly before it's gone. I went to Alaska for $160 round-trip and Peru for $242 by snatching those rate deals when they became available.

3. GET AHEAD ON PLANNING

Once you know which country or region you want to visit and you've taken a look at the Lonely Planet guide, then start refining the details. You can do this one of three ways: Get a few guidebooks out of the library and peruse them for interesting things to do; research the region online; visit a travel agent.

When we were in our youth, travel agents worked free based on commissions they received from airlines, hotels and transportation companies. They still do get some commissions, but now they often work on a fee-to-consumer basis. This is OK, because it means they're less likely to steer you somewhere based on how much commission they were going to get from it.

If you want to consult a travel agent, you need to determine if he or she is an expert in the region or type of trip you want. If not, there isn't much point. Keep in mind that he or she is more likely to steer you to the higher-end type lodgings, etc. because that's what most clients want, and that is what pays commissions. If you're like me and you want to stay in modest guesthouses, then you want to do this type of booking yourself.

4. READ ONLINE

Online research is now by far the best way to go. If your computer is slow downloading, you can do this at a public library as well.

Let's say you've decided to go to Thailand, which is a very diverse country that includes big cities, ancient ruins, rainforests, wildlife, gorgeous islands and 4,000 kilometres of coastline. How do you decide where to visit?

I usually start by looking at the official government tourism website and just glancing over the different regions until something speaks to me. Sometimes it can be difficult to tell the difference between the official website and another site that is operated by a commercial company, but look for the government site because it's going to be more inclusive.

Do an online search for 'Thailand and official tourist bureau or agency'. Immediately, the 'Tourism Authority of Thailand' pops up. Bingo. You've got maps, photos and detailed information about virtually every tourist location you could ever want to see, including accommodations, tours, packages, food, festivals and the like. Look for things you'd like to do or learn. My kids learned to dive in the bathtub-warm Andaman Sea on our trip there.

5. SEARCH FOR ACCOMMODATION

Once you know where you want to go, then look for lodging. My favourite site is TripAdvisor.com. However, make sure you are searching for 'hotel reviews'. The site's been revised to make it harder to just find reviews, because it wants you to book a room instead.

Once you find the list of reviews, you'll find everything from 5-star hotels to small family places. Sometimes the top-listed hotels won't be the big, fancy ones, but the ones that guests have found friendly or a good value, or ones that are just very good at convincing their guests to give them good reviews. Look at the preponderance of reviews. Occasionally some complainer will be on there with ridiculous claims. And sometimes the hotels hire shills to write fake reviews for them. I have been using this site to help me decide on my lodgings for over a decade and it has seldom steered me wrong.

I also suggest you look up the city of your choice on Booking.com. That site also has reviews, of actual customers. It's also used by small hotels that can't afford their own big fancy reservation systems.

I have mixed feelings about Hotels.com, Expedia, Travelocity and others. Sometimes they have good deals, sometimes not. And note that if they say a hotel doesn't have rooms available, it doesn't mean the hotel has no rooms left. It just means it doesn't have any rooms left for that site. Always call to check.

Once you've picked a likely hotel, go onto its actual website and read up. If it still looks good, read the cancellation policies and reserve, if you're ready to take the plunge.

You can also find cute little guesthouses, mostly family owned, on websites that specialise in booking hostel rooms around the world. I often use Hostelbookers.com but there are others such as Hostelz.com. Search by location and see what comes up. You can see photos, prices, descriptions and reviews by travellers. I wouldn't book any lodging that had less than 80 per cent approval.

This is where I found, for example, the Hospedaje Turistico Recoleta in an old mansion in Cusco, Peru, where we had our own beautiful suite of rooms including two baths, two bedrooms and a sitting room for less than $40 per night, total. By comparison, the fancier bed-and-breakfasts cost $140-$200 per night. And we enjoyed chatting with the owner, whose family has owned the house for generations.

6. FIND YOUR TRANSPORTATION

How are you going to get around on your trip? Rent a car? Hire a car and driver? Walk? Take a bus or train? This is when Lonely Planet can help you out, quickly giving you an idea of distances between sites and how to navigate them.

Sometimes it's cheaper to hire a car and driver than to rent a car yourself. We had fun taking sleeper trains in Thailand and Egypt. The kids especially loved their bunks. If you love train travel, check out The Man in Seat 61 (Seat61.com) to learn about trains all over the world.

Especially check out any passes that could save you money. Buses in some countries like Mexico are subsidised, making them a good value, but you want to book the first-class lines, which are comfortable motor coaches with curtains and videos.

7. GO, BABY, GO

Get on a plane and head to your destination. Even if all the questions aren't answered, if you're going to a place that attracts tourists you're going to find people to help you. Your hotel can direct you, or often there are entire streets dedicated to tourist needs, ranging from changing money to taking day tours to day trips to unique areas like the Amazon. Make sure you buy travel insurance before you go to cover any emergencies.

I recently read about a study that found people who travelled to foreign countries were less fearful in general and less anxious about terrorism and other ills. I believe that, because you can't help being afraid of the unknown. And, once you've encountered anxiety-producing situations and overcome them, you feel calmer and as if the world is a less scary place.

Have an adventure. Get out of your rut. You'll come back a changed person.

TNS

See also:

Eight reasons why you should take a tour

Ten reasons why you should travel solo