I suppose I wouldn't mind traveling with someone else, if I could find someone who wanted to do their own thing in the same places I wanted to visit, so they wouldn't need babysitting and wouldn't require me to adjust my sightseeing plans for the day. I do miss having someone to eat dinner with and talk about my day. So I guess my ideal traveling companion would be someone who doesn't want to spend any time together except at dinnertime!

I've been accused of being a loner because of traveling solo, but the alternative is not to travel where I want to go, since there's nobody in my life who wants/can afford to go where I do. I prefer to be alone in Paris for my vacation rather than spend it at home with company!

I met a ~75 year old cycling from the UK to Santiago a couple of weeks back. He had his 'phone and a book. He told me when he had read a book he would leave it by a park bench and buy another.

Didn't there used to be a culture of leaving books for strangers to read?

I still leave books behind and I'm a bit miffed if I stay somewhere where there isn't a collection to rummage through.

Almost in your age bracket Peg and I too travel alone.
I have always traveled & when my husband died it didn't stop
me. In fact, just returned from Munich, Danube cruise & Prague.

While I am somewhat geographically-challenged I manage & part of the fun of travel is doing all the R&D beforehand.
And I have definitely learned to travel light.

That's the thing isn't it Rhea? You learn to only take what you can comfortably manage - and that getting lost often leads to interesting discoveries.

I'm looking at you Cathie . Who knows what fascinating things you might find! Not that I'm suggesting you ditch your lovely other half - just that getting lost doesn't matter, provided you have the name of your hotel & enough for a martini, scotch or champers & the taxi fare home in your pocket.

I spent 3/4 of my first trip to Venice lost - but then I never have a strict schedule of things to tick off, so it hardly matters.

What you sat is true bokhara2, I did make sure I had the address of my apartment in my phone and some cash in my pocket. And no, I hope I won't be travelling solo for ages. My DH is a great travelling partner.

Solo travel is cool if all goes well. Being stuck with, for example, a sprained ankle all by myself in a place where I could hardly communicate due to language barriers was not so entertaining. Okay, I'm not the bravest person on the planet and have never been. Compared to you people here, from what I hear about your trips and plans, I am not brave at all. Anyway, my conclusion from that experience is not to travel alone to places/countries where I cannot communicate with people.

No, I do not expect everyone in the world to speak my language. On the contrary, the result of all these thoughts is my plan for this summer: Four weeks in Poland to attend a language class.
Even here in Germany where language skills are generally valued high, this requires some explaining. Why Polish? Eh, why not?

Solo travellers need all the encouragement they can get. She may have also been from an era where the husbands did all the "planning" etc so cant conceive of the notion of going alone. Be the example she needs to see. I hope to be travelling forever( or until funds run out

One of the key components of being a solo traveler is that you don't care what other people think about solo traveling.

"..you don't care what other people think..."

I suspect the pool of solo travelers includes a great variety of people, including those who care what people think. So not sure it's a "key" component. I do think though, that travel itself is something some of us need to do, alone or otherwise, so maybe going alone is simply a measure of one's desire to travel, even when there's no one to go with. Or, maybe a measure of one's desire to spend time alone in general, traveling or not, as in my case.

Get up on the wrong side of the bed, Sandra?

You're assuming facts not here in evidence as to my motivation, for one thing.

Many of my friends are women I know through church. They've raised families and stayed in the neighborhood. Most don't have the resources to travel, and when they do, they go in a tour.

I posted this topic because I've noticed how often acquaintances have this same reaction, though most of them are merely impressed, but not horrified, as Jeanne was. I don't know her well, but she seems to be a very fearful person.

I visited her because my paralyzed neighbor was concerned about her and had requested that ask her why there was a police car at her house earlier in the week. When I asked, she told me that there was a consistent effort to pull some kind of scam on her by telephone, and that the police checked on her occasionally.

She seems pretty negative about life in general and about flying over the ocean in particular. That's undoubtedly one reason why the idea of traveling solo scares her.

Gertie: I have enjoyed your trip reports in the past. I hope you post again after your next trip.

I travel solo to France (a lot) and the reaction I get is how brave I am. I tell them that it really is very easy. Then the next thing some people will say is why don't I take a vacation with my husband. To that I respond that he likes to go to Las Vegas and I don't. I like to go to France and he doesn't.

As an earlier poster stated, when traveling solo, I decide what I want to do, when and how. I love it!

Regarding the comment about leaving books behind, I do that every trip. I have a Nook, but don't travel with it. I take books and have left them at apartments, hotels and even in the airport. I've also left behind guidebooks because I don't feel like lugging them back home.

As I've thought about Jeanne's reaction to my traveling solo, I realized that she's stuck somewhere in the past--maybe the 60's.

She has a computer but doesn't use it, so she doesn't know how easy it is to reserve and buy seats on the planes, find hotels (either in guidebooks or elsewhere) and check them out on TripAdvisor or other sites, rent a car or buy train tickets online.

I remember how pleased I was when guidebooks started listing website information and email addresses. It seems to me that before that Rick Steves had a sample letter in the local language, and that you'd copy that and send it to the hotel.

Do I have that last item right? I know he had a fax sheet one could send, but who had a fax back in 1998?

"It seems to me that before that Rick Steves had a sample letter in the local language, and that you'd copy that and send it to the hotel. "

I thought you were right, so I checked. I have a copy of the second edition of "Europe Through the Back Door", from 1981, and at that time he was recommending that you travel without reservations. His 1998 "France, Belgium and the Netherlands" does have a reservation request to be faxed to hotels, but it's in English, as is the equivalent form in the back of his French phrase book. The only other ETDB I have is from 2007, and it has the same form.

I believe that back in the 90's if you didn't have a fax machine you could send faxes from places like Kinkos, no? But email is definitely preferable.

Maybe extroverts tend to travel more in groups and introverts don't mind going it alone .
Broadly speaking...

I remember traveling without reservations, though I usually did reserve for the first and last day. The earliest Rick Steves I have are Germany, Austria and Switzerland, 1998, and France, Belgium, and the Netherlands 1999.

It was easier to do that back then. It seems to me that people didn't travel to Europe as much as they do now.

Faxing was expensive back in the day. I seem to recall paying something like $10 to fax from Kinkos.

I think it is great and inspiring that so many women DO travel alone.

My first time was just last December- a few days alone in Paris.
I came to this board for guidance,inspiration, and a general calming of my fears.

I just spent a some days alone in Aix last month.

So yes, I have now traveled alone in Europe twice, but the thing is...
I really don't like it.
Which is odd to me, because in my normal day to day life I spend a lot of time alone, and I am a very capable woman.

After this last trip I have come to realize that I just prefer to be with someone else when traveling-no shame, it is just my preference.

It was not about fear, as I felt completely safe in France, and in transit, but more of feeling lonely.

But on the flip side if it means not traveling or traveling alone, I would choose traveling alone-or I might even try a small women's tour group next time if I don't have a compatible travel partner (compatible being the key word).

I was "onto" Rick Steves with his first book "Europe through the Back Door (1980). Back then, you could write Steve with your proposed itinerary, and he sent back an audiocassette with suggestions. I still have his personalized commentary/critique. Who knew the business that he would become? Wonder if my cassette tape is worth anything now!?
BTW, even now, when I tell colleagues or friends that I have rented an apartment (again) to travel solo in Europe, MOST give me a pained grimace and soothingly say, "I'm sorry. Couldn't you find anyone to go with?" I find it amusing! (I am in the 50 and under crowd).

Some people just don't understand woman traveling alone at any age. And some people have the (unjustified) fear of travel in Mexico.

I do both (go alone, and go to Mexico) without issue.

You're an inspiration, Peg.