In January of 2018, my friends of 13 years and I discussed our travel plans for the New Year. We agreed to visit Kenya by June. Thankfully, we all have good jobs and this meant we would have our flight, accommodation and Faaji money ready by that June.
We even formed a WhatsApp group to coordinate our travel plans. Hmm, imagine o. You know that interesting greeting you get on the WhatsApp group and you know for sure that someone is about to drop gist. It might be about a guy, a new job, or perhaps they killed someone. I mean, no one knows but you just know something is up. This greeting came through on our travel WhatsApp group chat!
For some reason, I was holding my breath as I saw “friend 1 is typing”. Next thing I saw was: Guys, something just came up. I can’t make our trip in June. This happened with my other friends between April and June. So, last last, I was the only one left on this trip. From a group trip of 6 girls, I had travel alone.
See! This trip was one of the best decisions I made in 2018. This does not mean that I didn’t suffer. But it was so worth it.
So, let me give you the 411 when it comes to solo travelling
I figured out I was on my own in a foreign country, so research was the first thing I did. Then, I drafted all my activities for the trip, the places I wanted to visit and things I needed to buy. After that, I included places I can get ‘peng’ pictures so I can pepper my friends that did me dirty. Lol!
I got a sim card so I could call without issues in case of an emergency and also for data purposes when I’m not in the hotel
When I visited the market, I was cheated. Hmmm. It pained meeee! Well, lesson learnt. Never visit the market without a local from the hotel or having an idea of what you need to buy and sticking to a budget. My accent sold me out. So I ended up buying things x5 the actual cost.
Guess what, I haven’t repeated that mistake!
I hope my experience helps you when you solo travel.