Can Women Travel And Vacation Alone

My name is Delaina M. Waldron, I am from New York City and a single mother of one. I am not only a freelance writer/Author/filmmaker, I have a full-time city job and I am also a Military Veteran and work part-time in the Army Reserves.

With so much responsibilities, I still find what little time I have to vacation and to experience a somewhat freedom for myself, but I have no one to travel with. My family and friends either did not have time, money or interests in the places I wanted to travel too. So I faced a dilemma where I had no choice but to travel alone.

Like a majority of women everywhere, I was scared to vacation or travel alone.

I had questions about what places I can travel to alone? Were those places women friendly? How long should I vacation? What kind of places would I stay at? What kind of activities I would try alone? How would I feel dining solo? How would it feel experiencing the night life alone?

And the biggest question of all for myself, “how would I look vacationing alone?”

I had numerous questions and hesitations when it came to vacationing alone as a woman, but I still wanted to travel. I had a need to be free and to see what else was out there.

I wanted to experience other cultures, other countries, various outdoor activities and make new friends. I wanted something to look back on and say, “At least I tried,” and “I did that.”

Since no one I knew wanted to or were able to vacation with me, I started the research and I immediately felt unrestricted. I realized that I could go anywhere I wanted and I did not have to compromise on the destination with anyone. So I was free to go anywhere and that was awesome.

I searched practically every affordable website like Groupon, LivingSocial.com, Expedia for travel packages either to exotic places foreign or domestic, all-inclusive packages and adventurous packages.

I tried to figure out exactly what it was I wanted to do and wanted to experience. I mean I am a city girl at heart, but I am also a free spirit and I love the outdoors.

I felt I wanted to be closer to nature and be in a rustic setting. The smell of fresh air and moist trees; the sound of birds chirping or crickets all around, the sun and soft wind in my face or the view of a clear bright blue sky with white fluffy clouds floating by or a deep dark blue sky filled with sparkly stars hovering above me is what I needed.

Based on the article above, I enjoy adventures - I am in the Military, lol.

I then asked myself a very big question…

Do I want to exert myself on my vacation or just relax? Ugh, that was definitely confusing, because I work a lot and need a lot of relaxation in my life, but I also like to have fun.

So – I decided to combine the outdoors with some fun on my vacation, lol.

Through all of the time researching where I wanted to vacation, I still didn’t want to travel alone. I was scared and embarrassed to travel alone.

I mean how would I look to others as I traveled by myself? Would I look vulnerable?

I could picture everyone staring at me wondering what I did wrong to end up traveling alone or them thinking I am a lonely woman traveling by herself, “Oh – that poor thing,” or “Do you see that woman eating by herself? That’s so sad or pathetic."

I wanted to avoid those embarrassing stares or feelings of failure, of not finding that one special person to enjoy those exciting moments with me and I did not know what I would be getting myself into, so instead of asking friends and family to vacation with me, I thought maybe I could find people or groups that wanted to travel and do the same activities I was interested in.

I found websites that actually catered to people looking for travel companions or join a group of travelers like; Meetup.com, adventures-abroad.com, or Globetrooper.com, which were simple sites where people had specific activities or places they were traveling too. All I had to do was find which one, I wanted to join.

On Globetrooper.com, I looked around and found some exotic places I wanted to travel too like Africa, Australia, Europe, Asia, etc., but they had set travel dates that did not match my schedule and some of the prices were not in my price range.

On Adventures-abroad.com, a solo traveler is able to pick their destination and be matched to another solo traveler, that way they can get two for one deals and save money rather then being charged as a solo traveler.

Sometimes solo travelers are charged more for rooms, meals, etc and two for one deals or group discounts is a great way to save.

Meetup.com was a different story. I joined meetup.com in 2009 and they have numerous groups that are specific to whatever interest anyone likes, for instance if you are interested in dancing Salsa, Tap, Hip Hop, etc., you can find numerous meet up groups that meet up just to learn or dance those types of dances.

Well, the same thing for traveling. I found numerous groups that were aimed at traveling stateside or out of country. Groups that met for outdoor activities like Skiing, Snowboarding, Camping, Boating, etc.

I have to say all of the groups on Meetup.com welcome people who are alone and might not have anybody to experience all of those activities with, which was very welcoming.

In 2015, I found a meet up group that had most of the activities I wanted to experience. The leader of that meet up group Chase was actually the owner of an outdoor adventure company called Xcelerated Adventures.

Chase was very friendly and professional. Xcelerated Adventures is also veteran owned and as veterans we clicked very well and it didn’t hurt that I could get a military discount, lol.

I finally chose an outdoor activity that was not only affordable, but it was an activity that could be done in a day and I would be able to go to work the next day if I wanted too. So I chose to go Tandem Hang Gliding for a day in New Hampshire.

Chase took us to Morning Side - A Kitty Hawk Kites Flight Park. It took about four hours from New York City and it would be my first outing alone/solo/single/solitary however you wanted to call it, lol.

Tandem Hang Gliding in my opinion feels like I'm Super Girl or since I'm with a pilot, flying with Super Man :)

One of the best things about vacationing or traveling alone are the people you meet. I do not think I would open up as much to strangers if I were traveling with a companion or friends.

We might have been in our own world enjoying the moments together and occasionally talking and mingling with the other Hang Gliding group members.

I realized when I am alone I tend to be open-minded and welcome talking and learning about the people I meet.

This was just the beginning of my many travels alone or at least until I found that special someone or a travel companion to keep me company, but until then I am pretty much open to the idea of vacationing and traveling alone.

Hang Gliding was just a test run, a sort of dipping my toe in the water. Don’t get me wrong I am still scared, but was also excited to see what happened and happens next…

If you liked this story about whether or not women can travel or vacation alone?

You will like my next story about me traveling to Hawaii – yeah – I know right, awesome lol.