Lessons From Over 50 Years of Solo Travel: Facing Fear Head-On

Featured image: Facing fear in travel head-on means learning from our mishaps | Photo by Meniphoto on Envato

Travel mishaps that made me stronger

by Leyla Alyanak

Roberto slammed on the brakes, and my head hit the windshield. I didn’t even have time to brace.

“We’ve seen that tree before,” he mumbled. “Three times.”

We were lost, stranded in a Mozambican minefield.

It felt unnervingly empty. No skulls or red tape, just a patch of scrub in the middle of what used to be a glorious national park before three decades of civil war.

So somewhere between throwing up and nursing the bump on my forehead, I discovered fear’s peculiar gift: unlike panic, which scatters every thought, fear sharpens the mind, or maybe it just makes you notice details you’d usually ignore.

As I retraced my steps mentally, that moment taught me a key travel lesson: fear is often not only about danger but about the feeling of losing control, and paying attention early can mean preventing small mistakes from becoming disasters. Once we were lost, attention became the only thing we had left – stopping and orienting ourselves so we didn’t compound the mistake by rushing blindly on.

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Over 50 years of solo travel, often as a foreign correspondent in distant corners of the world, fear and I have become not friends, but perhaps companions. Terror is a great equalizer, whether you’re afraid of a flight or are running for your life.

If every street looks the same

Zanzibar’s Stone Town is built like a maze – narrow alleyways twisting back on themselves in identical patterns. I’d wandered out from my hotel that morning full of confidence, but by lunchtime I was completely lost. Every person I stopped spoke only Swahili, and I had no phrasebook (translation apps were still in the future).

Then I remembered I’d grabbed a business card from the hotel desk. I pulled it from my pocket and showed it to the next person I passed. He nodded, smiled, and gestured for me to follow. Five minutes later, I was back at my hotel, which had been just around the corner the entire time.

The lesson wasn’t dramatic, but it stuck: small preparations — a business card or a photo of your hotel entrance on your phone — can turn a frightening situation into a minor inconvenience. Now I always take that card and photograph the street sign intersection nearest my hotel, so I’m not relying on memory when I need to find my way back.

If you’re too confident for your own good

Barcelona. After decades of solo travel, I thought I had it figured out. I’d navigated war zones, survived minefields, and handled countless difficult situations. A day of sightseeing in a European city? Easy.

I wore my daypack on my back – money, passport, cards, everything important tucked inside. I’d done it without thinking a thousand times before.

When I stopped at a pastry shop for a coffee, I reached back for my wallet. The pack was unzipped. Everything was gone.

The sick feeling in my stomach wasn’t just about the loss, it was more about my own stupidity. I knew better. I’d gotten complacent, convinced my experience made me immune to the most common tourist mistake. Instead, I spent the next several days navigating bureaucracy for an emergency passport and cancelling my cards, kicking myself all the while.

The lesson was humbling: it doesn’t matter how many years you’ve been travelling or how confident you feel, but the moment you stop thinking is the moment you become a target. Now I use a cross-body bag that stays in front of me where I can see it because years of travel won’t protect me if I neglect the most basic precautions.

If you’re sick and help is far away

In a small village in central Uganda, I tripped and gashed my knee badly. I carry a basic first aid kit of disinfectant and bandages, so I did what I could, but I needed proper medical attention. The nearest hospital was hours away.

There was a bus stop across from the post office so I sat down – I couldn’t stand – and waited. When the bus arrived, the driver ignored me completely. He dashed into the post office, picked up some mail and left before I could react.

Several hours later, another bus came. This time I painfully wedged my foot in the door before he could take off and asked why he wasn’t taking me. He pointed to the back of the bus. It was full. I explained I needed to get to a hospital, but he said regulations wouldn’t allow it. Uganda wasn’t the sort of country where problems could be solved by slipping someone a bit of extra cash.

So I begged. The driver took pity and went inside the post office to get permission, which was granted.

What I learned: when you’re injured or ill and alone, your best tool isn’t stoicism, it’s your willingness to ask for help — and keep asking until you get it. Pride is a luxury you can’t afford in an emergency. Carry basic medical supplies and know where the nearest hospital is before you need it, and don’t be afraid to make yourself someone else’s problem when your safety depends on it.

Learning from fear

Each time I encountered fear on my travels, I walked away changed.

When women tell me they’re afraid to travel alone, I understand. Fear is real, and you don’t need a war zone to experience it viscerally — getting hopelessly lost or dealing with an injury far from help will do. But fear can also act as a guide, showing where your limits are and when to push beyond them. Sometimes you’ll need caution, like keeping your belongings where you can see them, but other times you’ll be pushing those boundaries, like getting lost and finding your way back through unfamiliar streets.

Fear isn’t something to be conquered, and a lot of it is just our mind painting worst-case scenarios. Simple tactics like grabbing that hotel business card or overcoming timidity to ask for help can dissipate some of the fear. Once that happens, you’ll be back in the driver’s seat, maybe not forever but at least long enough to get to your next destination.

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