Want to lose people quickly - try traveling with them? Share your stories! (the good, the bad, and the ugly)

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TopHatFox
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Joined: Thu Oct 17, 2013 10:07 pm
Location: FL; 25

Want to lose people quickly - try traveling with them? Share your stories! (the good, the bad, and the ugly)

Post by TopHatFox »

What are some of your travel stories with people: How long was the trip? Where was it to? What happened? What did you learn? Did anything surprise you? What would you have done differently if you could do it again, if you would? Feel free to share the good, the bad, and the ugly, especially with people you initially thought you'd chime well with over the trip.

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Here's mine:

Do you remember that week to Canada with a person I fell head over heals throughout a month or two? Welllll, on a scale of 1/10, it was actually 11/10 stressful.

To be fair, it was productive in that many "how do we live together and what are our deepest pitfalls as human beings" conversations happened on the daily on top of 8 hours of driving each way, an intense 30 hour outdoor course, and a severe cat allergy (hint: my roommate has a cat) sort of way. These conversations are indeed useful long-term, but oh boy did I just think the trip was going to be hanging out lounging amidst a mountain top view as we sipped chilled coconut water and munched on dark chocolate chunks.

The point being is that you really do not know someone until you've traveled with them non-stop for a while, especially under stressful circumstances. I think this is an even bigger test on the connection than living together, since you're with the person pretty much 24/7.
Last edited by TopHatFox on Mon May 08, 2017 8:58 pm, edited 5 times in total.

TopHatFox
Posts: 2322
Joined: Thu Oct 17, 2013 10:07 pm
Location: FL; 25

Re: Want to lose people quickly - try travelling with them? ~ (the good, the bad, and the ugly)

Post by TopHatFox »

( I may have snagged the title from this, but here's a sample: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/artic ... iday-.html )

distracted_at_work
Posts: 202
Joined: Fri Jan 13, 2017 11:51 am

Re: Want to lose people quickly - try travelling with them? (the good, the bad, and the ugly)

Post by distracted_at_work »

Absolutely correct. That's why I usually travel alone... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Wait until you travel with someone to a less developed continent/country and things really start to go wrong. Haven't experienced it personally (the with someone part) but have witnessed the conflicts between others first hand.

Hope you enjoyed Canada otherwise :D

*Edited after I realized you asked for stories. I remembered a week long road/hiking trip I took last year with a buddy. I think I punched him after the first ~twelve hours of driving due to lack of sleep, stress and, most importantly, mis-hearing something he said that I thought was extremely offensive. We realized the error, made up immediately and had a wicked time for the rest of the week. That buddy is now one of my roommates. Funny how those things go.

James_0011
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Re: Want to lose people quickly - try travelling with them? (the good, the bad, and the ugly)

Post by James_0011 »

What exactly happened? I've traveled with people in the past and it was fine. But, the people Im thinking of I knew for years before the trip.

TopHatFox
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Joined: Thu Oct 17, 2013 10:07 pm
Location: FL; 25

Re: Want to lose people quickly - try travelling with them? (the good, the bad, and the ugly)

Post by TopHatFox »

I think it can be summed up with never having been with one another while stressed and figuring out how to do so on the fly together for 7 days, while stressed.

But anyway, the post is ideally about you all's stories.

McTrex
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Re: Want to lose people quickly - try traveling with them? Share your stories! (the good, the bad, and the ugly)

Post by McTrex »

Ooohh...travel disasters :)

I met this girl online from a country 5000kms away from mine. We mailed and chatted for hours and seemed to have a really good click. Meeting in real life turned out to be quite different.

The first time we met in real life she went on holiday to my country (the Netherlands) and stayed with her best friend who lives here. We met and things went okay-ish. The second time she was on a short business trip to the Netherlands and we got to meet for a couple of hours. The third time...oh boy.

She was in Milan for work and we had agreed that she would stay an extra weekend so we could meet up. I would drive from the Netherlands to Milan on Friday and we would spend a long weekend together, sightseeing in Milan and skiing in nearby Innsbruck (this was in December).

Work at that time was very busy and stressful. On Thursday, the day before I would drive to Italy, my direct colleague went home with burnout. My manager threatened to fire me if I would still go, but I didn't budge. We agreed I would stay at work on Friday and be reachable by phone while away. So Friday evening I got in my car for a long drive. About 400 km in, I realized I forgot my passport... I called my parents to ask if they could meet me halfway and bring my passport. On the way back to meeting them I drove through a snowstorm with cars lying in the ditches next to the road. Then my passenger window started to malfunction and to go up and down out of itself. Luckily the window motor burned out while it was in the closed position.

Anyway, I met my parents, got my passport, turned around again and started driving through the night to arrive in Milan somewhere on Saturday afternoon.

Sunday morning we met up and things started out fine. We did a bit of sightseeing in Milan and then drove to Innsbruck. We were both exhausted and stressed from work and traveling and so I said something wrong and things went downhill from there. It ended up with her crying and not wanting to talk anymore. We still went skiing but for the rest of the time we were just sitting there, staring out the window, not knowing what to say, watching the clock, wishing the whole thing would end. It was horrible. Worst date ever. Oh, and all the while I was on the phone on and off helping colleagues. I spent a whole ski lift ride on the phone...that didn't help either :) Tuesday morning I brought her to the airport and thought "I'll never see her again".

We hardly chatted for over a year. Then, 1,5 year later, we made contact again and she invited me to visit her in the country where she was living and working at that time. Things clicked better this time and we've been married for almost 8 years now with two kids. Life can turn out that way :)

saving-10-years
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Re: Want to lose people quickly - try traveling with them? Share your stories! (the good, the bad, and the ugly)

Post by saving-10-years »

Thanks for the stories. I don't have any about falling out. I find travel an interesting opportunity to meet people who I would never have chosen to spend time with before and have made long term friends this way. My stories of travel with significant others are rather like the ones from @scriptbunny and @McTrex. Memories are made of things like this ...

One trip to Scotland, pillion on a motorcycle and laden with panniers and huge rucksack we had terrible rain (laying out clothing to dry on the car park of a closed supermarket in Ayr is one fond memory), he forgot tent pegs so had to improvise wth rocks when pitching tent for first evening - then found that the flat space in the bracken where we had pitched when rain made visibility poor was actually the path to an ancient monument. Rain stops and suddenly people were walking right by our tent (we were literally in their path) as they did their tourist thing and we kept stum and tried to pretend not to be in there. The rucksack that broke a stap while we were at high speed that same trip was quite a tense moment (he whipped his head around and hissed 'Don't laugh'). Singing 10,000 green bottles to amuse myself while he fished in the rain (no ipods/iphones/tablets in those days and too rainy to draw or read). Maybe @olaz needed more adversity in his travels to give things a bit more bite? I did not marry the motorbiker but we dated for many years, are still (tell it as it is) friends, and I am godmother to his daughter.

Eureka
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Re: Want to lose people quickly - try traveling with them? Share your stories! (the good, the bad, and the ugly)

Post by Eureka »

@McTrex, what a great story teller you are!

Did
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Re: Want to lose people quickly - try traveling with them? Share your stories! (the good, the bad, and the ugly)

Post by Did »

I met a girl, we quit our jobs and took off in a modest van living out of the back as we traveled Australia. 6 months later we were married in Darwin as we traveled through. We were on the road 8 months in the end, living in a tin can.

Loved it.

When we encouraged my brother in law to have a holiday in a van he protested that within a week he and his wife would be tearing each other's eyes out.

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