5 Tips to Finding a Perfect Travel Companion

If you’re not lucky enough to have someone permanent to share your trips with, and you’re not comfortable traveling alone, you’ve most probably faced a problem of finding a travel companion. People by your side can make your trip the time of your life or a complete disaster. Follow our tips to make sure you don’t make an error of judgment during the “casting” process!

Get to Know Them

It’s best if you can convince a close friend to join you. It’s the safest option because you already know what to expect of them and, if you decide to go on a trip together, you are already pretty sure you won’t get on each other’s nerves. But if you’re planning to go with a mere acquaintance or if you’ve found a fellow traveler on the Internet, it’s vital to meet them and get to know them better. Make sure you speak the same language, both literally and metaphorically. It’s nothing worse than to get stuck for a week with a person that doesn’t get your jokes.

Discuss Your Expectations

People have different notions of traveling and often want to do different things. If one of you dreams of chilling out on a beach with a drink, another is eager to visit all museums and operas, and the third hopes to volunteer for the homeless, it’s never gonna work. Draft at least a rough plan of what you’re gonna do and make sure your travel companions are OK with splitting for a while if you want to do different things once or twice.

Talk about Mundane Things

If you’re OK with sleeping in a hostel room with 16 other people, it doesn’t mean your travel companion is. For some a taxi from the airport is a necessary safety measure and some consider it money thrown away. And you don’t want to get all excited about getting a week-long surfing course only to find out that none of your companions can afford it. To put it plainly – discuss your budget! I know you might feel uncomfortable talking about money but believe me when I say it’s better to understand in advance if you’re going chic or student-style.

Compare Your Food and Drinks Preferences

Chances are you will be eating together a lot, so make sure nobody has any strong disagreements in this department. It’s not to say that, for example, a veggie and a burger lover cannot have a pleasant trip together. But the veggie must be OK with his/her travel companion enjoying a steakhouse and the burger lover must not oppose to going to a vegetarian restaurant once in a while. Drinking habits are even more important to match. If your ideal holiday includes barhopping every evening, it may be very dull for your non-drinking friend.

Do a Test-Drive!

It’s ideal if you can go on a short trip together before launching into a longer adventure. You cannot discover everything you might find important from a mere chat. Who knows, maybe your prospective companion drives in a way that you don’t find safe? Or snores? Or whistles annoyingly? People usually don’t tell or even know this about themselves. Therefore, the best way to find out everything is to hit the road with them for a short time. And if you are still excited about going together after this small trip, you’ll most certainly be fine.

Going on a journey together with somebody can make you best friends, and it can equally make you hate each other’s guts. Choose your companions wisely!