Not sure if a certain someone will make a good travel partner? Don’t make any rash decisions, ask yourself these 10 key questions and make the right choice!

Traveling with the right person is fundamental to the success of your trip.

Making the wrong choice can make you miserable and ruin a, perhaps once in a lifetime opportunity, to see a particular part of the world.

I once got stuck with a moaning minny whose whining reverberated around my ears like a dying wasp.

Luckily the trip was short. But not short enough.

Don’t make the same mistake as me. Ask yourself these 10 key questions before committing to a travel partner and go see the world in peace and harmony!

1.    Have you spent a concentrated amount of time together?

A crucial point. You never really know someone until you’ve spent at least a weekend straight in their company. This is a great test, do it!

You may be surprised what you find out about that person you thought you knew so well.

2.    Are you planning the same trip?

Have you actually sat down and scoped out the details of your trip? If not, you might be talking at cross purposes.

You don’t want to set off on your wild road trip only to find your buddy settling into the nearest yoga retreat.

3.    Do you have the same taste in people?

You’re going to meet a lot of people on your trip so it’ll help if you got similar ideas of who’s good company and who’s not. Think about the people they bring to parties.

Think long and hard.

4.    Is your relationship ‘issue free’?

All the deep-rooted grudges and resentments come out when traveling, that’s just the way it is. Ask yourself if there are any unresolved emotional issues between you and your potential travel partner?

If the answer’s yes then sort them out before you go…. Or go with someone else.

5.    Do you have the same routines?

You’re going to be doing pretty much everything together so your lifestyle’s had better be compatible. If you’re an early bird and they’re a nocturnal beast it just isn’t going to work.

6.    Are they a moaning minny?

Travel can be inconvenient, and frustrating and uncomfortable. A moaning minny WILL ruin your trip. See reverberating dying wasp anecdote above. You have been warned!

7.    Have they ever displayed violent, irrational or psychotic behavior towards you or anyone else?

This is an important one. You may love your friend dearly but if they’re a little bit cuckoo and unstable then I guarantee they’ll have sent you cuckoo too by the end of the trip.

8.    Do you like to do the same things?

Pretty obvious but it’s amazing how many people don’t think this through. Don’t go away with a bookworm if you’re a crazy raver. Figures.

9.    Can they roll with the punches?

The key to successful travel is flexibility. If your buddy can’t be spontaneous, go with the flow and muck in here and there then they will impair your enjoyment of the trip.

10.    Are they a good conversationalist?

Think long flights, train journeys, bus-rides and hikes. It helps if they’ve got something interesting to say.

Do you prefer traveling with a buddy or going solo?? Post up your comments below, we want to hear from you!

If you liked this you might also like: 10 Ways to Avoid Vacation Stress

Feb 25th
Why do I cry? I am all alone on the wrong train. I need to find the train to Goa. There are no tourists. Anywhere. It is just me and the Indians, yet I cry. This is what I wanted, no? Total unfamiliarity. Escapism. Why do I fear the next 40 hours or so where I will have to suffer my own company sans entertainment. The landscape is bleak – miles and miles of fields with no lights punctuated by the occasional zhodpatti – or slum.

My driver today in Agra, as with so many other Indians I have met kept beginning his sentences “In India…” followed by some little anecdote about this land. Little villages are springing up around the train stations. People staring at me everywhere I go. In Delhi they stared less. But here on the train, everyone from Chai Wallahs to ticket inspectors thinks I’m some sort of alien.

Spending extended amounts of time with yourself can be extremely trying. Especially with the knowledge that those around you do not speak your tongue. Will try to sleep before I get off to change for the right train to Goa.

Feb 26th
It is the dead of the night. I am on the right train. Another 36 hours till Goa. I got off last night in a place called Gwalior – middle of nowheresville. Station full of soldiers. Was a bit nervous. The Indians in my booth cheered my up loads. Dr King, San something and other guy and his lovely old wife who spoke no English. I told him I think I’m falling in my love with his wife. He translated for her and she laughed hard and grabbed my hand. There’s lots of head-wagging here (in the North there is no head-wagging). I am getting the hang of it. I slept fitfully fearing my bags which are under lock and chain, but still. Today, I awoke to shrieks which I learnt were from a woman who had her chain stolen while she was sleeping.

I met some more young Indians – Rahul and Vinod – the hopeless romantic who took countless photos of me with his camera phone. I charged my MP3 and when I took it out the charger it continued to charge! They explained in unexceptional tones: “this happens only in India. There is energy in the air, no need for conventional electricity.” I realised maybe I am to have one good day and one bad day in India. Today was a good day. Met Na’eem Sitarmaker who incidentally, makes sitars. Only in India.

Met Raphael from Chile who has a sister Deborah. He is very cool. Met King Banesh – a 20 year old Indian who claims to be King.  Indian humour is quite dry – actually I really like it. They are very deadpan. Vinod is on his way to Puna to see about a girl. Either he will work it out with her or he will have his parents arrange a marriage for him which will mean meeting the girl at their engagement and for the second time at their wedding. But he wants to confess his undying love to the Puna girl who he has been seeing for a few months behind his parents back but has never touched. Raphael and I told him to go for it. India is kind of haunting at night – especially with all these forest fires, caused by “mischief” as explained by Dr King.

Was not alone at all today. I taught Raff Backgammon and all the Indians crowded around to look. Rubbish lines the railway tracks as do rats the size of cats. Everyone throws everything outside – not very environmentally conscious here. Vinod paid for my drink, “In India we are very hospitable. When I come to your country you will do the same for me surely. India has great heart.” And it does. Vinod says everyone is living a Bollywood film story here in India – some are living the bad parts and some are living the happy endings. The Indians I met couldn’t believe I was travelling – and alone at that. “You surely very bold. In India, we busy marrying off children and busy all the time with family.”

March 1st (I think)
Having strange feelings here in Gokarna on Kudli beach. We all went to a jam where I’d been told that there were really talented musicians. But the jam was fully of smoking stoner hippies who really it seemed to me had no feeling to their jamming. How I missed suddenly the jams in my house where one doesn’t have to be “gone” to bond with others – the music bonds not the Indian Hashish.

So I’ll leave. And on my way “home” I went past the loos (the public hole in the ground I should say) and saw that the restaurant that accompanies the guest house had Indians sleeping in it covering every square inch. Everywhere. So I’ve come instead to the beach where I am now as I write this and the waves are lapping and glistening with plankton – the shiny whale food, and millions of stars above are ablaze, reflecting the plankton. India is a place brimming with contradictions. I want to write more but a stray dog followed by a cow have come to greet me….

That’s all for now, must go catch sleeper to Hampi will be a 16 hour ride. The most terrible thing happened. I lost all my pictures – I filled up the memory card of 4GB (About 1000 pics) and they all got erased from the heat. So I took some off someone else’s camera (mine were way better).

Deborah Danan

Photos by Deborah’s friends. (Hopefully she’ll get her camera fixed soon).

India is all the rage. It’s captivating, it’s chaotic and it’s huge. It’s become a top destination for adventurous travelers of all ages keen to take themselves far from their comfort zone and experience some of the most stupendous natural and spiritual sights in the world.

The good news is that we’ll be getting an insight into what it’s really like to travel around India. Alone.

Deborah Danan is a friend and travel writer who’ll be posting regular blogs as she embarks on her fantastic Indian adventure.

We love her stories, the hilarity and absurdity of the situations she finds herself in, and are sure you will too. To find out more about Deborah, visit our guest blogger page and be sure to follow all her latest installments here at the Tripbase Travel Blog.