My Worst Travel Moments of 2024 & What You Can Learn From Them

This list of my worst travel moments of 2024 – thankfully – isn’t a long one! Given that I traveled so much in 2024, this is actually the biggest blessing anyone could ask for. However, my year of travel wasn’t without its headaches, stomachaches, panic attacks, and x-rays.

I write so much about how wondrous travel is and can be, but I want to make sure you know travel almost never, ever goes as planned. There are always pitfalls, f*ckups, and surprise illnesses to deal with. So, I’m showing you all the dumb crap that happened to me this year (whether my own fault or not) to help you understand that YOU’RE NOT ALONE. Enjoy, lol.

---

Fair warning – #1 on this list contains graphic photos.

1. Crying over cuy in Peru

My first international trip of 2024 took me on an amazing 15-day premium tour of Peru. Besides hiking to Machu Picchu, exploring colorful Cusco, and searching for exotic animals in the Amazon, one of the seriously “Peru” things I wanted to do was try cuy.

Cuy is a “noble and ancestral” food in Peru. (The paintings of the Last Supper inside Peru’s cathedrals show plates of cuy on the table!) It’s probably the most traditional dish you can try here and you will see it everywhere – in fancy restaurants, street carts, everywhere. Oh, by the way, cuy is guinea pig.

I always preach about trying the local cuisine anywhere you go, regardless of how unusual it is relative to what you’re used to. And yes, I also practice what I preach and I’m always happy to do so!

My cuy experience

The night I tried cuy in Arequipa was… emotional. I was happy to partake of course, but the presentation hit me harder than I expected. They serve it to you fully splayed out – face, fingers, teeth, toes. I was not expecting that and seeing that chubby little face on my plate sent me spinning.

I broke out into hysterical sobbing while everyone else in my group laughed at me and took pictures and videos. (‘Twas not my finest moment, sure, but also maybe don’t make a joke of someone when they’re clearly going through it.)

Eating cuy was challenging but I’m so glad I did it. Our guide and others at the restaurant were very proud of me for trying it since most tourists aren’t brave enough to do so. It meant a lot to them that I tried their most treasured culinary tradition (especially after my initial reaction). For the record, they did ask if I would like them to take it back to the kitchen and cut the head off so I could eat it.

So how did it taste? Well, it’s lightly fried and has the texture/consistency of dark meat poultry. It has a slightly gamey flavor, but also something different I can’t describe. I’m glad I tried it, but I have no desire to ever have it again.

What you can learn from this

First of all, don’t let my weird cuy experience lure you away from trying weird and exotic foods. You should always consider trying to local cuisine wherever you are, especially if it’s a historic and meaningful tradition.

But really what you should take away from this is – be considerate of others, even if what they’re crying over seems silly to you. I can always take a joke, even when I’m the butt of it, but I felt especially bothered by this. I mean, they were literally pointing their phones in my face while I sat there crying. They laughed and posted videos of me on their Facebook pages and screamed about how funny their friends are going to think it was. Umm, thanks?

2. Not being able to brush my teeth in the Amazon

To finish off my Peru trip, I spent three nights in a remote jungle lodge in the Amazon. But, in order to get there, we had to leave our regular luggage locked up somewhere in Puerto Maldonado and only take with us what we would need for the next three nights. (We had to take a small boat down the river to our lodge which couldn’t accommodate all our bags.)

But first, we had to fly to Puerto Maldonado from Cusco. Then, over in the corner of the small airport, we had to quickly switch our luggage over to what we’d be bringing to the Amazon. In all that chaos I managed to leave my toiletry bag behind.

No big deal really – I didn’t need much of it in the Amazon. Deodorant? Pshh. Eye makeup remover? Ha! Olaplex bonding hair oil? Don’t make me laugh. My toothbrush? Oh wait, I actually do need that! HELP!

A very weird 3 days

Again, no big deal, the lodge we were staying at had a small convenience store for stuff like that. Only, someone had just bought the only toothbrush they had. When I asked if they had anymore toothbrushes, the response was, “Nope.” Full stop.

So, with no way to get a toothbrush to the Amazon anytime soon, so it went. That was the first time I’d ever gone three days without brushing my teeth in probably my entire life. Luckily, my friend Amanda had a travel-sized bottle of mouthwash I could ration. I did my best with what I had but man that was an uncomfortable three days. (Especially as an Invisalign wearer.)

3. Malaria pills making me sick

One standard of spending any amount of time in the (mosquito-infested) Amazon rainforest is that you need to take malaria pills. I was really dreading this because of all the horror stories I’d heard about their side effects. Things like hallucinations and terrifying dreams where you can’t distinguish what is real anymore. Yikes.

Multiple doctors assured me though that those are the malaria pills of yore, and that what they prescribe now is much better. And they were right – no weird dreams here (well, weirder than normal of course). But that didn’t mean there weren’t still side effects.

My experience with Atovaquone

With malaria pills, you have to start them a few days before you enter the jungle, and then continue for another 7-10 days after you leave. Thankfully, I didn’t get bit by any mosquitos in the jungle, but by the time I made it back to the US a few days later, I started feeling sick.

I was convinced I’d contracted malaria at some point and kept taking my malaria pills as recommended. (TMI warning) I had diarrhea for a week after leaving the Amazon and it wasn’t until I stopped taking the malaria pills (a few days early) that everything went back to normal. But for someone with pretty high levels of anxiety already, that week was pretty scary, not knowing which terrifying jungle disease I’d picked up in Peru.

What you can learn from this

If you didn’t get bit by any mosquitos, you probably didn’t contract malaria. Malaria pills are no joke and, even though I didn’t experience any of the psychological side effects, there are still always going to be side effects. Just keep in mind – the side effects are still not as bad as contracting malaria. (Or whatever other disease you’re trying to prevent!)

4. Not being able to get gas in Belgium & France

When I visited Belgium and France back in May, I rented a car. My husband and I road tripped all over Belgium for 10 days without issue. The night before I was to take him to the airport in Brussels and continue traveling without him, we found we weren’t able to put gas in the car.

Every gas station in Belgium was declining all of my credit cards. I tried multiple Visas, Mastercard, Amex, and even UBS, a European bank. (Yes, I have many credit cards. Thanks for all the free travel, credit card points!) I couldn’t pay in cash because the gas stations in Belgium don’t have little stores with attendants; they’re just lone pumps.

So naturally, I panicked

Knowing I’d be dropping him off in the morning, that the gas tank was nearly empty, and that I had a solo 6-hour drive to Normandy ahead of me, I spiraled. I mean, full-on panic attack. How was I going to get gas? What if I got stranded in the middle of nowhere? I would surely be murdered. (Yes, this is crazy talk, but these are the things you tell yourself during a panic attack.)

I was up crying all night trying to figure out what I was going to do. My credit card company assured me there had been no declined transactions so there was nothing they could do to help me. I was just stuck.

It occurred to me that the one time during our 10-day Belgium road trip that we did get gas (without issue), we were actually in France. So, a glimmer of hope. Maybe all I had to do was make it to France. But that was still longer than I felt comfortable driving on a nearly empty tank.

How I solved the issue, sort of

I stayed up all night researching gas stations around Brussels to find one that employed an actual human attendant. Fun fact – there are none! But what I did find out is that many of these people-less gas stations do have machines that act like a reverse ATM. You insert cash and it prints out a ticket that you can scan at the pump to pay with. Nonsense? Yes. But still.

In the morning, I literally waited outside the closest ATM so I could be there when it opened at 6am. I took out hundreds of dollars in cash in case I could only get gas that way.

I picked one of the gas stations that was on the way to the airport. Before trying the cash thing, I tried my credit cards again. One by one, the transactions failed. It wasn’t until my husband gave me his work Amex to try and for some reason that one worked. I was able to fill up the gas tank. He gave me his work Amex to keep in case it was the only thing that worked and would just explain those charges later, haha.

What the issue was

Turns out, the issue wasn’t with Belgium because I was unable to get gas in France too. The issue was something weird with the computer system those gas stations use. In many European countries, when you get gas with a credit card, it automatically takes out a “deposit” of sorts of around €120. Then you pump, and you get back the difference.

But the problem is that their system also is set up to require a signature for purchases over €100. But without a human attendant to collect the signature, that system doesn’t work and so the transaction is automatically declined. This isn’t an unknown issue either – I learned all this from a very frustrated gas station employee who completely understood my dilemma.

What the rest of my trip was like

My trip had me driving around Normandy, France and back up to Brussels for the next week or so and I had several gas station issues in that time. But, I was always able to get gas one way or another. Did I get gas way too often just in case? Absolutely.

Most of the time I was able to find gas stations that had little shops attached where I could pay at the counter with my credit card. Each time was a pain in the ass though; you have to pay the huge deposit at the counter, pump your gas, go back in the shop and present your receipt to show how much gas you got, and they refund you the difference in cash. It’s insanity.

At some stations I did have to use the reverse ATM system. One station actually had a shop and an employee but literally would not take credit cards. Thankfully, he was very nice and showed me how to use the cash machine to pay for my gas.

So as you can see, this was an ORDEAL. I have driven all over Europe and have never had trouble getting gas, ever. After this trip I drove around Poland for two weeks. A couple months later, I drove around Germany. NO ISSUES. I really hope this was just a temporary issue, but at least I have a few workarounds in my back pocket now.

What you can learn from this

Honestly, I don’t even know how useful this story is. This seems like such a fluke, but judging by the gas station attendants’ commentaries, maybe it’s not. (I also had some Instagram followers share similar stories!)

I guess just emotionally prepare for this nonsense if you plan on driving around Belgium and/or France in the near future. If you see a station with a shop/attendant, get gas there! Whether you need it or not. Always have a good amount of cash with you in case you need to pay that way. Only get gas during the daylight hours. And really, just keep your tank topped up as much as possible.

But also, keep emergency contact numbers handy just in case. Like roadside assistance in these countries, local police numbers, your hotel, etc. If you want to take it up a notch, maybe even keep a full can of gas in your trunk, no judgment. This was an issue I’d never had before and therefore was fully unprepared for.

You can also take away from this the fact that, even when you’re in your deepest spiral and it feels like there’s no hope, you will make it out. You will survive because you have to. In my case, I had to get to Normandy and I was all on my own. I had to get gas, so I found a way. Hang in there.

5. Rouen panic attack

Speaking of panic attacks… let’s talk about my day in Rouen, France. After my 10 days in Belgium and my week exploring the beaches of Normandy, I decided to end that portion of my trip in Rouen. Rouen is the capital of Normandy and a beautiful, medieval city with a famous cathedral. Harmless, right?

I arrived to Rouen, parked my car in an underground garage, and checked into my hotel in the main square. Then I decided to go for a walk to check out historic Rouen. And that’s where things went south.

But it’s a feeling I can’t quite describe. I guess I’d call it a gut feeling – but something just felt off. Walking around the city alone, I got a strong feeling that I was being watched. I noticed a couple of men at a sidewalk café staring at me. I started noticing that more and more as I moved around the historic center.

Creeped out in Rouen

At one point, I felt like I was being followed. I noticed some of the men who’d been staring at me were on their phones, and got the distinct feeling they were communicating with each other, on opposite sides of the street, like they were working together. There were lone men standing around on the corners I passed, and one appeared as if he’d taken a photo of me.

At one point, I was walking down the sidewalk and felt the presence of two men following close behind me. In a move I hadn’t planned, I immediately spun on my heels and started walking in the opposite direction, towards them. They passed me on either side, close enough that both of them could have brushed up against me.

What was going on? If it wasn’t anything sinister, why were they walking so close behind me? Why did they bread-and-butter me? (Please tell me that phrase makes sense to you.) Were they trying to steal my phone? Was I about to be “taken?” A million thoughts ran through my head. And then I ran towards my hotel.

Even though Rouen is a relatively small city, it was absolutely packed that day. (In honor of the annual Joan of Arc festival, the entire city had been transformed into a giant renaissance festival.) So, I certainly wasn’t alone, but rather, it was uncomfortably crowded. But because it was mostly packed with children and families, the creepy men stood out.

Is this normal in Rouen?

Maybe they were just pickpockets itching for some petty crime, but, as I do, I spiraled. I was certain I was about to be sex-trafficked. I carried only a small purse and my phone, both of which were bound to me with crossbody straps – so certainly it wasn’t that stuff they were after; there were loads of easier targets around.

For better or worse, I am a tiny person, and therefore not entirely difficult to kidnap. Yes, this is something I think about often which is perhaps why I spend so much time in the gym.

I finally stopped gaslighting myself long enough to take off towards my hotel, only to realize I left the code to the door inside my room. And it was an un-staffed hotel. I frantically messaged the owner through Booking.com in a desperate plea to send me the code. She didn’t respond, but was in the lobby to let me in when I got there. Once in, I literally barricaded myself in my room and shut the curtains for the rest of the night and went full spiral.

And this one went deep. I felt absolutely certain I was being stalked and when I finally felt brave enough to peek out of the curtains, I SWEAR TO GOD the two men that had been sitting on the bench outside my hotel all night looked up at me and waved, as if to say, “We see you.” I completely lost it; I had never felt sheer panic like that before.

Trying to pull myself out

This lasted for the rest of the night. I used every bit of psychological trickery on myself that I could think of but nothing seemed to help. At one point, I turned to my go-to calm-down distraction movie (Mrs. Doubtfire, lol) and tried to convince myself that I was safe. Eventually, I started to feel okay, but really it was just because I’d physically exhausted myself.

Having finally stabilized myself, it suddenly occurred to me that that day was the 1-year anniversary of losing my beloved Fratello – my feline sidekick of 18 years. I cried and cried until eventually I fell asleep.

In the morning, I didn’t feel much better but I had to leave in order to drive back to Brussels in time to drop off the car and catch a train to Frankfurt. But, it was still dark out at that hour and I’d parked my car a few blocks away in an unmanned underground parking garage. That thought terrified me, but I hustled like I’d never hustled before. It wasn’t until I was on the highway out of there that I let myself unclench.

What you can learn from this

Yes, I have issues, almost all of which get triggered when I’m traveling alone. And yes, I also have a therapist to deal with such issues. Believe it or not, I’ve made oceans of progress, but there are still some days when I can’t shake them. (FWIW, I think it all goes back to when I was robbed in Italy while traveling alone.)

During this whole ordeal, I not only felt terrified, I felt paranoid, like I was imagining the whole thing. And maybe I was? But my gut tells me I wasn’t. I’ve always preached following your gut, and I will continue to do so. I truly believe it’s our most powerful tool. And that day my gut told me I was in danger. It never hurts to err on the side of caution, but it does hurt to gaslight yourself. Always. Trust. Your. Gut.

6. Almost peeing my pants at Mother Teresa’s house

My next stop after Rouen was a 10-day tour through the Balkans that began in Skopje, North Macedonia. My second day of the tour took me on a day trip to the beautiful Matka Canyon.

We rode boats through the canyon, explored a cave, visited a 14th century church, and enjoyed a couple of beers along the water. What we didn’t do, was use the restroom before getting on our bus back to Skopje.

“It’s just a 20-minute drive,” I said. “I can wait.” Spoiler alert: I COULD NOT WAIT. By the time everyone in our group had (used the restroom and) gotten back on the bus and we had started to pull away, I had to pee. Like, a zero to sixty situation.

A wee lesson in culture norms

On our way out of the canyon, the cops pulled our bus driver over for having parked in an unauthorized zone. He gets out and he and the police officer just hang out… smoking cigarettes together… while I’m on the bus writhing and starting to panic. I asked our tour leader WTF was going on. She explained, “Our driver parked where he shouldn’t have. He got pulled over. They will have a smoke together and all will be forgiven. It is customary.” (Our driver also had smokes with the border patrol when we tried to cross.)

Meanwhile, I’m about to pee my pants. Eventually, we get back on the road and there’s just one obstruction after the other. Twenty minutes quickly turned into an hour. I literally had Google Maps up on my phone so I could count down the kilometers until we were back in Skopje.

At this point, I have fully unbuttoned my pants. I am now praying to the toilet gods to just throw me a bone; I am meditating; and I am almost crying. I have now made peace with the fact that I will pee my pants on this bus.

I’d given up all hope of making it to the bathroom on time and was now plotting out my next moves like which pants I would change into when we get back and how I would wash my pants in the hotel sink. I now fully, 100% understood that I would be peeing my pants in public, as an adult. And I wasn’t even mad about it; I was just longing for that sweet release.

Save me Mother Teresa

That was the longest bus ride of my life. And the most physically painful. I have never “held it” so intensely as I did on that bus. My tour leader knew of my predicament but there was little she could do. She told me that when we get to town, there’s a public restroom beneath Mother Teresa’s house that I could use.

I think now would be a good time to mention that Mother Teresa was born in Skopje and a replica of her house in the center of town is now a large memorial to her and her work.

When the bus finally came to a stop a few blocks away, I jumped out of the bus and ran all the way to Mother Teresa’s house, holding up my unbuttoned pants. I ran down the steps to the subterranean restroom and—of course—there was a sign saying, “Closed for cleaning.”

NO ONE IS THERE CLEANING THE BATHROOM. And yet, the doors were locked. I must’ve looked like a ghost in that moment. Still determined to not pee my pants at Mother Teresa’s house, I climbed back up to ground level and made a beeline for the first toilet I could find.

I entered a bar/restaurant that was busy enough that I don’t think anyone noticed me speedwalking through it to get to the “for customers only” restroom. Not that I even cared. I will buy something. I will buy this entire restaurant!

By the grace of, I’m guessing, Mother Teresa, the restroom was unlocked and unoccupied and I was saved from public humiliation. But I am not exaggerating when I say it was down to the microsecond.

What you can learn from this

Hands down, that was the closest I have ever come to peeing my pants as an adult. But, lesson learned. Seriously, I mean it. If there’s a restroom, I’m using it, and you should too.

Never assume you can “hold it.” Do not play with that kind of fire! If there’s a restroom and you’re about to get in a vehicle, use it. Even if you don’t think you have to go. USE IT. You will never regret using a bathroom if you don’t have to, but you will absolutely regret not using one if you do.

7. Hurting my elbow in Skopje

After a few days in Skopje, this weirdest of European capitals, I was heading down from my 3rd floor hotel room to get on the bus.

This hotel left a lot to be desired and this was actually my second room. (The first smelled so bad of raw sewage I couldn’t make it through the night. “Yeah, that happens.” I was told.) While being led to my new room on the 3rd floor of a different building, the elevator started doing some wonky sh*t and even the receptionist goes, “Yeah, I wouldn’t use that.”

So, on my last day, on my way out, I took the stairs, as I’d been doing the whole time. Only this time, I was carrying about 75 pounds of extra weight–a completely full suitcase, a backpack on my back, a backpack on my front, and a bag full of food and snacks hanging on to one of them. I took about five steps down the slippery, marble, spiral staircase and then just ate it. Really, I don’t even have any memory of the fall. The last thing I remember is finding myself halfway down the staircase on my ass, still clutching all my bags.

My friend who had braved the elevator (a nurse) shouted up to me asking if I was OK because god knows what that must have sounded like. I said Yeah, but didn’t realize how bad I’d fallen until I got settled on the bus.

My poor elbow

My elbow was throbbing. And bleeding. But I was on a bus to a different city for the next couple of hours with no ice in sight. I took some Ibuprofen and just hoped it wasn’t broken. The pictures I took of it later don’t do the damage justice at all. My elbow was HUGE and every color of the rainbow.

Had I been in, say, Germany, I probably would’ve gone to a doctor to get it checked out. But I was now in some super small village somewhere in the Balkans so… no. The swelling eventually went down but the pain never went away. I continued to travel and eventually made it home a month later where I continued to deny that anything was wrong.

Fast forward two more months when I noticed a weird chunk missing out of that elbow that wasn’t missing from my other one. I finally decided to get it x-rayed. The x-rays came back totally normal with no injury whatsoever. A few weeks after that I saw an elbow specialist who looked at the x-rays, felt my elbow, did a bunch of tests, and also concluded that nothing was broken and thus there was nothing to be done.

That accident happened in early May, and it wasn’t until early December that I noticed my elbow not hurting as much. That weird chunk is still missing from my elbow, even though the doctors tell me there’s nothing missing. But at least it doesn’t hurt as much!

What you can learn from this

First of all, let it be known that I have no regrets. After my elevator in Marrakech dropped out from under me and then got stuck between floors, I’ve sworn off most elevators. I never really liked them to begin with anyway. I have no regrets about choosing to take the stairs that day.

What I would change is that I would have told my tour leader what had happened and then gotten some freaking ice for the bus ride. I do think that bringing down the initial swelling would have helped a ton.

The lesson here: don’t be a hero. Even if there’s a group of people waiting for you to leave, no one would fault you for seeking medical help when you’ve suffered an accident. And always purchase travel insurance no matter what!

8. Getting sick in Kotor (& missing out on Croatia)

Throughout my 10-day Balkans tour, people had been getting sick with what presented as food poisoning. When it happened to the first person, we all thought it was something she must’ve eaten. But then it happened to someone else. And then to that person’s roommate. And then to my roommate.

At this point, I knew it was coming for me and that it wasn’t food poisoning but some other gross virus. And then, yup, it hit me, and at one of the most inconvenient times.

Just tryna explore

While exploring Kotor, Montenegro, I felt fine, great even. Doing some shopping, talking to street cats, having a beer, and then some gelato. My friend and I then took a boat tour out to a couple of small islands and a small village.

While on the first island that holds nothing more than a single church, I started feeling nauseous. I chalked it up to dehydration, having not eaten enough that day, and the intense sun we’d been in all day. I bought some water and a protein bar and consumed it all in the shade while my nurse friend never left my side.

It was time to get back on the boat to visit the small village on the mountainside. Immediately after docking I started looking for a place to sit and a place to throw up. There was no good place to do either. I ended up throwing up in the flower bed outside a café. And wow, I felt so much better. “Maybe it was just the ice cream!” I lied to myself.

By the time we’d gotten back to Kotor, I knew more was coming. Once we docked, it was still—I kid you not—a 45-minute walk back to our hotel. The most painful walk ever when you’re on the edge of puking. I just wanted to make it back to my room to puke in peace.

Down for the count

And I almost made it. My friend ran ahead to unlock the door for me as I puked off the ledge next to our hotel. Ohh so close. I thought I was puking into another flower bed but instead it was actually a ledge overlooking the lower floor. So, I puked two stories down; thankfully no one was down there.

I spent the next 24 hours or so in the fetal position in my dark room, getting up every so often to re-wet the towel I kept on my face, throw up some more, and uhh take care of other business as well. It just wouldn’t stop.

The only relief I got was from one of the other people on the tour. It was a kind of anti-nausea medicine reserved for cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy. He said his doctor gave it to him because of his intense motion sickness, and he so kindly shared it with me. I’m always leery of taking medicine not prescribed to me and 99% of the time I would say no, but my roommate was a nurse and she said it was fine so that’s all I needed.

Honestly, that stuff was a god-send. Thanks again, Mother Teresa. That was the only thing that saved me from this funk. I eventually stopped throwing up and felt decent by the time we had to get on the bus again bound for Dubrovnik.

That said, I hadn’t eaten anything in about two days. My amazing tour leader brought me a bag of goodies that she thought would help—mainly, a can of Coke and a box of Plazma, a kind of bland cookie they’re obsessed with in Serbia, where she’s from. By the third day, I had eaten only Plazma.

Croatia didn’t stand a chance

When we arrived in Dubrovnik, the idea of walking the city walls with the city crowds under the hot summer sun made me nauseous just thinking about it. Our whole group left to go explore the city and I stayed in my room, clutching my box of Plazma. That night, I managed to get some French fries down.

The next morning, I had to leave for the airport to head to Poland. I didn’t get to see any of Croatia which was a big reason I booked this tour in the first place. But, I know had I gone on that walk I would’ve puked Plazma all over some tourists.

9. Getting my first speeding ticket in 21 years

This one wasn’t a huge crisis or anything, just a general frustration. I’d gone almost 21 years without a speeding ticket and I was pretty proud of that. Until I got caught by one of France’s many speed cameras.

The ticket—as you’d expect me to say—was total BS. And if I’d gotten it here in the US, I would’ve appealed it without a second thought. But this was a soulless speed camera and I just didn’t want to deal with French authorities. Plus, the charge wasn’t all that much.

The camera was placed at the junction of two major roads and the speed changed drastically at that point. When I came to it, I was concentrating more on merging with speeding traffic and didn’t slow down fast enough and it took my picture. Of course it did, on my last day of driving my rental car around for WEEKS.

My French speeding ticket

Not feeling that fighting this was worth my time, I simply paid the €45 fee online and went about my life. But grrrr.

Honorable mentions

Here are a few more instances that could have been real problems but thankfully weren’t.

10. Getting trapped in a bathroom in Peru

One of my biggest fears is getting trapped in a bathroom stall. (So while many people love the private stalls you’ll find in Europe, I personally prefer the no-privacy-whatsoever, wide open ones we have here in the US.) And I got a little taste of that at a Peruvian rest stop.

During one of our long driving days, we stopped at some random rest stop (and one of the lesser quality ones at that). After using the restroom, I realized my door was stuck. It was unlocked as far as I could tell and I was banging, pushing, and eventually kicking it to try to get it to open. Nothing worked.

Just as I was about to climb up and over the door, my friends walked in, heard me screaming for help, and let me out. The problem? There was a lock ON THE OUTSIDE OF THE STALL. Why? Please explain.

It’s true – all the bathroom stalls at this rest stop have locks on the outside of the stalls that drop shut when you close the door. Is this just some totally ignorant design flaw? Or is this literally where sex trafficking begins? Honestly, I can’t make sense of it.

Thankfully, I wasn’t trapped in there for long but had I been traveling alone things could have gone very differently. Well, maybe not because I was about to either crawl out through the top or bottom or kick that mf’er down. But still.

What you can learn from this

Well, I guess maybe just check that there isn’t a lock on the outside of the stall as well???? Which sounds crazy because I have literally never seen that before. In any case, maybe just keep going to the gym in the event that you need to get yourself out of some scary or awkward situations.  

11. No tray table on my 11-hour flight to Hawaii

Yes, this is probably the most first-world problem of them all, but I feel it’s still annoying enough to warrant mentioning. On my 11-hour flight from Boston to Honolulu in December 2024, my “Extra Comfort” upgraded seat had no tray table, at all. Nothing. In all the flights I’ve ever taken (which is a lot) this has never happened.

Whatever, I wasn’t going to let it bother me. The flight attendant was incredibly apologetic and kept offering me free stuff throughout the entire flight. She checked the logs and there was no mention of a missing tray table, but she felt so bad. Again, I tried to not let it bother me.

But it bothered me. I had nowhere to eat my food, or use my laptop, or lay my head. (Face down on the tray table is how I sleep on planes.) I tried using my husband’s table but I just kept spilling my water on him. All-in-all, it made for a very awkward and frustrating 11 hours.

Again, not the worst thing that could happen – I was still on a flight to Hawaii after all. But combine a frustrating flight with the fact that it was also 11 hours long, it’s pretty mentally and physically draining.

What you can learn from this

All I can say is just expect the unexpected and prepare for things not to go smoothly. I’ve never had this issue before so I would never have thought to prepare for it, but sh*t happens. When traveling the world, you have to be adaptable.

Like this post? Have questions about any of these ordeals? Let me know in the comments below. Best of luck in 2025!

Save this info, pin this image: