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Solo travellers
Travelling solo can be a liberating experience, encouraging you to make new friends and giving you control of where you go and what you do.
With changing demographics it is also increasingly common for people to travel on their own. However, particularly for female travellers, travelling on your own brings its own risks and challenges.
Solo travellers may also want to know how to keep their costs down.
- If you would prefer to travel in company there are many ABTA travel companies that offer organised tours aimed at solo travellers.
- Activity holidays in particular guarantee that you will be travelling with like-minded people by the very fact that you have all chosen the same kind of trip and are a great way of meeting people and making new friends.
- You can also avoid the dreaded single supplement by sharing your room with a fellow traveller, though this is usually optional not obligatory.
Why do solo travellers so often have to pay more, what is the justification for single supplements?
Hotels have traditionally provided services on the basis of people travelling in pairs with a limited number of single rooms. Since hotels charge per room, not simply the number of people staying in them, solo travellers will proportionately pay higher prices, though many hotels will offer a discounted rate to solo travellers rather than charging them the full room rate.
Even when single rooms are available they are not generally half the size of a double and also will usually have en-suite facilities, so consequently hotels will not usually charge half the rate they would for a double.
To keep costs down, travel out of the peak summer months as rates are much lower and hotels will be more likely to offer discounts to solo travellers.