Overcoming Challenges
Because what is travel without a few challenges…
Travel is meant to test you. Consider this a running post of some of the challenges we have encountered and what we did to get past them, learn from them, and move on. This post is for us more than anything but maybe this will help you too at some point.
Missing Your Train [NEW]
Despite the inevitable unpredictability of transit systems we are huge proponents of public transit over any other form of transit.
This is the time I almost lost my faith in public transit.
Spain has this cool system where if you are taking a long-haul train you are entitled to shorter regional transit for 4h before and after your departure/arrival. This is to help you get to the station rather than driving or using cars. We have gotten quite used to it and it’s been nice to not have to spend extra getting to and from the stations.
On our trip to San Sebastián (earlier departure at 8:43am) we left more than an hour before our scheduled departure to use the free regional train to get to the departure station. Despite arriving at the regional station more than an hour before (for what was to be a 22 min train ride) there was no train for more than 30 min (despite the schedule saying there were supposed to be 3) and when the train finally arrived after 8am ( still theoretically leaving enough time for us to ride 22 min to the departure station and arrive for our 8:43 departure), we didn’t pull into the station of our train departure until 8:40…inevitably leading us to miss the train to San Sebastian with no refunds of transfers allowed.
In the grand scheme of things it wasn’t the biggest challenge, we ate the costs, got new tickets, and were only out 90€ and 6 hours of our time. But man this one stung.
What we learned:
It helps to have a balanced partnership. I seethed in rage even before we got off the regional train that took forever but Ryan really came in clutch in this scenario. Within 15 min of our missed train he got us tix on a new train, found a park and plaza area with a ton of restaurant options for us to relax and even made a plan for us to visit the nearby bowling alley when it opened at 12 because in the words of the Big Lebowski, “fuck it dude let’s go bowling”.
San Sebastián was well worth the extra hassle. Both in scenery and accommodations but we also come away with further understanding of the trials of train travel.
A Lost Bag
On our flight from Paris to Porto, Ryan’s pack (with 95% of his clothes) evidently did not make it on the plane (despite us checking the bag at the counter). We were able to immediately know that due to the airtag in the bag that showed us it was still in Paris. You can read more about the full Porto Debacle in forthcoming post but here is what to know about a lost bag.
What we learned:
Some airlines outsource the baggage retrieval to a third party company. This is not a good thing for you trying to get your bag back. Follow their process but ALSO reach out to the airline who has more to gain/lose by making it right. The third party is nothing more than a middle man paid to do a job and don’t have enough skin in the game to be truly helpful. We reached out to the airline on top of the third party company and while we can’t tell if it truly helped, it was a greater peace of mind knowing we were doing all we could.
Mix up your packing configuration + pack spare clothes in your carry on. We absolutely knew the second part but consider this a reminder that it is ALWAYS worth following because you NEVER know when your bag goes missing. As we were in line to check our bags we commented how we had not followed this cardinal rule, and shrugged it off since there was little we could do at the time… From now on, each of us has a set of spare clothes in each other’s bag + we always have a set of essentials in our carry on.
The AirTags were worth it. Being able to keep track of our bag provided at least a superficial peace of mind. We sent screenshots of the location to the airline and were able to check the location and movement (or lack thereof) as the days progressed.
Getting Sick
Some of the basic hygiene practices that we obsessed over during the pandemic have long been forgotten and it shows… The number of times we have seen people cough and sneeze into their hands and/or open air on public transit and in public places has been enough to make anyone sick… Getting sick was an inevitability.
What we learned:
People are gross. We knew this but it has been reaffirmed. Plan accordingly but also plan to be sick.
Pharmacies are wonderful and useful places. We are used to the CVS (and the hell that is Walgreens) back home but in Europe at least, you walk into a pharmacy, tell them what is wrong and right then and there they “prescribe” you something. It was magical, efficient, and did the trick.
Their goal wasn’t just to drug you up either but actually treat your symptoms. I have been so used to taking the [insert medicine brand] Cold & Flu combo medicine all my life which just seems to drug you up and put you to sleep. I was initially taken aback by being prescribed a specific medicine to treat only one symptom… but duh! If it works it works.
You will be hard pressed to find medicinal supplies outside the pharmacy. If you are lucky a grocery store will have an attached pharmacy, but otherwise you will not be able to procure basic medical supplies (even things like Vicks and Tylenol). Make sure you can locate your nearest pharmacy and don’t rely on a grocery store having what you need.