Harry Kuril: Tips for adventurous travel

A photograph of the ocean, taken from the deck of a large metal boat. The sun is setting behind an island ridge, and reflecting on a choppy sea. The sky is partially cloudy. In the foreground, the back of a person’s head is visible and they are wearing a colourful beanie hat. On the right of the image, the boat’s deck, railing, and a doorway are all visible. A photo I took from the deck of the MV Tutsumena ferry, part of the Alaska Marine Highway System, an adventurous and inexpensive way to see the Aleutian Islands. I love to travel to hard-to-reach places, independently if possible. I’ve ridden to the Aleutian Islands on the Alaska state ferry, and walked alone across Tajikistan. I’ve received safety and security training for my work in dangerous places, including an earthquake response in war-torn Myanmar. Despite this training, I’ve had a few bad moments, like sharing a horse with a drunken shepherd in Tusheti. All of this experience has made me a wiser traveller, and here I would like to share my travel tips.

This advice will be useful for those who enjoy independent, low-budget travel. If you like outdoors activities in remote areas—the sort of places with no phone signal, and only one weekly minibus passing through—then you will find this helpful. The advice is for travelling, not life abroad.

Money

A photograph of bank notes from different countries, displayed on a wall. Cash is often the only way to pay in remote areas. In most countries, I use a Wise card. I pay by card wherever possible. (If the card machine asks which currency to use, choose the local one.) Card payments are not always possible, and it is always sensible to carry cash in remote areas. (For example, I once had to pay a tow-truck, after driving into a ditch in an area of the US with no phone service.) Travel cards such as Wise allow a relatively small amount of cash to be withdrawn per month (around 200 USD), after which higher fees apply. Therefore, I carry multiple cards from different banks. Free cards which don’t have expensive travel charges include Revolut and (in the UK) Monzo.

In any case, it’s sensible to carry multiple payment methods, because one might stop working or get lost. Try to keep a bit of cash and a backup payment method in a separate safe place in your bag. If you are planning to rent a car, you might need a credit card (not debit card or travel card).

In some regions, card payments are almost never possible. When I hiked the Pamir Trail across Tajikistan, I entered the country with 1,500 USD in cash, which was necessary but not ideal. I bought the cash based on this UK comparison site, and similar sites exist for other countries.

In remote places where cash is used, it can often be difficult to pay with large-denomination bank notes. When you withdraw cash, if possible, choose an awkward amount to withdraw, for example 85, so you will automatically get some smaller bills. Then break the large bills when you get a good opportunity, for example at the supermarket. If I have a wad of cash, I like to hide the larger bills in the middle, to avoid appearing rich.

Health and insurance

A photograph of bandaged feet. You never know when you might need your first-aid kit. After 59 days of happy hiking, I pushed too hard on the final day of the TCT and needed to bandage my feet. I have Forgey’s Wilderness Medicine book on the Kindle App on my phone. I have a small first-aid kit and I check relevant vaccinations. The rabies vaccine is particularly important for hiking in developing countries.

Try to get a sense of the cost of hospitalisation and the quality of the healthcare. If the cost is high, or the healthcare is poor (increasing the chances that repatriation will be required), it’s important to get health insurance, because the bill can be life-changing, and it may be hard to get treatment without it. Some destinations require it. Read the policy carefully to determine any restrictions, such as altitude limits for hiking trips. Also, try to find some real human reviews on the insurance company, to get a sense for any pitfalls. For serious mountaineering trips, I recommend insurance from the British Mountaineering Council or another climbing body.

In my experience, other forms of insurance (covering possessions or trip cancellation) are probably not worth it. Statistically, you should save money over the course of your lifetime, by not paying for them.

In many countries, tap water is not safe to drink. Environmentally-minded travellers might feel unhappy about buying bottled water all the time. You can buy travel water filters. I have heard good things about Water-To-Go brand, but I haven’t tried them myself. Water treatment for hiking is a much bigger topic, not covered here.

Safety

For more dangerous countries, you should be aware of your visible, perceived ‘profile’, and the profile of your travel group. This includes age, gender, race, nationality, dress, and other factors. Unfortunately, somewhere which is safe for one person might be unsafe for another.

Try to appear neat but not wealthy. Hopefully the latter shouldn’t be too difficult if you’re wearing beaten-up hiking gear, but keep valuables out of sight. Have a small bag for your most valuable items, and always keep them on your person.

Try not to appear lost, and don’t travel at night time in risky areas. It’s good to listen to local advice, although I have found that locals—from Ecuador to China—tend to exaggerate the risk of bears and wolves.

Arrival in the country is often the riskiest moment in terms of petty crime and scams, if you are arriving by a standard tourist route. Airport taxi drivers are very often unscrupulous. Plan your arrival in advance, to make sure you have phone service and a reliable way out of the airport (for example, by public transport or hotel-provided taxi). Read forum posts. Look up the exchange rate before arriving! Ride-hailing apps can make the process easier, but they are not immune to scamming. Try to download the apps and set them up before arriving in the country, as it might be hard to receive SMS activation messages once you’ve arrived.

Carry paper and digital copies of your passport and insurance documents.

Telecommunication

A photograph of a biscuit shaped like an old-style cell phone with numbered buttons. It is decorated with coarse sugar and held in a hand. It can sometimes be hard to connect to local phone networks. For example, in Tajikistan, I was only allowed to connect for 30 days, so a lot of the time when I was hiking on the Pamir Trail, my phone was as useful as this biscuit. In many places, it’s best not to use your home SIM card, as you will pay expensive roaming fees. The cheapest option is usually to buy a local physical SIM card. A convenient alternative is to get an eSIM, although these are usually slightly more expensive, and often they aren’t available for as many networks. It’s a good idea to research which networks are best for the country you are visiting; often, it can vary by region within a country, and some providers are better for rural areas.

Older phones don’t support eSIMs. However, there is a workaround: you can buy an eSIM.me physical card to enable eSIMs on your phone. I have found that it works well.

When travelling, I store my home SIM card by sliding it into a keyring label tag. I keep the SIM card extractor tool on the keyring.

Data-only plans might not support SMS messages and calls, which can be a nuisance, particularly when trying to receive verification messages. Some apps allow you to send and receive calls and SMS messages via a data connection. I used to use Skype, but that has been discontinued. I haven’t assessed the other options thoroughly myself, but I have bookmarked this useful article.

Think about any crucial apps for which you might need to receive an SMS code to your regular phone number. Depending on your phone plan, this might not be possible in some countries, so try to set up other forms of authentication. Also, have a plan in the worst-case scenario that you lose your phone. You might need somebody back home to help you with recovery emails. I learnt this the hard way, when my phone got destroyed on a very rainy trek in Ecuador.

Be aware that some countries restrict satellite devices or even GPS devices (despite the fact that modern cell phones may be both).

Languages

I didn’t have to learn Burmese to understand this juice bar menu, but there were other occasions on this trip when it was very helpful to have the offline version of Google Translate. Before you travel, you can download specific languages for apps like Google Translate, so they will work in offline mode. Be aware that some useful features (like voice translation and image translation) don’t usually work without a data connection. If there is a strong language barrier, it can often be easier to communicate via written messages in Google Translate. Different translation apps are can better in different countries; for example, Yandex Translate can be better than Google Translate for languages used in former Soviet countries.

I think that travel is a lot more enjoyable if you know even a little of the local language. In remote areas, it’s unlikely that people will speak an international language. I recommend starting with some basic phrases. Wikivoyage has phrasebooks, usually linked from the country page, for example this one for Burmese. Learning the script can help with reading signs and maps, and will accelerate your wider language learning.

A really useful tool is Anki, which uses spaced repetition of flashcards to make learning more efficient. It’s free on all platforms except iPhone, and can sync between accounts. You can usually find flashcard decks online that cover your learning goals.

For more serious language learning, it’s best to have real conversations, ideally with a teacher. If you can’t move to a country or take an intensive course, I recommend signing up for online lessons. Preply is a good platform for finding teachers. Even one lesson per week will boost your learning, and motivate you to practise more.

It can also be helpful to learn how to type in a foreign language. It will make you quicker at texting. I used Ratatype to learn how to touch-type in Russian, and they support lots of other languages.

Responsible travel

It is a privilege to travel, especially internationally. Many people will never own a passport, and many who do will still face barriers to enter other countries. You should deserve this privilege by travelling responsibly: think about the impact of your actions, and what would happen if everybody acted like you.

Try to set a good example, for example by picking up litter. Be kind, polite, respectful, and understanding. Try to reduce your consumption of resources, as all resources come at a cost to the environment, in terms of land use, mineral extraction, or emissions. Travelling over land, if you have time, can be much more interesting and tends to consume less of resources. ‘Luxury’ is often particularly wasteful, and usually inauthentic. Avoid paying bribes if possible.

In my opinion, it’s foolish to fixate on visiting as many countries as possible. If somebody has 193 friends, they probably don’t know their friends very well...

Miscellaneous tips

I always remove my sunglasses and hat before talking to somebody for the first time, for three reasons: I think it is polite; making eye contact builds a connection; and: in a security context, it shows you have nothing to hide.

If your phone camera is not very good, don’t despair. Part of the strength of expensive phone cameras is their post-processing, which you can do yourself, with an excellent app called Snapseed (on Google Play or the Apple Store).

I have written a journal by hand almost every day since I was 18. I’ve tried various notebook brands, including Moleskine and Leuchtturm1917, and found that my favourite is Bindewerk. In particular, I use the linen (Leinen), 96-sheet 9×14 cm blank notebook. It is the most beautiful and resilient notebook I have used.

Other useful resources

Wikivoyage: An editable travel guide, like Wikipedia. If something is missing, add it! Don’t use the for-profit version, Wikitravel, which is less well maintained.
Government advisories: Many governments maintain travel advice. Here’s an example for Egypt from the UK government. These advisories are most relevant to the citizens of the advising government, especially because of political factors. However, they can still be relevant to all travellers, as a way of gauging risk. They can also affect insurance policies.
Forums: The most up-to-date information can usually be found on forums. For example, Caravanistan is an excellent resource for travel in countries along the ancient Silk Road.
The Man in Seat 61: Information about train travel. The site is most detailed for travel in the UK and Europe, but even at a global level it is amazingly comprehensive and regularly updated.
Tom’s Bike Trip: Comprehensive information on practical aspects of bike travel.

Tips for adventurous travel

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