Adventure Tales from Ant in England

Q: Where do you live?
Wow. Where do I live? That is such a good question. I guess my home is in the rolling countryside of Cambridgeshire, England whereas my feet currently scuttle across the tiles of a house in Melbourne, Australia.

Q: Biggest accomplishment you achieved on your own?
The finances to travel. From day one of my full-time employment, I was dripping £250 a month into an account. I overcame several self-sacrifices (lads holidays, latest fashions etc) but seven years later I achieved my dream and hit the highways and sky ways to the east. I've learned so much from my journey so far, including the real value of £250.

Q: What inspired you to travel the world?
At fifteen years old, my mum encouraged my little sister and I to visit some relatives in Ontario, Canada. We spent a month in their care, persuading them that we were allowed to do all sorts of things that we weren't back home. One night in Toronto we got lost while riding a tandem bike in search of Baskin & Robbins. We tumbled off the bike when we slipped in a tramline, I was winked at by prostitutes and hounded by a local basketball gang. We were well and truly lost with. No phone, no address and no map in a big strange city. Somehow, we found our way back and I have never lost that sense of adventure. The following week we were camping by a lake when my second-cousin-once-twin-twice-removed-uncle (that kind of relative) instructed us to hoist the food up off the ground, “in case bears got it”. What more does a teenager need to inspire them into the hidden valleys of the world?

Q: Name the three most memorable places you have seen?
The coastal combs of Norway left a massive impression on me quite a few years ago. I have a vivid imagination, which was fertilised by the possibility of encountering mischievous trolls and their scheming, slender cousins.

Secondly, Mount Everest base camp. Never has a place been so worthy of the journey. I expected to have seen it all before. I presumed my visit would simply fill in the peak's shadows and highlights. There was something about knowing where I was, with just a handful of other people. I was at the top of the ladder, looking up at the attic, while the world as I knew it was barging past each other at the foot of the stairs.

Finally, southern India; specifically the Western Ghats. I crossed these during an arduous journey by motorbike. I was battered, scarred and rattled aboard that finicky machine but nothing will ever replace the feeling of freedom as we swept by Tamil tea pickers, strands of curious villagers. With my girlfriends arms noosed around my waist, we rose from the heat of the foothills, into the crisp hollows of the Ghats fuelled by glasses of chai, smiles and wallah snacks. This was possible the most incredible journey of my lifetime, and I'm aching to equal it.

Q: Best way to approach new people when you are all alone in a foreign place?
With a smile (and a packet of Marlborough)

Q: Favorite foreign dish?
The pizza in Naples is simply amazing, so much so that once I've secured a steady enough cash flow I will fly from anywhere on the planet to the restaurant where I ate five pizzas in three days! I wish I could remember the name of the pizzeria, but it escapes me (or maybe I'm keeping it a ‘momma's secret?') The city might have a reputation for reducing once-sane visitors as feeble wrecks, but rest assured an evening sat amongst the saucy Neapolitans on the hard benches of an Italian pizzeria is an instant remedy. Ok, I can't keep this up, the restaurant is called Trianon da Ciro!

Q: Top three destinations for singles?
Southern Sri Lanka; where the surfers learn a trick or two in the white waters licking at the divine beaches. The Gili Islands off Lombok; where textbook sunsets scribe a dozen daily love notes. Kunming, China; a city lit by western-style nightclubs, where tired travellers cheers with locals and shleers with fellow backpackers. But I would say this, it's where I met my girlfriend.

Q: Best places to stay solo?
Europe per se. There are few places in Europe that you can't rent-a-friend with Heineken. You're rarely more than a day from a solitary escape, and rarely more than half a day from a red wine tinted afternoon. You can congregate in the hostels at night, and trace a sole stroke throughout the day. People exchange friends over beers and exchange beers over stories of their favourite solo jaunts.

Q: Funniest, craziest or worst solo travel story?
I rid myself of all companions in Nepal, partly through compulsion and partly through circumstance. As I squinted at the map I decided it was time to descend into Northern India, all that came between me and another passport stamp was a faint border crossing and a few switches of transport. Several hours later I was begging for help on the platform of Gorakhpur train station. I was drowning in my own sweat while attempting to decipher the ticketing system and board the correct train to take me onward to Lucknow.

I was laughed at. Sneered at. I was pointed at. Stared at. I was almost bribed. And I almost cried. I looked down at my ticket (now buckled in sweat) and tried to find some clarity in my moment. My knuckles were white from gripping the stub, and it's fair to say I was desperate. Then a small red dot appeared on the edge of the ticket. Then another. And another. And two more. My nose was bleeding. Curiously however, I became a little calmer though I still vented my anger at the fat briber-controller, and was rewarded by a young hand on my shoulder urging me to follow. Five hours later I arrived in Lucknow, and instantly made another new friend. A barman.

Q: Travel gadgets/products that are always in your suitcase?
My Canon DSLR. I've learned more about photography during the last year and a half than I have my entire life. There are so many awesome photographers tramping around the world, I think it's a shame that people are persuaded their prize camera is replaceable by a snapshot camera. Let's face it, they take up about the same space as a can of deodorant and a shampoo bottle. I smell, but I can take a decent photo. If you love photography, don't compromise because you probably won't ever be in these places again.

Q: What do you love about solo travel?
I love sitting on a train and catching the eye of the girl sitting up the aisle. That moment I wonder ‘would she do this?' while she thinks ‘why does he do this?' We smile and convince ourselves we'll never truly know. I also love the reaction from the older generation who tell me how great it is, as ‘they never had the chance'. I never want to tell my grandkids ‘I had the chance, but didn't take it'. I love the way my preconceptions of places are hammer by the blacksmith, and forged into something new, something everlasting.

Q: Many people are afraid to travel alone, what words of advice would you give to inspire them do so?
You're never more than a plane ticket away from square one. That's a fact. Solo travelers are a canny kind, and I'd say they're nearly all afraid. They find a hundred friends in the tightest nooks of the world, while failing to find one in the most populated coves and crags. Traveling solo allows the fellow to experience the massive highs and lows of human emotion, while slipping under the skins of cultures far easier than as a duo or triplet. When they are up, they are up and when they are down they are down (and when they are only half way up they are neither up or down). To the majority of Asian's, going solo is a difficult concept to grasp. You become an instant curio, revered and respected while simultaneously feared and judged. To conclude, the moment you lose that fear, is the moment you find yourself traveling with another.