How can I travel abroad alone?

Excerpted from the self-report of a Zhihu netizen.

One's freedom, social security and difficulty in traveling are my primary considerations, and Japan and Thailand are ideal in this respect. Although some people cheat in the streets of Thailand, it is safe to get familiar with the routine in advance. Because it's my first trip, I chose famous scenic spots and mature routes to minimize the chance of getting lost.

In the very limited preparation time before departure, I intensively supplemented the corresponding contents in the well-known travel guide Lonely Planet, referred to the travel guides on free travel websites such as "Honeycomb" and "Sixteen Fans", installed the highly recommended travel mobile phone application, and made a number of passport information, scenic spots, hotel names and addresses, maps and other materials for insurance.

Even so, when strange travel destinations spread out in my mind, I still have a deep sense of powerlessness about how to arrange my trip as scientifically and effectively as possible to ensure a smooth journey. I didn't have enough preparation time, and I had to finish all the processes efficiently, so I chose to seek outside help. Today, with the vigorous development of domestic tourism, "private ordering" and "pocket escort" are not too strange to some freelancers.

Wang Shiyu, a friend, studied in Japan for many years, and then returned to China to work as a private travel tailor in "Fun Travel". After fully understanding my travel expectations, he helped me make a detailed travel plan, including daily itinerary, mode of transportation, time allocation and so on. For special cultural experience projects such as tea ceremony, he can also give reliable recommendations based on experience. My experience is that when checking the travel plan, it will get twice the result with half the effort if you have friends who have lived in the local area or professional customizers to help you.

"Pocket escort", that is, "personal assistant for outbound travel", was discovered by accident when I booked tickets for various scenic spots and bought a day trip on Taobao. It is called "local escort" because "he" can provide real-time consultation service during the trip (but there is a working time limit of "nine to eight" every day), while "pocket" only communicates with WeChat one-on-one throughout the trip. In the first half of the trip, "He" can help design the trip, handle various projects (from visas to air tickets and hotels, experience projects), and exchange questions and answers through WeChat during the trip. In addition to high-cost offline companionship, "He" also provides the choice of online real-time problem solving. At present, "pocket tour" can provide information services in Japan, Thailand and South Korea with high cost performance, but the scope and flexibility of booking projects are limited.

Through practical experience, Japan's "pocket escort" service is better, while Thailand's service is more general. The former has a strong willingness to help solve problems, faster and more enthusiastic online response, and relatively mature service; If the latter does not take the initiative to ask for help, they will not take the initiative to say hello every day, and answering questions is short and casual. According to the company's customer service, most of the questions answered in the bank are international students with local life experience.

In addition, booking half-day tours, one-day tours and special tours on "Ant Honeycomb" and Taobao will also help improve efficiency. Some of them can be chartered to pick up and drop off the whole journey, which saves the time of finding a car between scenic spots, and the itinerary is relatively compact, accompanied by local Chinese tour guides, but the quality must be screened. When I went to Japan, I also explored it all by myself, and signed up for several local half-day tours or one-day tours in Thailand. However, the recent shipwreck around the beach island has also aroused people's concerns about the safety of similar reserves.

In the famous scenic spots in Thailand, you can see the exhibition boards of "San Mao Tour" (free to listen to the voice explanation of global scenic spots) everywhere. By scanning the QR code on the mobile phone, Chinese voice and graphic navigation of the corresponding scenic spots will appear. This kind of information service is simply the gospel of free travellers. "Fun Travel" has also recently launched a new European game. * * * Set up seven tourist routes, customize the city, the number of days and the number of people leaving the group, and report to the group at any time. All these represent new possibilities for more flexible travel and give free travellers more choices.