It’s a midweek morning and I’ve just woken up in a hotel room in Madrid on the first day of a minibreak. The day stretches deliciously ahead: shall I go first to the Prado, or the Reina Sofía museum? Shall I have brunch and a late-afternoon main meal, or tapas here and there? The Gran Via is just up the street; I fancy a wander around the shops, but I’ll probably leave that till later in the day.
The fact is, I can do exactly what I want, when I want, because I’m holidaying alone. Like an increasing number of older women in the UK and across the world (I’m 61), I’ve discovered the huge benefits solo travel has to offer. It helps me to recharge my batteries, it’s empowering and it doesn’t have to be horribly expensive (I generally travel off-season and midweek). It takes me out of my comfort zone in just the right way, allowing me to have the experiences, the food and the fun that I want.
Like many women who travel alone, I have a partner, but his life is a lot less flexible than mine and he doesn’t always want the kinds of breaks I do. Phocuswright, a US market research firm, reports that there was a 46% increase last year in people over 55 travelling without their significant other – and most were women. In the UK, the Association of Travel Agents says solo travel is up from 6% of trips in 2011 to 16% in 2023.
Deborah Ives, who works in international marketing, is not surprised. Fourteen years ago, shortly before her 50th birthday, Ives split from her partner and decided to go on her own to Borneo, a trip they had booked together. “I’d loved planning it and thought: sod this, I’m not going to let it stop me going,” she says. “I remember feeling absolutely petrified as I was about to board my flight at Heathrow. But I had the most amazing time. It gave me a real sense of adventure and freedom. I remember days when I thought: no one knows where I am right now. It felt exhilarating.”
Back home, telling her friends about the trip, she sensed some were keen to try solo travel, but had worries and wanted advice. In response, she set up a Facebook group called Solo in Style. “For a long time, it was me, my sister and a few friends and we’d post something occasionally,” she says. She half expected the group to fold during the pandemic, but they kept it going with virtual journeys. Then, as the world started to reopen, the group’s membership shot up. “We’ve now got 485,000 members, with about 15,000 joining a month,” she says. “About 60% are from North America; most of the rest are from the UK, Australia and New Zealand. There are women in their 50s into their 80s in the group.”
One is Kay Johnson, 58, a nutritionist, who has enjoyed solo travel since she hitchhiked around the UK in her teens. When we speak, she is enjoying the sunshine in a park in Málaga. She got back into solo travel after her dog died in 2020. “I was devastated – it was the end of November and I thought: I need a break,” she says. “I booked to go to Egypt and, from the moment I got off the plane, I found this incredible energy. There’s a kind of excitement you lose as an adult that I’ve regained – I go somewhere and think to myself: I’m on my own and this is a big adventure.”
Alison Henri, 57, lives in Surrey and works in IT. She finds travelling alone easier than with friends. “Go in a group and you’ll always be waiting around for someone, or people can’t decide on what they all want to do. It’s much easier to go alone – I can spend as much time as I want in a museum.”
For me, as for others who do it, solo travel is partly about balance. I have four (now adult) children and a lot of my life revolves around them and their partners: it’s hectic and sometimes a bit chaotic. There are times in Spain or Italy when I’m in a restaurant and I look across and see a parent, or parents, juggling two, three or four young children, waiting for that moment of calm when they can eat their pasta or have their glass of wine. Twenty years ago, that was me; the fact that I can now sit and sip my Campari spritz unencumbered by anyone else feels like a reimbursement. It’s a freedom I didn’t imagine I would ever taste again, which makes it all the more precious.
Netta Weinstein, a professor of psychology and clinical language sciences at the University of Reading, is researching the benefits of solitude, which she believes have been occluded by understandable worries about the dangers of loneliness. In a recent study, she found that there is a big difference between solitude that is imposed and solitude that is chosen. “Having space gives us time to connect with ourselves, and connecting with ourselves benefits our wellbeing,” she says. “But it’s an area we know very little about – most psychological research has looked at how we relate to others.”
The more she examined it, the more Weinstein discovered the rich benefits of time spent alone by choice. “There are patterns in time alone that researchers are only beginning to tap into,” she says. One of the main points seems to be the sense of autonomy that solitude can bring – and solo travel gives plenty of scope for that. “What we found was that, on any given day when people felt autonomous and competent in solitude, they feel better on that day.”
For aficionados like me, Ives, Johnson and Henri, it’s clear that the good aspects of solo travel outweigh the difficulties, but for many who have yet to try it, doubts simmer. One of the things I’m most often asked is how I cope with eating alone. “That can be difficult,” says Ives. “Then you look around the restaurant and see couples who aren’t talking to one another – what’s the difference? And there are good ways of coping: I’d choose a long, lazy lunch over dinner on my own – lunch is definitely easier.”
I concur, although I prefer lunches on holiday anyway, whether alone or with others, because it feels so decadent to linger over a midday meal and that is what holidays are all about. I’m also picky about where I sit. I wouldn’t, for example, take a table on my own in the middle of a crowded restaurant, especially if the other diners were all in couples or groups. I tend to go for a table at the edge of the room; if there isn’t one I like the look of, I move on. When I want a real treat, I go to a restaurant with live music: I’ve had some of my best solo evenings in jazz bars. In Madrid, I headed for a restaurant with live flamenco – it was magical.
For me, eating alone hasn’t been much of an issue in the 15 or so years I’ve been travelling solo, which I put down to my grandmother, who I now realise was my No 1 role model. Widowed in her 50s, Granny sold the family home and was fortunate enough to make enough money that she could move into a hotel. She lived there, and in other hotels, for the next two decades. I spent a lot of my childhood and adolescence with her; it was the 70s and she was stunning in her geometric outfits, high boots and ponchos. The idea that there was anything sad, second best or strange about being like her had no traction in my world: she was the coolest person in the restaurant every time, self‑contained and happy to be in her own space.
A question Ives says often comes up on her Facebook posts is: which places are easiest for solo travel? “Language probably comes into it. I think a lot of people start with a solo holiday in the UK and move on to a trip abroad,” she says. “Sri Lanka is one of my all-time favourite places and Portugal is big now.”
But the No 1 destination, she says, is the country I think I visit alone more than any other: Italy. Florence is probably the easiest city I’ve spent time in alone: it’s made for wandering and people-watching from cafes. Plus, in the busy art galleries, the Uffizi and the Galleria dell’Accademia di Firenze, being alone is a distinct advantage – there is no one to get separated from amid the crowds.
Italian cities are also easy places to strike up a conversation with the people at the next table, who are often British or American, so language isn’t a barrier. I’ve had lovely evenings with people I only met because they were sitting nearby. Never worry about initiating a chat, because it’s always clear whether others want to talk or not. And, of course, starting out alone doesn’t mean you will end up alone: like my daughter, who is now backpacking around South America, I meet people all the time on my travels. Sometimes, my husband joins me for a few days if he can get the time off.
So, what has changed to make solo travel so attractive to women? For many of us, including Henri, it grew from a realisation that we enjoyed travelling alone for work. “I work in IT and was doing a lot of business travel – Paris and US cities – and that gave me a real flavour for it,” she says. “I started tacking holidays on to the beginning and end of work trips and I loved that time.” That is my story, too. Journalism took me to cities in Europe and other parts of the world; I added a few days to explore and realised I enjoyed these holidays as much as any others.
It’s also, I think and hope, about older women now having more autonomy and financial independence than our mothers did. If we have a partner who can’t or won’t come along, we’ll just do it anyway. “I meet far more older women than older men going it alone when I’m on my travels,” says Johnson. Ives agrees: “These days, older women tend to have a bigger disposable income than they had in the past and I think the growth in solo travel is partly because of lockdown. Now that we can do it again, we’re thinking: if not now, when?”
Tips for solo journeys
If you don’t want to arrive at an airport without being met, book a taxi, so that someone is waiting with your name when you get off the plane.
In restaurants, befriend the waiting staff. It’s fun to have someone to chat to, plus they will make sure you are not ignored and give you advice on what to try from the menu.
Accommodation can be expensive if you are alone in a double room, so look for single rooms, which even in more expensive hotels can be good value. Or try a hostel – many have single rooms.
In Italy, especially, try staying in a convent – I’ve stayed in lots in Rome, Florence and Venice. They tend to be central and have plenty of single rooms. If they have a curfew, it’s usually not before 11pm.
Smaller, family-run hotels can be easier than anonymous, corporate places – you are more likely to make friendly connections with the owners and staff.
Have a project, so your trip has a focus: it could be some art you want to see, an ancestor’s grave you want to find, or a trip to a vineyard to try wine you have always enjoyed.
Keep a diary – make voice notes if you don’t like writing – so you can remember what you did and how you felt once you are home.