I am Ready to Become Part of the Emerging Trend of Women Vacationing Without Their Loved Ones – and Traveling Solo

A few weeks back, I received an message about a media tour I would never countenance. It was long haul and it was about health, so it would have entailed a lot of exercise and early nights. Although I enjoyed those things, I wouldn't have been desperate to spend a week with other people who enjoyed them. But even as I was hitting delete, I started to think what that would really be like: being somewhere different, without anyone to accommodate except myself, without anything to do except exactly what I wanted. Clearly, it would be incredible. So I said “yes” and it turned out they meant the different Zoe Williams, the one who is a physician and used to be a TV Gladiator, and is incredibly fit already, and yes, in hindsight, that should have been clear all along.

So, without meaning to and without going anywhere, I've entered the most rapidly expanding travel group: the female solo traveller, between 45 to 60. One travel company reported that nearly half (46%) of their reservations are now people travelling alone, and 70% of those are women. They have households, they have busy social lives, they have partners, their world is absolutely lousy with people they could go on holiday with – and that’s why they (we) need a holiday on their own.

The more daring the travel, the more people are undertaking it alone. People are very interested in trekking, biking, paddling, all the things that couples are least likely to be in agreement on in their interest. If anyone is also tired of dragging teenagers to the wonders of the world, just to watch them be on their phones and answer questions such as “how much longer do we have to be here?”, they are too discreet to mention it.

The real mystery is why it’s taken so long to reach this point. My father's wife, who is completely modern in every way, would get arrested before she’d go into a Belgian restaurant on her own, and even though I mock her for this constantly, I must have had a vestige of it myself, to be this old before it even came to mind to travel solo. Now I just have to go somewhere.