My First (Failed) Attempt at Solo Female Travel

"If you stay in a hostel you will get murdered."

-My mother every time I mentioned staying in a hostel for the past year.

Well mom, I stayed in a hostel and I did not get murdered. I can now check that off my bucket list. Last month, I spent ten days in California. I spent half of my time in the Bay Area in Northern California, and the other half of my time in Orange County in Southern California. I absolutely loved my ten days away from Texas, but not everything turned out exactly how I thought it would. For one thing, this was my first attempt at a solo female travel trip. I did everything myself- bought my own transportation tickets (planes, Lyfts, and the BART in San Francisco), I spent my own money to stay in a hostel, and most importantly, I tried to explore a brand new city (San Francisco) all by myself without planning anything other than the fact that I wanted to go to San Francisco Pride. Needless to say, as someone who suffers from major anxiety in everyday situations, somehow it didn't occur to me that I might be overwhelmed once I actually made it to San Francisco. But alas, I'm getting ahead of myself.

My first day in California was just a travel day. My flight left Dallas around 2 pm and landed in San Francisco around 4 pm. Usually, I would fly out of the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, but for this trip I flew out of Love Field because it was a cheaper flight and it left at a better time. I am not a morning person, so having a flight depart earlier than 11 am is a no from me, plus I read online that you should always try to get to a new city before sunset, so that meant no evening flights either. Leaving in the mid afternoon generally helped my anxiety, as waking up earlier than normal spikes my anxiety, so I got to the airport feeling fairly calm. I got a window seat on my flight (I always choose the window if I can), watched Big Hero 6 and Hidden figures on the plane, and soon I was landing in San Francisco. The first thing I noticed upon arriving in San Francisco was how nice the weather was. If I remember correctly, the high temperatures for the few days I was there was low to mid 70's (in Fahrenheit, about 20C), and being by the Bay equaled a cool breeze as well.

I took the BART from the airport to the closest station to my hostel, then I (stupidly) walked nearly a mile uphill to my hostel and got all checked in. Seeing as my out of shape dumb ass walked nearly a mile from the BART station to my hostel uphill, I was pretty tired, so I just went to my room and got settled in before hanging out in the main dining area in the hostel while drinking peppermint tea and watching The Office. My first day was pretty uneventful, as it was a travel day, but I had done it: I traveled to a brand new city all by myself.

I woke up on my first full day in San Francisco feeling incredibly anxious. I had felt nervous the night before and it took me a while to calm down and sleep, but I just narrowed it down to new city jitters and the fact that my mom had been telling me for months that I would get murdered if I stayed in a hostel. I shook it off, got ready, filled my bottle with water, and decided to explore the city a bit.

Left to right: View from Peter Macchiarini Steps, cute SF buildings once at top of steps, buildings downtown

I left my hostel around 10 am and walked over the the Beat Museum. I was trying to walk to the Coit Tower, since it was only 0.3 miles from my hostel, but I saw cheap books in a bathtub and curiously stepped into the store/museum. I didn't stay too long, but I liked looking at all the books and art, and it calmed me down a bit. After looking around, I made my way back on my journey to the tower. I thought "it's not even half a mile away, I can totally walk there," not thinking about the fact that again, it was completely uphill. I walked up the Peter Macchiarini Steps, which are right next to the hostel, and by the time I made it to the top, I was completely out of breath and feeling nervous/nauseous again, so I sat on a rock and at least had a great view of the city. I ended up getting a Lyft to the tower, but I never actually made it up to the top.

Coit Tower

Once at the tower, I could see the Golden Gate Bridge and Alcatraz from a distance, but I was good with that because I didn't really care to see either up close. Anyways, I was getting ready to go into the tower so I could go up and see everything when I was just overcome with anxiety, so I hid in a shady spot out of the way of everyone and let the fresh eucalyptus scent wash over me as I called my mom crying because it just hit me that I had no idea what the fuck I was doing. I was nervous and alone, halfway across the country from my cat and my family, and I just broke down. When I was reading about travelling solo, I read about people making friends in their hostel and going on fun adventures with them, but I don't think those posts were made by anxious teenagers who have no idea how to make new friends. My hostel bunk mates were two French friends who were traveling together and I didn't want to annoy them with my poor French skills or poor people skills, so I kept to myself. Even when I was relaxing in the main part of the hostel, I stuck to myself and generally tried to stay unnoticed. This led to a very lonely Maddison trying her best to enjoy a brand new city all by herself with not a lot of planning. After I hung up the phone with my mother, still hiding in the shade of the Coit Tower, overlooking the Bay and Alcatraz, I felt like I was in my own prison: my mind. 

As it turns out, my mother has family friends that live outside of San Francisco in San Jose, and my mom said that they would be happy to come get me and let me stay with them for the rest of my trip. In all honesty, I felt ashamed. Ashamed that I had a panic attack, ashamed that now these people knew, but most of all, I was ashamed that I couldn't travel by myself for 24 hours without having a breakdown. I ended up calming myself down enough to stop crying, so I got another Lyft back to my hostel and ended up checking out so that I could stay with the family friends that were on their way to pick me up.

They ended up picking me up around 1 pm, and soon enough I was being driven out of San Francisco. My first attempt at solo travel had failed, but it still gave me a lesson: as much as I love being alone at home and where I'm comfortable, I don't think I'm quite ready to travel the world by myself just yet. I would just like to say right now though, that I'm really glad that they came and picked me up. I was overwhelmed and they were there for me. They've known my mom since they were all kids and they were so welcoming. They made me feel like I was back home with my family, which ended up being exactly what I needed. Even though my time in San Francisco didn't end up exactly how I planned it (aka me living my best and gayest life in the gayest city), I did end up having a good time regardless. I can write another post about the rest of my time in California another time, but this is the story of my first attempt at traveling alone, and it ended about 24 hours after it started, so I thought I'd end this post where my solo travel ended. Let me know if you would read a separate post about the rest of my time in California.

~Maddison