Spontaneous Trips: Expectations Vs Reality
Adventure unfolds unpredictably—discover how surprises reshape your travel tales.
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As a travel enthusiast, I’ve always loved to explore new places, try new cuisines, meet interesting (sometimes strange) people, and experience the culture of a new place. While some people choose to party, shop, and invest in a luxurious lifestyle, I like to spend my time and money on traveling. With work pressure and other responsibilities, travel is a great escape that helps me recoup and rejuvenate to handle the added pressure that comes with adulting.
When I was younger, I needed permission to go on a trip with my friends and more importantly, needed to know my entire itinerary for those days. Hence, every hour of every day was planned and followed so that my parents were at ease while I was off on a trip. Recently, I stepped into adult life and the one thing that I was most excited about was traveling without worrying about what my parents would say. I was super excited to just pack a bag and take off on a spontaneous trip with my friends without having to plan everything to the tee.
One Thursday evening, a friend posted a message on one of our Whatsapp groups saying that the next day would be a holiday on account of a strike in our city. The first thing that came to my mind was “Yay, it’s a long weekend” and we realized that it was the perfect opportunity for a weekend getaway. Five of us, including me, quickly packed our bags and met at our friend Andrew’s house and were ready to go on this unplanned adventure.
The Adventure Begins
We got into Andrew’s car and were all set to leave for Coorg which was the only thing that we knew for sure. On the way to Coorg, we started with a fun and exciting vibe listening to music, pulling each other’s legs and laughing. This soon transitioned into fighting for the aux, sharing munchies, and just like in every road trip there was that one person (in our case Jess) whose head was out the window like an excited dog but in reality she was trying to avoid throwing up.
As we grew closer and closer to the destination, the excitement just peaked because we did not know what to expect. While this was the case, it is safe to say that our expectations of an impromptu trip were quite high. We were discussing all the things we would do to make this a memorable trip like build a campfire, barbecue around it and dance until it is morning. We talked about the trek we would go on in the morning and then go explore the beautiful hill station. What none of us realized was how different it was going to turn out to be.
The point of an unexpected trip is to take it as it comes instead of planning everything out. But what do we do when “Travel” has different plans for us? The real adventure began when the first mishap took place— we had stopped for lunch and when we got back to the car, we realized that we had a flat tire. We had to make a huge detour to fix the tire because there was no repair shop close by. After getting this fixed, we continued on the journey. We finally arrived at a homestay and guess what? They did not have any vacancies! We were disappointed but luckily found another place that we were not so happy with, but hey, all’s fair in the name of an adventure.
When Travel Made Plans For Us
Since it was a long and tire-some journey, we were all tire-d and just flat-ened out to sleep that night (geddit?). No campfire, no barbecue. The next day we woke up pumped to explore the Scotland of India, as it is known and we did. Except, since this was a spur-of-the-moment trip, we forgot to carry first aid kits and if anyone of you has been to Coorg, you know where I’m going with this… well yes, leeches! There were so many of them and we were definitely not prepared (I know that was the point, but come on!).
A few of these bloodsuckers feasted on a couple of us and to address your curiosity, yes I was one of the chosen ones. We wrapped up quickly and met a few locals who were kind enough to give us eucalyptus oil to ease the swelling (free pro tip— it helps). By this time, we were done with the adventures and just wanted to get back to our rooms to rest.
That night was quite pleasant compared to everything that had happened until then. We managed to build a campfire that night and spend time around it laughing and giggling while sharing a few drinks. The owner of the homestay served us home-cooked pork which is a Coorg delicacy and some neer dosa. It was delicious and we enjoyed every last bite. The most distinct memory of that night was how beautifully starry the night sky was. As we lay on the grass watching the sky, we admired how dreamy and wonderful it looked. It looked like a blanket of stars and all of us knew that we could never see something so magnificent in the city.
What We Learnt
We fell asleep that night knowing that the trip definitely did not go according to our expectations but the experience of our spontaneous adventure will always remain close to our hearts. I could not have asked for a better ending to the most impulsive trip I have ever been on and what I learned through this is that expecting a certain outcome from traveling is robbing ourselves of what the experience can teach us. A spontaneous trip will never meet our expectations but what makes it special is the memories and lessons we learn from it that planned trips fail to give us.
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