I spent three hours a few days ago comparing solo travel tours on my laptop while Frank sat six feet away in his recliner. The one he's had since before we left Illinois, the one with a spring poking through the armrest like a cry for help. He was watching golf and occasionally glancing over with the expression of a man who has learned, after most of a lifetime together, not to ask questions.
He asked a question.
"Why would you go somewhere alone," he said, not looking up from his putter coverage, "when I'm right here?"
Looked at Frank. Looked at the La-Z-Boy. Looked at my laptop screen, which was showing a small-group tour of the Amalfi Coast with exactly zero recliners in the itinerary.
Booked it.
Solo senior travel is everywhere right now. Every magazine, every website, every woman in my book club who just got back from Portugal and won't stop talking about the custard tarts. But most of what you read is either so vague it's useless or so cheerful it's suspicious. Nobody tells you the parts worth knowing. So I will.
The Tour Companies That Earned My Trust (And My Credit Card)
Lost my luggage on a flight to Dublin in 2017 — wore the same outfit for two and a half days while Aer Lingus figured out which continent my suitcase was on. Locked out of a hotel room in Bruges at midnight because I'd put the key card in my back pocket and sat on it until it demagnetized. So yes, I have opinions about tour companies. Earned them the hard way.
Road Scholar is the one your retired professor friend recommends, and for once, your retired professor friend is right. Not-for-profit, 5,500 tours across 150 countries, and their Solo-Only programs give you a private room without the usual penalty for traveling without a spouse. Prices run $1,800 to $6,600 depending on destination. New for 2026: Albania, North Macedonia, Oman, and a food-focused trip in Alaska I'm pretending I haven't already bookmarked. Everything's included (lodging, meals, expert guides) except your flight, because apparently getting there is your problem.
O.A.T. (Overseas Adventure Travel) is the one I keep hearing about from women at my gym, and the numbers back them up. They've got 26,000 single spaces in 2026, and 92 percent of them carry no single supplement at all, saving you up to $5,000 compared to competitors who think sleeping alone is a luxury. Groups top out at 16 people. Right now they're running $500 off per person on all 2026 departures, plus an extra 10 percent if you pay by check.
Grand Circle Travel offers free single supplements on every land vacation, period. They also run a free roommate matching service, and if they can't find you a match, your single supplement is still free. Solo travelers make up a third of their customers. They're currently advertising up to 40 percent off all 2026 trips, including new 8-to-10-day river cruises I would like someone to buy me for my birthday.
Intrepid Travel runs Women's Expeditions in seven countries: India, Morocco, Nepal, Turkey, and now Peru, Cambodia, and Bhutan for 2026. Led by local female guides. Prices range from $1,249 to $8,525. Their new Cambodia trip starts at $995, which is less than I spent on my last pair of prescription sunglasses (don't judge me). Accommodations, most meals, and transport included. No airfare.
If you want the full breakdown on solo travel specifically for women over 60, I wrote a whole separate piece on that. This one's for everybody.
Where to Go in 2026 (And One Place to Skip)
If you've never traveled alone: Start domestic. Santa Fe. Savannah. Asheville. The Oregon Coast. English-speaking, walkable, excellent food, and nobody's going to make you figure out a bus schedule in a language you don't speak. Not yet.
If you're ready for international but watching the budget: Portugal. Will keep saying Portugal until everyone listens. Lisbon and Porto are 30 to 40 percent cheaper than France or Italy, English is everywhere, and the wine costs less than a movie ticket. Japan is the safest country on earth for solo travelers: astonishing infrastructure, low crime, single rooms are standard. But budget $150 to $250 a day. Actually, that's not quite fair. You can do Japan for less if you stick to hostels and convenience store onigiri, but if you want comfortable hotels and restaurant meals, $150 is the floor. Costa Rica sits in the sweet spot: adventure without chaos.
The 2026 sleepers: Albania and Slovenia are showing up on every "underrated" list for a reason. Lower costs, fewer crowds, and Road Scholar just launched tours to both. Essaouira, Morocco, is the other one. My book club friend Janet went last fall and has mentioned it exactly fourteen times. I'm counting.
What to skip: Anywhere you're choosing because it sounds impressive at a dinner party. If you're picking Machu Picchu because you genuinely want to see it, wonderful. If you're picking it because you want to post a photo, pick somewhere with fewer stairs and better Wi-Fi.
A rental apartment I booked in Lisbon had a washing machine with instructions entirely in Portuguese. I spent twenty minutes guessing which button was "start" and which was "drain." Ended up with very clean, very wet socks and a WhatsApp photo to my daughter captioned "send help." Even great destinations will test you. That's not a warning. That's the fun part.
The Single Supplement Scam
Can we talk about this? The single supplement is a surcharge — 25 to 100 percent on top of the per-person rate — because you had the audacity to use only one pillow.
O.A.T. waives it on 92 percent of their 2026 trips. Grand Circle waives it on all land vacations. Road Scholar includes a private room in their Solo-Only pricing.
Ask before you book. Call the company. Say the words "single supplement" and listen carefully. If they mumble, book somewhere else.
What Nobody Tells You About Eating Dinner Alone at 72
The loneliness question. Everyone wants to ask it but nobody wants to say it out loud, so I will.
Yes. There are lonely moments.
They don't hit when you expect. Not at the museum, not on the walking tour, not at breakfast when you're reading a book and perfectly content. They hit at 6:15 PM in a restaurant in a city where you don't know anyone, when the host says "Just one?" and you hear it as a judgment even though it isn't, and the couple next to you is sharing a bottle of wine and laughing about something, and you are sitting there with your bread basket and your phone and a feeling in your chest that is hard to name.
That's real. Not going to pretend it isn't.
But here's what else is real: by day three, you stop caring. By day five, you request the table by the window because you've realized you like watching the street more than making conversation. By day seven, you have talked to more strangers than you have in six months at home — because solo travelers are approachable in a way that couples are not, and people will sit down next to you and start talking and you will let them, and some of those conversations will be better than anything you'd have had with someone you already know.
Wrote about feeling less alone after retirement once, and the inbox surprised me. Dozens of people saying the same thing: it's not the absence of people, it's the absence of being chosen. Solo travel fixes that in a strange way. You choose yourself. You choose the restaurant. You choose whether to stay out or go back. Every decision is yours, and after decades of consulting, compromising, and accommodating — decades of "what do you want for dinner" and "where should we go this year" and "whatever you think, dear" — the freedom is so startling it takes a minute to recognize it as joy.
When Frank and I were in Barcelona a few years ago, I sat on a bench in Park Güell looking out over the city and realized I hadn't thought about a single obligation in three days. Frank was buying gelato somewhere behind me. I didn't need him to be next to me for the moment to be whole.
But I wonder sometimes what I would have felt sitting at the same table alone. Think I would have been okay. More than okay, actually.
That's worth knowing about yourself.
Seven Mistakes That Will Ruin Your Trip Before You Unpack
- Overpacking. You need three outfits, a Tide pen, and a Travelon anti-theft crossbody bag ($40 to $60). You do not need the fourth pair of shoes. You especially do not need the "just in case" outfit. Just in case of what? A state dinner?
- Assuming Medicare works abroad. It does not. (See next section before you panic.)
- Scheduling six activities in one day. You are not 35. Schedule two things. Nap between them. Cannot stress this enough!
- Arriving after dark. Book flights and trains landing you in a new city before 4 PM. Finding your hotel at 11 PM in an unfamiliar neighborhood is not an adventure. It is a bad time.
- Leaving your phone uncharged. A dead phone means no GPS, no translator, no emergency call. Carry a portable battery pack. They cost $20. This is not optional.
- Wearing expensive jewelry. Leave it home. All of it.
- Not downloading offline maps. Open Google Maps. Search your destination. Tap "Download." Do this on your home Wi-Fi before you leave. My neighbor's teenage grandson showed me how at a barbecue last summer. It took ninety seconds. Before your trip, also check which free apps will actually help you on the road.
Travel Insurance Is Boring and You Need It Anyway
Before Frank's knee replacement in 2021, I thought I understood medical costs. Wrong. And all of it was in Scottsdale, with insurance, in a hospital twelve minutes from our house.
Abroad, without coverage, an air ambulance back to the U.S. runs over $100,000. A hospital stay in Europe can hit $30,000 before you've finished the intake form. Medicare covers none of it.
Here's the fix. Travel insurance for seniors over 60 averages about $40 per day. A 65-year-old pays roughly $174 for a one-week trip to the UK. Top-rated plans for 2026: IMG iTravelInsured Choice ($100K medical, $500K evacuation, no age limit), Tin Leg Gold ($500K medical, best in class), and Seven Corners (highest overall marks from U.S. News). Compare plans at Squaremouth.com. Require at least $250,000 in medical evacuation coverage. Get your checkups done before you go — it's cheaper to prevent a problem than to treat one in a foreign hospital.
So You're Going
Good.
Something will go wrong. You will take the wrong train or eat something questionable or accidentally order four desserts at a restaurant in Lyon because you pointed at the wrong line on the menu (ask me how I know). And you will handle it, because you have been handling things your entire life, and a missed bus in Lisbon is not going to be the thing that breaks you.
Frank will still be in the recliner when you get home. Spring still poking through the armrest. He'll look up and say something like, "How was it?" And you'll try to explain, and the words won't quite work, because some things you have to feel to understand.
Go feel them!
