9+1 tips and tricks for safe travel
After many years travelling and exploring different destinations around the world, we wanted to share with you our best tips and tricks for safe travel and how you can easily protect yourself and your belongings when you are travelling away from home.
Our safe tips help us in daily situations so we can avoid robberies and problems during our trips. However, we want to clarify that these are prevention tips and we cannot assure you that nothing will happen during your trip.
On the other hand, based on our personal experience, if you follow one or all of the safe tips that we are going to list below, the probability of unfortunate events or robberies decreases incredibly.
Belongings | Copies | Passport | Numbers | Padlocks | Jewelry | Distribute | Money | Safe | Situation | Conclusions
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Before starting with the our safe tips we want to ask you a question:
Is the world a safe place to travel?
And our answer would be, YES, clearly, but…
There are no places safer than others, in fact, not even your own home is 100% safe, and we can tell you that after years of travelling and living in different parts of the world.
There are probably safer places than others, due to their geography or history, and sometimes countries that are impossible to access. For example, due to its position, you could assume that in a small town in Argentina Patagonia you will be safer than in the capital city Buenos Aires, and we can tell you that this is partly true. You will probably have less exposure to unfortunate events since there will be proportionally fewer people trying to rob you. Despite that during our South America trip, the only time we have had the impression of insecurity was exactly in the extreme south of Patagonia and not in Buenos Aires.
We want to clarify that it has only been a particular case and that Patagonia in general is a place that you absolutely have to visit, like the rest of Argentina, but always with the right precaution.
You must also consider that travelling to another place will suddenly take you out of your comfort zone and the places you know, so in general, you could be more vulnerable to this type of incident there.
Let’s be clear that we are not trying to prevent you from travelling, on the contrary, we want you to travel as much as you can, but we want to share our safe tips to avoid bad moments so you can enjoy yourself to the fullest.
For us, travelling is definitely one of the most beautiful things in the world and we encourage you to explore the world like us. We love the constant confrontation with other cultures, because it enriches you and makes you a better person.
If you are one of those people who think that the world is dangerous, we give you some advice, “turn off the television” and social networks and start travelling.
The world is described by the media and news as a place of terror and crime, but it is not like that. The world is a beautiful place with great people, and yes, sometimes with some bumps, even so, it is worth the effort, worth discovering.
These safety tips will help you avoid any unpleasant situations and will allow you to travel more calmly, wherever you go.
General travel safety tips
1. Secure your belongings
This may seem like banal advice to you, however, you don’t know how many times we have seen travellers with their belongings, passports, wallets or mobile phones neglected and within easy reach of even the most clumsy of thieves.
The first piece of advice we give you is to take good care of your belongings, be it in your accommodation or when you move from one place to another. We do not recommend using the back pocket of your pants, simply because it is very easy to steal and most of the time you won’t even notice it.
On the market there are several objects to keep your belongings safer, such as an inside pocket in your pants or money belts that will make your life easier.
2. Make copies of your documents
Before each trip, we always make 2 copies of all documents. Normally, we do not take the passport with us when we go to explore places, we leave it at the accommodation and take a simple copy with us. We leave the other copy in accommodation as a backup, and also because sometimes it is not as easy to print a copy of your documents when you travel.
Another thing that we absolutely recommend doing is having a saved copy of all documents in an online cloud, such as Google Drive or Dropbox, which will turn out to be very useful when you need to show your document or vaccinations.
Whether we go, to the beach or to the mountains, on a day trip or for several months, we always carry this incredible product with us.
The portable water filter is an essential product on our trips, as it is sustainable, useful and super small, a real joy. Click here for more information!
3. Leave your Passport at the accommodation
Previously, we always took our passports everywhere, however, with the accumulated travel experience we changed our habits and nowadays, we keep our passports in the accommodation and we just carry the copy in case someone requests it. When, for example, we move with all our things from one place to another, we carry it with us in a well-secured pocket or in a small backpack that we always have with us.
We will never get tired of saying that the passport is the most important thing you have when you travel and that is how it must be treated.
It is definitely safer to take it with you and have it in a plastic passport case to avoid being broken or damaged.
Grab our Travel Checklist and Let the adventure begin!
4. Prepare a list of all the important numbers
We always prepare a written list of all the most important phone numbers. In this list we have also written the numbers of the banks, national and international, to be able to notify them in case of fraudulent use of our cards or accounts.
In addition to that, we added numbers of some family members, to be able to notify them in case of phone loss or a possible accident.
It is quite funny to see how many people do not remember the phone numbers of loved ones, such as parents or partners, in fact, we are included in this group.
If you travel to very remote destinations, we advise you to even write the numbers to the Embassies or Consulates of each country you go to.
Of course you can also save this list online and always have it with you.
Our Tip: Wise is a great card when you are travelling to a country with a different currency than yours. We use this online bank during our trips and we never had problems, even in remote places around the world.
5. Use and carry locks on your trips
Padlocks are one of the most useful things on your travels. They get you out of trouble and give you more security when leaving your belongings in hostels and other places.
If you go on vacation to upper-middle-range places, most probably you will have a safe at the reception or in your room to leave documents and valuable belongings. If you have a tight budget, you have to know that most of the accommodations that have affordable prices do not have a safe, and for this reason, you need a lock.
In general, in case we do not have a security safe available, we lock our documents and valuable objects with a padlock inside the backpack so that we make it a little bit harder for the possible thief to steal our things.
We also use the padlock when leaving our backpacks at airports for check in, to close lockers in swimming pools and gyms, we use a lock in a shared accommodation or to secure rented motorcycles when the place does not seem very safe.
In general, we advise you to buy good padlocks with TSA locks so in case of control at airports they do not break it and open it quickly. We also recommend padlocks with a personal code, since they are usually more secure than those that go with keys.
6. Leave your pretty watch and jewelry at home
Without a doubt, if you like jewelry and watches, it might not be a good idea to take shining jewelry with you, especially if you plan to visit less developed countries.
It works more or less like this. The more attention you attract to yourself, the more chances you have of being robbed, it is mathematically and statistically proven.
Ideally, you don’t take any valuable watches or jewelry on your travels, remember that your safety and peace of mind is worth much more than showing the world what you have.
7. Divide your cash, cards and documents wisely
We recommend that you do not carry all your cash, credit cards, and documents in one place, do not be careless and think wisely.
If someone steals your backpack where you supposedly carry all your belongings, you are screwed, and you will probably have to end your trip.
Our advice is to distribute your documents, cards, and money in different places.
When we travel we have a large backpack with all our clothes and a small one to transport the things we use daily. In these two backpacks, we divide almost all the most important documents and cards.
In addition, for daily use, we use a travel belt with a hidden pocket, secret pockets in the pants, and a small pack to be able to divide all our belongings.
We also use a small wallet with little cash for daily purchases, in which we always have one or two expired credit cards. In case someone decides to rob us, most likely they will take only the wallet and leave you alone with all your belongings safe.
It is a common fact, that thieves usually want to get away in a hurry with few things and they will not search you from head to toe, so we think that the wallet is a good practice.
In case of robbery, our advice is “DO NOT BE A SUPERHERO”, your life is more important than anything and remember that in many underdeveloped countries the value of human life is little or nothing.
8. Pay when you travel the world
To be able to travel anywhere in the world, for sure you will need money.
There is the option of taking cash with you and changing it upon your arrival in the country. However, this option also leaves you more vulnerable at the time of theft and in case of a long trip it will be impossible to take all money in cash.
The other option, usually safer, is to use credit and debit cards.
Today even in less developed countries you can pay with credit cards, and if not, you will surely have the possibility of withdrawing money at ATMs.
Surely you are wondering:
Are you absolutely sure that paying with a card or withdrawing money abroad is safe?
The answer is easy: NO
You can’t imagine how many people benefit from this business and how easy it is to clone your card. Even if your bank assures you that it has the most advanced security systems, always, and we repeat, there is ALWAYS the possibility that someone may try and keep your money.
But don’t worry, because instead of focusing on the problem, we look for the solution.
Our best tips and tricks:
We advise you to always have some cash, ideally international currency like Euro or USD, to be able to get you out of trouble in case of need.
Another tip is to travel with more than one credit or debit card. We travel with at least one credit card, a debit card from our main account and one or two prepaid cards from online banks.
The first two cards we only use in case of emergency and not for daily use, because they are the most vulnerable with all savings.
For daily use we have prepaid cards from online banks since in case of problems or cloning, they can be blocked with a simple App.
We use two types of prepaid cards that have a very good exchange rate to withdraw money abroad.
We use the Wise account on our trips and we are always super satisfied with this online banking. It turns out to be online banking with an incredibly good exchange rate and low fees, perfect for all the countries we’ve had the pleasure of visiting so far, including Laos.
We also use the Revolut company card which, as Wise, has better commissions than conventional banks when it comes to exchanging money abroad. We recharge the cards with a certain budget each month and then withdraw and spend money in the local currency. In this way we have control of the budget and more security.
9: Travel insurance
There are an infinite number of things that can go wrong when you travel, thefts, accidents and of course also your health.
We do not travel anywhere without travel insurance, it is a basic and essential thing that you should not ignore. We are sure that in case of health problems during your trips it will get you out of trouble and save you a lot of money.
Our travel insurance is True Traveller and we definitely recommend it, because it is a great company, it is super organised and with good policies. It is also one of few travel insurance companies that you can use when you are already travelling, so it is perfect for travellers and digital nomads like us.
How to secure your belongings
Currently there are several ways to have your belongings safe and hidden during your trips.
The secret pocket or the money belt are some of the gadgets we use when we travel.
10: Check the real situation of each country
We always advise you to check the status of a country and its current situation to not have unpleasant surprises upon arrival.
Today’s technology allows you to know exactly what is happening around the world at that precise moment.
One of the resources that we use to check the current situation around the world is WikiTravel. It is a fairly complete and updated page about each country, its culture, safety, gastronomy, social situation and other information that may be important for your future trip.
Another option could be an official website of your government that gives you information about the political and social situation in other countries.
For example, we use two official websites of our native countries, which also give you the possibility of contacting them in case of an emergency on our trips.
The Italian website is called Viaggiare sicuri della Farnesina (Minister of the Interior).
The Czech website/App is called DROZD and it works in the same way as the Italian site.
Another option to know the security situation of a country is to consult the online pages of the local newspapers or the government pages of each country.
However, here you could find two problems.
1) The language barrier
2) Fake news
Conclusions
This is the end of our post on how to travel safely. We hope we have helped you organise your trip in the safest way possible.
Do you have any other ideas about safe travel?
Write us here in the comment below or send us an email, we will be happy to respond as soon as possible.
Thank you for having come this far, we hope to see you soon on this blog and our social networks, a hug from your friends, travelers, and gluttons of Fun Food Travelling.
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Thanks for reaching the end of this article, if you are interested in more travel and food tips around the world, every month (more or less) we come out with a new post in Spanish and one in English.
A hug for you, friends, travelers and foodies of Fun Food Travelling.
Our tip: When we travel we always make sure to have travel insurance. Our personal recommendation is Truetraveller as they have great support and health coverage around the world. And don’t worry if you forget about it, you can purchase the insurance during your trip!
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