Portofino: Finding My Ability to Travel Alone
The trip I made has been one of my favourite travel moments, and most memorable, in more ways than one. It was my first trip to a non-English speaking country on my own, ever! It began with sitting on the plane for 2 hours before it got the go-ahead to leave, then circling before landing because there were birds on the runway in Genoa
See for me, things tend to end up a little disastrous. I am known as a scatterbrain, I am the youngest and most spoon fed child of six. My family refer to me as Dosie Rosie, and they are spot on. But through the strains and the stresses, I enjoy it, because when things aren’t always straightforward, you accidentally end up somewhere even more exciting.
I rose early on a warm October morning and walked to the train station in Genoa, I got lost along the way but let’s move on… Trains in Italy can be somewhat, surprising. And by surprising I mean they turn up when they want to turn up, not when they are meant to turn up. But that is something I love about Italy, the confusion and the chaos seems perfectly ordered to the Italians themselves. The country is so beautiful it doesn’t really need to be particularly efficient, that’s not why people travel there.
To sum it up, Portofino was as beautiful, if not more so, than I imagined. It is one of my favourite destinations not just because it was attractive and I liked watching other people go about their day, but because I mastered it by myself. My family wouldn’t come with me the first time, so I took it upon myself to go there anyway. Since then I have been on another European trip by myself, as you may have seen I went to Belgium and Amsterdam this Spring and loved every minute of it. The great thing is I no longer have any hesitations in travelling solo, and I look forward to planning more trips in the future, just for me! I will always be thankful to Portofino for offering me that realisation that it is okay to go solo, it’s okay to get on a plane by myself, I CAN do it and I can do it well! Had I not had that push to pack my bags and leave Alex at home keeping our house together, I’m not sure I would be so confident about going abroad by myself in the future. It was a proud moment for sure, and one that worked wonders for my confidence.