Backpacking Europe part 1: England
I am writing out my travel story from the beginning, of how I , an artsy Midwesterner, made it to all 7 continents, hiked the Appalachian Trail, and worked in Alaska doing commercial fishing. You can start at the beginning here. Or go here for an intro into my childhood.
I was 21 years old. I had worked a whole winter saving everything I earned for a 3 month trip to Europe that only one year before I had thought was actually not possible. I hope you fully understand “not possible”. When I say “I had never thought it was possible.” I’m saying that a year ago my dream was, “I wish I could get married so I would have a traveling partner to safely travel Europe.” The sentence, “I bet I could travel Europe alone,” never formed in my mind until the summer I was driving in my ’72 VW Bug across North Dakota.
Dad has been my faithful airport driver for all my travels. It’s a 2 hr drive to the airport from our house in the Northern farmlands of Minnesota. Mom and Dad took this maiden voyage with me. I love airports. I hate airports. I think they are a perfect illustration of limbo. Of that point in your life, in your journey where you are leaving an older version of yourself behind and moving on to another destination but that journey hasn’t gotten underway yet. It’s this time of reflection, of being trapped in the in-between. Heads one way, tails another, and you are on the edge just waiting for boarding call.
Mom cried when we hugged goodbye. I held it together. Mom cries at everything. I struggled not to do the same. I didn’t want to give my parents more to worry about straight away. The moment I was through the security doors I cried and cried. This was probably the first time I gave myself a pass for crying in public. “I’m leaving on a jet plane” by John Denver was blaring through my head. It was my mantra so I wouldn’t think.
Waiting for my flight was me choosing over and over to keep following through with my decision to go on this trip. What if I get there and nothing interests me? What if I’m just wandering around a foreign city for a couple days and then I’m done? What if this turned out to be a massive let down? Or what if I panicked and got too scared by myself and just ended up screaming, curled up in a ball, on some random street?
I boarded the plane and the consequences of my choices began to sink in. At the airport I could have just walked away but now I was getting locked into the plane. Now sky marshals and policy might get involved if I suddenly insist that I want all this to stop. This right here is the beginning of being 3 whole months away from my family. It’s like I had already forgotten that I had spent 5 months at a ski resort, that I road tripped around the US for 2 months, that I lived away from home for my last 2 years of high school. I reminded myself of these things and how I enjoyed all those experiences.
TRAVEL ANGEL
There was a man sitting next to me. I wonder if he could sense my nerves. He began talking to me, asking about my travel plans. I told this stranger about my plans to backpack Europe for 3 months by myself. I listened to the crazy come out of my mouth. I hadn’t discussed this with many people. My dream was now out there to be publicly mocked. His eyes lit up, he shifted in his seat to face me better. “Oh really?” He asked excitedly. Then, “You are going to love it! You are going to have such a good time!” His excitement caught me completely off guard.
He began asking me all sorts of things, asking if I knew about bucket shops, and hostel clubs, and how cheap flying between countries was. He listed off all the backpacking trips he had taken. I felt seen and understood. It was the exact validation I needed in that moment. I was sitting next to a kindred travel spirit.
As the plane raced down the runway for takeoff he asked me another question, “Have you thought about backpacking Asia?” Asia??? “Oh it’s wonderful!” he insisted, “Everyone knows English for the tourists, there’s like a travel route that everyone does through the countries, everything is so cheap and the local people are so polite and friendly. It’s not the seedy dangerous place that non-travelers insist it is. You have to go!” I had never thought of traveling Asia. As the plane rose into the air my travel dream was reaching higher as well. My fears of traveling Europe were left behind somewhere on the Minneapolis tarmac. Asia, what if I could travel somewhere cheaper than Europe? Think of the beautiful colors and different architecture that Asia has! I could see that with my very own eyes! What is eating street food like? Would I smell incense?
I was almost laughing at myself as I started thinking about budgets for Asia and how/when/where I would get back to work after returning from Europe. How long would it take for me to rebuild my travel budget? Could I try to spend less than my $30 a day? I decided to get back to this moment, get back to this current trip. I reached out and took out the flight magazine for some grounding, before I got too many travel ideas in my head. The first article I came to was about a woman and her journey of doing a commercial fishing season in Alaska. My brain blew a fuse.
Let me explain: back when I was in high school, when I was in The Church, we had an area meeting where the church from Wisconsin joined our services in Minnesota over a long weekend. I was standing in the row of set up chairs, behind my brothers. They were at that age where they had recently been through their growth spurt and now towered above me. I still had not gotten used to their new height. My brothers were standing around socializing with their friends, each in their white dress shirt and tie. A man from the Wisconsin church approached the group of boys and butted into their conversation, “Have you boys thought about fishing in Alaska?” He asked as his intro. I stopped whatever paper and notes I was sorting and blatantly eavesdropped. He explained that he was a fisherman in Alaska, that he had a boat that he needed 2 people to crew on it every summer and how crew members are paid a percentage of the season’s catch but it was hard work. With every word I heard I got more and more excited about this job idea. Alaska?! Fishing?! Living on a boat?! Manly work?! “Ask me! Ask me!” I shrieked in my head but he never did. He never turned around, never acknowledged that I was there. “In a couple years when you are older, come try it,” He said as he walked away just as suddenly as he had stepped in. My brothers did not seemed enthused. They seemed more awkward at being interrupted and quickly went back to their conversation, probably talking about guns. For a moment I was confused why he hadn’t approached me. I was the age he was looking for, I was standing right there but then I realized it was one of those jobs. The sort of job that is “too hard for a woman”. I sighed in disappointment. How could it be too hard for me but my dorky brothers could handle it? It started this mild idea, what if I tried living out some of my life as a disciple? Like, Literally. What if I walked a lot, learned to fish for an income, just sort of followed in their footsteps in a modern-times sort of way? Would that be a way for me to maybe get closer to their mindset and what brought them to have a closer to relationship with Jesus?
Here I am on my first transatlantic flight, stopping in Iceland, on my way to solo backpack Europe. I’m trying to be normal and rational but instead I’m getting ideas to backpack Asia and now this article had opened up another possibility. A girl had fished in Alaska. I am strong for a girl and I am tough. I know this. I slept in a cabin where the bucket of water froze. If a girl could do it I could most definitely do it. Fishing in Alaska had just been debunked in my brain as an impossible man-only job! What if I made fishing my goal for the next summer? What if I could use that job to save up to go to Asia???
Iceland was a four hour stopover. There was a beautiful giant stained glass art wall in the airport. I had chosen not to stay over in Iceland because I had heard how incredibly expensive it was and I wasn’t even sure I had enough money for 3 months in Europe. I looked out the windows longingly, hoping I could see some of the amazing rugged landscape from the airport. Iceland, along with Alaska, had been another place Dad had wanted to travel. You may think that National Geographic and my active imagination began my wanderlust but I also grew up with Dad’s travel stories. In 1973 he put an ad in a New Zealand newspaper and asked for help finding a place to live and a place to work so he could explore New Zealand. He was allowed to graduate high school a couple weeks early so he could drive his 175cc Bridgestone motorcycle across the US, over the Rockies, and to California. Sidenote: When Dad was wearing his rain poncho his top speed was 45 mph. He sold his motorcycle in California and flew to New Zealand where he lived for 2 years, before he became so homesick he came back to Minnesota.
HAWAIIAN-SHIRT-GUY
I landed in Heathrow, at 9:30 am local time. I collected my giant backpack, and followed the route to get to the underground and to downtown London. Here is something that I have learned I do differently than some other travelers; I arrived in England with no place arranged to stay. Why make plans if you don’t know the area? That was my thought. I had all day.
Getting to my first Underground platform was my first European accomplishment. I didn’t feel like I was in England until I was waiting at a train track. I was still commuting from the airport. I was now in a setting that I had only ever seen in movies. I was in it. I am here. I have officially arrived. I willed myself not to look too much like a tourist but my backpack was a giant red giveaway, a third of my size. I really hoped no one noticed that I was American. I decided to talk as little as possible as I infiltrated this foreign place.
I heard a commotion coming down a corridor. Until that moment I had not realized that the tunnel I was in was not all that loud, there were people everywhere but it’s not like anyone was talking. Most of the noise was from trains and wind and announcements over the speaker. It was when I heard this ruckus of voices that I realized that human noise had been mostly absent.
“WHAT DO YOU THINK? WHERE ARE WE? DO YOU THINK THIS IS IT? WHAT TRACK DID IT SAY WE NEEDED TO BE ON? MAYBE THERE IS SOMEONE WE CAN ASK!!!”
It was this barrage of loud questions and a voice with no accent that made me realize that this intrusion must be Americans. It sounded like they were trying to communicate to each other from opposite sides of the subway. Who were these people? A whole basketball team? An entire American tour group? How was it possible to be the main noise source in this really big place? The noisemakers finally joined me on the platform. It was only a family of 4. Three adults, one small child. They had piles of hard suitcases on wheels, shoulder bags, and even a stroller, things that they tried to roll over the gap onto the train car while shuffling everything else. Things piled up and falling over and passing to each other like a bucket brigade. There, in the midst of them, the central noisemaker was this man with a giant beer belly, some light colored hat, and he was WEARING A HAWAIIAN SHIRT! I. Kid. You. Not. I had barely even gotten out of the airport and I had been followed by the American stereotype. I stared in horror and then scuttled away from them as fast as possible. Don’t let anyone know that these are “my people”. My fellow Americans, I invite you to use travel as an opportunity to tone it down — just a bit. Not everyone has to hear you. Your existence is still valid. Travel is an invitation to fade into the background and let the culture come out to greet you. Being quiet is a wonderful skill to hone.
GIVING
When I was near a touristy area a small woman in a headdress asked me for money an ‘r’ rolling accent. Her skin was olive, she had these large eyes and a jagged scar on the right side of her temple that snaked down onto her cheekbone. I couldn’t tell if her eyes looked haunted, the whites were a bit milky. I wondered what a doctor would be able to read from her eyes. I wondered what country she had come from, what her face had seen, I wished I could hear her whole life story but I wasn’t sure she knew enough English. There was so much I didn’t know about her and so much I was assuming. Was she a war survivor? Domestic abuse? Car accident? I wondered if I was being a duped tourist but I decided this was my tax for arriving in this country. I had only taken out a few pounds at the airport for transportation. I gave her what I had, it was nearly 10 pounds. She clutched it in my hands and without even looking at the money she asked for more. I was annoyed that she hadn’t even acknowledged what I had given her that our exchange wasn’t over but what does 10 pounds really do, I guess? So, we went to an ATM where I took out more money, then we had to go to a fast food place and I had to buy something to break a bill. I think I ended up giving her 17 pounds. She blessed me over and over but I didn’t feel like any sort of savior. Do people give to feel better about themselves? I didn’t feel better. I was so worried about saying no; I was worried about not helping the destitute, that I gave away ⅔ of a day’s travel budget within hours of arriving in England. I felt so guilty that I had saved up my money to spend it all on something so frivolous as traveling when there was this woman out begging in the streets of London for her living. She reminded me of all the poverty and desperation in this world and how useless I was to stop it. What kind of good person am I? Why didn’t I give all my money to the poor if I really wanted to experience living like the disciples? I didn’t even give her a day’s travel budget.
NO VACANCY
When I got to the central station I caved and bought a guidebook to England so I could look up hostels more easily. I had not bought any kind of guide book for this trip. Before the internet travel books were how you learned about destinations; all the customs, sights to see, recommended restaurants, accommodation. I learned about hostels on the internet and I read a travel book in the middle school school library called something like “How to travel on a Shoestring Budget,” That book gave me many creative ideas on how to help my money stretch the farthest. I took note of free places to sleep: barns, cemeteries, graveyards, construction sites.
I followed one address to one hostel, the cheapest I could find, and it was $30 for the night. I had already paid nearly that for my travel book. They were full. They were able to tell me a couple other places were also booked. They explained that it was the summer and everything in London would be most likely booked by now. I didn’t have the time or the money to wander London going door to door to find out if expensive hostels had any space. I immediately forgot my brand new guidebook on the next bus. I took this as a sign.
It was time to revert to the more exciting method of “signs” and guidance. I followed the crowd back into the Subway. It was getting busier and busier as the day went on. I looked for something interesting to catch my eye, to give me an indication of what to do next. I finally saw one other guy with a backpack. It wasn’t a fancy one like mine, it looked like an old army backpack. He was probably on a budget. He also looked like he knew where he was going. This looked like a good sign, so I followed him.
We ended up in a different area of the subway that seemed more like a train station than the subway system. I thought that was odd but no one stopped me, my ticket had worked, so I got on and rode on a nice peaceful train. It was so much quieter compared to the clattering din of the underground. Then I noticed we were passing through countryside. We were leaving London. I guess so much for visiting London for a few days, it was big, crowded, and expensive anyways. I could always go back. It was quite exciting to not know where I was going. I didn’t even know how long the ride would be. I figured it was a 30 minute commute out to the edge of London.
More than 30 minutes passed. I don’t remember how I got up the courage to talk to the guy I had followed. I had gotten on the same car as him. I asked him where he was going and how long he had been backpacking. I was a bit wrong about his story. He was actually returning home from a 3 day music festival. He lived in Brighton and would be back to work tomorrow. I think he was a bit perplexed about me. “Where are you going?” he asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Where are you staying,”
“I was hoping you might have a recommendation.”
“How did you get on this train?”
“I followed you.”
“But then how did you get a ticket?” I showed him my ticket.
“That’s not the right ticket. You have a subway ticket, you need a train ticket.”
I shrugged. There had been a crowd of people when I had gone through the gates to get on this train. It seemed legit to me. No conductor came through to check our tickets.
This poor guy. At least he knew Brighton well. He said there were several hostels we could look up. He invited me come with him to his “flat”. Another indication I was traveling for real in a foreign country — they really do say “flat” for apartment! Just like the movies! I contained my excitement. All the hostels in Brighton were fully booked as well. There was a bed available in one hostel 2 miles out of town but my helper wouldn’t hear of it. “That’s way too far away,” he insisted. I was pretty sure I could have walked the 2 miles with my backpack, no problem.
Finally, reluctantly he let me sleep on the couch. “But my roommate can’t know,” he said. It’s only because she’s gone.” Oh man, I was thrilled again. Opposite sex roommates that aren’t sleeping together??? Is this for real? His apartment was a whole discovery about English living, it was old, full of natural light, the bathroom sink was the tiniest and cutest sink I had ever seen. How the shower worked, how the water heated, how the toilet looked and the mechanism for how it flushed, everything was different from what I had always known. I knew right there, in that bathroom that I was going to be fascinated by every part of this adventure. I wouldn’t have to worry about getting bored. Even the light switches were different and located in different places than I would expect. There’s a whole other world of what “normal” means
We went out to meet his friends, we listened to live music. One of his friends had written an entire guidebook about Brighton. I was allowed to borrow it while I explored. I wouldn’t say they were laughing at me — ok, they certainly laughed when I had no plans tell them about but I think they were quite amused by this American backpacker that had just arrived in England, talking about backpacking for 3 months and then following strangers around. In my defense I thought he was a backpacker going to a hostel in London! This was supposed to work out much more simply. Still, my first night in Europe and I was sleeping for free.
BRIGHTON
I had never heard of Brighton. It was this coastal town, fairly busy and touristy with a convoluted area called “old city” which wasn’t even mapped out because the streets were so tiny and random. It felt fresh and sunny. Brighton had 2 piers with fair rides on them. The shops and store fronts were adorable. I was experiencing cobblestone everywhere! Brighton is the sort of place that should have ladies walking around wearing white dresses and shading themselves with white parasols in the sea breeze.
The next morning I went to a hostel at checkout time and got a room. This is the better way to find a bed. Go in at 10 am, wait for the cleaning and switch over of travelers. I also wanted to plan out my trip. I had a short list of destinations: Ireland, Innish Moor, Norway, Auschwitz, Paris, Florence, Venice. My nearest goal was to see Ireland. I decided to take care of that extra cost next. I found one of those travel agency shops with the cheap plane tickets and bought a flight for around $60. I did have to wait 5 days for my flight. So I stayed and explored Brighton.
I tried my hand at painting and selling to businesses. No luck. But a dad, paid me 5 pounds to draw his son in a stroller. He was quite excited and grateful to stop and talk to me while I painted a pub with green ceramic tiles.
CHARACTERS
I met two characters in Brighton, one was this beautiful looking man, with high cheek bones and long braids and soft brown skin. He ran a fruit stand and told me of how he had walked across Russia for 9 years. I was amazed and humbled by his story. I had my 2 months of a US road trip under my belt but I wasn’t even a week into being a European backpacker. How much time did I have to put in to officially be a “backpacker”.
This guy said he was an artist and I kept asking to see his work and he kept telling me it was his stand and I kept not getting it. I was like a dementia character. We’d get to talking, it would come back to art, and then I would say that I wish I could see his work and then he would say that it was here. I did that a few times and didn’t even realize that I was asking him the same thing until he went around that stand, tucked in an alley slot between two buildings, and pointed out the hand lettered signs with decorated borders and how he had painted his cart in coordinated colors of bright yellow, lilac, and orange. I finally got it and saw the care he had put in to creating his fruit stand business.
The first day I met him he sent me away with a sack of fruit for almost nothing. I had 6 grapefruit to eat. I gave thanks for the food and assumed I needed the fiber and vitamin C. Hey, I didn’t get sick after my plane ride. The next time I was back to finish my painting he bought me lunch. Something like Pad Thai. I felt super cool hanging around him. He talked passionately about following your dreams and not getting sucked into the normal every day life. Keep being strange.
Another character came up and started talking to me while I painted. Art is the way to meet people. They will come to you while you sit on the sidewalk to work. He was sweet and inquiring but the sort of person that doesn’t know social cues, doesn’t know when visiting time is over. I’m the kind of person that doesn’t know how to politely get out of conversations. So when he learned that I was visiting he led me all over the town showing me his favorite places: an old movie theater, a museum, the pier. I think he took me to 4 different places but we would walk in, he’d point out a picture or a detail and then we would rush back out, barely even circling the room or area. He never stopped talking, hurriedly trying to cover everything that he loved about Brighton, his trench coat whipped around him enhancing his nearly flailing movement, his thinning hair waving behind. He moved like he was a music conductor, conducting the whole world. I spent half the day with him.
He found me when I was painting another day. I wanted to paint all the beautiful streets in my little artist world. I was happy for a short distraction and being shown around by a local. I gave him something to do out of his usual routine, I guess. He lived at a group home and received payment by the government. We exchanged addresses. On the third day of making plans with him I told him where I would be to paint but I showed up several hours later. I never see him again but we wrote back and forth for a few years after my trip. His letters were written in large childlike handwriting.
Next: Ireland. Following people on trains seems to work. Dragheda, invited for tea, a Samba festival, communicating with Aussies, my first hitchhike.