I am Ready to Become Part of the Brave New World of Females Leaving Their Family – and Holidaying Solo

A few weeks ago, I got an email about a media tour I would not consider. It was long haul and it was about fitness, so it would have entailed a lot of exercise and early bedtimes. Although I liked those activities, I wouldn't have been eager to spend a week with other people who liked them. But even as I was hitting delete, I started to wonder what that would actually be like: being somewhere new, without anyone to please except myself, without anything to do except exactly what I wanted. Clearly, it would be incredible. So I said “yes” and it turned out they meant the other Zoe Williams, the one who is a physician and used to be a Gladiator, and is extremely fit already, and yes, in hindsight, that should have been clear all along.

So, without meaning to and without traveling anywhere, I've arrived in the fastest-growing travel group: the female solo traveller, between 45 to 60. One tour operator reported that nearly half (46%) of their reservations are now people travelling alone, and 70% of those are females. They have families, they have busy social lives, they have partners, their world is absolutely full with people they could go on holiday with – and that’s why they (we) need a holiday on their own.

The more adventurous the travel, the more people are doing it alone. People are big into trekking, biking, paddling, all the things that partners are least likely to be in agreement on in their interest. If anyone is also tired of dragging teenagers to the wonders of the world, just to watch them be on their phones and field questions such as “how much longer do we have to be here?”, they are too tactful to mention it.

The real puzzle is why it’s taken so long to get here. My stepmother, who is totally modern in every way, would get arrested before she’d go into a Belgian restaurant on her own, and even though I mock her for this constantly, I must have had a vestige of it myself, to be this old before it even came to mind to travel solo. Now I just have to go somewhere.