How To Survive A Euro Trip With Your Relationship Intact

Posted: 18 Jun 2012 05:13 PM PDT

Travelling Europe with your loved one is one of the most magical and memorable experiences you can have. Unfortunately, the reality can be that the stress of being on the move, dealing with different cultures and sticking to a budget can cause friction to even the most stable of couples.
Don’t let anyone tell you backpacking isn’t hard. It IS amazing but at times it can also be stressful, tiring and downright difficult! So how can you make your relationship last the distance while having this incredible experience?

Patience, patience, patience…

Travelling together means that you have a lot of advantages solo travellers don’t have. You have someone there to take a photo of you in front of that beautiful view; you have someone there to help you put on your increasingly heavier backpack and you have someone there to relive last night’s crazy antics. But what you do have is also someone who may not be quite willing to spend four hours wandering the Vintage Markets with you; someone who is tired and cranky and starting to take it out on yourself and someone who may want to party all night when you want to get an early night and go hiking in the morning.
What these situations call for is patience. Take a breath, slow down and think twice before you react. Perhaps all that’s needed is to look after your tired and cranky partner and sit them on a bench while you grab them a cup of coffee. Be patient and the day will be so much nicer.

Time apart…

Now before my boyfriend and I went travelling together everyone told us, make sure you spend time apart regularly or you will kill each other! Well, to be honest we really didn’t spend that much time apart but what we did do is spend a lot of time in large groups of people. We never made days where we would go exploring separately but we were always eager to make new friends and one of us might go and hang out with some friends at the beach while the other one went to the pub. This is something that never bothered either of us and through it we ended up with some amazing friends that we will keep in touch with for a very long time.

Looking after each other…

As I alluded to earlier, one of the most amazing parts of travelling with your partner is the fact that you are with someone that you can ask that little extra of and vice versa of course. I found that Tom and I did this very well while we were travelling. I’m a morning person while he is definitely not so I liked to get up and go for a walk and buy us some breakfast while he was still sleeping. Tom was wonderful at helping me put on my heavy backpack and carrying all the heavier items in his own pack.

Having some alone time together…

While meeting lots of fellow travellers and making friends is one of my favourite parts of our trip, our week alone in Paris will always be a very special memory. We decided that after 6 weeks of staying in Hostel dorms we were going to book a private hotel room for ourselves.
In some cities this can actually be more affordable than two beds in a dorm surprisingly enough. We had a special week together being romantic and loved up before we headed to Barcelona to stay in a hostel for a more social and party time atmosphere.
All in all, don’t forget to stop and appreciate this experience you are on. Sometimes it’s easy to get caught up in stress of travelling on a budget and dealing with long, uncomfortable bus trips but when you are with your loved one just smile and enjoy the ride.
This is a guest post from Tom and Trudy of ActiveBackpacker.com – they love to roam the world with their backpacks and experience new things (and keep their relationship intact) appeared in Midlife Travel