Hey! It’s Carla from @by_carlarojas, I’m 25 years old and I’m from Terrassa, a city near Barcelona.
When I was a child I liked to travel with my family and friends, though I wouldn’t say it was something that I really loved to do or was passionate about. But all of that changed when I was 18 years old after I went to Dublin for a language exchange programme.
While in Dublin, I lived alone in a new city, I met many people from different countries, I found new interests, and my mind was completely turned upside down. Ever since then, traveling became an obsession!
– More about my travels –
Every free weekend that I have, I take my backpack and visit different countries. I sleep in hostels or do CouchSurfing and explore the cities inside and out. In the summer, I take the opportunity to go further away from where I live, for example, to Thailand, India, and Sri Lanka. On these trips, I experienced a thousand adventures that I will always remember.
In 2018, I decided to leave everything behind and travel alone with my super backpack. I didn’t have a return ticket or many plans, I simply wanted to live the biggest adventure of my life. I visited countries like Vietnam, Cambodia, the Philippines, and Australia, met amazing people, lived wonderful experiences, and discovered dreamy parts of the world.
The trip lasted 9 months and going for it was the best decision I have ever taken. Traveling alone is really something you have to do at least once in your life!
With all these trips, I collected many anecdotes, some of which are very funny and others a little less so. Today, I want to share one with you!
A road trip through Croatia
This summer, my friends and I went on a road trip through Croatia. The plan was to visit different islands, do free camping, enjoy each other’s company and spend sunny hours on the most beautiful beaches of the country. Well, sometimes plans differ from reality and the trip didn’t quite go as we thought.
Each day, it became more and more difficult to find places to camp, prices were crazy, and canned food was our usual meal (lentils every day). Sooner or later the trip came to an end and we got ready for our return flight that was departing from the Podgorica airport in Montenegro at 20.10h. We stayed in Dubrovnik (Croatia), from where it usually takes 3 hours by car to reach the airport. We decided to leave at 12.00h to have time to grab lunch and clean the car before boarding.
What could go wrong?
After driving for 45 minutes, we noticed a lot of traffic on the road. After stopping completely for a few minutes, we disembarked, and another guy told us that all the cars are queuing to cross the border. Here, we got reminded that Montenegro is not a member state of the EU.
We were like “don’t panic, we have enough time”. We played music, started singing, and hung out.
After we were standing for 1 hour, we started to get nervous and decided to explore on foot how far we were from the passport control area. We discovered that we were super far away and needed to come up with a plan quickly because we were losing time. Firstly, we took advantage of the stalled time in the queue to clean the car with our dirty clothes and some bottles of water. We blasted our music and the whole situation looked like something out of a Katy Perry music video!
After cleaning, we decided to go car by car, explain that we had to catch a flight, and ask if we could pass them. Some people said yes, others said no, but after many beeps, we were able to advance a lot! In total, we stayed more than 3 hours in the line, but still had hope to catch the plane in Podgorica.
If you have been to Montenegro, you know that there are no highways, but just small roads that go from village to village. And surprise, the roads were full of traffic as well! When Google Maps told us that there were 20 minutes left, the nerves really kicked in. At 19:45, our only thought to calm us down was “no worries, for sure Ryanair is late, we will catch our flight!!!”
We rushed to the airport, hoping that they would let us in… but it was too late. The plane had already closed its doors.
An unplanned road trip
After this drama, we looked for flights the next day, but the prices were too high for our low-cost backpacker budget.
So, we checked airports nearby and found a flight from Belgrade, Serbia for a good price. After some intense debate, we decided to take an overnight bus to Belgrade and catch the flight from there.
However, the bus was leaving in just 1 hour. We didn’t have internet on our phones while we were still in Montenegro (remember, we are not in the EU) and we had no time to buy the flight tickets.
Considering the amount of bad luck during our trip, we had the feeling something would go wrong, but we decided to go with the flow. We even asked someone on the bus for a hotspot so we could buy the flight tickets. Well, that did not work either.
After a long night on the bus, we arrived in Belgrade! We rushed to a bar to connect to the WIFI and buy the tickets…but, guess what? SOLD OUT!
We were in Belgrade, and once again we had no flight to go back home.
What now?
“Okay, okay, don’t panic, there must be a solution!” – We found a cheap flight from Vienna and bought it without thinking. It was for the next afternoon, so we had more than 24 hours to get there.
After breakfast, we spent the whole day visiting Belgrade, although we felt like zombies because of the little sleep we got in the last few days. It was the perfect opportunity to visit a place we had never been to! We found it a very interesting city, so write it down on your bucket list.
At night, we took the night bus to reach Vienna (Austria) crossing Serbia, Hungary, and Slovakia. We had the whole day to enjoy the city, we even went to Prater, the oldest amusement park in the world!
At this point we had travelled for a total of 1.221km (758mi) instead of the 150km (93mi) we originally planned. Afterward, we finally made it to the airport, we got on the plane, and after a few hours… WE WERE HOME!
Now, as surprising as it may seem, I remember this trip with great fondness. I believe it all comes down to how you take life and the people you surround yourself with. Sometimes things don’t go as planned, but it’s all about your attitude of how to make the best out of a challenging situation which can lead to the best adventures that you will remember for a lifetime!
Carla Rojas Vilà
Check out Carla’s Instagram and follow her new adventures here: @by_carlarojas