SLEEPING

I hate paying for hotels – it is expensive to be unconscious for 8 hours. Every hostel, hotel, or BnB is rated by customers and has reliable reviews.

Camping
I love sleeping outside, in a tent or the open if there are no dew or bugs. But I rarely travel with a tent as it would overwhelm my carry-on pack.
On some trips, camping is necessary – the Sahara in Algeria, Socrata, a 28-day trek in Nepal. Treks where a tent is provided include the Inca Trail, the Santa Cruz Trail and Roraima in Venezuela.

• New Zealand. In my first year of travel outside North America in 2009, I went to New Zealand and did all nine Great Walks. Some have huts but not all and I used my MSR Hubba to sleep on several. 

• Azores, Madeira, Mallorca and the Canary Islands. I rented a scooter and probably drove around 1000 km on all the Islands. I bought a Big Agnes Great Wall one-man tent to start travel in 2022 and used it about 15 times, alone paying for its initial expensive cost. It is the lightest, sit-up inside, free-standing tent I could find. The tent, sleeping bag and sleep sheet fit into my small collapsible daypack. I also carry another tiny collapsible pack for a few personal extras and food one needs for 2-3 days of scootering around. I slept on beaches and pull-outs along highways and city parks. A tent provides safety from grab-and-run thieves. I mailed it home from Amsterdam to reduce pack weight.

• Iceland. To do the Laugavegur Trek in Iceland in August 2017, I bought the great 2-man MSR Hubba Hubba and then mailed it home.

• On the 5 ½ month overland trip from Morocco to South Africa, we camped almost every night (along with cooking all our meals over a campfire). A tent was necessary to avoid the bugs – most of the trip was in malaria countries. This type of travel would not suit many, especially most older women who usually hate sleeping in a tent.
Most used the tour’s provided tents but I brought a one-person MSR Hubba, a high-quality tent. It was the one place where I could be alone and escape the crowd. I also brought a sleep sheet, a backpacking pillowcase and a good sleeping pad, the Exped Down Mat.

• In my 38 trips to the desert SW of the US, I can only remember sleeping in a tent 4-5 times (usually in dust storms). I slept in the open for great star gazing. Wild camping is free on all BLM (Bureau of Land Management) land in the US.

Couchsurfing.com is the go-to for many young travellers travelling on the cheap. It the best way to meet locals and have authentic experiences. Meet-ups and dinners are often arranged. Hosts and guests are rated giving good references.
However, for an older man, it is almost useless and I never use it. I write many requests and never get accepted. You have to plan too far ahead. Young women don’t even need to make a request. They post their trip dates and get hundreds of hosts. Being gay also helps. There is a sexual overtone that appears to motivate many to host. I wonder if it works. I think I am a much more interesting person than most young women, but that doesn’t count. I also wonder if any of these guests ever host at home to reciprocate. I doubt it and find their behaviour exploitative. I have hosted much more than being a guest.
Taking a taxi to many hosts can be more expensive than staying in a hotel. Their locations may not be very convenient.

Sleeping in Airports. Use www.sleepinginairports.com to find the best places to sleep. It is also the best source of information on any airport – luggage storage, lounges, hotels, restaurants, and access. The choices landside are much more limited than airside, but one can only be airside for long enough to get a good sleep between flights with longer layovers.
Many flights arrive late or leave early making sleeping in the airport very convenient.
I have slept in hundreds of airports and have never had a security issue. I use small plastic lock ties to attach stuff to nearby immovable objects.
There are often many others also sleeping but most look uncomfortable. With the proper gear, it is possible to sleep in complete comfort. Everything here are things I normally travel with. But none are cheap. You have to pay for gear that is light and compact. Here is how to do it.
Sleeping mat. The Thermarest Neoair Uberlite weighs 220 grams and fits into a 300ml glass. But it is very fragile and easily develops punctures. I now have a Nemo mat, about twice the size and weight of the Neoair, but much tougher.  
Sleep sheet. A must to provide privacy and keep your sleeping bag clean and in warm airports, all that one needs. I have a Rab silk sheet with a fold-over to hold a pillow. It is expensive but packs very tiny. it is easy for anyone with a sewing machine to make their own. I put my wallet, passport, money and phone in the bottom of the sheet where they are very secure.
Sleeping bag. I have travelled my entire 18 years with the Western Mountaineering Mitylite, a very light, down, and compressible barrel bag. I sleep hot and the bedding on most beds is too warm for me and I use it almost 100% of the time. It unzips completely to make a quilt and can be matched to WM’s Sleep Sheet to provide comfort for two. In 2011, I walked 1700 km of the Camino de Santiago and a sleeping bag was necessary.
Backpacking pillowcase. Stuff with clothing or a down puff jacket.
Add an eye cover, earplugs, pee bottle, and a Kindle Paperwhite, and you have all the comforts of home.  

Hostels. Usually, the cheapest accommodation is dorm rooms in hostels. It is the best way to meet fellow travellers, which is rarely possible when staying in hotels. Despite occasional bad dorm room behaviour, things are good. Young people don´t usually snore. The best websites for hostels are hostelworld.com, booking.com and trip.com in China. Many countries, like India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Myanmar and many African countries don’t have hostels.

Air BnB is handy to find cheaper places in some areas. Some countries like Equatorial Guinea and Angola have expensive hotels, but some AirBnBs. Once you are a registered member, all your billing information is saved so reservations are easy. Every visit to the website requires 2-step verification. The greatest difficulty is finding the house. If they are not registered on Google Maps, it can be impossible.

Hotels are my last choice for accommodation. They are the most expensive accommodation. You rarely meet other travellers or anyone interesting. Booking.com is the only booking site I use as reservations can be cancelled and no payment is required upfront. The ratings are fairly reliable. I usually stay in the cheapest that isn’t an absolute dump.
However, in many countries, hotels are the only accommodation available – India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Iraq, Turkmenistan, Syria, UAE outside of Dubai and Abu Dhabi (where the dorms are of bad quality), Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait and China.

• China presents an interesting situation. There aren’t many hostels. Shanghai has several but Beijing only has one good one. Many hotels don’t accept foreign guests. There may be only one, usually the most expensive in other cities. It was not common on the earliest of my seven trips to China, but in the summer of 2023, the policy was followed by every hotel.
When you visit the government tourism website, it is stated that all hotels accept foreigners. I read a post in EPS that said all hotels accept foreigners and the individual hotel refused because they didn’t want to do the mandatory registration of each foreign guest. When making a reservation, it was impossible to determine if the hotel accepted foreigners as few stated it in their hotel policy and none answered translated emails.
I became very frustrated making reservations that adamantly refused my stay. I walked around and took taxis to many others with the same result. The policy may not be correct but when a hotel refuses you, there are few options.
I became fed up and made reservations at the cheapest 4-star hotel available. It was most often Holiday Inn Express. They are great hotels but more expensive than I was used to paying. I was even refused by one of them. I can’t believe that they were too lazy to register me as they spent a lot of time helping me find a hotel (it was 5-star).
I have a girlfriend in China and have travelled with her around the country. Many hotels still refused foreigners. When she phoned them to determine the policy, many hotels stated they didn’t accept foreigners.

• Palermo Sicily. In the process of obtaining my girlfriend’s Schengen visa (despite the extensive 120-page application, the visa to Italy was refused twice, so I am travelling alone for 2 months), we booked 66 days of accommodation in Italy and France. By mistake, I did not notice that the booking for the hotel in Palermo, Camplus Guest Palermo, could not be cancelled. I had spent 759€ and was forced to into luxury for 14 days (I hate spending money on hotels). Although it was located in a rather run-down part of the Old Town of Palermo, it was very modern and an excellent breakfast was included. This was a chance to get caught up on sleep, read, play bridge online and generally relax. The 100 or so TV channels did not have one in English and the one sports channel covered Olympic events with mainly Italians in them (no hockey or curling).
I took it easy for the first 4 days seeing some of the sites in Palermo. Sicily has the most spectacular churches in the world. The wonderful mosaics and marble work never get tiring.

• Lalibela Ethiopia. I was here to see the Rock-Hewn Churches of Lalibela, a WHS.
I had come from Gondar by bus and had no accommodation, I went online at the bus terminus to find a hotel.
Zan-Seyoum Hotel had a price on Hostelworld for an unbelievable $5. It was 3.5 km from the churches. When I got my taxi at the airport, the driver asked where I was staying and he happened to work at the hotel. I asked for the price and he said “150”. When I got to the hotel (with exceptionally nice rooms, easily the best hotel I have stayed at in 4 months), the price was $150. I wasn’t paying that and offered $25 and they accepted! At 6 pm the owner knocked on my door and refunded $20 as the price was $5, as advertised.

MY MOST MEMORABLE NIGHTS 

• South Utah. I have made 38 trips to this area over the years. I always sleep under the stars as it is bug-free and there is no dew in the spring and fall when I go. I have slept through 3 dust storms in that time. It’s hard to believe what it is like. Winds gusting up to 100 km/hour blow sand into everything. Fine sand goes through the walls of a tent. One gets unbelievably dirty, Once, I had no tent and wrapped myself up in a nylon tarp. I think these are worse than being cold.

• Laos December 2013. Nam Ha National Protected Area in Northern Laos is supposedly the trekking mecca of SE Asia. Starting from Luang Namtha, several companies offer 3-day treks. Each company has its own trail with jungle camping. The first day was auspiciously Friday the thirteenth. I don’t believe in superstitions like this, but wondered how things would turn out after it rained heavily all night. The trail had several trees fallen across it and the downhill sections were incredibly treacherous with no cut steps and a lot of mud. Everyone fell several times and we were covered with mud.
The jungle camp was a simple lean-to with a banana leaf roof and floor. After downing a small forest of banana trees, the roof and floor were completely reinforced (and this was advertised as an eco-trek). It was dark at 5:30, it started to rain, we had supper, and in our sleeping bags by seven. With no ground sheets, little pools of water collected under me and I put my rain jacket under to try to keep dry. The rain was incessantly heavy all night and by 2 am, I was completely wet as my sleeping bag soaked up the never-ending stream of water like a sponge. The roof worked but the floor didn’t. Down loses most of its insulating value when wet and I was cold by 4 am. Not light till 6:30,
it was the most uncomfortable sleeping experience of my life. I have spent 12 hours on trains and buses with no sleep, but at least I was warm and dry. All would have been preventable with a simple sheet of plastic, but this was never mentioned by the trekking company (Luang Namtha Travel Company – avoid them like the plague).
In the morning, the three of us had difficulty convincing the guide that the trek had to be abandoned as everything we had was soaked, We returned the way we came, now wading through the swollen, chocolate-brown creek. They greatly exaggerate the times given for walking. The quoted 5-7 hours took us 2 1/2. There were no big trees and no wildlife, not a great wilderness experience. For a tropical place, northern Laos can be incredibly cold.
It rained cats and dogs all the next day. The only good way to stay warm in my room was with my down jacket on. No money was refunded. I couldn’t convince the tour operator to provide a groundsheet for his future trips. If you do the trek, make sure to inquire about the sleeping facilities and what their definition of a jungle camp is. It is not quite as romantic as it sounds. At least there were no mosquitoes.
The next day I met a Spanish couple who had done our trip in reverse. After a night in a dry hut in a village, they spent their next night in our jungle camp with an identical experience. Unbelievably, they had a worse time than us. We were to meet them on the trail between the jungle camp and village and give them our pot to cook with. Besides getting completely soaked, they had no warm food other than frogs and crayfish cooked directly over the fire. We laughed at our horrible experiences and vowed to slag the company on Trip Advisor. Unbelievably bad travel adventures are the ones you always remember and talk about with other travellers.

• Nepal. In November 2012, I had a guided 28-day trek across the entire south side of the Annapurna Range. The trek is superior to the better-known Annapurna Circuit as we had views of the entire range from the south. The trek started in the east at Seclis and nearby Tara Hilltop, detoured to Annapurna Base Camp, and ended at Khopra Ridge on the western edge of the range. There were 5 guests, 2 guides and 13 porters.
We slept in tents every night and were at altitude for several nights at Machhapuchhre Base Camp (3700 m) and Khopra Ridge (3900 m). Temperatures at night dropped to -10°C. I had only brought my Western Mountaineering Mitilite, a +4 degree C sleeping bag as it was all I needed for my next 6 months of travel. I dealt with the well-below-freezing temperatures by sleeping in two tops, merino long-johns, socks and a fleece liner lent me by one of the couples. But it wasn’t comfortable.

• Urumchi, China. In September 2015 on my trip along the Silk Road. I flew from Kashgar to Urumchi. The flight left at 23:30, arrived at 01:00 and it took an hour to get my luggage. My flight from Urumchi to Bishtek, Kyrgyzstan was at 08:10. It made no sense to get a hotel and I often sleep in airports anyway. The domestic terminal was completely closed and only the arrival section of the international terminal was open. They said we couldn’t stay there but I snuck upstairs to the completely dark, empty departure section and found some empty seats. It didn’t take long for a guard to kick me out into the cold – it felt about 0°C. I found a place out of the wind, sat on my pack and curled up in my sleeping bag for a fitful 3-hour sleep. When the terminal opened at 5 am, I slept for another hour and a half and almost missed my flight.
This was my coldest night out with no tent.

• Ghana beach. In January 2017 on my 5½ month overland trip from Morocco to Cape Town, we stayed two nights at the Stumble Inn Resort, about 5 km from El Mina, Ghana. It was lovely to camp on the beach with a nice breeze.
On our second night (Sunday, Jan 22), there was a huge storm and it started raining at 3 am. A massive thunderstorm went directly overhead. With exceedingly heavy rain and winds gusting to at least hundreds of kilometres per hour, the water was driven through my fly in a fine mist. The tents on the beach collapsed and it took two people to hold things together. The mist created puddles of water covering my air mattress. I put my sleeping bag and clothes away to keep them dry and sat huddled in one end of my tent that was dry. A huge bolt of lightning surged overhead followed within a millisecond by thunder and a mammoth gust of wind. The poles in my tent collapsed. I popped the tent back up and everything stayed together. It was an interesting hour and a half of the same until it finally slowed down. The truck was full of wet excited campers.
The next two stories are about the worst hotel rooms I have ever stayed in.

• Sudan. December 2022. This is both a border story and a hotel story. From Abu Simbel, Egypt, I crossed Lake Nasser by ferry. Foot passengers were not allowed and I luckily got a ride onto the free ferry in a bus with 16 seats – 13 filled with freight for 100 EP. It was going the 39 km to the border at Wadi Halfa. The crossing took one hour and there was nothing on the other side of the lake but a few houses and a store. I would have been stranded without the bus.
We drove to the border but it was only open from 9 – 4 and arrived at 16:30. Hundreds of big trucks and about 25 buses were waiting. There is nothing to eat or buy here and I slept on the bus. The Sudanese guys on the bus were very kind – one made buns with either halva or cheese and I had three. A group from the next bus borrowed some lentils from our bus and made a tasty lentil stew. Seven of us enjoyed it with pita. In the morning, I had another cheese sandwich and was dying for a coffee.
Crossing the border was very confusing – buy an immigration card for 50EP and 2 pieces of paper labelled General Authority for Land & Dry Ports Qastal Land Port for 105EP. Board a passenger bus just before the gates. Go through security and passport control. This took quite a while and the bus I had crossed through the gate was gone. I boarded another bus packed solid with luggage. Everyone had TVs in boxes. It was noon before we exited the Egypt border control gate.
At the Sudan border, I boarded another bus and drove a few hundred metres to Sudan immigration. Make sure to take your luggage with you after each bus – this one stopped just inside the Sudan gate and unloaded all the freight and passengers. I didn’t take my bag, couldn’t find the bus and It took me forever to look inside all the buses to find mine. I paid the 5000SP transit fee.
I exchanged my Egyptian pounds (646EP for 14,000SP), then he returned and wanted 3,000 back (646×17) so I relented. That took an hour and it was now 13:00. I finally exited the final gate and caught a new bus to Wadi Halfa that filled before it left.  
I arrived at about 2 pm and wasn’t charged for the bus so I assumed that was what the General Authority for Land & Dry Ports Qastal Land Port 105 EP was for. I was tired after my poor sleep on the bus at the border and stayed in Wadi Halfa. Hotels ranged from 300-400SP for a bare, filthy room with 3 ugly beds, more upscale places were 1000-1500 but were both full and I ended up at the Nubian Hotel for 10,000 SP ($18) and not surprisingly, it had vacancies but was a normal hotel room. I watched the World Cup final between Argentina and France to the bitter end.
I then took a share van to Karima (578 km and 8+ hours), finally arriving at 8:20 pm. The hotel, Al Nassr was 4000SP ($7) for a bed, a fan and an outside bathroom that was very rough with filthy pit toilets and a tap in a large basin. The room was extremely dirty with cigarette butts and sand all over the floor and lining the walls. It appeared that it had never seen a broom for a few years. But what the hell, I was only going to sleep and leave immediately in the morning. Thankfully I had a pee bottle to avoid the toilet, a headlight, a sleep sheet, a sleeping bag and DEET to protect me from all the noseeums and to stay warm. A nice room with an ensuite and clean floors was 8000, but the beds were identical and the bugs the same. I continued to Meroe and then Khartoum.

• Ethiopia, In January 2022, I was bussing around southern Ethiopia and took a bus from Konso to Addis Ababa. This was Ethiopian Christmas and every vehicle had hundreds of live chickens on the roof. We had many passengers with live chickens carried upside down by the legs. I had never seen chicken in Ethiopia before, even in restaurants. 
We stopped several times to gather branches for the goat riding on the roof. I stopped at Tiya to see the WHS. I wanted to exchange 20€ for birr (1800 black market, 1140 official). They brought out a bill counting machine to check if the bill was counterfeit but it only worked for US$. I showed them how to use the watermark on all bills to ascertain if it was real.
My night was spent in another atrocious hotel, the only one in Tiya. The room was basic and not clean but had a bed. It was only 200 birr ($4). You get what you pay for. The bathroom was the grossest I have ever seen – no running water, toilets full of feces that had not been flushed for years and garbage lining the shower walls. The one electrical plug didn’t work. It was cold and I killed several mosquitos before falling asleep with my sleep sheet over my head. A donkey tied up in the yard brayed all night.