Three C's
--Submitted by Splash Confidence, Control, and Choices
My backpacking experience, while being at least 2000 miles, has been all in the western U.S. and most recently 15 years ago. (I hope to change that this spring/summer.) I have criss-crossed the U.S., including Alaska, and Canada, by car for over 200,000 miles, mostly while travelling solo. Many travel tips by car, are useful for backpacking/hiking, although with modification. The concepts are the same. Coosa touched on the two that I consider the MOST important travel tips: being prepared, and following your instincts.
It has been my experience that by using the three C's, most vulnerability of being a solo woman traveller is erased. My three C's for travel are: Confidence, Choices, and Control over the situation. My Confidence comes from experience, being prepared, knowledge, being flexible, and trusting my instincts. Choices can be most numerous and best made, again with knowledge and preparedness. Control over a situation is mostly maintained by Confidence and making appropriate Choices. Deal with situations or problems as they unfold. Don't wait for it to become a desperate situation, or worse, an emergency.
I feel that I keep an "edge" of control over situations by always speaking as "we" when talking to strangers, thereby implying I am with or meeting up with others. In the car, I keep my felt hiking hat on the dash indicating there may be a man around. The third offensive action available, where even with my immense experience, I still often fail, is that one does not owe ANYBODY information about one's trip. Also it is okay to NOT be nice or polite to queries. Again, like Coosa said, follow your instincts and get out of there.
With one of the three C's failed, it is still quite easy to compensate, mostly by knowledge or preparedness. If two C's start to break down, I feel I am approaching desperate as in the two following incidents. I have not, thankfully, experienced a breakdown of all three C's at one time.
One of my desperate times happened on a car trip in the southwest. It was 1986 and every highway exit did not have a fast food or necessarily any other services. I needed a restroom. The highway I was on was too well travelled to, uh, well, you know. Anyway a rest area was coming up so in I drove. As I approached the parking area, I noticed the cars ahead of me taking off again. When I reached the area I saw why. Two cars full of young tough looking guys, just hanging out. I was nearing a desperate state. I observed the guys for a moment and noticed they, while being annoying, did not seem dangerous. I took my dinner of canned beanie-weenies, opened it and proceded to eat it with the Buck knife off my belt, while leaning against the front fender of the car. I crumpled the can, tossed it in the garbage as I walked past, licked the knife, wiped it on my leg, and sheathed it as I went by the guys on my way to the restroom. While this situation turned out okay, by failing to prepare (not using the last restroom) I had begun to compromise my future safety. Oh, yes, I also do not recommend this action that I settled on: if I had "read" the situation wrong, the knife could have incited the guys.
The second desperate situation was in New York state. I had three children with me and we had our gear stolen in the city, including credit card receipts. With all the credit cards cancelled, I was left with pocket cash and one gas card I could use. We could not use the toll roads and had to search for that particular brand of gas station. It was 10 pm and I was lost in Albany, with an almost empty gas tank and five dollars remaining in my pocket. Being one to always gas up before dark and to keep the tank at least half full after dark, I had almost lost control of the situation, I was losing my confidence, and quickly running out of choices. I told the kids that the next station we found I would put the whole five dollars in it and get to a safe place to wait until daylight. With a plan we all felt better and the next station was well lighted and the brand with the credit card I had. Again I got lucky, but as soon as I had a plan my confidence came back. We then proceded to Buffalo where $200 awaited us.
Now when I travel, I include a few low denomination postal money orders, so that I can get quick cash, even in little towns. I also leave one credit card at home for my maildrop person to send to me if something happens as in the previous story. I guess most people also use ATM's. Anyway, I hope some of this info is useful.