About

Not another travel blog? Yes, but we hope it’s a bit different. There won’t be travel hacks, budget ideas (unless only eating gelato counts as a money-saving hack), or tips on how to travel light. There will be tales of the unexpected, derailed plans, and mild disasters such as being stranded and robbed. (Italy has a lot to answer for but we keep going back.) These misfortunes don’t happen because we’re unlucky or inept, but because we’re travelling with Autism. Unfortunately, we can’t just pay extra and sling our Autism into the hold to enjoy a weight-free existence when travelling, we have to lug it around wherever we go, encountering stares, misunderstandings and numerous frustrations. Autism just doesn’t go with our aesthetic.

We’re identical twins and late-diagnosed autistics. We didn’t leave the UK until we were 33 and were diagnosed with autism at 38. So we’re now making up for lost time and trying to travel as much as we can. Well, as much as self-employed horror writers (we write as C L Raven) and pole/aerial instructors (we run a mobile studio, The Pole Vault) can afford. Until the diagnosis, we thought that our travel disasters were down to our inexperience, but it turns out that our autism is an unwanted stowaway in our mental luggage that makes travel so much harder.

Autism is a spectrum, so our experience of autism is going to be completely different to someone else’s experiences. To avoid repeating ourselves throughout our blog, below we’ll list how travelling with autism affects us.

Trials and Errors

Instructions –

If they’re not completely clear, guarantee we will get it wrong. If the instructions are verbal, forget it. We can’t listen and process the information at the same time. Written instructions are great.

Public transport –

We don’t use it at home, as we drive everywhere. Timetables make no sense to us because of all the numbers. So of course we use public transport when travelling, and always get it wrong. In Prague’s central station, we nearly got on a train bound for Germany. We were trying to get to Kutna Hora.

Directions –

Cat is especially bad at directions, and doesn’t recognise our route in reverse, so Lynx navigates. She just can’t understand Google maps when walking. We firmly believe Google is trying to sabotage us.

Plans being ruined –

if we planned to do something or go somewhere on a particular day and it gets ruined, we find it hard to adjust to a new plan. We usually do adjust, but need to have a ranty meltdown first.

Decision paralysis –

If there are too many choices, making a decision is highly stressful. If pushed, we will likely snap. We usually eat the same things at the same time every day, because if we have to choose what to eat, we will usually not bother eating.

Processing –

We need time to absorb new information, or emotions, so usually under-react until it sinks in. This makes us look like aliens in human form. People will react appropriately, we will merely look confused. Sometimes we will laugh, especially when it’s a situation that is definitely not funny. Our reactions are not normal.

Transitions –

This is usually to do with switching tasks, or going from the car to the house when we’ve arrived home, and getting out of bed. We can’t do it immediately, we need time to process the change.

Social interaction –

We find this so stressful and do much better with two-to-one or small groups. If we do tours, you will either find us right at the back taking photos or keeping pace with the tour guide so we can quiz them about aspects of the tour. We never make friends when travelling because we can’t talk to people. Also, bad past experiences have meant that we don’t trust people who approach us, pretending to be friendly. All the friends we have are because other people have adopted us.

We also take random dislikes to people, so guaranteed, any rants in our blog are because other people in the group have annoyed us 😀 Also, and this may cause people to utterly dislike us, but we can’t deal with children. They’re extremely loud and unpredictable and often disrupt tours we’re on. We have superhero senses, so noise is painful and we wear Loop earplugs to make busy places bearable. We’re aware this probably makes us monsters. We’re also aware that we’re ok with that.

Food –

This is by far our biggest issue. If you’re expecting lengthy descriptions of the food we eat when travelling, you’re in the wrong place. We suffer from ARFID – Avoidance Restrictive Food Intake Disorder. The easiest way to describe it is that most food looks and smells disgusting to us. Food photos make us feel nauseous, particularly if the food is covered in some sort of sauce. Where you might see rice, spaghetti or coleslaw, we see maggots, worms and vomit. Food smells are some of the worst smells, honestly right up there with raw sewage.

To make things harder, we’ve been vegan since 1994, and a lot of local delicacies involve some kind of meat, fish or dairy products. Fortunately, ice cream or gelato and chips are some of our safe foods, so whilst you won’t find us dining in restaurants, we will be haunting every gelateria that sells sorbet or vegan gelato. We used to check in a suitcase that was literally full of food, soya milk and Red Bull. Now we force ourselves to just take carry on luggage. They’re still full of snacks, but it’s progress.

Special interests –

Ours are dark. Graveyards, skeletons, dark history, macabre things, anything to do with horror or the paranormal. So our travel is based around the dark history of a place, morbid sights and interesting architecture. If it’s creepy, we will find it. Touristy sights are always on our list, but our nights feature ghost walks rather than bars. We visit graveyards in every city or country we travel to and even planned an entire trip to Prague around seeing the Sedlec Ossuary – the bone church – purely because we wanted elements of it for a tattoo. We experience Autistic Joy (extreme happiness or excitement) when we visit catacombs and crypts, and this is the rare time we show emotion, by clapping excitedly. Yes, we are ghouls.

Travelling with Autism

We always travelled with our best friend, Neen, and she would deal with public transport, directions, and generally keeping us alive. But she doesn’t travel at the moment so now we go alone. But whilst travelling with autism challenges us in so many way, it’s also liberating. If we get the public transport wrong, get lost, only eat gelato, don’t talk to anybody except animals, or have no idea what is going on, we’re excused because we’re tourists. Abroad, people don’t see us as autistic, they see us as confused foreigners. Travelling allows us to remove our masks and be our odd little selves without repercussions.

And we always get repatriation on our travel insurance.