Most days, I love travelling. There are times when I feel so content and at peace and am so glad that I chose to go on this trip.

But there are other days when things go spectacularly wrong and I’m all alone and I have to figure out how to fix everything. Those days are hard and lonely and exhausting, and make me long for my family and friends.

This is the story of one of those days. It’s the day on which I had to get from the Ashram in Nicaragua where I’d been doing my yoga teacher training course, to an AirBnB in Coyoacán, Mexico.

I thought it was a good story to share because it’s kind of funny in hindsight, and also because I think it’s a good reminder that as great as travel can be, there are also times when it’s absolutely awful.

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Part 1: Getting from the Ashram to Managua

My flight from Managua to Mexico City was meant to be at 1pm. I could have organised for a car to take me there from the Ashram, but that would have cost $65USD. Or I could get a tuk tuk into town, catch a local bus from town all the way to Managua, and find a taxi at the bus terminal to take me to the airport.

Given that I was trying to be both environmentally and budget conscious, I decided to go with Option 2.

To be safe, I’d booked a tuk tuk for 7:30am, so that even if we got stuck in traffic or something else went wrong (highly likely, given my experience with Nicaragua so far), I calculated that I should still get to the airport by 10:30am at the latest. Perfect. That would be enough time to drop off my baggage, check in, and read for a little while before take-off

Then the night before I left, Xian briefly turned the internet on so I could check in, and I learned that my flight time had been changed to later in the afternoon. It was too late to call the tuk tuk driver, so this would mean that I’d get to the airport too early to drop my bags off.

Waiting at the airport before baggage drop-off opens, with a huge suitcase, is the worst. Sometimes there aren’t even free seats, and you have to stand around with all your stuff. It’s especially awkward when you need to pee, and have to figure out a way to take all your bags into the cubicle with you.

But Ali, who was also heading to Managua, consoled me. ‘We can find a nice cafe in Managua to hang out in for a while before you head to the airport’ she suggested, ‘and we’ll have time to eat some more corn bread’. We’d gotten very into this corn bread (called pererreque) that was sold at the Managuan bus terminal. It was made with cheese in the dough, and was sweet and fluffy and just the tiniest bit crunchy all at once. That was enough to perk me up.

So Thursday comes, and we wake up nice and early, and settle on the doorstep with our fully packed bags, each of us reading a book to pass the time as we wait for the tuk tuk. I finish one chapter, and then another, and then another. And then I realise that I shouldn’t have been able to read that much before the tuk tuk came.

We call the driver, and he tells us that he’d had some problems with his motor, so couldn’t come pick us up. And he didn’t have any phone credit, so he couldn’t call us to tell us that he wasn’t coming. I guess it didn’t occur to him that we might be going somewhere important, or that he could have Whatsapp’d us over wifi.

He sent over another tuk tuk driver after we called, but the other guy didn’t seem happy about having to pick us up. He sat watching sullenly as we struggled to lift our bags into the tuk tuk, until Xian insisted that he help us. Then he tried to overcharge us pretty significantly when we got into town, refusing to give us back the right change until we argued with him for so long that I think he just got overwhelmed and gave up.

But getting to town late turned out to be a good thing. Every other time we’d caught the bus, it was so full that we had to push our way on through throngs of standing passengers. But this time, there were free seats and space for our bags. It felt like such luxury.

Our mood was dampened a bit when the conductor charged us extra for the bags, which he’s not meant to do. The money didn’t matter – it was such a small amount – but after having such good experiences with the locals throughout the rest of our trip, it sucked that today, on our very last day in the country, it felt like everyone was trying to rip us off.

In Managua, after Ali and I each got some corn bread, we found a taxi who offered to take both of us to our respective destinations (it being too late now for us to hang out at a cafe) – Ali to her hostel first, and then me to the airport. At first this seemed perfect. I’d been worried about finding a taxi, and especially finding one who wouldn’t charge us more money than I actually had on me.

But as we started on our way, I felt more and more uncomfortable. At one point, the driver asked if we had boyfriends, and even when Ali said yes, he insisted that we should both give some Nicaraguan men a try.

Then, after dropping Ali off, he asked for more money because the route had been more complicated than he’d expected. This was bullshit – Ali had directed him through the entire ‘complicated’ part, and before we’d even gotten into the taxi, she’d pointed out the hostel on a map. Ali gave him the extra 50 cordobas he was asking for anyway because she was worried that he might not drop me off at the airport if she didn’t.

I felt pretty nervous after Ali left. The driver’s sleazy comments made me super uneasy and my overactive imagination started coming up with all kinds of terrible scenarios. Ali had suggested that I use my GPS to check that he was actually taking me to the airport, but my GPS, for some reason, just wasn’t working at all, even after I restarted my phone a few times. And I didn’t recognise anything along our route.

It got later and later and I had no idea where we were. At one point the driver even stopped and picked up another random passenger. I tried asking whether we were still going to the airport, but I didn’t know enough Spanish to ask properly, or to understand his response.

By then it was past 11. I decided that by 11:30, wherever we were, I would insist on getting out, and would find another taxi to take me to the airport. Just as I was working up the nerve to do that, we pulled in to the airport. THANK GOODNESS. I was so relieved. ‘Finally,’ I thought, ‘finally I can relax, and drop my bag off, and just read for a while, without worrying about anything more.’

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Part 2: Getting onto my flight

I’d lined up to drop my bag off and finish checking in, but when I got to the front of the line, the steward said that he couldn’t check me in unless I could show him that I had a ticket out of Mexico. And it had to be a confirmation, not just a reservation.

I’d had no idea that I’d need this. It hadn’t said so on my ticket or my confirmation. I’d checked the entry requirements for Mexico too, and there had been nothing there about needing to have an exit ticket.

Here’s the thing – this shouldn’t have been that big a deal. I knew that I could buy an open ticket leaving Mexico, and then just change the date based on when I actually decided to leave. But there’s no Wifi at Managua airport. None. I know because I checked. I asked at almost every single store in departures, and they all said the same thing – that there used to be wifi, but there wasn’t anymore, and that I wouldn’t find it anywhere in the airport. Not free airport wifi, not free restaurant wifi.

I tried offering to pay for wifi, but everyone still said that there wasn’t anywhere I could connect. I ran back to the Copa check-in and begged them to let me use their wifi, or to suggest some other solution, and the steward was stone faced. He told me I had 45 minutes in which to figure it out, or I wasn’t getting on my flight.

I was panicking. Should I get a taxi to a cafe that has internet? I didn’t have the time! Or the cash! And without internet, I couldn’t even search for a cafe that had free wifi.

Should I just give up on getting this flight, go to Ali’s hostel, and figure things out from there? But the flight had been expensive, and I’d already booked and paid for my AirBnB in Mexico.

Maybe, I thought, I could buy a sim card, and use that data. But I went around to the kiosks, and they could only sell me credit, not a sim card. That seemed strange, but I remembered that when I’d flown in, we’d gotten shunted through the airport, without even getting to walk through the stores. Managua airport was not a regularly functioning airport.

I was ready to cry. I didn’t know what to do.

Finally I went to the information desk, and asked if I could pay either of the people there to tether onto their data. The girl was lovely. She was definitely reluctant, but I was almost in tears and sounded frenetic and desperate. She turned her data on and punched the password in to my phone. I tried pressing money onto her and she said no.

Now I just had to buy a ticket. But what ticket?! I didn’t know how long I’d be staying in Mexico. I could buy a bus ticket, which would be cheaper than a flight. I tried searching for bus tickets from San Cristobal, heading to Peru. They were all expensive.

Okay, maybe not a bus ticket. Maybe I could get an open jaw flight ticket. So I could change the date to whenever I was ready to leave. But again, from where?! I hadn’t thought that far ahead. And when I tried buying one from Aeromexico, everything was in Spanish and even when I translated it, I couldn’t figure out whether I’d be able to change the dates, or what the cost would be.

It is awful trying to figure all of this out on a phone. The screen is so tiny. It takes so long to type things in. And the internet was so slow!

‘Think, Des, think‘, I urged myself. Okay, what if I just buy a cheap flight out of Mexico and don’t take the flight? But where is it cheap to fly to? And from where in Mexico? I tried using Google Flights, but most of the cheap things that showed up were to other places in Mexico, or back to Nicaragua.

And then I remembered that Air Alaska lets you cancel your flights for a full refund, if you cancel within 24 hours. Oh Air Alaska, my hero. I quickly booked a flight from Mexico City to San Francisco, then waited tersely, repeatedly refreshing Gmail, for the confirmation email.

FINALLY. Got it. I left the remaining cash I had on the desk, and thanked the girl profusely, then ran to the Copa Airlines check in desk and got back in line, for the 4th time. When I got to the front, the guy didn’t just look at my ticket, but searched to make sure the flights were actually real, and then recorded their details.

Wow. I have been to over 42 different countries in the world so far, and I had no idea that Mexico would be the hardest country for me to get into.

With very little time to spare, I hurried to get through customs. Nicaragua, when you arrive, charges you $10 for a ‘tourist card’. It feels like a blatant money grab, and it looks like something you just throw in the trash after you get in.

But in order to leave, you have to give them back that tourist card. It’s not stapled into your passport. It’s just this flimsy little piece of paper that you have no idea is actually important. And because I like to keep things neat and uncluttered, I usually immediately throw away any loose pieces of paper that don’t seem important.

I frantically leafed through my passport, hoping against hope that I hadn’t thrown in out, and that it hadn’t fallen out when I’d given my passport to the various hostels I’d stayed at to photocopy. And, to my eternal relief, it was there!

The guy at customs still seemed really confused by my passport for some reason, and spent a long time looking at it. ‘What now?!?’ I thought. But eventually, after what seemed like an eternity but was probably only a few minutes, he handed it back to me and let me walk through.

Getting to my gate felt like the emotional equivalent of finishing a tough run. I sank down into a seat, opened up my Kindle, and started to read.

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Getting to my AirBnB in Mexico

Of course, there was still the trip on the other side to get through. I got off at the airport in Mexico, and as soon as I’d gotten through customs, I logged onto the wifi to let my AirBnB host know that I was running even later than I’d expected, and that I’d arrive close to midnight.

She told me to call her when she got to her place. Everyone would be asleep, so the only way I’d get in would be to call her directly. I didn’t have a sim card, but I told her I’d connect to the wifi, and use Whatsapp to call her. No big, right? The wifi details had been included in the airbnb check in instructions, so I should be dandy.

Then, after grabbing my bags, I headed out to call an Uber.

Some airports are really well organised around ridesharing. They have a designated space for cars to arrive, where it’s easy for your car to get in and out, and it’s easy for you to see your car when it arrives.

Mexico City’s airport did have a designated space, but it was so crowded that there were cars 3 deep fighting to get a spot to stop in, and it was absolute havoc. If you couldn’t spot your car, and jump in immediately, it had to keep driving and I imagine you’d have to call another.

My car was stuck on ‘7 minutes away’ for 20 minutes. It didn’t seem to be moving at all. Traffic was ridiculous getting in to the airport. The driver sent me some messages, in Spanish, which I would have translated using Google, except that just then, my wifi got disconnected.

I tried to reconnect, with no luck. You only get 30 minutes of free wifi at Mexico airport, and after that you have to pay. Great. Just great. I had no idea when my ride would actually get here, or if it even would. Was my driver trying to cancel? Did he want me to go elsewhere?

Okay, I decided. The most sensible thing is to decide to wait for a given amount of time. Let’s say that I’ll wait for another 15 minutes, and after that, if I don’t spot the car, then I’ll just get a taxi instead. Except that I don’t have cash, because I was trying to get to my AirBnB as soon as possible since someone was literally waiting up for me to arrive, and I was already going to be arriving near midnight, on a weekday. I hoped it wouldn’t come to that.

And after waiting 10 minutes, my car did arrive, and I only just managed to spot it and run over in the nick of time. It turned out the messages he’d been sending me were apologising for the wait.

The Uber driver seemed nice, but when I told him I was here to learn Spanish, he asked if I wanted to teach him English while I was here. In my head, I thought ‘please no…. I don’t know you, you’re a much older man, and I hope you mean that innocently, but I have no way of telling and I don’t want to make committed plans with a complete stranger.’

So when he dropped me off at my AirBnB, I was pretty quick to say goodbye. Which was a mistake. Because the wifi code in my check in instructions didn’t tell me the actual wifi network. There were over 20 available networks!

I copy pasted the password into every single one, and none of them worked. I tried walking around and calling out, and knocking on the door. Not a peep to be heard. Great. Great. I was going to spend the night out here, on the street, in Mexico, because I couldn’t get into my AirBnB.

A man walked by on the other side of the street, and I tried calling out to him, hoping he’d let me use his phone. But it was midnight! In Mexico City! He looked alarmed and started walking faster.

And then, my Uber driver came back around. He’d wanted to check on me. I ran over, and he let me use his phone to call the AirBnB host. When she opened the door, she explained that the password was actually wrong, because it had been changed. She’d sent me the new password, but she’d done that after I’d already gotten cut off from the wifi at the airport.

I gave my driver a huge tip on the app, and exhaustedly collapsed onto my bed in my room.

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The AirBnB

This day – this night – was almost comedically bad. I was so ready to just have a nice, hot, shower, and go to bed. I was sticky and disgusting and so over everything.

But when I told my host that, she apologised and said that the shower wasn’t working right now, and I’d have to wait for the morning. She hoped that was okay.

It wasn’t okay, really, but there wasn’t anything I could do or say about it that would change the situation. Instead I just took a moment to sit there and wallow in self pity.

But I was hungry too, and eventually I got up to wash and eat the apple and two chocolates she’d left me. And when I did that, I realised that the water evidently was still working. I tried the shower, and the hot water wasn’t working, but cold water was still coming out.

Mexico City is cold at night. Very, very cold. But it was an easy choice between having a cold shower in the cold, and going to sleep feeling sticky and rank. I gritted my teeth and shivered my way through soaping up and rinsing down.

And then when I finally, finally, thought I could just snuggle into my bed and get a good night’s sleep, I heard a buzz.

Mosquitos. There were mosquitos in my room. Lots of them.

I spent literally an hour chasing and killing mosquitos before I realised that there was a tiny open window hidden behind some furniture, through which more mosquitos were constantly coming in. It took me some more time after closing that window to get the rest of the mosquitos.

I felt almost hysterical by the time I was done. Hysterical, and tired, and so over everything. When I finally crawled into bed, in a foetal position, it didn’t take very long for me to pass out. And as awful as the day had been, I did enjoy a very restful sleep.

Days like this are tough. But I’m glad that I get to experience both the good and bad parts of travelling. It’s because of days like this that I appreciate every other day so much more.