Flying Solo on Your Next Trip? Avoid These 10 Countries.

The world's riskiest destinations include a few surprises.

January 29, 2019 9:00 am

Traveling by yourself means leaving your troubles behind.

But new dangers may lie ahead, particularly if you’re headed to Venezuela. That’s according to the Solo Travel Safety Report 2019, produced by the travel site Wegoplaces.me and with info sourced from the Gallup Global Law and Order Report, Global Peace Index 2018 and guidelines from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO).

Venezuela “topped” the riskiest countries for solo travelers report, followed by Afghanistan, South Sudan, Gabon and Liberia. More tourist-y countries in the dangerous 10 included South Africa, Mexico and the Dominican Republic. (Botswana and Sierra Leone rounded out the riskiest list.)

The numbers in the report were based on surveys taken in 142 countries that quantified the “population of that country’s feeling of safety and security.” Of which there is almost none in Venezuela, which is currently under the unstable reign of Nicolas Maduro and where 42% of residents reported having property or money stolen in the last year.

If you do have to go to South America’s most dangerous land, the FCO now advises against all travel within 80 kilometers

of Venezuela’s border with Colombia and within 40 km of the border with Brazil, due to the presence of drug traffickers and illegal armed groups. As well, “all but essential travel” is discouraged within the remaining parts of the country.

(As well, the U.S. State Department just issued a level four travel advisory for Venezuela, placing it in the same category as Syria, Iraq and Iran.)

The safest places to go it alone? Singapore by quite a margin, followed by Norway, Iceland, Finland and Uzbekistan. Why so nice? The Solo Travel survey credits “economically developed countries with a strong rule of law.”

If you really want to travel solo and do it well (and safely), we suggest using the help of an experienced adventure travel company.

[H/t D’Marge]

Photo by Andrés Gerlotti on Unsplash

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