Adventurous over 50’s want more from their holiday abroad

Did you know that last year, a 73-year-old Japanese woman became the oldest female to climb to the summit of Everest, the world's tallest peak?  Pretty impressive stuff – but apparently it’s all the rage!

A new survey from a major UK travel company has revealed this week, that Brits over the age of 50 have a growing taste for adventure travel.  Forget laying towels on the pool-side sun-beds at 6am, never mind lazing on golden sands in your sandals and socks or paddling in the shallows, todays over 50’s Brits are looking for something much more exotic.

Such adventure travel usually means visiting places further afield, whether it’s coming face to face with dangerous wildlife on a safari in Kenya, mountaineering in Nepal, a colourful rainforest trek in Malaysia or a visit to an under-developed country; the chances of meeting locals who don’t speak English is magnified.  Being able to communicate in those native languages would certainly add a little more colour to the whole traveller experience; but for most of us laid-back Brits content with muddling along, phrase book in hand, we could find ourselves in a difficult situation should we fall ill during a trek, have an accident or get bitten by a poisonous snake for example.  Flicking through a phrase book just might not be an option.

It’s encouraging to hear that more people want to experience new cultures and destinations in later life, but engaging in daring experiences in a bid to get the most out of trips abroad can also be dangerous if travellers are not adequately prepared.  There is a tendency to be so fixated on the excursion or holiday itself that the serious side of travelling half way across the world is overlooked – even though travellers are venturing further afield to unfamiliar countries and climates.  It pays to do some research and also to recognise that when it comes to language barriers, UK travellers will increasingly find themselves in scenarios where they simply don’t understand what is being said to them.  In most cases that won’t be the end of the world, but in some it might be just that.

Most people wouldn’t go on an adventure holiday without travel insurance (they may even take out a better policy so that they are covered for other instances), so using a service like i-interpret4u to make sure you can communicate in over 85 languages if you need to, would give extra peace of mind as an inexpensive but much-needed addition to the comfort of good insurance cover.