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People tend to have consuming, negative impressions concerning travel safety. Most think of travel safety as an endless list of regulations strong enough to confine you to your own home. Instead, the focus of travel safety is simply the opposite. With the proper groundwork, you can spend your trip thinking about the beautiful places you could be visiting as opposed to worrying about what could go wrong. You could be anywhere in the world and the chances are your trip will be completely safe.

The unfortunate truth is that the trips which get interrupted or ended early tend to have one thing in common. The unfortunate, positive, and negative streak of bad luck that you experienced on your trip is usually waiting to capitalize on your lack of preparation.

Not all trips carry the same risk

Not all trips carry the same level of risk and it is important to be completely honest with yourself about the type of trip you’re taking. A three week trip across a city in Europe and a three month expedition through a remote country are both still considered “travel,” but they are in completely different categories. If you treat them all the same way you are likely to get yourself into trouble. You shouldn’t have to pay a price for your trip to a new city, but you could pay with your life for a poorly planned trip to a remote country.

In order to be clear about the effort you’re putting in, a gap year spent traveling from one hostel to another, requires a different mindset, compared to a corporate posting in an unstable country, which is, in turn, different to a guided trek. The closer you are to easy assistance like hospitals, embassies, or a cell signal, the less you have to prepare. The further you are from those things, the more important your preparation, and the less you can rely on your ability to make things up as you go.

Look into your destination, not the marketing

Do the research and see where you’re really going before you put your money down. If you’re in the UK, your first stop can be the foreign travel advice from your government, but don’t stop there. Update yourself on the travel warnings as the flight date approaches.

You also want to dig deeper to avoid the common traveler’s mistakes. Learn about common tourist traps, and local scams to avoid. If you’re going somewhere with seasonal weather that may affect your travel plans, stay informed. The sea and some mountain passes may be impassable at certain times of the year, among other things. All of this unexciting but unprepared travel can cause a lot of avoidable travel complications.

Insurance that Matches What You Actually Do

People make this mistake time and time again. They think they’re fully covered once they check the travel insurance box without understanding the coverage. They end up cheap policy customers who end up discovering that their travel insurance excludes provisions for at least half their travel plans.

Standard policies exclude so-called “hazardous activities” — a broad category that includes anything from mountain climbing and “high altitude” trekking to diving, skiing, off-piste fun, and even engine-restricted fun. If your travel plans include any of the above, look for the policy that explicitly covers the activity you’re planning to do. A policy that doesn’t mention the thing that put you in the hospital isn’t going to help you when you try to claim. Don’t make the policy number and the insurer’s emergency number a digital note that is most likely going to remain on your phone. Text it on a piece of paper.

Health, and the Distance to Help

You should prioritize the medical aspect and take preventative measures. Not considering this when traveling means you won’t get critical vaccinations and medications that you may need for travel planned weeks in advance.

The aspect of safety that people most overlook is distance. In a city, you are almost always near a pharmacy or hospital. While on a remote trip, you may be days away from either, and a problem that you would ignore back at home, may end the trip, or be even worse. Carry a sensible kit, and keep any prescription medicine in the original packaging, with a copy of the prescription. Split the kit across bags so a lost bag will not leave you with nothing. If you are going somewhere extremely isolated, this is no longer a luxury. It makes the difference between the ability to control the situation, versus being completely careless in managing the situation.

What no checklist can cover

There are lots of safety-based scenarios that focus more on your instincts, and the one thing a lot of people are most reluctant about is responding to their instincts. Most people ignore the withdrawn, empty street, the overly eager-to-help-stranger, or the dubious deal to avoid appearing rude or overly-paranoid.

When it is a safety based scenario, be rude. Get in the cab, say no, leave the bar, and walk in the opposite direction. You’ve probably only lost a moment’s awkwardness, and the potential positives are immeasurable.

The quieter habits help too. Don’t show off. The expensive watch and the camera that hangs around your neck don’t mark you out in a way that helps. Spread your wealth in more than one place. Tell someone at home about your plans, that way if you go dark, they won’t be left in the dark about your whereabouts and the people that care about you won’t have to figure it out where you are and what you are doing.

When winging it isn’t enough

Common sense and decent preparation should get you through most trips. But, there are some that just go beyond that and it’s a grown-up thing to know which ones those are.

Your first big solo trip. When you are traveling to remote and unforgiving territories. When your work takes you to places where the risks go beyond having street-smarts, things like civil unrest and being very far away from rescue. The trips where proper planning and preparation have to include training about how to figure out the lay of the land and the risks, how to plan for the threats and what to do if things go sideways. People who have that type of preparation say the same thing and for the same reason. It’s definitely worth being grown-up about.

For a two-week stay at a normal holiday resort you could easily skip a lot of the above. Strap on the gear before cycling across the continent or heading to a genuinely hostile environment. The most difficult thing will be understanding where on that line your trip falls — that’s the call you’d be wise to get correct.

Then go

Once the tedious but necessary prep work is complete let the fun part of the trip begin and bring those documents and supplies along! All the prep work is behind you and you deserve the break so firm the prep and enjoy the trip you worked hard for.