Rick Steves' Protégé Gets Brutally Honest About The Worst Part Of Any International Trip

Travel guru Rick Steves has made a career of showing the joys of traveling abroad to his audience, but he is always practical with his advice. The same goes with his protégé Cameron Hewitt, who got brutally honest about the worst part of any international trip: The first few hours after landing.

In his blog, which lives on Rick Steves' Europe's website, Hewitt shared with readers an experience that has been universal for him since his early travel days: "There aren't many hard-and-fast rules of international travel. But one of them is this: The absolute worst few hours of any trip invariably take place on your day of arrival." Between disembarking on the tarmac, carrying luggage down stairs, through crowds and onto buses, and making it through immigration and customs, it's rare to be out of the airport and on your way quickly. If you're catching a connecting flight, the wait can be hours longer at the airport.

Once you're free from the clutches of passport control, you still have to get to your destination. The headache of hauling luggage from point A to point B while trying to find your hotel for the first time is never fun, especially in a foreign country. You usually forget just how painful it is until you're in the thick of it, but as Hewitt puts it, "that moment when you realize all that you've just endured has been worth it" will come as soon as you're out exploring. You just have to get there first. 

Prepare, prepare, prepare. This is probably the best thing you can do to make the process as seamless as possible — from the moment your plane lands to when you flop onto your hotel room bed. No matter where you may be traveling, ensure you have the documents you'll need — passports, Global Entry cards, visas — in an easily accessible place once you've disembarked. This will make getting through passport control faster and easier. It's important to know if a visa is required for entry to the country you're visiting, and how to travel without a visa as an American. You can also save time at customs coming back into the U.S. by registering for Mobile Passport Control.

Something Cameron Hewitt also discusses in his blog post is how exhausting finding your way from the airport to your accommodations can be. He writes, "You're more prone to epically stupid mistakes upon arrival than at any other point in the trip not involving unhealthy volumes of alcohol." While you may not be fully familiar with transportation options in a new place, try to have a general sense of how you'll get to your destination. Many major cities abroad have public transportation available at the airport, while others may require you to take a car or a taxi service. Going in with at least a rough plan of how you'll leave and what is worth your money is a good way to lessen the time waiting around outside the airport. For more planning advice, take advantage of Rick Steves' "secret research weapon" on your next trip.