22 Eerie, Unsettling, And Truly Unfortunate Travel Stories That Have Me Stressing From The Comfort Of My Own Home
We asked members of the BuzzFeed Community to tell us about the eerie, unsettling, or just plain unfortunate things they've experienced while traveling. Here are the wild stories they shared:
1."After a series of decisions that I was increasingly (and vocally) uncomfortable with, I ended up with no choice but to get on a small boat from a port south of Mombasa in Kenya. We were aiming to get to Zanzibar, but after a fairly terrifying (though beautiful) journey, we had to jump out of the boat into the sea at a beach on Pemba (an island north of Zanzibar). We were met by men with a tiny truck, and all had to cram in with our luggage and be driven for several hours through dense jungle. At one point, we stopped and money was demanded, but we had nothing left at all. There was a gun bandied around."
"We eventually made it to a town, and the men said they’d take us to the police station. We didn’t trust anything by then, so we insisted they take us to the only guest house listed in the Lonely Planet for that town. It was closed and in darkness, but the owner came out when we knocked and took us in. He saved our lives that day. We’d only gotten that far because we were a group of 12. We had some difficulties sorting out visas the day after!"
—Anonymous
2."I was on a safari with my husband and some friends. One morning, I wasn’t feeling well and decided to skip the morning game drive. After a few hours, I felt better and decided to go to the main lodge and have a little breakfast. We were not allowed to walk without guides at night, EVER, but this was during the daylight, so I didn’t think twice. I was about halfway to the main lodge when I heard twigs snapping and some chomping. I froze in place, unable to even look at what animal was making the noise. After what seemed like an hour (but was probably more like a minute), someone from the main lodge came out and told me to walk very slowly towards him. I was not to look up or at the animal. I had to just look at my feet, take one step, stop, and do it again."
"It took about 10 minutes to get to the lodge. During that whole time, I still had no idea what kind of animal it was. I could smell it, but I wasn’t allowed to look for fear it would charge at me. Once I was safe, I looked back, and it was the largest elephant EVER! The funny part was that when my husband and friends came back from their safari drive, they were disappointed because they didn’t see anything. 'My' elephant decided to hang around the lodge, and I was able to show my husband and friends what I had been up to that morning. Needless to say, I never went anywhere without an escort for the rest of the week."
—Anonymous
3."I am actually still recovering from my experience. I went to India on a business trip with a couple of colleagues (including the new chief technology officer). Traveling from the UK, you lose a day, and I was hit with the worst jet lag I've ever had. I slept through all of Sunday, day and night. On Monday, I went to the office to work, and still kept falling asleep. We then went out to dinner, and I got a migraine. The next day, we went back to the office, then out for dinner. Something to note is that literally everywhere was over an hour away. During the middle of dinner, I started feeling funny. By the time I was back at the hotel, I had the most painful and violent food poisoning ever. I managed to simultaneously poop myself while vomiting. I was bound to my room from Tuesday night until Friday morning. I couldn't be more than 10 feet from the toilet."
"On Friday morning, we had to leave at 4:00 a.m. to get our flight. The airport was two hours away. My colleagues were awesome and called multiple hotels on the route ahead of time to confirm I could dash in, as needed. I then spent the next 24 hours traveling and periodically vomiting and pooping. At the airport? Check. On the two flights? Check. On the two-hour drive home from the airport? Check. I'm now at home and coming to the end of my first day back, and I still can't eat anything without bringing it back up. I spent a long time trying to figure out what it was, as I only drank bottled water, no ice, and no uncooked fruit or vegetables. Turned out the cocktail I had was chilled with ice before being served to me. Devastating."
4."My mum and I once stayed in a bed & breakfast, and the owner was a seemingly normal, middle-aged man. He showed us to our room, which opened with an old-fashioned key, and he told us that when we went to bed, not to leave our key in the lock because if there was an emergency, he wouldn't be able to get in, which was odd. There was no bolt on the inside. The second he left, we said in unison, 'Let's leave the key in the lock!' which we did, and turned it slightly so that it couldn't be pushed out. Much later, just after we'd turned out the lights (but weren't asleep yet), we heard soft footsteps outside the door, and then heard someone trying a key in the lock. They tried again, then must have realized it wasn't going to work because ours was still in it, and left. The next morning, he acted normal, but kept giving us the side-eye."
"God knows what he intended. He wasn't a big man, and I'm pretty sure we could have overpowered him if he'd tried anything, but it was SO creepy."
5."About 15 years ago, I was working for a bit in LA and staying at a famous Hollywood hotel. Very swanky. They still used actual metal keys, not keycards. After one late night of partying, I staggered to my room, turned the key in the lock, and went in. As I was pulling my clothes off, I looked at the desk with the MacBook on it and said to myself, 'I don’t remember leaving that open.' I remembered using it earlier, but I definitely closed it. Then, I looked further around the room. IT WAS NOT MINE. I guess the hotel saved money by having a finite number of unique keys and replicated the locks for multiple rooms. This room was directly above my actual room. Naturally, the next morning, I called the front desk and told them my story. I was MAD. Amazingly, this was not the last time I stayed at this particular famous hotel, but the very next time I stayed there, they had keycards."
6."My scariest/freakiest experiences weren't while at my destination, they were while on the plane getting there. I've had several unsettling events happen, but the one that was the worst was on a flight from Salt Lake City to San Diego. I always try to sit in the window seat. On this trip, I felt the plane begin to descend, but it seemed too early, so I looked out the window. All I could see was desert, and having flown into SD before, I knew this wasn't right. About that time, the captain came on and said, 'Folks, we're having a problem with one of our hydraulic systems, and the company wants us to try to land in Las Vegas.' Two things about his statement really hit me. First, he said 'try to land,' and second, he didn't mention which hydraulic system."
"To make it even more unnerving, as I looked out the window, fire trucks were pacing the plane (as best they could anyway). When we touched down, the engines went into reverse, and we slowed down and made it to the gate. It turns out a hose for the hydraulic brakes wasn't tightened properly, and hydraulic fluid sprayed all around the wheel well and on the tires. The company and fire department were afraid the hydraulic fluid would ignite when we landed. So, we landed in a puff of smoke with no brakes. Four hours later, we re-boarded the same plane and went to SD."
7."It was the third night of our honeymoon in Mo'orea. We were in an oceanfront bungalow at a beautiful resort and had spent the previous two nights falling asleep with every window and door in the bungalow open so we could experience the ocean breeze and amazing smells from the island. In the middle of our third night, we were awoken by awful, blood-curdling screams off in the distance. My husband and I were frozen in that moment, but we could tell the other was also awake. The screams got louder and louder as they were making their way to us. We laid there frozen in fear since all of our windows and doors were open. The closer it got, we were able to hear the words 'stop' and 'please don't hurt me,' accompanied by constant screams. At this point, you could hear footsteps moving along the walkway outside the bedroom window."
"The only phone in the bungalow was out in the living room, so my husband dropped to the floor and crawled to the living room where he called the front desk to tell them something was going on. They assured him they would immediately look into it and to remain in our bungalow. He quickly closed each of the windows, locked the doors, and crawled back in bed with me, where we laid in silence and waited to hear if the resort was investigating. We laid there awake in silence until the sun came up. The next morning, we saw our neighbors on their patio and asked them if they had heard anything. There was great fear on their faces, as they also heard the commotion. The four of us went to the hotel front desk to ask them what had happened, and the front desk acted as though they had no idea what we were talking about. Needless to say, our neighbors packed their bags and left the island two days early while my husband and I remained at the resort for our final night before moving on to our next island. To this day, 20 years later, this has been the scariest moment in all of our travels."
—Anonymous
8."On a climbing trip in South America, I was anchoring the rope at Chimborazo's crater rim at about 20,000 feet when a refrigerator-sized chunk of ice broke off the glacier above me. As it flew past me into the void, it made noise I can't describe and will never forget. The team above me didn't hear it or see it."
—Anonymous
9."When I was 18, I went to Europe for the first time. I met some great people in a hostel in Salzburg, and we decided to travel to Budapest together. I didn’t realize I needed a visa (this was 1999), and I ended up being removed from the train by soldiers and sent back to Austria. None of my travel companions needed a visa, and border security made them stay on the train. The small station had full police cells! A lot of tears later, they found me an English translator who explained that I could get a visa at the auto border in Austria and make my way back across. I managed to be reunited with my travel buddies a day later, following a frantic visit to an internet cafe. I never told my parents this story!"
10."I was sent to work for the week in a very small town in the middle of nowhere. After landing at a 'regional airport,' I was informed that my final leg was on a five-seater plane. Five. Seater. Plane. The local airport was smaller than my high school gym, and that's where I discovered that my luggage was missing AND that there were only two flights in and out of this airport each WEEK. I told the agent: 'There were five people on the flight, and you lost my luggage. That means you lost 20% of the luggage on this flight!' After struggling with the luggage issue, I went to access my rental car from the car rental desk (no counter, just a desk) and was told the LONE rental vehicle (MY rental vehicle) had just been rented out to one of the other travelers before I got to the desk because I was 'late.'"
"The temperature never went over 14 degrees that entire week, and every day I had to walk five blocks from the hotel to the account and back, washing out my clothing at night and drying them (sort of) with the hair dryer. Why didn't I buy some clothes? Because I had no way of getting to any store outside of town, and there were only two clothing stores in the town, and both had weekday hours of 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. I worked until 5:00 p.m. Besides the restaurant in the hotel, there was one other place to eat in the whole town. Quite an eye-opener for someone born and raised 12 miles outside of Manhattan. When the shuttle bus came to pick me up to return me to the airport, I opened the door, and there sat my suitcase, which, of course, simply returned to the airport with me."
—Anonymous
11."We went camping on an island in the Everglades, and a huge storm rolled in. Our tents were blown over, and the next morning, our Sea-Doo boat was washed up on shore and we had to wait for high tide to get it off the island. Everything was soaking wet."
—Anonymous
12."I was on holiday with a friend in our early 20s, and we had booked a super cheap deal which ended up with us staying at a very remote hotel. It was actually nice — right by the ocean with a pool and a huge room — so we were enjoying the week. Then, we started talking to some of the staff one night, and the chef started giving us creepy vibes. We laughed it off and went back to our room, but joked we should block the door as well as lock it (you needed a key to enter regardless). So, we shoved all the chairs in front of it and went to bed. In the morning, we woke up and saw the chairs had been pushed forward a couple of inches where someone had opened the door and tried to come in. We were freaked out, to say the least!"
—Anonymous
13."When I was leaving my hotel room in Amsterdam, a man ran up to me, grabbed my shoulders, and started screaming at me in German. I was so freaked out that I just froze until he screamed at me in English that his wife was dead and to get help. About an hour later, the EMTs (I think?) came down with a body bag. 😳"
14."I was studying abroad in Italy and got really, really sick all of a sudden. I was living in a smaller town, and no one at the hospital spoke English. The program director ended up having to accompany me to the hospital to translate. I had a high fever and they sent me in for a ton of testing, including a vaginal ultrasound and an EKG. I ended up staying for five days, often by myself for the majority of the day. Because the problem was with my GI system, they didn't let me eat for three days. While I was there, I got a blood clot in my arm from the IV and had to give myself daily shots of blood thinners to fix it. To this day, I'm not totally sure what happened, I just know it was something gastrointestinal."
—Anonymous
15."In 1974, I was hitchhiking around the US. One night, in some small town in the Midwest, I decided to sleep under a picnic table in a public park. It was very late and nobody was in the park. I awoke from a deep sleep and heard people talking. I realized that there were teenagers trying to put a plastic bag over my head. As I sat up, they got scared and ran away. Somehow, I did manage to get some sleep."
—Anonymous
16."During my study abroad in Spain, I took a weekend solo trip to Berlin to visit a friend. While waiting in line to board the plane in Madrid, two guys in front of me asked me to take a picture of them, so I did. This was shortly after the movie Taken was released, and I naturally don't trust people, so I was wary when they kept trying to talk to me. The one guy started talking to me in English, but I pretended not to be able to speak it well, so I kept responding in Spanish. When he started saying fun things like, 'Is anyone meeting you at the airport?', 'Does anyone know where you are?', 'Do you need a ride when you get there?', and 'The trains won't be running that late. You can stay with us,' my hackles went up."
"The dude kept asking me creepy stuff like that, even after I responded that people knew where I was, my friend was meeting me there and giving me a ride, and that I was staying with him. This went on up until I boarded the plane and took the first empty seat with no available seating around it. When I got off the plane in Berlin, I did a speed-walk out of the gate to find my friend at baggage claim. I spotted my friend and rushed over to him saying: 'Hi. Great to see you. Get to the car. I'll explain once we're there.' Thankfully I didn't check a bag, because I could see the guys who were way too interested in my travel plans searching the baggage claim area (and not for their bags)."
—Anonymous
17."I was traveling in Cuba just after things had started to open up again after the pandemic. I was staying with my friend in Cienfuegos. We'd been out looking for food, which was challenging, and ended up eating and getting a bit merry in a bar. Fast forward the next day, and I'm not feeling so hot. I assumed it was heatstroke. I was sunbathing outside when all of a sudden, I got this overwhelming urge to go to the toilet. I ran to our room, and suddenly poo exploded out of me and all over the floor. I was bedridden for two days, other than trips to the toilet. I was finally admitted to the hospital and put on a drip. Worst trip ever. I ended up in an all-inclusive hotel (we had already booked it) only able to eat rice and drink water."
—Anonymous
18."My first trip abroad, I got sick on the plane ride over and ended up being awake for an entire transatlantic flight while the person next to me also got sick, but after taking an ambien. When we arrived, I ended up passing out on the way to the hotel. After just 24 hours in a new country, I had to be sent in an ambulance to the nearest ER for fluids. When we got there, we got front-row seats to the local police extricating a balloon of drugs from a screaming person's mouth, who, by the way, had been handcuffed to the back of the wheelchair he was in. I did not have that on my bingo card for the start of the trip, that’s for sure. The rest of the trip was uneventful, save for the EMTs who took me to the hospital inviting us to their annual charity festival. I still have a picture with the EMT who dutifully tried to shove a candy bar in my mouth as I thrashed my head around to avoid eating it."
—Anonymous
19."While studying abroad in Spain, I had a roommate who liked to drink a little too much. She nearly got us arrested one night after punching an off-duty cop in the face. We had to drag her back to the apartment kicking and screaming, where she then punched our roommate. She woke up several of our neighbors, who also threatened to call the police. It seemed like she'd never stop, but with the help of some friends, she eventually calmed down and no one got the cops involved. I'd never seen someone in that state, even back home, but it gave me a crash course in dealing with belligerent drunks."
20."I was traveling with an ex to a friend's wedding in Albania. We were going to go to the wedding, then to Greece for a few days. We had a layover in Turkey. My ex wasn't American, so I told her to make sure she got the proper visa to enter Europe. We boarded the plane at JFK, and the ticketing agent gave us a look, but they let us through. We got to Turkey to get on the plane to Albania. Turns out my ex didn't get a visa, so she couldn't get on the plane. She told me the embassy said she didn't need a visa. A two-minute Google searched proved her wrong, so she just never went and figured it would be okay. I pre-booked all the hotels in Greece, so I lost all that money. I almost missed the wedding, but I put her in a hotel and went to Albania alone. She also brought no money or credit cards, so I had to pay for everything and give her money for food while I was gone."
"To add insult to injury, my phone didn't work overseas, so for about 24 hours, no one knew where I was. My friend sent his cousin to pick me up in Albania, but I never showed. He had no idea where I was or what happened to me. Then, I got back to Turkey and found my ex arguing with the hotel manager, who was threatening to call the police."
21."I left the US with my father to take him on a bucket list trip to Egypt. Between the time we left home and the time we landed in Cairo, the revolution of 2013 had begun. We had no warning whatsoever. While being driven to our hotel, we had to take numerous detours due to roadblocks and angry protesters. Luckily, we were able to see a few Cairo sites by special appointment, but only by leaving the hotel in the early hours of the morning (with armed guards). We ended up having to leave our hotel in the middle of the night several days early because the hotel next door had been breached and looted by protesters. I made the unfortunate decision to peek off of our balcony to see what was going on below, and was lightly exposed to tear gas. Luckily, we were able to fly to Luxor in the middle of the night, and we ended up having a wonderful trip. Egypt is a beautiful country, and all the Egyptian people we met were wonderful."
—Anonymous
22.Finally: "I was staying in Brussels at a hotel that didn't have a front desk, so they dealt with everything over WhatsApp. When I first arrived, I didn't have any information to get in, so I had to call them just for the door code. The first full day I was there, my room key stopped working and they had me go into the housekeeper's safe to find my room key from everyone else's room key and let myself into my room. This was also during the most recent World Cup and Morocco had won, so there was a lot of rioting around, causing the city to get shut down. I ended up trapped on a closed subway platform, waving down a subway train to get out of the city center, and taking a scooter two miles back to my hotel past dozens and dozens of riot police."
—Anonymous
😮 Wow. I'm just glad everyone was okay in the end. What's the most unsettling thing you've ever dealt with while traveling? Tell us your story in the comments!
Note: Submissions have been edited for length and/or clarity.
