After returning from a self-driving tour to South Taihang with two friends a few days ago, I was exhausted and secretly swore in my heart that I would never go on a trip with others again. There were too many contradictions in this trip.
Before departure, both families knew that I often go out, so they insisted that I make a travel plan. I didn’t think too much about it and made a travel plan based on a three-day self-driving tour in Nan Taihang.
After reporting the content to both of them, they had no objection, so I thought everything was fine.
On the first day, when we were walking up Yuntaishan as planned, we were stopped by the police at the Yuntaishan Scenic Area. They told me that Shanxi was building a road, so we could only go through Wujiawan.
We had no choice but to turn back and go to Wujia Bay. As you can imagine, it is summer vacation now, so there must be a lot of people in Wujia Bay.
As expected, there were constant traffic jams on the road leading to Wujia Bay. At this time, everyone was stuck here and could only endure it silently. What else could they do?
When there was a traffic jam, their two families kept running to my car and complained to me that the traffic jam was too severe and they would not have come here if they had known.
When we were almost at Wujia Bay, everyone went to the toilet by the roadside. One of the children saw a pear tree by the roadside with good fruit, and the pears were not tall, so he picked one.
What he didn’t see was that the owner was sitting behind the wall, so he scolded him.
As soon as I saw him, I hurried over to apologize. I knew that this old man from Shanxi wasn’t necessarily trying to extort money, he just couldn’t stand tourists who took advantage of him.
Who knew that my friend’s wife pushed me aside and insisted on explaining. The old man couldn’t understand her Henan dialect, and she couldn’t understand the old man’s Shanxi dialect. Finally, a group of people from the village came out and refused to give in.
Seeing that the matter had gotten out of hand, I had no choice but to apologize to them in my unstandard Henan Mandarin, and only then the matter was resolved.
When we arrived at Wujia Bay, the children of several families had a great time playing in the water. Then our accommodation became a problem. One family wanted to stay in a comfortable and high-end place, while the other family thought that economical and affordable would be fine. In my opinion, simple and affordable would be fine. However, one family said that they came out to enjoy themselves and did not want to be wronged.
When I saw that there were too many conflicts, I suggested that each family find their own place to live and eat their own food.
I originally thought that this would reduce disagreements, but I still oversimplified things.
During the rest of the trip, we still had conflicts and our paces were totally inconsistent. One family liked to take their time to enjoy the scenery and take photos; the other family was in a hurry to get to the next attraction. As a result, we often got separated and had to wait for each other, wasting a lot of time and patience.
This self-driving tour in South Taihang left me exhausted. I originally thought it was a way to enhance friendship and share good times, but I didn’t expect that due to various conflicts, everyone became resentful.
It seems that there are too many factors to consider when traveling with others, and it is very difficult to coordinate. Perhaps traveling alone or with family is a better choice for you. At least, these conflicts will not ruin your travel mood.
I hope that years of friendship will not be wasted because of this unpleasant incident.