Bad news for subscribers to the Noah’s Ark School of Travel. It doesn’t have to be done in pairs. More of us, sniff, are single now than ever, while fewer of our single friends can afford to come on holiday with us.

Flying solo comes with advantages: nobody to battle over the bathroom; nobody to compromise for; nobody to hate for a bit. But being on your own also means there’s the potential for the odd low. Here’s how to avoid them.

Blend in

Follow the example of Rory Stewart, who walked across Afghanistan in 2002, at the age of 29. He survived this fairly hairy undertaking by being fairly hairy — changing his appearance to match the locals, wearing grubby Afghan clothes, covering his bag with an old rice sack and being accompanied by a sorry-looking mastiff. But it takes preparation, which I’d forgotten in Bahrain’s capital, Manama.

Dressing in western clothes (a vaguely silhouette-revealing but fully covered combination of jeans and polo neck) and walking alone brought me leering, blown kisses and hooting. “Ah,” said my Anglo-Arab friend, “the only foreign women who walk outside alone are prostitutes.” (They can’t afford the air-conditioned SUVs that western women drive.)

Suspend your Britishness

And channel your inner American. That’s right. Stop avoiding eye contact and look up from your feet. Hold that gaze... and SMILE. Follow through with “Impressive hiking boots — how many miles have they clocked up?”, or something equally anodyne. Cringe indeed, but alternative routes to ensuring company are altogether more mortifying. Namely, holidays for single travellers (singlesholidays.com, travelone.co.uk, friendshiptravel.com). Or what about that veritable no-mates institution, the singles hotel? Exactly, so smile...

Find a purpose

All right, it’s a bit of a self-help cliché, but conceiving a mission will hush those nagging questions over whether it was a bad idea to go solo. It’s the Eat, Pray, Love school of thought — the American journalist Elizabeth Gilbert’s year-long solo quest through Italy (eat), India (pray) and Indonesia (love) to find herself, which spawned her bestselling memoir.

Research a theme, learn a language, achieve a personal resolution: this will provide structure and distraction when you’re lost for friends and the will to continue. It also sets another goal other than plain happiness, which is really rather restrictive. Besides, if something better comes along — a wealthy Brazilian, in Gilbert’s case — you can always suspend your duties.

Go back to school

Because you’ll learn so much more than what’s on the curriculum — such as social mores, anthropology and where the locals like to lunch. Try an ironic dance class such as Crumpin’ and Clownin’ at Crunch gyms in America (crunch.com). Learn how to cook the local cuisine: On the Menu (holidaysonthemenu.com) has a whole range of cookery courses, from Thailand to Sydney, via Mexico or Morocco; or try tastingplaces.com.

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