I had never thought I would be travelling with someone.

Travelling with my Couchsurfing friends was imaginable, but other than it had barely ever crossed my mind. How did I ended up travelling around Calabria with my boyfriend, that I wasn’t quite sure.

Well, maybe because he was originally from there. Even though Calabria had never entered into any of my travel plans, it was a good opportunity to discover this rather ‘untouched’ region (and considerably unknown to many people outside Italy.)

When mentioned that I would be going to Calabria to Italians, question marks appeared on their faces, like they wanted to ask, ‘Why are you going there?’ and to people outside Italy, even Europeans, often asked where Calabria was.

After the quick 1 night stop in Rome, our Blablacar driver picked us up on the hottest sunny afternoon, and off we went down South, on a 7-hour drive to the toe of Italy.

We drove through the mountains and along the sea, the landscape of this place already had my heart.

I drifted in and out of sleep, listening to Italian conversations between the two sisters from the neighbouring town and my boyfriend, Antonio. At some point that night, we entered a small village by the sea called Saline Joniche, the place where Antonio came from.

From then, it was more about the experience, not the place. Every experience was new to me.

After a light dinner, we went out for a walk along the main street and he recalled the atmosphere of this village when he was a child to me, how people moved out to find work and the place was slowly dying. I could sense the nostalgic feeling in his voice when he talked about the big fair on the street he used to go, or how lively a bar next to his house was.

The next two and a half weeks in Calabria were quite interesting for me. This trip was definitely much different than any other I have experienced. I didn’t feel like I have learned, seen or experienced much of Calabria, but instead I learned about myself as much as what it’s like to share this travel experience with someone else. I learned to compromise and I learned about silly habits I would like to get rid of. It really was the trip about my relationship I thought it would be at the beginning, only so much more about that than I expected it to be.

There were more sweet than bitter moments, but both were equally important and valued. We learned to deal which each other’s mood and habits. I learned to stop and compromise. We learned to talk and apologise.

I also learned a lot about myself and the way I overthink things. I was scared of making decision because I was afraid of the consequence. Since I didn’t travel by myself, it wasn’t just me who would bear the consequence of my decisions, and I didn’t want to feel responsible for his feelings. I was afraid to be blamed when something went wrong, and sometimes I didn’t want to say my crazy weird ideas out loud because I knew that he would be likely to let me choose what I want to do just for me to be happy. But I wanted him to make the choices he want too.

Although I also knew that seeing me happy was what made him happy as well.

This trip also thought me about the beauty of sharing all these new experiences with someone. Someone who was willing to be a part of my journey. At the end, what I would remember from this trip was more likely to be those moments we shared, rather than beautiful places. Like the two hours of sweaty walk uphill and the conversation about travelling we had, running our of cash while we were staying in a small village or having rustic dinner in our tent after a long walk along the river; our sunset, sunrise and midnight (skinny) dips in the sea or lying on the beach, gazing into the stars under the moonlight. The beaches I had been to in Sardinia were no doubts much more stunning than here, but there were no beautiful shared memories created on those beaches.

Unlike when I was in Puglia, it wasn’t Calabria that had left an impression on my, it was being in Calabria with Antonio that did.

This had truly become a journey of my relationship. Something that had crossed my mind before but never thought it would happen so early. Right here, right now.