Traveling in a Country With a “Travel Advisory”

Is It Safe To Travel to a Country With a Heightened Travel Advisory from the Dept of State?

As you spin the globe and pick your next travel destination, you might settle upon a country that the United States Department of State has indicated is a bit more dangerous than your average walk down the street of your quiet suburban town. As anyone who watches the news knows, conflicts are occurring all over the planet that make travel difficult in some countries.

Now, the information I’m sharing here isn’t a look into traveling to places like North Korea, Iran, or Russia, where Americans aren’t usually thrown a welcome party but rather to countries where you might assume it’s dangerous to travel simply because the Department of State has indicated that there are some dangerous things going on in that corner of the world.

As always with my posts here, I’m writing from an American perspective, which means the experiences and relationships I convey here are from the perspective of someone who has grown up in the United States and traveled to several continents. I’ve traveled to countries the State Department has suggested I shouldn’t, and I’ve returned to tell the tale.

I think it’s an incredibly valuable experience to visit a country where the average American might assume that the level of safety you’d experience would be low or non-existent, only to find that following some basic situational awareness and doing some research before your departure is entirely sufficient for traveling safely through “dangerous” countries.

(note: some of the links here are to websites with which I am an affiliate, and your purchases help fund my website!)

My Experiences in Countries With High(ish) Travel Advisories

The countries I’ve traveled to that have had an elevated travel advisory (as of late 2024) are Vietnam, Colombia, and Morocco. When I traveled to Morocco, the advisory was a level 2, which means “”Exercise Increased Caution.” When I traveled to Vietnam, the travel advisory was also at a level 2, but it’s since been reduced to a level 1 (at the time of this writing, which is “Exercise Normal Precautions.”

For my travel to Colombia in June of 2023, the travel advisory was at a level 3, which was “Reconsider Travel.” From my research, I believe that the political climate in neighboring Venezuela was partially responsible for this rating, as well as the drug cartel activity still present in some of the rural areas of the country.

My traveling partner was actually a little concerned about the Colombian travel advisory, but honestly, I think I’d feel less safe walking around Downtown Los Angeles’s Skid Row (the giant homeless encampment we have here) than I would stroll along one of the less-wealthy neighborhoods of Bogota or Medellin.

Honestly, the closest I came in any country to anything suspect or dangerous was when we went to Cartagena, and my traveling partner was asked if he wanted drugs. The city is popular with Caribbean cruises, and it’s my guess that a lot of the travelers hop off their cruise ships looking to “party,” which leads to a pretty healthy level of drug activity. My traveling partner and I don’t “party,” and we also don’t drink alcohol, so we’re pretty boring.

Doing Your Due Diligence Regarding Safety While Traveling

As I would with virtually any international travel plan, the research I might conduct before departure would definitely impact my overall level of safety throughout my vacation. For example, when we traveled to Colombia, I did some research about the drug activity and the cartels, but it was easy to see that remaining with tourist groups and sticking to group activities and the cities would keep us out of harm’s way.

It’s also worth examining the government of the country you’re visiting. When we visited Vietnam, I expected that I might see some level of petty crime in the bigger cities like Hanoi and Ho Chi Min City, but the country exuded quite a high level of safety throughout our visit. Even when we were riding bikes in the middle of the countryside, there was no indication that anyone had any ill intent toward us.

I’d say that the nearest we came to any suspect activity was when we were in Morocco and walking around the crowded medinas of Marrakech and Fez. If you’re aware of your surroundings, it’s actually quite easy to notice when someone’s eyeing your purse or bag. You can experience petty crime there, but not when you remain vigilant and aware of your surroundings.

It’s always helpful to ask your tour guide, should you decide to take a tour of a heavily trafficked area of the city, what to watch out for when you’re walking around as a tourist. Some places do have significant pickpocketing activity, but those thieves can’t really operate successfully around tourists who know they could get their bags stolen.

Researching The Experiences of Other Recent Travelers

Some of the most amazing adventures from traveling internationally can come from trips made to environments that are totally different than your own. If you’re an American looking at taking your first international trip, you might be wondering whether you can truly enjoy yourself when the state department has told you that you need to “reconsider travel” to a particular locale.

I think that paying attention to current events and having some awareness of the various political climates of countries around the world can help you make your decision. I’ll take Colombia as an example since I traveled there when the Department of State had a “reconsider travel” advisory for a handful of South American countries.

Reading about the experiences of recent travelers is a good first step in figuring out whether it’s truly safe to travel. When my traveling partner and I went to Colombia, there weren’t a lot of Americans there except for some groups in Cartagena, who were mostly from the cruise ships. However, the country seemed to be pretty popular with travelers from Central America, as well as Mexico.

I was able to read the advice of recent travelers that told me about the dangers of heading off into the jungle on my own and booking tours instead whenever I found something I wanted to do that wasn’t in the middle of a large town. We did indeed head out into the rural hills outside of Bogota, but we were with a group and there was absolutely nothing to fear. I did my research and created what I felt was a safe itinerary for our visit.

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