A traveller is looking for a gentle way to let down his friend after discovering they aren't compatible travel buddies not long into their road trip.
The adventurer explained how they'd embarked on a dream journey across New Zealand, heading down the north island at first.
The island has a huge amount to offer travellers, including parts of the Shire from Lord of the Rings and stunning glow worm caves.
Neither attraction, nor New Zealand's stunning mountain ranges and verdant woodlands, was enough to keep the two travellers together.
"He hasn't enjoyed all the tours we've been on and doesn't want to chat about anything," the exasperated globe trotter wrote in a Reddit post.
"We're a week into our trip and this is the quietest I've ever been when hanging out with another person as he rebuffs all my attempts at conversation.
"He wears his Airpods in the car and around the accommodation - not that I've kept trying to talk to him. Honestly, he is bringing some seriously bad vibes to everything and it's ruining my trip.
"We don't have anything booked in yet for the South Island, so I'm planning to ditch him in Wellington at the ferry.
"Probably book my own car in Picton and just relax alone for the rest of the trip. (Just thinking about it is such sharp relief that it makes me feel emotional. I'll pay whatever price I have to just to get away from him.)
"Obviously telling him he is ruining my trip with his negative energy isn't the best way to approach this.
"Any advice for the best approach so we can split amicably? Or at least not have an argument that ends with very hurt feelings?"
The difficulty of getting rid of a travel companion was recognised by users writing in the comments, many of whom delivered some genuinely quite helpful advice.
"I would be as honest as you can while being nice," one person wrote.
"Next time you’re both in the hotel or whatever just say 'hey man, I was thinking about when we get to X—it seems like we like to travel really differently and I think it’s stressing us both out, so how do you feel about splitting up after that stop?'"
Another person noted that the traveller had clearly made their mind up on what they wanted to do, but how to do it needed to be decided.
"It really just depends on him and your friendship with him," they said.
"You already know what you want to do, you just need to find the best way to communicate that with him and then do it.
"For the future, I avoid longer trips (more than two to three days) with people I have not already done a shorter trip with because of how the dynamic changes."
One person recalled how they had gone to Scotland with a good friend, only to discover that they had different approaches to holidays.
"He wanted to just pub crawl. I wanted to go explore and sightsee," they wrote.
"He was up until 2am and didn't get up until almost noon. I was up at 7am and went to bed at 11pm.
"He was drunk most of the time and loud and rude and demanding and I was embarrassed most of the time and too anxious to tell him where to go.
"After an hour of this (joke it was actually after about four days) I finally told him we have to talk. And we sat down and had a very candid discussion about the differences.
"I told him I don't want to lose him as a friend, but we were perilously close.
"We agreed that for the remainder of the trip (another week plus) we would do our own thing and just meet up for dinner.
"And that's what we did. Once the expectations were knocked down, it was so much nicer. It was really the expectations that were getting in the way."
A fourth advisor said they had gone through a similar process of resetting expectations.
They said: "This happened to me and the guy handled it well. It was a group of five 20-23 year old guys traveling together and one got sick of the testosterone fest.
"Admittedly, it was intense. He just said, 'Hey you guys are starting to piss me off and I don't want to get resentful or hate you so I'm going to go do my own thing and we can link up later.'
"He travelled solo seeing different cities in the same direction of us and we linked up two weeks later and finished out the six month trip together and had a great time. Directness is a good way to go."
How would you let a travel partner down? Tell us in the comments below.
