‘The men! I felt like prey. Even the husbands sitting with their wives would break their necks to stare at you walking down the street.’
American female solo traveller Eve Kovac, 19, is telling MailOnline Travel about her first trip to Europe – and about her experience of visiting Albania, where she ‘did not feel very safe’.
Eve, from Connecticut, set off on her first solo adventure just a few months after she turned 18.
She notes: ‘I left America for three months alone with a one-foot-by-one-foot backpack. I had this itch that there was something out there for me.’
Eve amassed 154,000 followers on Instagram, under the username @outdoor.eve, by documenting her adventures through seven countries during her trip.
American solo traveller Eve Kovac, 19, tells MailOnline Travel about her first trip to Europe – and her experience of visiting Albania (above)
Above is Eve in Albania, where she ‘felt like prey’. She added: ‘Even the husbands sitting with their wives would break their neck to stare at you walking down the street’
She tells MailOnline she wanted to prove to herself that ‘the world is not just huge, but kind’.
‘I was right,’ she added. Though at times Albania left her feeling like a ‘target’.
She adds: ‘[While there] I had someone touch my hair in the supermarket, and a few people took my picture. I figure because I am blonde and short with blue eyes, I can be a target.’
Norway was a contrast, as she felt safest there.
She says: ‘Norway shocked me by how safe I felt. I took the locks off my bag the second day.
‘There was not an overwhelming welcome like I found in Italy, but just an overall feeling of safety and security.’
Italy took the prize of being her favourite European country to visit. Eve comments: ‘My favourite place in Europe is the Amalfi coast in Italy! I have found great hospitality, surf, and agricultural work there.’
Eve is pictured here in Norway, a country so safe it ‘shocked’ her
Eve wanted to prove to herself that ‘the world is not just huge, but kind’. Here she is shown travelling in Spain (left) and her favourite European country, Italy (right)
However, it was a different story across the Ionian Sea in Greece.
Eve says: ‘In Greece, my hostel was infested with bed bugs. A nightmare. I problem-solved, slept in my hammock, and left the next morning. That was before I knew about having “oh s**t” money for a hotel.’
Having completed her European travels, she says every country has taught her something.
Now, she’s offering safety advice to would-be travellers.
Eve explains: ‘My safety precautions are to bring locks for my bags, always keep track of my belongings, and stay aware.
‘Never give anyone money who asks, never take something from a stranger.
‘I follow my gut and believe in that wholeheartedly. If the feeling is right, then it’s right. When you start to feel it’s wrong, you know it’s wrong.
‘Last year. I had a week of travelling over six hours every day. I felt like cr*p. Take care of yourself. Slow down. Enjoy.’
Eve, who has visited 11 countries and is currently in Tromso, in the Arctic Circle, also notes that travelling is ‘cheaper’ than people think.
Eve is shown here in the Albanian Alps during her three-month-long solo travelling trip through Europe
Eve says she felt an ‘overall feeling of safety and security’ in Norway (where she’s pictured on the left), but didn’t get ‘an overwhelming welcome’ like she found in Italy (right)
She says: ‘I work a job for a few months and save up. Living rent-free in my van helps. I still have bills, phone, insurance, gas… but I am very good at budgeting myself to afford being abroad for a few months.
‘I definitely travel cheap. Cook a lot, buy what’s on sale, never buy clothes or makeup. I think I’ve had my nails done maybe twice in my life. Never had my eyelashes done and have been cutting my own hair for the past three years.
‘Cut costs where you can – it’s about priorities, and mine is travelling.’
Among the self-described nomad’s many jobs to fund her travel, she has worked as an RBT [Registered Behaviour Technician] for disabled children, as a bartender, in construction building skateparks, as a waitress, a dog walker, nanny, and even tried olive picking in Italy.
After completing her trip to Norway Eve is returning to Italy before backpacking around Europe for a month. Then, she will solo travel around Asia.