many of my best dreams, the ones i remember large parts of after waking up, and that doesn't happen often, involve waking up in strange places in them places where i know i belong, or am at least welcome to be there but places i hadn't been the day before, or at least not quite like any place i had ever been awake. and usually knowing none of the people there, but sometimes getting to know some of them a little bit as the dream goes on or other times, not really seeing anyone at all. the most recent was something like a college dormitory. they're always "co-ed" too, but people there always take that as no big thing, and don't really go about life as any different then our own everyday because of it.
It sounds exciting! Are you about to go to college or some other life change like that? Either way, it sounds exciting!
been several times. been a long time since. some dreams in what this world after ecopocalypse might be like. not many (of tiny population anyway) live in what had been large towns, but some of what had been universities are some of the best remaining places.
I thought you meant literally waking up someplace you'd never been. Once, after a night of heavy drinking, I woke up in someone's front yard surrounded by candy wrappers and such. I had apparently decided to walk home, stopped at a convenience store along the way with the munchies, and passed out. The best I can remember I woke up about 6:00 am when a car passed by and honked at me. It took a while to orient myself but I finally figured out what neighborhood I was in, so I cleaned up my garbage and staggered on home.
that's not far from how many of them start, though they usually start sort of in the middle, walking alone or intering some place or sometimes having to deal with something. haven't had that in real life, nor specifically that either. i guess because consuming mind altering anything has never played a major role in either. and i usually recognize where i would be on a map, not that i have ever had one with me or needed one, other then when they change the bus or trolly routes, and there's usually maps and notices at the stops when they do. but is also been as or more often to smaller places or out in the woods where they don't have any. sometimes i'll find myself in someone else's yard, or in an apartment that is mine that i didn't realize was and not like any place i've lived awake. sometimes it will be places i've been in real life, but greatly altered, or familiar dreamworld places, also things change over time in both.