BootsnAll Travel Community

Hi there,

Just got married back in October and had to postpone the honeymoon until I finished the project I'm on at work. We started talking about making a big trip for a good amount of time. Well, big turned in to RTW and good amount of time became a year. We are starting the whole planning process and man it is enough to make your head spin - itinerary, budget, packing, vaccinations, visas....ok I have to stop before I get dizzy....again.
So after doing a little research into the best times to visit the places we would like to go, I came up with the following VERY rough itinerary.

MAY MAY DEPART SF --> Prague
MAY-JUNPrague/Slovakia
JUL-AUGBudapest/Croatia
SEP Greece
OCT Instanbul
NOV Egypt
DEC Nigeria/Madagascar
JAN India (Angra and Cochin)
FEB Thailand/Cambodia/Vietnam
MAR China/Japan
APR Australia
MAY New Zealand

Looking at it again I start to wonder if we might be trying to do too much. We really want to be able to remain in places for a little while and not feel like we're constantly on the move. It's hard to know how much time a given city or country really merits.
I would love whatever feedback anyone has to offer.
We're just kinda getting started with this so anything you have to offer would be great.
Just like everyone just getting started, we really don't know what to expect budget-wise. I seem to be seeing the $20K number thrown around a lot as "tight" budget. Would that be reasonable if it doesn't have to include flights?


Thanks!
Tim

Hi There and congratulations on your marriage...

I would say that your jaunt throughout Europe is absolutely fine and spot on for timings.

I would be wary about trying to do Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam all in a month...you'll be on the move too much!!

Again trying to do China and Japan in a month is far too ambitious and you'll basically be travelling the whole time as China in particular is HUGE!!

I would recommend that you choose Thailand and visit the various little islands there for the month.

Then I would recommend that you go into Malaysia or Indonesia for a month instead of China or Japan...but if you are set on doing one or the other then I'd do Japan for the month.

Hope that helps.

Congrats!

I just want to say that I am VERY jealous. I've been trying to get my husband to do this since the day we met! Just curious....did anyone in particular need any convincing to go on this trip?

I think you will have a fabulous time but I do agree with DreamerHelen---think about concentrating on one country in Asia for a month....

Can we get married?????

Oh that sounds SO awesome--celebrating your love with a RTW!!!!

Hi Tim,

Firstly congrats on getting married, sounds like the Honeymoon will be worth the wait!

It can certainly be a daunting task trying to figure out a rtw trip like this and it can be overwhelming at times. I've been there myself and helped and also helped a lot of people similar to yourselves.

First off the itin isnt a bad effort at all for a first(ish) draft, it'll need some tweaking but we'l come to taht in a sec.

I think for a trip like this you need to have a short list of places/things you really want to see or do and then base the trip around that. Its the easiest way to deciide where you want to go. For the most part it looks like you've been doing a bit of that already - Which is good

Its definately a good thing to not want to be on the move constantly and you'll thank yourself for having that approach too! Judging the right amount of time per country is hard, especially when you dont know much about a place or whether you'll actually enjoy it...

I would say the 2nd part of your trip is pretty rushed. To give you some idea I spent roughly 3.5 months in the Thailand/Cambodia/Vetnam area and still didnt get to see all I wanted. Getting around that area is pretty easy and tehre is just so much to see and take in that you reallyneed the time to enjoy it.

I'm a big New Zealand fan as I'm sure a lot of people here would atest to, then again I've not many many who didnt fall in love with the place! I'd say that if you dont want to feel rushed you should be looking at 6-8 weeks to do it justice - Hire a car to get around, its, without question THE best way to get about the Country. Many people underestimate New Zealand basing it on the size of teh country, there is however something to see at almost every turn and I feel a lot of people actually miss out on some of teh bes places (see: Wanaka).

Australia, I guess depends on what you want to do there. I honestly think 6 weeks is pretty much an absolute minimum to do it in. The distances are big between places and part of the beauty of Oz is the smaller places along teh way (East Coast especially). Doing the Whitsundays for example is a good 6 days excerise when you consider arrival in Airlie Beach, a day to find the right tour, 3 days out on a boat, day at least to recover back in Airle Beach and then onwards. It can be exhausting to say the least if you dont have a day or 2 of recovery after doing such things.

So you're gonna need taht extra time from somewhere.... What would I suggest? Well I'd actually drop teh African portion and leave it for a time when you have just that, TIME, to come back and see it properly and do it justice. I think you could probably trim down your time in Eastern Europe too, I would say you could do Prague, Slovakia, Budapest, Croatia, Greece and Turkey in 3 2-3 month srather than 6. It would give you ample time to see that region (and a little more I would think too) and give you the time to add onto SE Asia and Oz/NZ.

Budget wise is the $20K for both of you or $20K each?

I hope some of that is helpful, and always happy to answer and more quetions you might have.

Thanks so much for the input.
First to answer the questions.
I don't think either one of had to do any pushing for the trip. We both love to travel and have been feeling a bit travel deprived as of late. It kind of snowballed from wanting to do something "significant" for our honeymoon. My wife's biggest concern about the trip is the possibility of returning home and not having work.
The $20K would be for each of us, although truth be told we would love to get it down closer to $15K.
LondonCard2, a lot of what you said falls in line with I had suspected in terms of more time needed for SE Asia and being able to do Eastern Europe in less time. The effect that would have on the budget would, of course, be advantageous.
My wife has been to Australia before and I've been to Japan before and we have both spent some time in New Zealand so that's kind of why their time seems perhaps shorter than it should be.
We'll have to do some thinking about the Africa leg. It would be great to get some of that in, but looking at the itinerary it's obvious something has to give.
Does anyone have any thoughts on India? How much we should allow for that?

Thanks!
Tim

My husband and I are currently in the process of planning a RTW trip, departing later this year. We've been documenting our planning on our website (in my signature). Perhaps it will be useful to you in some way.

As for your itinerary:
What's the reasoning for Nigeria & Madagascar being the two countries you want to visit in Africa? Just wondering since they aren't particularly close to each other (obviously) and traveling between the two could be not so fun.

September in Greece will be perfect. I used to teach English in Greece and September was my absolute favorite month.

As others have mentioned the Southeast Asia section seems a little too short. We're planning on 3 months for the three countries you mentioned plus Laos.

Happy planning.

Thanks Theresa!
I'm really enjoying checking out your website.
There looks to be some great info and it's just exciting to read about you guys going through what we're just getting started with. I think it'll be very useful in helping us know some of what we can expect down the road. (no pun intended)
I think we will definitely expand the SE asia leg. 3 months seems much more reasonable.
As for Africa, Nigeria and Madagascar were selected because my wife really wants to visit west Africa and has heard some amazing things about Madagascar. We haven't really done any research on Africa yet we're still pretty open.

congrats!!!

My husband and I did the same thing (got married in Oct too and followed a similar route started in Prague in April). Kudos for having the insight to do such an amazing thing! Not a day goes by that I dont think about our trip.

Great advice here. Things to keep in mind: Your itinerary looks good but you may want to either cut a portion out or leave the trip open ended (like end your air tickets at Bangkok and purchase the rest from there)

The reasons why the veterans here keep advising newbies to slow it up is for two reasons: first, the obvious reason being that you cannot do much beyond the touristy things spending a week or two in a country and there is always so much more to see & learn beyond those sites and secondly, traveling RTW is incredible but it's no vacation. After a few months it wears you down. In a year's time, you WILL get sick. You will need to take it easy. You will find little slices of paradise in the most unsuspecting places and want to stay there for a few weeks and you know what? you should because chances are you may not have the opportunity to do that again (that may be a personal issue...I thought we'd be out there again already but we traveled in 2001 and havent been back - we had kids instead, things change quickly!).

I cant speak of Africa, we didnt make it there but I must concur with the advice for SEA. We spent 3 months in thailand/cambodia/vietnam and hardly scratched the surface of SEA, I could kick myself everyday for not going to Laos & Myanmar!

Hi all, fascinating itinerary, certainly got me thinking.

My comment would be that India is great and well worth more weeks - and can be very cheap. Kerala has some great sights and is very tourist-savvy (more expensive) but the whole country is there to be explored. If you do cut your Euro leg shorter check the heat - I had some friends found it too hot in Croatia in July to tour and sightsee. And I can see the attraction of Madagascar but not of Nigeria, which does have a bad reputation for safety (FCO advise against going to the Delta area but also traveling around Nigeria is risky - somebody correct me?) - why not Tanzania or Ethiopa/Eritrea/Kenya (once they have finished electing)?

This has also made me reconsider our itinerary, which includes SA in winter and no SE Asia... Hmmm

I think it's good that you're adding more SE Asia time. And I do agree that you'll need less time in Europe. Of course, another possibility if you need more time (or money) is to cut Europe out completely. Of course, if those are major highlights of the trip, then by all means leave them in there.

I tend to look at Europe as a place that I can always travel to fairly easily. It's also a place I could without any real difficulty take any future children or go to when I'm older (and maybe more interested in comforts). I guess my view is also somewhat colored by the fact that I've been lucky enough to live in Europe on two separate occasions and travel quite a bit then. It's certainly a fabulous place...but it's not so good on the budget...especially as we Americans watch the dollar plummet.

If you want any advice on Greece, send me a message. I'd be glad to tell you all my favorite spots. Living there was one of the best experiences of my life.

Thanks for the heads up on Nigeria.
Honestly, Nigeria was kind of an arbitrary pick. We really need to read up on Africa and see what's out there; what sounds appealing and what's to be avoided. I had been thinking I wanted to go to South Africa until a guy from work wandered into my office and just started talking about a buddy of his who was saying how bad it is down there - really dangerous and sketchy. I took it off my list for that reason.
I think we would love to get some more time in India.
It's gotten to the point now where we really need to figure out what are our "must sees". It may turn out that we pare down E Europe in order to keep Africa (after, of course, figuring out where in Africa we want to go).

Hello,
That sounds like an awesome trip! I'm definitely jealous...
Anyway, I agree that Nigeria has a bad reputation. I lived and volunteered in Benin, West Africa for 3 months and loved it! I was actually about 20km from the Benin-Nigeria border. If you want a taste of Africa without an overwhelming number of tourists I really recommend Benin. It is the birthplace of Voodoo and it's possible to catch Voodoo ceremonies, or tour a python temple! It can be as expensive or as cheap as you want it to be, $10 a night would be a pretty decent hotel. Depending on the time of year, you can even go on a safari (up North) and see elephants, water buffalo, baboons, warthogs, and antelope. It is a french speaking country, but so is Madagascar I believe...
Anyways, I would try and do another country besides Nigeria, but West Africa does have a lot to offer, and the people are great and so helpful!

Have a great trip!
Ben

Congrats Tim! It is nice to hear that more couples are taking off together! My girlfriend and I originally planned to just do a 3 month Dive Master course as a break from work, but it then turned into 3 years and now to doing only 2 years. At which time we will decide if we want to continue. For us doing most of Asia (India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, China, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Guam, Philippines, Micronesia and Indonesia), Australia and New Zealand will probably take close to 2 years. We are also looking for that special place to get married, which at the moment might be Bali or Lombok. My point is that for us at least, the planning part has been so much fun. For a few months now, we have been reading BNA and all the blogs we can find! We excitedly email back and forth while at work saying lets go here or there, check out what this person said about xyz. Heck go ahead and pack now, your wife might laugh at you (like my girlfriend did at me when I first packed 9 months out), but you are about to embark on a great journey (according to almost everyone who has been). For us the only thing that is really planned is our first stop which is a three month Dive Master Internship course in Thailand. The rest we will kind of make up as we go, knowing that eventually we will hit all the places on our (ever growing) list. Are you planning on getting a RTW ticket or pay as you go? If you are getting a RTW ticket, which will definitely affect your plans. For budget I have come across couples travelling on 38k to 50k a year. Until the $ gets better we have decided to bypass Europe for now. Since it is easy to travel to as Theresa states, we will save that for another time. We figure our budget will go a lot further in Asia. Anyway congrats and enjoy!

Congratulations on getting married Tim. My hubby and I got married during out RTW trip a couple years back. Anyway, to be honest $20 K is a bit tight and especially now w/ dollar not doing so well. We travelled for 13 months and including insurance, airline tics we spend around $35K. I am also Slovak and we went home just last september ( my hubby's american, we live in USA) and let me tell you, even Eastern European countries are becoming pretty pricey. We spend almost $100 day, but it was only a short trip so we rented a car, slept in hotel and ate in restaurants.
As many people said here before : try to concentrate on SEA where you can live so much cheaper, travel for less and still have a HUGE continet to explore. What about Nepal, we found it fascinating. And yeah, you get tired and worn out from travelling, you really want to give yourselves enough time to just relax and have "time off" from travelling. I hit that point after 6 months on the road and i think my hubby too and we significantly slowed down, leaving few places on the next RTW trip's itinerary.
No matter what you'll do enjoy yourselves!!!

Since you've been to Europe before and even Eastern Europe is expensive I would keep that short.

If you're truly staying in just Prague (not all of Czech Rep.) and Budapest (no more in Hungary) you could probably take some time out of there and put it somewhere else.

Greece is full of honeymoon types, it should be really romantic. It wasn't so much fun for someone alone like me! If you're going to a lot of islands you could spend a month. But if you want a really nice beach why not shift some time to a cheap place where you can rent a bungalow for weeks for nothing in SE Asia?

You could definitely spend 1 month in Turkey but I think 1 month in Istanbul would be long.

A month is a good time for Egypt if you want to see a lot without flying or moving every day.

I went to Madagascar on my last RTW and would say you need at least one month. I didn't spent too much time on the beach either! There's a lot to see and travel by bus is slow and flights are expensive. Nosy Be p north is really developed (but too far by land and expensive to fly to). Isle de St. Marie on the East looks gorgeous and I've heard from other people that it might be the most beautiful beach anywhere. It does have more weather problems though and you'll want to pay attention to that when you go to Madagascar. I was there in May and it was a nice temperature, not too hot but maybe too cold for the beach. There were a lot less tourists though. I hope you speak a little French! If you have any questions on Mad email me because it isn't a common RTW destination.

The other thing to take into consideration is that to get to Madagascar there's only two places in Africa you can fly from: Nairobi and J'Burg. The Nairobi flight is only once a week, not sure about South Africa. You can also fly from France and through some of the nearby islands like Mauritius, possibly from India.

I like the South of India but I wouldn't spend half a month in Kerala. If you're' down there try to see the big temple in Madurai.

I agree that Thailand/Cambodia/Vietnam can't be done in one month. I suppose you could fly between all the big sites but one of the nice things about SE Asia is cheap travel.

Unless you only want to go to Tokyo and to a few cities in China 1 month is not enough. You could spend forever in China and I spend 2 weeks in Japan seeing very little. I guess its' up to what you're really interested in.

Hope that helps and remember that you just need an outline, you can always change it along the way.

I highly recommend Ghana over Nigeria. Lots of cultural sites, great food, friendly people, beautiful beaches and forests, and it's safer.

Hey folks,

Thanks for all the input. So we've done some reworking on the itinerary to try and make some more time for some things. Would love to hear any feedback you might have.

JUL - AUG - Eastern Europe
SEP - Egypt/Morocco
OCT - Tanzania
NOV - mid-DEC - India
mid-DEC - mid-JAN - Nepal
mid-JAN - MAR - SE Asia
APR - Japan
MAY - Australia
JUN - NZ

I had originally been afraid of spending so much time in Japan from a financial standpoint, but I just found out that we have a place to crash with a friend down in Kansai so that'll be nice.
I'd love to hear about what people think of this schedule as well as any highlights that you might have from trips you have taken to any of these places.

Thanks!