Rough international travel itinerary

[mattbell]

My friend who was going to join me for the late February portion now is unlikely to make it, so I may rearrange the order of the SE Asia part into something that makes a little more geographic sense and drop Bali.

The itinerary:

Date	Days
Jan 23	1	Fly to Bangkok
	4	Bangkok (Thailand)
	3	Chiang Mai (Thailand)
	5	Singapore	Stay with S’s family (?) & go on day trips
Feb 4	4	Bali	Resort island -- probably not as much fun alone. Lots of beaches and scuba diving. If I skip Bali, I’ll aim for diving or Thailand or Malaysia. It looks like diving opportunities in Vietnam are limited.
	1	Fly to Saigon
	5	Southern Vietnam	- Saigon (err.. Ho Chi Minh City) looks interesting, but not as cool from a cultural perspective as Hanoi - The Vietcong tunnel complexes looks interesting. I'd like to tour one. They have them at Cu Chi (Day trip from Saigon) and Vinh Moc - My Tho and Vinh Long (on the Mekong river delta in S Vietnam, day trip from Saigon) are small towns with Vietnamese river boat culture. You can rent a boat and wander around. - Dalat is a funky town full of weird artsy buildings... probably half a day of stuff to see here at most. There's a traditional town nearby (Buon Ma Thuot) that has a matrilineal culture... that could be fun to see. It's about 250 miles from Saigon, so it will take a day to get there and back. It also has an airport, so it could be a 30-minute flight from Saigon. - The towers at Po Klong Garai in central vietnam are very well preserved and have unusual style but they're probably nothing compared to Ankgor Wat.
	3	Ankgor Wat (Cambodia)
	4	Central Vietnam	- Hoi An is a town in central Vietnam with interesting eclectic architecture. It was also apparently untouched by bombing in the Vietnam War. Hanoi might offer the same experience though. The My Son temple ruins are nearby, but our friendly American troops bombed the hell out of it for some reason so there's not as much to see anymore. Julie reports they’re still worth seeing though. - There's a cluster of stuff near the old DMZ in central Vietnam -- the DMZ itself, the Hue Royal Tombs, the Perfume River (a river with various old architectural goodies on it), the Vinh Moc vietcong tunnels, which apparently are extensive, and an enormous watery (natural) cave that extends in several miles.
	6	Northern Vietnam	- Hanoi looks generally awesome. It seems like it would be culturally interesting as well as interesting from a "oh look at all the relics this past culture left for us to look at in museums" kind of way. Plus, it's a big city, and that means interesting mixes of restaurants, bars, people watching etc. - Halong Bay in northern vietnam, with its rock formations and floating villages, looks beautiful. Apparently the 3-day boat trip, with a night spent on the mainland, is recommended. - The northern highlands look fascinating -- there's the Perfume Pagoda complex of Buddhist temples in the mountains as well as small towns of the various Hmong subcultures. The mountains look beautiful too. This is the sot of area that makes me want to discard everyone's advice and rent a motor scooter. (Will likely have to cut some stuff to fit in 6 days)
Feb 27	1	Fly to India
	4	Mumbai (India)	Flexible
	1	Fly to Dubai	Check compatibility with ticket.
	1	Dubai
	1	Fly to Istanbul	Check compatibility with ticket
Mar 6-24 Adi/Jeff/Daniel(?) portion (18 days)
	5	Istanbul and environs (Turkey)
	3	Izmir and environs (Turkey)
	1	Kayseri (Turkey)	Underground city
	2	Israel (Jerusalem)	Adi tour of holy sites.
	3	Israel (Jerusalem & environs, solo)	Adi visiting family. More historic Jerusalem, Dead Sea, Masada. Stay in youth hostel? (1hr roundtrip to Tel Aviv)
	3	Petra and Wadi Rum (Jordan)	Need to work out car rental / tour arrangements.
Mar 25 - May 4 Solo/flexible. Currently very rough. Possible rendezvous with various friends
	6	Egypt
	4	Greece	Stay longer if island-hopping
	4	Croatia
	3	Budapest
	3	Prague
Eurail-accessible countries -- 21 day pass is $859. 15 day pass is $665.
	3	Berlin
	3	Geneva (Switzerland)	CERN tour. Need to verify date.
	4	Denmark
	4	Netherlands (?)
	8	Norway & Sweden
May 4		Fly home

 

Comments

[ferrouswheel.livejournal.com]

New Zealand next time? ;)

[nasu-dengaku.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I wasn't able to make AUS/NZ due to scheduling constraints, but I figured it's good to carve out bite-sized contiguous vacations for future me. So one day I will come and see the Kiwis in their native habitat.

[chalgaryn.livejournal.com]

Man, I really want to brush up on my German for 4 months and then meet you for a weekend in Berlin. You'll be there right around my birthday. I doubt I could make it work around my teaching schedule though :-P

[nasu-dengaku.livejournal.com]

The Eurail section's timing is very fungible (and will continue to be so for months), so if you have a time you think you could make it (eg spring break) let me know. Plane tickets are also crazy cheap now due to falling gas prices.

[chalgaryn.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately, I don't have a spring break. What I do have is 3pm Thursday until Tuesday morning open every weekend. So, a completely insane Thursday night flight that arrives Friday followed by a Monday morning departure would allow for two full days of weekend sightseeing in between. I would just have no idea where (or when) I was Tuesday in class :-)

Strangely, I'm not spotting any nonstop flights between LAX and Berlin. Hmm...probably too crazy, but I'll spend this next week at least contemplating.

[nasu-dengaku.livejournal.com]

Hmm... could you do something like substitute swapping, where someone teaches one of your classes and you make up the favor later?

[chalgaryn.livejournal.com]

That is part of the contemplating I need to do. The problem is that I'm teaching Statistics during the morning and early afternoon, so there are a very limited number of people who would actually be available to cover the time slots _and_ able to teach Statistics. If there is a test day around there somewhere, it might be easier to find someone to proctor the exam for me.

[nasu-dengaku.livejournal.com]

Ah, the dirty secrets of professor-land come out. So that's why we had 3rd party proctored exams at odd times!

[serolynne.livejournal.com]

What an amazing experience you're going to have! I'm so glad you're able to take this time in your life to explore the world. I so look forward to your travel updates.

hand off

[catithat.livejournal.com]

Have a great trip, it looks packed and adventurous!

If you decide to start a little earlier, I'll be in Japan January 14-20 (flexible). I'm flying to Sri Lanka today and staying there until the 14th.

-Steve

Re: hand off

[nasu-dengaku.livejournal.com]

I've actually been to Japan several times, so I am planning on skipping it. I heard Sri Lanka is amazing though. Let me know if you want Japan advice.

Re: hand off

[catithat.livejournal.com]

I'll totally take advice on fun-in-Japan. I haven't made any plans yet.

Re: hand off

[nasu-dengaku.livejournal.com]

Tokyo is like no other city I've seen. I got a huge amount out of just wandering the neighborhoods and looking at the setup.

Some places I enjoyed:

In Tokyo
- Shinjuku
- Shibuya
- Harajuku
- Ueno park and the area east of it
- Akihabara
- The modern island in the SE corner (forgetting its name)

Get a JR pass... with it, you can take any of the super-fast trains in the country for 2 weeks. You may have to buy it in the US.

Kyoto -- Go to all the major temples and the hill full of gates in the southeast corner of the city. Take a day trip out to Nara.

Because the trains are so fast, you can "hop over" from Kyoto to Hiroshima or from Tokyo to Matsumoto. In American terms, it's like "hopping over" from San Francisco to Portland to check out a couple of museums. :-)

Re: hand off

[nasu-dengaku.livejournal.com]

Oh, that's right. Trans-Siberian express.

I can show you my docs (I have a whole bunch of them). It's a lot faster to just discuss it in person or on the phone instead of writing out suggestions here. I only live about 2 miles away from you, so it shouldn't be hard to meet up. I'm fairly busy but I can do late evenings most nights.

Re: hand off

[nasu-dengaku.livejournal.com]

I doubt Rion knows my address. I'll just email it to you.

I have *two* foofs. :-)