Kevin's Travel Blog

A good number of people have asked me about what it would cost to backpack around the world. While researching the trip, I came across a wide spectrum of opinions. Ranges varied from US$ 10,000 to 30,000/year, while others said that with some start-up money, they could backpack non-stop for the rest of their lives by traveling and stopping to work when the money started to run low. A friend of even said: “3 years? Don’t you need like $300,000 to do something like that?” She didn’t know what a hostel was, so in her mind traveling on $60/day is impossible.

The best way to find out much you’ll need is to look at what people with similar travel philosophies have spent in similar trips. I have come to realize that there is really not a “right” way to travel. Different people travel for different reasons and have different comfort levels. Even the same person can enjoy contrasting “types” of traveling. Last year I went from hiking and camping the wilderness of the West Coat Trail to drinking margaritas next to a huge swimming pool in decadent Las Vegas all within 24 hours. I enjoyed both of them equally.

Pre-Trip Expenses

My likely first destination is New Zealand, and I should be able use frequent flyer miles for the plane ticket. Aside from that, I’m budgeting $2,000 for a netbook, new digital camera, backpack, vaccination, and some other smaller things.

Countries To Visit

The majority will be cheaper third world countries because I find them more exotic and adventurous. I’ve already been to expensive Western Europe so I will try to avoid it or spend as little time there as possible. I will focus most of the traveling in South East Asia, Indian Subcontinent, Middle East, Eastern Europe, Africa, Central and South America.

Transportation

By the time I leave for my trip, I’ll have about 200,000 AAdvantage frequent flyer miles, and since they now allow you to get one-way tickets, I should be able to use them for a good number of my flights. That should save me a few thousand dollars. I’m aware they have a round-the-world ticket option, but it’s not very useful to me since it has a 1 year time limit. As far as local transportation is concerned, I don’t mind taking local buses and trains. Some of them can be uncomfortable, but I find them to be very interesting because for the duration of the bus/train ride, I feel like I’m living the life of a local person.

Lodging

I’ll be staying mostly in dorms in hostels, with some couchsurfing mixed in. With a bit of research before arriving at a city, I can avoid the bad/dirty hostels. From time to time I will get a private room in a hotel/hostel because I do think it gets tiring to have to continually deal with other roommates and the lack of privacy.

Food

Mostly street food because while I can spend long periods of time alone without any problems, I find it very lonely and uncomfortable to sit at a restaurant table by myself. Besides, street food usually taste great. You can see exactly what you are going to get, as opposed to items on a restaurant menu which would probably be in a language I can’t read. In cheaper countries I wouldn’t mind going to restaurants with people I meet along the way. I’ve never cooked in hostels in the past but I think if I’m staying in a place for a longer period, I’d be inclined to do it. Sometimes I also like to just grab some ingredients to make a sandwich from a grocery store and eat it on a park bench.

Sites and Activities

I really don’t want to skimp on these. I would really like to go to all the museums and sites and adventure activities (bungee jumping, paragliding, etc) I’m interested in. Unless something is so outrageously expensive that I won’t do it out of principle. Also included is a trip to the 2014 World Cup in Brazil. Since traveling does get tiring if done non-stop, I envision a lot of days where I’m lounging around doing nothing, so averaging these days with those where I spend more on expensive activities should still keep my budget under control.

My Estimates

Considering all of the above, I’m planning to budget US$ 60/day on average, which amounts to $21,900/year, which I’ll round up to $25,000/year to cover plane tickets and other unexpected expenses. I’ll try not to be too militant about the budget to avoid worrying too much about how much I’m spending, instead of just enjoying the journey. If I end up spending more per day, I’ll just shorten my trip and come home early.

Yeah, that’s a lot of money, but I think it’s the best money I’ll ever spend.

Ever since growing up in Buenos Aires and riding it’s subte (subway), I have been fascinated with trains. I love taking a train and see how people live their lives in other regions of the world, going from large cities to rural areas, carving it’s way between mountains and over rivers.

I think of the Trans-Siberian Railway as the ultimate train ride. At 9,259 km (5,753 miles), it is the longest railway in the world going from Moscow to Vladivostok. Although I might be more inclined to do the Trans-Mongolian Line, which branches off at the Russian city of Ulan-Ule (about 2/3 of the way from Moscow to Vladivostok), and goes through Mongolia before arriving at Beijing, China.

Trans Mongolian Railway. Photo courtesy of Josh Gerritsen.

Whatever route or direction is taken, there are 2 ways to do this journey. One is to just hop on the train and stay on the it until the final destination, which takes about a week. Another way is to get off the train and stay a few days at some of the cities along the way. Both ways has its appeals.

A week-long uninterrupted train ride would be great at getting to really know some of the people on it. I would assume that after so many days together, you would become pretty good friends with a good number of them. Also the idea of doing the whole route without stopping appears to be more “epic” than one that has been broken down into pieces.

On the other hand, it would be a shame to travel through so many miles without stopping at a single site or city along the way. What good is it have visited Mongolia when it was only from the inside of a train car? With no time constraint, I think I’m more inclined to make many stops along the way. Maybe when I get older I’ll get another chance to relive the journey uninterrupted and all in one seating.

Interesting Trans-Siberian Railway Links

Moscow-Vladivostok: virtual journey on Google Maps – View the entire journey from a passenger seat through YouTube videos, while tracking your current location on Google Maps.
Seat61.com – Lots of practical information and pictures.
Josh Gerritsen’s Trans Siberian Railway Trip – Great account of the trip with amazing photographs.

Travel Philosophy

On my first trip to Europe in 2002, I did a fair amount of research beforehand mainly because it was my first time traveling solo, first time backpacking, and first time going to the region. I wasn’t sure if it was going to be easy or hard, so I wanted there to be as few unknowns as possible. I ended up realizing that backpacking travel is not hard.

On a overland trip through Peru, Bolivia and Argentina in 2005, my backpack was stolen halfway through the trip and I was forced to improvise the rest of the way by winging it with only a very small, newly-acquired, half-full backpack. It was very liberating. I enjoyed figuring out things along the way, and just relaxing and not worrying too much. The lesson learned was that things will usually work out in the end with a little bit of instincts and common sense (too bad I didn’t have the instinct or common sense to avoid having my backpack stolen in the first place).

Isla del Sol, Bolivia

For my upcoming Round The World (RTW) trip, which I’m hoping will last 3 or more years, the goal is to travel slow and not be on any kind of schedule. Building on past journeys, I now have enough trust in my traveling know-how to not worry too much in advance about the logistics for each destination. I would like to travel by land wherever is safe and feasible.

Destinations

Most of the pre-trip planning will mostly be just figuring out which places I want to visit. Inspiration can come from a photograph, a movie, or an online blog post or article. Over the years I have made a mental list of places I wanted to visit in my lifetime, and the idea of an RTW trip come up as a way to kill all the birds with one shot. I definitely don’t want this trip to be about ticking off a long check list of destinations. There are some must-see places, and some with lower priorities, but I will have to remind myself to stay very flexible and enjoy the journey more than the destinations.

For my first destination, I’m leaning toward either New Zealand or Mexico. New Zealand because I plan to do a lot of hiking there, and since I don’t want to be carrying all the hiking gear during the entire trip, I think it’s best to just get most of the hiking done at the beginning and then mail the equipment home. From there I can move on to Australia and South East Asia. The other choice is Mexico because one of my “must-do” items is traveling from the United States to the south of Argentina by land (or vice versa), going through most of Latin America. Mexico is only about 130 miles (210 km) south of where I live.

What To Pack

Unlike a wilderness backpacking trip, this one will mostly involve city traveling, so I’m not too concerned about trying to get the perfect packing list. If I forget to bring something, or if an item doesn’t work out, I can buy or replace as I go. I think a backpack in the neighborhood of 40 liters should be enough.

I’m also leaning towards bringing along a netbook computer. With wi-fi connections available in a lot of hostels, it will make writing this blog and communicating with people much easier. On the other hand, I don’t look forward to worrying all the time about it getting stolen. If it becomes a pain in the ass during the trip, I can always sell it.

Getting Things In Order Before Departure

There’s of course a number of logistical tasks that needs to be completed before departure, which I listed in this to-do list. Why bring the Taiwanese passport along with the American passport? It is easier and sometimes cheaper to get into certain countries like Argentina, where American citizens need to pay a $131 entry visa fee.

I have decided to fulfill my lifelong dream of traveling around the world starting in about 12 months time. I’m currently 33 years old and not getting any younger, and with no mortgage, car payments, significant other or kids, this is the right time to do something like this. Well, the right time would have been 10 years ago, but back then I didn’t have the means nor the vision to do it.

My initial plan to is go for a minimum of 3 years. I’m not sure where I’ll be going first (probably New Zealand), and I don’t think that is very important either in such a long trip. I have many places that I want to visit for sure and I know that eventually I’ll get there. I have no idea how many countries or cities I’ll end up visiting, or how long I’ll stay at each place. I like to travel slow and have complete freedom, so I might stay in any particular place for 1 day or many months. After 1 year I might get tired of it all and decide to come home. Or, I might just keep on traveling for the rest of my life, stopping from time to time to work and save money to keep on traveling. I really don’t know what will happen, and I don’t think I’m supposed to at this time.

What I do know is that a little bit before June 2014, I’ll be in Argentina to meet my high school friends before going together to the 2014 World Cup in Brazil. We are all getting older and a few of them are starting (or planning soon) to form families, so we see this as our last chance to take a trip like this together.

There are a million things I want to do, see, and experience during this round the world trip. Too many to list them all in this post without making it unbearably long, so I’ll post them in separate posts between now and my departure day.

Machu Picchu, Peru