Sample Travel Itinerary

Here’s a sample travel itinerary I made for my Vietnam and Cambodia trip. A- stands for primary or have to see/do, B- so so and C- secondary/can wait. As you can see, it’s pretty loose. To know how to make one, read my post: How To Make an Easy Travel Itinerary.

Pretty excited to go home to the Philippines tomorrow! Uncensored faster Internet surfing here I come!

Vietnam- Saigon/Ho Chin Minh

A	B	C
PLACES: Cu Chi Tunnels USD10 (takes most of the day) Mui Ne Sand Dunes- Bau Trang – 5 hours travel/1 Day Tour Restaurants: Le Fenetre Soleil- 2nd flr, corner of Le Thanh Ton and Nam Ky Khoi Nghia (watch out for decrepit staircase)	Benh Thanh Market Notre Dame Cathedral Reunification Palace Flower Market Saigon Square Cappucino Underground	Vung Tau Le Thanh Ton Diamond/Zen Plaza- expensive shopping malls

Vietnam to-do list:

1. Exchange money to VND (Vietnamese currency)
2. Look for cheap travel agency in backpacker’s District 1.
3. Secure bus to Phnom Penh. USD15 – 6 hrs land trip. 4 hour wait for bus to get on Neak Leung Ferry transport across Mekong River
4. Watch Water Puppets
5. Buy souvenirs.

Vietnam Reminders:

1. AnAn Hotel- July 15-21 7 days
2. Vinataxi- VND12,000/15,000 starting rate
3. Mr- An’oi, Ms- Je’oi
4. Bill please – Chin-chin (make a gesture of scribbling a pad with your hand). The Vietnamese would understand.

Updated: It’s important that you make a detailed plan on your first day though so you won’t waste waste it on idleness.  Here’s a sample below:

AM

1. Pack for Saigon
2. Leave City Backpacker’s Hostel in Singapore via Subway- don’t forget MRT card!
3. Go to Green Line Tanah Merah
4. Switch to Changi Airport
5. Go to Terminal 1 for Jetstar for flight to Saigon
6. Check-in

PM

1. Arrive in Saigon
2. Money Exchange at airport (no commission)
3. Unpack
4. Buy a Vietnamese Sim card (in this case, Mobi fone) with help from hotel
5. Get in touch with Marjorie (my friend who works in HCM City) and Mr Chinh
6. Plan get-together- write in calendar
7. Look for good travel agent and money exchange center in backpacker’s street
8. Book tour to Cu Chi, Mui Ne,- Mr Chinh will take me to Notre Dame and Reunification Palace and other places on B Secondary Places. Write in calendar
9. Walk around backpacker’s street and look for Le Fenetre Soleil.

To know what really happened and changes made in the real itinerary you can read this post: The Real Travel Itinerary- What Really Happened.

Other related posts:

How To Create A Budget For Your Travel In Just Three Steps

The Quick Pack List

How To Prepare for Your Trip the Lazy

Spirit Possession in Cambodia- The Real Travel Itinerary 2

Your Passport Might Not Let You Travel- A Cautionary Tale in Immigration

How To Prepare for Your Trip the Lazy Way

It’s been a while since I posted a how-to post since I’ve been caught up in my writing.

Photo by rockin_the-free_world

Preparing for your trip can be a serious hazard to your stress level. Believe me, I’ve been there. But guess what? It doesn’t have to be.

I did the anal route when I planned for my previous vacation trips to Thailand and Indonesia. You know, the endless googling of hostels, clicking one random link to another taking me god knows where, the incessant perusing of Lonely Planet. It’s often the research that kills me. It’s so passive you could’ve used your five hours of surfing for packing, buying those tickets or even making a reservation to your hostel instead of warming up your ass.

For my trip to Vietnam and Cambodia next month, I decided to just chill. Forget about extensive surfing and cramming every last bit of detail into your notes. This is preparing your trip the lazy way.

Below are some of the steps I did in order to prepare for the trip.

1. Let’s say you already picked a country and a date. Check if you need a visa to go to that particular country. You can go to projectvisa for that.
2. Get a copy of the Lonely Planet edition or any travel guide of your destination.
3. Book your tickets. Read your guide book for better cheap flights to your country or check out Expedia.com although its prices are sometimes not reliable and end up being way too expensive. Since I’m cheap, I usually take budget flights. Around East and Southeast Asia, Tiger Airways, Air Asia, Jet Air and Cebu Pacific (warning: Cebu Pacific is often delayed but awfully cheap) are some of the prime choices. Since they’re budget, there are no free meals or flight entertainment on board. Don’t take Cebu Pacific if you’ve got a connecting flight to your home country in Hong Kong or Singapore. I saw some Brits who missed their expensive connecting flights to London because the plane got delayed. Since it’s budget, the airline wasn’t willing to give them a refund or pay for their stay at the hotel.
4. Check your country’s time zone, current exchange rates, plugs and voltage temperature/climate and current events (before I went to Bangkok, there was a bombing two days before I was due to leave. Yup, you guessed it. That still didn’t stop me from going. I draw the line on going to East Timor though). Below are the list of site you can go to check these out:

Time zone- http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/

Exchange rate- www.xe.com

Plugs and voltage- http://whatplug.info/

Temperature and climate- http://www.worldclimate.com/

Current events – www.cnn.com,

1. Make a reservation to your hotel or guesthouse or hovel. Keep a copy of your plane tickets nearby when you do this. Check if you’ve got any friends staying in that area. I usually get stuck here googling for reviews. Always check out pictures of the place and its location. Is it convenient? Is the area it’s in noisy? Does the guesthouse have many floors that you have to take the stairs? In my trip to Indonesia, I got stuck in a shady dump with rude guests that garnered rave reviews on Travelfish (your guide to Southeast Asia) so don’t trust them reviews! This time for my Vet/Cam trip —and herein lies the essence of the lazy way— I forego all surfing and just go straight to the source: FRIENDS. I asked them for hostel recommendations. Friends can give you hands down honest to goodness reviews not to mention their experiences, maps, lend you their LP guides and scams they encountered. If you don’t have any friends who have been to an obscure country you’re going to (say Azarbaijan) visit or post questions to travel forums.
2. Plan your itinerary (for a lazy way to plan one, click here). Again I buzzed over like a parasite to my friends and leeched them for information on their prepared itineraries or suggestions of top places to go to.

It’s also great to check out travel blogs because they usually write a blow by blow sometimes heart stopping achingly funny riveting storytelling about their travel experiences. You also get to know which places are not worth going and cross them out of your itinerary. No use wasting money. Here are some I usually check out:

Ally’s Trip- Europe and Asia. Hilarious stories!

Ivan About Town – Southeast Asia, backpacking in the Philippines, some parts of Europe and America. Straightforward writing but just don’t mind the annoying ubiquitous Hehe! that he injects in his entries.

1. Pack. See My Quick Pack List.
2. Plan your to-do list and reminder list for your country. List only the vital to-dos. E.g. in my Vet/Cam to-do: buy souvenirs for family, book a bus to cross to Phnom Penh Cambodia, visit travel agent, buy 3 day temple pass and so on.

You don’t need to follow to follow this list strictly by order. Play around with it but always do Step No. 1 first, of course. You don’t want to be sent back by immigration with tears in your eyes. This is happened to someone I know who went to India assuming she didn’t need a visa and was sent back home.

Remember, the magical thing about the trip is not that everything that goes according to plan but the surprises that sweep you away. That for me, is what makes a trip memorable.

Other related posts:

The Quick Pack List

Sample Travel Itinerary

The Real Travel Itinerary- What Really Happened

Spirit Possession in Cambodia- The Real Travel Itinerary 2

Your Passport Might Not Let You Travel- A Cautionary Tale in Immigration

How to Make an Easy Travel Itinerary

photo courtesy of Boccacinofoto

I used to cram so many details in my travel itinerary before.

7AM Shower in hotel

8AMBreakfast

9AMCatch local bus to temple

And so on…

The result is I spent countless hours just poring over the details and snags only to result in dumping the whole itinerary during the actual travel because only about 20% of it was used.

For first time travelers, this is very common because you don’t want to miss a single scenic spot but then you’ll also end up stressed since you’re constantly running after the time. This itinerary is also ineffective that it eliminates the element of surprise which is one of the best aspects of a trip. Is it possible to have both? You bet. On my second trip to Indonesia, I wanted to keep things light and simple.Here’s how I did it:

1. List down all the places you want to visit on a sheet of paper.

2. Divide and prioritize the list into three –primary A (must see/must do/must eat), B (may see/may do/may eat) and secondary C (can wait). Estimate how many places you can visit within the time span of your trip.

2. Next to the primary destinations, write how you’re going to get there or the page numbers of its info in your Lonely Planet book.

Then it’s just a matter of crossing off the places your list when you’re done with it. It doesn’t matter when, just as long as you go there especially your primary destinations.

3. Create a detailed to-do list on your first day only.

To see a sample travel itinerary and detailed to-do list, click here. To know what happens when an itinerary comes in contact with the real world and the changes it undergoes, read this post. This is based on a real experience.

That’s it! You’re done.

Other related posts:

The Quick Pack List for a fast and easy list of things to bring while traveling

Sample Travel Itinerary

Lessons I Learned From Travel and Pics!- talks about why there is no excuse to travel and includes pics of my travels in Nepal, Mongolia, USA, Australia, Burma, Japan and more.

How To Create A Budget For Your Travel In Just Three Steps – shows you how to create a budget in a fast and easy way

How To Prepare For Your Trip The Lazy Way.

Your Passport Might Not Let You Travel- A Cautionary Tale in Immigration

The Real Travel Itinerary- What Really Happened

Spirit Possession in Cambodia- The Real Travel Itinerary 2

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