This web page has five sections: Why Around the World for a Year?, Outlining the Journey, Selecting Destinations, Pacing the Travel, and Planning the Individual Tours and the Daily Detail at Each Location.
Why Around the World for a Year?
Gina and I traveled together when we were in college and realized it was a shared passion but we differed in degree. She dreamed of living abroad right away, while I wanted to focus on a business career in the USA. Luckily my employer offered a chance to move to Paris for a year. And so we became temporary ex pats. It was the best year of our young lives! Each day in a strange new land felt so much richer than a normal day at home.
We returned to Boston for business school, raising a family, and a dedicated pursuit of career. As the years rolled by we could appreciate more and more how exceptional our time in France had been.
Ten years after Paris we felt a deep desire to travel abroad again, but we were locked in place by my job and we knew we would be for a number of years more. We promised each other that no matter what happened, we would find a way to “travel abroad for a solid year” at the next chance.
We wanted to devote a full year to the travel because we knew it would be an incredible growth experience for every member of the family, because there are so many destinations that are not efficient to reach from the USA in one- or two-week increments, and because we wanted to spend “quality time” with our children. We hoped to create a cherished family memory that would help hold us together for the rest of our lives. Lastly, I had spent over a decade working intensely as an entrepreneur and I knew I would need a full year sabbatical to recharge, reflect and reload for another venture.
So when my company agreed to be sold in 2009, it was the perfect chance to take a year off. We began planning right away.
Outlining the Journey
The original concept was to pick one city each on four continents and spend a full three months in each, learning deeply about four cultures. We could make short trips to various surrounding destinations without having to carry everything with us all the time.
That still left a world of possibility. Our first stop was the bookstore. The most valuable book was “Where to Go When” by Eyewitness Travel. This is a coffee table book full of pictures that is organized by month and proposes the dozen best places in the world to be that month, depending on whether you are in the mood for Festivals and Culture, Unforgettable Journeys, Natural Wonders, Luxury and Romance, Adventure or Family Getaways. This was supplemented by The Travel Book by Lonely Planet which has big colorful pictures by country and Heaven on Earth: 100 Must-See Destinations.
As we contemplated the magnitude of taking the kids out of school and began leafing through these books, our list of places to visit grew longer and longer. We realized that we could really do something amazing and cover a lot more countries, if we could somehow manage the logistics.
That is where a travel planner is the perfect solution. A mutual friend connected Gina with Dana White who lived near us. She and her family were planning a similar round-the-world trip, and Dana highly recommended Sam McClure at Small World Travel. It turned out Sam had also done the planning for Ted Dintersmith’s trip around the world; Ted is a venture capitalist who I knew had searched exhaustively to find the best possible travel planner. We called Sam and quickly realized she had deep experience with all these issues and would be indispensible and enormously valuable.
That led to the final structure of the trip: nine months of traveling intensively as guided by Sam, with just 3-5 nights per location, plus four months of living in Paris where we could indulge in a bit of nostalgia (from our year together there –18 years prior) and do the deep dive on a single country’s culture.
With a July start, we would spend two summer months in new parts of Europe we had not seen before, then all of the fall and early winter in lovely Paris. Right after Christmas we would continue the journey, first down to the Middle East, over to India, and then Southeast Asia. This would cover some of the hottest countries in January and February while they were still nice and cool. We would continue through Asia and Australia/New Zealand, shuttling up and down to break up Australia and New Zealand into two visits instead of one large 6-week English-speaking block. From here, continue east to Latin America, and east again to Africa – arriving in July during the wildebeest migration – and that would be a true around-the-world experience. Again the weather would not be too hot because we would be in the Southern Hemisphere during their autumn and early winter time.
Selecting Destinations
After pages through all these books, we let everyone in the family choose three countries that we would absolutely, definitely visit. That gave us the first 12. The rest we filled in with further research and discussion with Sam.
We love cities and culture and variety and so Europe is the natural destination for us. The thought of returning to Paris or London would fill us with happiness at any time or place.
If you are just looking for a vacation idea then we would suggest Turkey, Thailand, or Peru. All three have a completely new culture, deep history, excellent food, stunning scenery and reasonable prices. You can also relax there, they would not leave you as exhausted as the intensity of India, China or Southern Africa.
For an inspiring and magical one-week vacation break for a family with kids, go straight to the Galapagos. This is a true life experience, not to be missed.
Here are more experiences, snapshots that I remember well about each location and may give you impressions:
– Greece: Anthony’s stories, Oedipus Rex performance, cooking with Anthony and his wife Sam
– Turkey: trading puzzles with puzzle master, the call at night from the roof of the Grand Bazaar, watching a Muslim service in Blue Mosque, a Turkish bath, seeing Selen and her family, horse ride in Cappadocia at sunset
– Copenhagen: walking through Viking town, Tivoli
– Sweden: fossil hunting
– Switzerland: cheese making, hike in the Alps
– London: an afternoon in British Museum; Tower of London on our own double-decker bus
– Dordogne: fireworks by our own Chateaux in Beynac; spending time with the Wilcox clan – my parents and brother Jason and his family
– Paris: meeting new friends (especially Nathalie & Stan, Blandine and James) and hosting old friends, lunches before class, the food especially Grand Vefour, the art and parks and monuments, White Night, soccer in the park, seeing Rue Mouffetard daily, trips to Mont St. Michel, Loire, Epernay, Strasbourg Christmas markets
– London: the snowy line for the train, Oxford tour, Christmas with friends
– Jordan: super guides Rahd and Magdi and first seeing Petra through the canyon walls
– Egypt: Egyptian Museum stories, seeing the painted tombs in the Valley of the Kings
– India: first view of the Taj, Lake Palace hotel
– Hong Kong: night view of Harbor
– New Zealand: playing cricket in the yard, picnic with Richard, wine class, skeet shooting, nature walks, Maori culture
– Singapore: ice cream sandwiches & food court
– Orient Express: Penang tour, fruit sampling
– Thailand: real pad thai, markets, Ramayama story, 3 countries in one day, opium museum, moving rice plants, boat ride and visit to long neck camp, mahout training
– Cambodia: visiting the four temples, hearing about Pol Pot, donating a well
– Vietnam: Ho Chu Minh story, Hanong Bay, splendor/grace/luxury of the Nam Hai resort
– Japan: cooking class, surviving the earthquake gracefully
– Australia: surfing with Darren, playing a videogame to de-stress after the quake, seeing my cousin Phil, footie, Great Barrier Reef snorkel, mud flats tour
– China: dinner with John Sun, tai chi / fan classes, walking among the terra cotta warriors, delicious Xi’an lunches, bicycle not-race, calligraphy class, surviving merchants of Guilin (tell friends to avoid), Lily telling stories of Dr. Sun Yet-sen and Confucius, the EI Ink factory, Shanghai acrobats, seeing Barrett
– Peru: great food especially ceviche and tiradito, seeing the agricultural lab, picnic on the wide open highlands, Macchu Pichu hike, buying hats
– Galapagos: an amazing week of nature walks and snorkels with all manner of life & nice people, Carter playing cards with seniors
– Costa Rica: recharging after a whirlwind start to the year (bur boring to site on resorts)
– Chile: chocolate class, planting seedlings
– Argentina: time with the Grimoldi’s & Gould’s, soccer game at Boca Junior stadium
– South Africa: Great Race, touring the wine lands, Soweto tour, seeing Michelle Obama
– Zimbabwe: getting soaked, sharing treasures from the market
– Safari (Botswana/Tanzania/Kenya): seeing my parents & all the experiences I listed in highlights
– Seychelles: sleeping late, private pool, decent Internet
Places to skip? There was something to like about EVERY destination. If we did it again we would skip or spend less time here: Gotland, Sweden (OK if you like Vikings, but not a full week); Zurich city (but don’t miss the Swiss Alps); Guilin, China (argh!); Paris in November (all rain, no Xmas markets); Orient Express train (exceptionally expensive); Costa Rica & Seychelles (long beach stays are too boring for us); Santiago Chile (not much history to see); Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe (2-3 hours of real interest but not worth 2 full days of transfer).
If you intend to make a prolonged visit to Europe, you need to read about the new Schwengen Agreement. The upshot is that out of any 180 days, you can only spend 90 days inside the Schwengen Zone which covers mainland Europe including many non-EU countries, Skandinavia and much of Eastern Europe. Luckily, United Kingdom, Ireland and Turkey are outside the zone and well worth visiting. Croatia is outside until 2015. If you want to spend more than 3 months in mainland Europe, you either have to (1) apply to one selected country for a special visa (usually for a reason other than tourism such as language study and usually from your home country well before you travel) and that will exclude the time you spend in the given country only; or (2) go elsewhere for 90 days and come back.
Pacing the Travel
Transfers are the source of stress and exhaustion. Do your very best to stay at least 3 nights in each place. Keep the 1- night and 2- night stays to fewer than a dozen nights in total.
The pace of travel and sensation and information flow is grueling. You will need to schedule at least one serious rest point every 2-3 months. Stay still at one hotel with modern Internet and safe food and water where you can speak the language and do ZERO touring. Stay for 5-7 days. Do laundry. Write blogs. Read books. Zone out with TV. Reflect and revise the plan for the next legs. Catch up on your bills from home. We particularly needed that in May after touring too heavily December 21-May 8. We collapsed to Costa Rico and spent 10 nights in our hotel rooms and did nothing touristic at all. That was an essential recharge period we needed to make it all the way to the end of Africa.
We generally hated being trapped for more than 3 days on any resort property, no matter how nice. We began to crave FREEDOM to move at our own will and choose our own activities and meals. Be cautious on long resort stays inside of one property.
It pays to review the air travel closely. Probably the best idea we had on air was to arrange the trip so we would go from Buenos Aires to Capetown on a certain day of the week. Most days you transit for two full days via Amsterdam with over 20 hours in the air. On Sundays and Wednesdays, you can fly direct on a nice Malaysia Air plane as it circles the globe endlessly from Kuala Lumpur to Buenos Aires to Capetown. Flying time just 7 hours! We tried very hard to minimize time in air and distance traveled, but we still logged 88 take offs and landings, of which 28 were on tiny puddle jumpers (all in Costa Rica or Africa). That’s an average of one flight every 100 hours for a year! The best tips for managing this are to make sure your carry-on is well organized so you know it can get through Xray easily, to use frequent flier preferred cards wherever you may have them, to pay the moderate extra charge for the ground operator to have someone in airport to handhold you on transits (these people can often jump the line for you and in one case even helped us backtrack through customs and back again without incident), and to reserve plenty of schoolwork and blog work for flights. While we could not bear to pay for business class in most circumstances, we did use it a few times and it is a good idea when you are in city airports in the developing world since the lines there can be crazy.
Where to Stay
Our favorite hotels and most luxurious safari camps, in order
India – Taj Lake Palace in Udaipur – exquisite; the ultimate in beauty and service
London – Athenaeum Hotel – superb family hotel right in the heart of London; a concierge desk just for the kids!
Vietnam – Nam Hai – stunning villas and personal butlers
Thailand – Anatara in Chiang Rai and Mandarin Oriental in Chiang Mai – both exotic and well appointed
Peru – Monasterio – luxury, history, cuisine, location – modern hotel in ancient monastery; the only property to consider in Cusco
African safari – Stanley’s (Botswana) – best food, Lewa Wilderness – lots to do in total comfort, and Sarara – a wilderness gem (Kenya)
Turkey – Empress Zoe – boutique hotel in heart of Sultanahmet; 14th century history; authentic Turkish feel
China – Peninsula in Beijing – fantastic location; best-designed rooms we encountered; top-notch service team
South Korea – Ritz – we arrived here after the Japan quake for just 2 days and they were incredibly kind and nice; cozy feel
Australia – Shangri La club floors in Sydney – amazing views of harbor and guest manager Sabina
Seychelles – super service and private pools at the Four Seasons
Planning the Individual Tours and the Daily Detail at Each Location
Focus on experiences over monuments and museums. For kids, they may get more out of milking a cow than seeing the Mona Lisa, unless your museum guide can tell a very colorful story.
Keep a diary or blog to write down your thoughts. The next experience will come very quickly and you will lose the essence of the feeling unless you make a reminder.
Rely on your travel planner and make sure you pick one who has actually gone to most of the places you will visit (Sam was exceptional in this regard). Expect some mutual frustration as you try to understand their world and they try to understand your personality. Spend plenty of time to discuss in detail what kind of room arrangements will work for you.
No matter how glowing the recommendation, thoroughly check each property in advance to avoid surprises and make sure you understand the price. It may only be 3 days on the schedule, but 3 days at a place you don’t like is still miserable.
We were conscious of safety for the kids and always made it a priority to be within earshot of them, 24 hours a day the whole year long. Nor did we ever leave the children with guides, drivers or hotel staff, no matter how trustworthy they appeared. Hotel lobbies and tourist areas are just not safe places for children to be alone.
So how do you stay so close while still allowing a degree of personal privacy? Our favorite room setup would be two connecting rooms, or a suite with one central area and two separate bedrooms. We tried hard to avoid two unconnected rooms, switching hotels if necessary. We never left the kids isolated so if there were truly no option, we split up boys and girls like in camp. It is certainly possible for the whole family to sleep all in one room with one bathroom, but after a few days of that everyone is on edge because there is just so little privacy. It also usually means your kids have to sleep on a sofa, which is just not fair for them to endure repeatedly across a year.
Money is a sensitive issue. You need to lay out a budget for the travel planner and you rely on them to help you spend wisely. But since the travel agency and/or the various tour operators all make more money when you spend more, there is a tension. You may run into days where you feel overcharged and tiredly wonder if the agent booked an expensive place just to use up the budget, but there are also days where the property stinks and you wonder why the agent did not step up to something nicer. You will wish you had looked more closely at the hotel website ahead of time.
Out of 77 different hotel and apartment stays, there were three times where we arrived and demanded an immediate change. In China, the charming boutique hotel bathrooms smelled of sewage and we left within hours for a big city hotel. In Cusco the hotel was poor quality and everyone jammed into one room and we left after one night for the best hotel in town. In Johannesberg we were staying on property at what turned out to be a nice hotel inside a closed amusement park, and we left after one night. In all three cases, although it was exhausting to re-pack our bags, it was always a good move and resulted in a much improved situation. So if you are miserable, speak up!
When it comes to detailed reservations and logistics, guide, driver, tickets and daily schedule, these are matters that are best handled locally. For this reason, your travel planner will not book directly but will instead select a country manager. Choosing the right local operator and helping to manage them is a vital skill for your travel planner. You need to mentally prepare as well to learn how many layers are involved in booking your travel. Spending $10K on a country might turn out to go $4K to various travel agents and operators and only $6K of actual goods and services. You might get there and discover you paid top dollar but the people actually doing the work are pinching pennies. So you have to be careful to understand exactly what you are getting and what a local person would be paying for that.
The travel planner will give you a detailed intinerary to review, which is prepared for them by the local ground operator. It often makes sense to prune back the proposed schedule. They will cheerfully book a ton of activities and pack every hour of your time, earning a commission on each event. Once the reservation is made, it becomes really hard to cancel, because your travel planner has long-term relationships in play or because the down payment is at risk. Some places even require full payment up front, which limits your flexibility. If you do cancel, getting cash back is a long slog.
Tour operators generally quote a package price across a week or more. You should go through and do a bottoms-up cost estimate and then push back to understand the logic. There is really no limit to how much you can be charged if you just nod along to any proposal. For example, in Argentina, the quoted price for a one-week luxury apartment rental was $13K. We looked online and found agencies that would rent apartments for $2K. Why the difference? The first apartment came with an English-speaking concierge service that would pre-stock the apartment with groceries of your choice. In the second apartment, you had to get your own groceries. Does that price make any sense? I suppose some people just don’t care. The travel industry is not there to help you spend efficiently, so check everything and do it before you pay a down payment. When in doubt take it off the list and just give yourself free time. If you suddenly decide you want to add an activity or book a restaurant when you arrive, the guide will be delighted to help you.
Be wary of prebooked meals. We loved having breakfast come with the room. But try to avoid having the tour operator prebook your lunches and dinners as well. Invariably, these are at restaurants where they get a kickback, and the meal will be overpriced, and you have paid in full for food you may not be hungry to eat. Similarly, there are always restaurants and souvenir craft shops who cater to tourists, and these places ALL pay kickbacks to your guide, often a big part of his income, so he will push hard to bring you there. The food at such restaurants that focus on tourism is generally mediocre although we found exceptions, and it is generally safe which is a real benefit. Still, if you have not paid in advance you can always go there anyway and you have freedom to change the plan to your liking.
Budget extra for tips, laundry and souvenir shipping. Each bag of souvenirs costs $200-300 to ship home no matter where you are. Six of these will cost you $2K. I talked elsewhere about laundry – we probably spent another $2K here. By far though, the unexpected and major cost was tips – a strong guide and driver will get tipped e.g. $50+$20 = $70 per day. We generally liked our guides and wanted to give the full amount or sometimes more. Multiply by 300 days of heavy touring and Wow it is a major expense! None of this was in our budget.
Figure out some small gift you can bring to give guides or people you like. Thank you note cards, or cards with your address would also be good. We made up cards at Vistaprint that had our pictures for easy reference and those went over well. When it came to gifts from kids to local kids, the most enthusiastic reaction we saw was when we handed out those little stretchy candy necklaces where the beads are sweet-tart candies. They are portable and they are a nice gesture without being a transfer of money.
So now you are ready to sit down and work out the itinerary in detail. Enjoy it! Building your excitement and anticipating great sights is one of the funnest parts of travel.
