Round The World Itinerary Help?

shuffles03

Attached is a detailed breakdown of two round-the-world itineraries for 2 people for 10-11 months travel. We are unsure as to which round-the-world ticket these fall under. We've emailed several companies (Usit,Sayit, Trailfinders) and are awaiting responses. Also, as you can see from our tables we have broken down what we think is a rough but accurate price guideline for our travels (pricing is per person). We plan to work in New Zealand for the 6 month period that we stay there. What are your views on our pricing outline? We are planning to backpack on a low budget, i.e. Hostels, etc.

We have previously travelled through Thailand and feel our pricing for that leg of the trip is pretty accurate. Also, Bali is cheaper again so our pricing estimates there hopefully should be spot on. We'd really appreciate feedback.

Thanks.

mac123

It depends what you want to do in each place really. Personally I dont think 700 is enough for a month in Thailand or Bali although it is doable, especially in Bali. I spent two months in Indonesia a few years back and spent about 800/month but when I go back il be spending a little more so I can get in some extra diving.

750 for 3 weeks in Darwin sounds way too low, you will probably be paying around 200/week on hostels in Australia. I would probably double that.

dory

Indian visa is not free, was around €50 last I checked.

So this €8000 is for two people? So €4000 each? I think it's way too optimistic. What kind of job do you think you're going to get in NZ that would allow you only spend €1000 of your savings for 4 - 8 weeks in south america?

Honestly, I would save more and have a decent holiday in the future. Or else settle down in one place in some of the countries, as it's the moving around that costs a lot. Try a homestay or something to save money.

shuffles03

No, it's €8,000 spending money each. I'll actually have €13,000 if we need to spend more. I'm in Usit at the moment and actually think India is out of the question now due to logistics - can't include India in a RTW ticket.

Personally, I now think the best option is: Dublin-Bangkok-Bali-NZ-somewhere in SA and then back home.

Is this doable? Hoping to find out in the next half hr.

dory

You can include India on an RTW! Mumbai is part of it. Maybe USIT doesn't have that option but RTW tickets in general do. So if you want to go to India look somewhere else for a ticket.

shuffles03

Just finished up in Usit and went to travelmood too. Basically, SA is adding about €700 onto the flights.

Based on where we want to go, they came up with this:

Dublin - Bangkok - (make our own way to Singapore) - Singapore - Bali - Sydney - NZ - LA - Dublin

Total incl taxes: €1,644

It seems pretty solid and I can see why we should scrap SA. The girl said that SA is amazing but a hike of over €700 doesn't justify 4/5 wks staying there. North America is included in the itinerary at no extra cost.

I can't help but think that this route has lost the appeal that our original one had. It's a great route but it just kind of seems like the route everyone takes when they travel around the world. I liked how our original route was different (bout obv it's too expensive).

dory

Why not just get a half RTW ticket flying out Dublin - SA - NZ/Aus. That should be €1000 - €1000. Then make your own way home from there. That's what I did. It'll mean going to SA first though, you don't need a half RTW for the Asia leg because that's cheaper than SA leg.

Then once you're in Australia, get a cheap Air Asia flight to Malaysia. Tiger Airways to some other Asian country and fly home from there. I paid €70 form Singapore to Chennai with Tiger, then €350 on a one way ticket home to Ireland from India.
Will come in less than €2300 anyway! And will be more adventurous. Just be sure to book everything in advance.

And always remember - as helpful as these 'advisors' are in USIT etc. they're there to make money from you. So they're never going to suggest you just get half a ticket with them and make your own way home via budget airlines.

shuffles03

Cheers for that dory. I'm going to look into that now.

shuffles03

Travelmood actually mentioned a half RTW ticket - still waiting for her to mail me on the details. I can't remember the specifics - so much has been thrown at me today but she mentioned something about 6 months and having to ring when I'm over there to sort something out? Can't remember but if she mails m, I'm sure the details will be in there.

shuffles03

I found this post on page 3:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056188253

Wat do you think, pretty much the trip I was looking at. My g/f's pretty keen on India as she's not too keen on doing the same type of trip everyone else does. I was telling her that if we were to go to India, we would prob have to drop a destination somewhere else on the trip. Either Bali or N.America. That's when I thought about booking it myself like in the link above. Checking it now. In anyone's opinion as I don't know too much about India, could you spend 4/5 wks there? Is it really cheap ie Bali prices?

shuffles03

I used Skyscanner and have gotten myself all the way to Auckland but I'm having trouble finishing off the trip. The calendar on Skyscanner doesn't go past March 2012.

Here's what I've gotten so far:


Dublin - Delhi

Sat 1 Oct 2011
bmi + Jet Airways
14:10 DUB – 09:45 DEL
15h 05 (+1)
1 stop LHR
€325

Delhi - Bangkok
Tue 1 Nov 2011
Thai Airways
11:55 DEL – 17:25 BKK
4h
€188

Singapore - Auckland
Thu 15 Dec 2011
Jetstar
19:50 SIN – 09:55 AKL
9h 05 (+1)
€255

shuffles03

I'm just thinking, I don't think I'll be saving much here as it's already nearly at €800 and by the time I get return flights, it will be pretty much the same as what travel agents are quoting.

dory

Well they were quoting €2300 all in with SA weren't they? And with no India? If you don't want to do the regular trip then definitely cut of North America. Wonderful place but you can do it when you're 50.

The way I see it - it's cheaper than the already quoted (with SA) but it has the places you want to go!

If you really want an off the beaten path, and economically sensible option, screw the RTW thing, book a flight somewhere random and wander. The RTW flights have very limited amount of stopover places so you'll never truly find a unique experience using those flights.

shuffles03

I've been talking it over with the g/f and we definitely want to do something different. I've mailed everyone again for quotes for this route (now with India) just to see whether they come back above my estimate:

Dublin - India - Bangkok - Auckland - Stopover in USA - Dublin

Breakdown:

- Travel for 4 weeks in India
- Travel for 6 weeks around Thai islands
- Work in NZ for 6 months (although we will have a 12 month visa so may stay longer)
- Make a stopover in USA eg LA on the way back.

The stopover is optional at the moment.

It'll be interesting to see what they come back with. Personally, we think this route is way better now especially due to India.

€8,000 spending money each. I'll have €13,000 just in case. Working in NZ should tie us over while we're there.

Can I just say thanks to everyone who has replied in this thread. I know my route has changed quite a lot in the past 24hrs but it's changed for the better and that's because of the replies I've received here.

Cheers.

doriansmith

Where are you getting the €400 NZ visa cost from? The WHV for NZ only costs about €60.

shuffles03

@doriansmith:

My g/f put that price in. That's a mistake. She took the price from the Usit website. There's no way i'd pay €400 for Usit to do it for me. Way overpriced!! I don't need them to take care of my insurance or bank account. I've registered on http://www.immigration.govt.nz/ and have filled out most of my details for the working/holiday visa. I haven't gotten as far as the price yet as I'm still waiting to hear back from the different travel agents so I don't want to commit to anything just yet. I've provisionally just gone through the steps in the form to see the layout. Is it here where you said it costs €60?

There was one question on the visa application where they asked, "Are you represented by an immigration advisor?". I'm guessing this is someone like Usit etc. I would never book it through Usit but if you use a third party, is it easier to obtain the visa?

shuffles03

Go4Less are offering it for €150. I really don't know how Usit get away with charging €400. €150 is still high but Jesus, Usit are having a laugh!!

mac123

shuffles03 wrote: »

Go4Less are offering it for €150. I really don't know how Usit get away with charging €400. €150 is still high but Jesus, Usit are having a laugh!!

It probably includes Insurance with USIT. Just a guess.

doriansmith

shuffles03 wrote: »

@doriansmith:

My g/f put that price in. That's a mistake. She took the price from the Usit website. There's no way i'd pay €400 for Usit to do it for me. Way overpriced!! I don't need them to take care of my insurance or bank account. I've registered on http://www.immigration.govt.nz/ and have filled out most of my details for the working/holiday visa. I haven't gotten as far as the price yet as I'm still waiting to hear back from the different travel agents so I don't want to commit to anything just yet. I've provisionally just gone through the steps in the form to see the layout. Is it here where you said it costs €60?

There was one question on the visa application where they asked, "Are you represented by an immigration advisor?". I'm guessing this is someone like Usit etc. I would never book it through Usit but if you use a third party, is it easier to obtain the visa?

Yeah if you get it directly from the NZ immigration website it costs $120 which is roughly €60. At least that's how much it cost a year ago, I'm assuming it hasn't changed.

No, it's not any easier to obtain the visa through a third party. Once you apply online you should get an email within about 48 hours saying you've been successful. I've never heard of anyone getting turned down anyway.

shuffles03

Excellent!! Usit came back to me yesterday with the best price so far.

Dublin - Mumbai - (need to book our own flight from Mumbai to Bangkok) - Bangkok - Auckland - LA - Dublin.

€1,509.

The flight from Mumbai to Bangkok is really cheap so no worries there. Looking at booking at the end of April/May!

dory

Sounds great! Let us know how you get on.

shuffles03

I just thought I'd give an update as to where we are in planning this trip, and also ask a question about a possible alteration in our route.

Well, we're booking our flights in the next 2/3 weeks (we were due to book them in May but we got set back due to a wedding and a stag weekend too).

Prices haven't gone up too much since I last posted here in March. They're around €1,600 incl. taxes pp.

Our current route still is Dublin-Mumbai-Delhi-Bangkok-Auckland-LA-Dublin.

A possible alteration to this route came about last week when we were looking at visas for each destination.

Since we only get a 30 day visa in Thailand upon entry, we were either looking at paying for an extended visa before we set off or travel to Vietnam and re-enter into Thailand with another 30 day visa.

We won't be getting the extended visa before we leave now as the visa itself begins the day we receive it here in Dublin so it would be a waste as 30 out of the 60 days of it would be wasted while we are in India.

We were also looking at a return flight from Phuket to Vietnam and just for a laugh I typed in a one way flight from Phuket to Bali as well. The return flight from Vietnam worked out at a few hundred euro and the one way flight to Bali was something like 60 euro pp incl. taxes.

It got me thinking, either spend the 6 weeks in Thailand with a trip to Vietnam or spend a month in Thailand instead (allowing us to stay within our 30 day visa) and then spend 2 weeks in Bali before heading over to Auckland.

We've also thought about traveling up to Lao and back to extend the visa that way. We'll have to leave Thailand anyway to extend our visa.

Good idea or not? I'm also wondering if our overall flight prices would be cheaper too now that we'd be flying from Bali to Auckland instead of Bangkok to Auckland. The way it works out at the moment on our current itinerary is that we'll be booking the flight from Delhi to Bangkok ourselves separate from the RTW ticket so really the new RTW ticket would only include:

Dublin-Mumbai
Bali-Auckland
Auckland-LA
LA-Dublin

I wasn't going to post an update to this thread until we had booked our flights but this alteration got me thinking and I thought it would be better to bounce the idea off a few people here first before annoying the travel agents with possible alterations to the route until I know for sure (God knows I've annoyed them enough, ha!)

It would actually mean we'd be in Bali for Christmas although I'd say it might be a lot cheaper to travel by land to Lao.

Pisco Sour

Do not leave out South America. It is an absolutely wonderful place. Great history, immense scenery, fantastic people, great food and drink, fascinating culture.

Big mistake to leave it out for the sake of a few hundred quid!

I got a half RTW ticket off Trailfinders. Dublin-London-Rio de Janeiro, Santiago-Auckland, and Auckland to Melbourne, all for a smidge under 1200 euro. That is very reasonable.

If you really want to see it (judging by early in the thread you do), then do it first! So many people go South East Asia first with the intention of South America after Oz/NZ but end up broke and don't have enough to do it and go straight home after Oz/NZ. Might be an idea to leave Asia, the cheapest place to travel, till last.

shuffles03

@04072511:

Cheers for the reply. S.A. is somewhere we both really want to visit but after looking at it extensively over the past few months, we can't add it into our budget. We feel that if we did go, we'd have to skimp on a lot of places and wouldn't get to see everywhere properly. It's our next trip after this one. We really want to go to India and S.E. Asia so we're going to leave S.A for next time so we can do it justice.

We're booking our flights on Saturday. Trailfinders actually came out the cheapest (nearly €200 cheaper than Usit). We just have to finalize our route.

I was talking to an agent in TF and he said that if we want to go to Bali, the flight route he recommended was:

Dublin-Mumbai
Singapore-Auckland (via Brisbane)
Auckland-LA
LA-Dublin

I checked out flights on Air-Asia.com and it's only €61 from Phuket to Bali and €24 from Bali to Singapore so we're just debating at the moment whether we'll go there for christmas and the new year.

My only worry is finding accommodation at christmas time. We'll be looking to stay in beach huts (absolutely love them) and as far as I can see, you can't book these before you arrive (only hotels/bungalows etc etc) and I'd be a bit afraid that if we arrived on the Gili islands a week before christmas, everything would be either full or ridiculously priced.

Should we do 6 weeks in Thailand with crossing into somewhere like Lao to extend our visa or do 30 days in Thailand and 2 weeks in Bali before going to Auckland?

If anyone knows where we can find info on booking beach huts on the Gili islands that would be amazing. I've searched threads here and on Google but I can only find hotel rooms etc.

Can't believe we're finally booking. I think it'll really set in once we've paid for the flights.

Seems like a long time to spend on the Thai islands.. On a budget, you can only really go to the main touristy ones which would get fairly boring. Especially if you're heading to Gili aswell? Or how about check out the Philippines for beaches instead... Amazing country and north Palawan blows Southern Thailand out of the water.
Maybe go into Burma or somethin for a while instead of 6/8 weeks beachin' it? And only going to Laos to extend visas?

The only advice I can really give is check the links below... The ticket might be cheaper, who knows.
http://www.staralliance.com/en/fares/round-the-world-fare/
http://www.roundtheworldticket.com/

shuffles03

@ Ads By Google:

Cheers for the info, we're looking into the Philippines now too, thanks for that. We booked our flights on Friday. In the end, we went with Sayit in Cork. All the prices were pretty much the same between each travel agents but the customer service in Sayit is outstanding. I dealt with a girl called Clare. She said she has a few clients that go to Indonesia and the Gili islands quite a bit and she's going to find out from them where the best places to go are. I definitely wouldn't have gotten that type of service from Trailfiners or Usit.

shuffles03

Hey,

Just a quick update on our trip. We're currently in NZ and just wanted to say cheers for all the help last year especially the mods with sorting out a route for our trip.

I've started writing a blog and will be updating it as often as possible.

Here's a link if anyone's interested:

http://feckthis****.blogspot.co.nz/?m=0

I'm only at the start, have a lot to write.

Cheers again.

shuffles03

For some reason that won't load. I think it's because the word '****' is in the address of the blogand boards has the word blocked out. Anyways, anyone interested in reading it just has to replace the four * symbols in the address with '****'

shuffles03

It's sh1t but with an 'I' instead of a '1'.