General

Now that we’ve been traveling for 3 months, I wanted to write up some general advice/insight.

Apps/websites

• Booking.com: our favorite site for finding a wide range of lodging, and best search filter options
• Airbnb.com: Best way to find a condo with a full kitchen, which is really nice once in a while
• maps.me: Great offline maps app
• Kayak: My favorite app for finding cheap flights
• Google maps: Learn to use the ‘save for offline use’ and ‘starred locations’ features.
• Uber/Grab: often cheaper than regular taxi’s, and you dont have to haggle. I prefer the Uber interface, as Grab sometimes got the locations wrong.
• Google Translate
• backstreetacademy.com:  Several of our favorite tours/classes were booked thru this web site. They specialize in ‘unusual’ activities. Klook.com has some good tours too. Some cities also have good AirBNB ‘experiences’.

Depending on exactly where you plan to go, you don’t need warm clothes. The most important thing is a good pair of shoes that can get wet and dry quickly. I LOVE my Keen Newport sandals, which are perfect in SE Asia. Pharmacies are everywhere and seem to carry every thing, so don’t worry about stocking up on meds. Bring a spoon and a small food storage box for leftovers. Help cut down on plastic bottle use and bring a water filter! A small roller bag is all you need. Laundry is cheap and easy everywhere. Usually about $1 per kilo. A good day pack is very helpful, as well as a small shoulder bag. A small Bluetooth speaker is nice if you want to listen to music in your room from your phone.

Here is really all you need in terms of clothing: 4 shirts, 2 pair shorts, 1 long pants, 4 underwear, 2 pair socks (in general you wont be wearing socks), 1 light jacket, Sun hat.

How to not burn out on a long trip

1. Spend at least 1 day / week doing as little as possible. Just read, research your next destination, watch TV, etc.
2. Try to spend at least 5 days in each city. Travel days are the most tiring, so try not to have too many of those.
3. Try to get a place with a kitchen at least 1 week/month. Eating in restaurants all the time gets old. AirBNB is a good source for places with a kitchen.

Costs

In general here is what we have been spending in South East Asia:

• Lodging: $20-30/night, mostly a room with AC in a small guesthouses, often includes breakfast
• Local food: $1-$2 per meal
• budget tourist food: $2-$4 per meal (places with English menu, and western options)
• Taxi: $2 for 1-2 miles
• Beer: $1-$2, cocktails: $3-5. (More in Malaysia, as taxes are higher. Less in Cambodia, where taxes are lower)
• full day guided tours/trips: $20-$100, depending on on the tour
• Flights: $50-$130 to get around within SE Asia. Anything over a 6 hour bus ride we flew instead.

Its also easy to spend $100 night for fancy 4-star lodging and $30-$50 for overpriced international cuisine if thats what you prefer, but why?

Mobile Data Options

• Get a local SIM card: you can get a local SIM card with a reasonable data limit for $5-$10 everywhere, but then you have a new phone number in each country
• Project Fi: works in 170 countries, $10/GB for data, unlimited text messages, $.20/min for voice calls
• • Advantages: It ‘just works’ almost everywhere in theory. In Vietnam it did not work, and while it was supposed to work in Laos, it didn’t. We could send text messages, but no internet. They added Myanmar just before we arrived.
  • Disadvantages: Must use one of 2 fairly expensive Android phones, and I really prefer IOS to Android.

We went with Project Fi, as we where going so many places and transiting thru Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur a couple times. It was really nice to not have to worry about getting/changing the SIM card all the time. Our monthly total cost for 2 people averaged around $70. But local SIMS are a lot cheaper. If you are just going to couple countries, I’d go with that option.

Being mostly in the land of motorbikes (aka scooters) for the last 2.5 months has made me think a lot about the advantages and disadvantages of cars vs. scooters. I think for the parts of the world that tend to be 60-90 degrees F (which is most of SE Asia, and even parts of the southern US and southern Europe), scooters are the clear winner. This will be even more true as electric scooters catch on.

People use scooters for most everything here, and you’ve probably seen some amazing photos of loaded down scooters. It’s also easy to turn a scooter into a taxi that can hold 2 passengers and their luggage (see below). There is secure parking for scooters everywhere, and you can buy gasoline in recycled water bottles everywhere. Many places you can even do an Uber on the back of a scooter.

In Vietnam, kids 12-16 can ride electric scooters, and so are a very popular ways for kids to get to school. Electric assist bicycles are also very popular. In Cambodia and Myanmar it’s coming to see kids 12 and up riding small scooters to school.

The only city on our trip so far where cars outnumbered scooters was Chiang Mai, Thailand, and the traffic was horrible there. In much bigger cities like Denang Vietnam where scooters still dominate, the traffic was way better.

I discussed this with several locals in all the countries we’ve been to so far, and they all have said that everyone wants a car as soon as they can afford one. Clearly this will be a big problem, as most cities here do not have the roads or parking infrastructure to handle it.

It would be great if all places in the world that have not made the scooter to car transition (or even the bike to scooter transition) to create large tax incentives for people to stick with scooters over cars. Maybe this could even work in places like San Diego too? Probably not….

We decided to see what it would be like for 55 year olds  to stay at at a backpackers hostel. Dorm beds $7/night, private rooms $25/night. Of course we did the private room.

Overall it was almost exactly the same at when I was in SE Asia 30 years ago. The hostel was full of Europeans (mostly German college students) in their 20s. Also Danes, Dutch, Brits, Aussies, 1 other American, etc. I even heard both ‘The Wall’ and ‘Hotel California’ on the stereo within 15 minutes of arriving, just like 30 years ago! (They did play more current music too later). The food was mediocre, the beers where cheap, and everyone was exchanging info on good places to go and how to get there. And there was AC and hot water, something that was rare 30 years ago.

Even tho we were the only ones over 30, everyone seemed happy to hang out with us and hear about what is was like backpacking in the 80s and 90s. We also booked a day trip with the hostel ($16 for a full day of activities) that was great, and got to meet even more backpackers.

Hostels are still a great way to travel, meet people, and gather information. We plan to stay at places like this periodically, especially when first arriving in a new country. More older folks should travel this way. Or at least find a hotel across the street from a backpacker hostel, and book some day trips with them.

Oh, and in Vietnam they all sell balloons of nitrous oxide for $.50 too, if you are into that.

Here is the place we stayed. Backpacker hostels don’t usually have pools, which helped us make the decision to stay there. 😉