The Voss Dufour World Tour

Congratulations! You are one of the thousands of people who have decided to take a break from life as you know it and take a trip round the world. Believe me, after making that decision (and clicking on the “purchase” option to buy your plane ticket) all the rest will be easy-peasy; it will just fall into place.

But first that plane ticket. Let’s talk about that.

Which type of plane ticket will you buy? Assuming you are planning on buying a Round the World Ticket (to which there are pros and cons), you have a couple options. I don’t know much about other companies (besides  <a href="www.oneworld.com" the One World Alliance</a>) or options, but can definitely talk about our experiences and the research we did.  James and I are traveling on a 4 continent  (Europe, South America, Oceania and Asia) One World Alliance ticket. This ticket allows you 16 legs over the course of your 4 continent travel. There are some things to know about this type of ticket:

Once you cross an ocean, you can’t go back over that same ocean. Once we flew from South America to Oceania, we couldn’t fly back to South America….at least not on this trip!

Our travel also has to be completed in about 11 months, or roughly 330 days.

The dates are changeable. You do need to book the ticket with set flights to assure that there are flights from point A to point B. But if and when you get to Point B and decide you want to stay longer than you originally planned, you can change your flight for a later date. We were told there was no fee for this and there wasn’t until we arrived in Oceania and Qantas told us that any changes done in Australia had a fee. Luckily we were calling from NZ and so reassessed some upcoming flights thru Asia.  Hmm…we hope we don’t run into this problem again. Touch wood.

Once you fly into a city, you can’t fly back into that city ie you can’t fly into Sydney, then fly to Melbourne and then back to Sydney. Each city on your itinerary has to be different.

One World is an alliance of some great airlines: Qantas, LAN, Iberia, Cathay Pacific, JAL, British Airways to name a few. They offer 3, 4, 5 and 6 continent ticket options. Before you buy one of these tickets, consider purchasing the ticket OUTSIDE of the USA. Depending on the country/continent, these ticket prices vary. There is a chart on the One World Alliance webpage outlining the prices based on purchasing location. Our ticket was about 1600 GBP/pp, at the time around $3000 USD. As we didn’t include North America in our 4 continents, our trip officially began in London but with family over there this worked out well for us.  While a round-trip ticket to London in August wasn’t cheap (about $900USD/pp), when all the math was done, we ended up saving ourselves about $1000 USD had we bought that same ticket within the USA.

I was lucky that James did most of the leg work when figuring out our itinerary. To say it took a lot time would be an understatement. There was lots of constant rearranging due to where and when particular flights went vs where we wanted to go. A lot of attention has to be paid to the flight path of the flights you are selecting. We had originally planned to fly Europe, South America, Asia and then Oceania, but all flights out of South America to Asia touched down somewhere in North America, thus making our 4 continent ticket a 5 continent ticket, even if it was just a lay over. So we (let’s be honest, it was James) had to spend some time figuring out  our route.

The upside of this ticket, in my opinion, is that it’s a nice balance between wanting to plan a bit vs figuring it all out while on the road. We have an itinerary and a sense of where we are going. But in between airports, the world is our oyster. Perhaps for some, that’s too much planning and they would rather buy tickets on the go, while on the road. That’s cool too. We have bought in-country flights to visit other places that aren’t official stops on our One World Alliance itinerary. Do whatever works for you. With the internet and a credit card, anything is more or less possible. .

The other Round The World Tickets options (no doubt there are many out there) that  I know about is with <a href="www.staralliance.com" Star Alliance</a>.  I am not 100% sure which airlines are in their alliance, but I do recall that their ticket pricing is based on desired miles traveled. So instead of purchasing a ticket by number of continents, you do it based on your flight path and how many miles that adds up to. Again, we went with One World Alliance so I can’t speak much to other choice, but I remember that our similar fllight with Star was over $5000 USD.

Considering the price of a round-trip ticket to Thailand from Boston is no less than $1000 USD and flights to Australia and some of our other further away destinations are $1500 USD +,  I would say with conviction that our $3300 USD 4 continent ticket is a bargain. It works out to about $200 USD/per leg of our trip. And no matter what price you put on the ticket, clearly the experience is priceless. Thank you Mastercard!

For the upteenth time, James and I packed our backpacks the other day as we left Penang to go back to Thailand. At this point, I feel like I could do pack in my sleep. With all the practice of packing and unpacking, having to find things in a hurry, knowing what goes in first vs last, I know the inside of my backpack like I know the back of my hand. It took a couple different iterations of packing before I found the one that works just right. Granted there are always some things that don’t fit. Now that we are in Southeast Asia, my hiking shoes and light jacket don’t fit in the backpack which is annoying as shoes are clunky but that’s okay. It’s the nature of traveling across different climates.

As we travel around, we often get asked “How do you pack for a Round The World trip?” and honestly I think it’s simple and perhaps even easier than packing for a shorter trip. Here are a couple ground rules that I employed before we left.

• Know that you will wear whatever you are packing at least every other day. You have to make sure to pack clothes that you like and you have worn prior to leaving (to ensure comfort etc.) If you have been following our blog, you will have seen every outfit I brought with us. (More on that in a bit.) There are no other ways around it. James refers to my outfits as Outfit #1 and #1A.
• Pick clothes that give you the most options, and I am not just talking about colors. Ideally everything has to serve more than one purpose. My long sleeved dri-fit tops were great in the cooler places and also work in the humid climates. I wear them to shield my skin from the sun, but they aren’t cotton so they remain cool (relatively speaking!)
• Accept that you can just pack for a type of travel—backpacking. This ultimately means you won’t be dining in nice restaurants, dancing in heels or attending any black tie events. That alone cuts down on so many clothes options!
• Figure out a way to organize your bag. I bought 3 Eagle Creek Travel Organizer Bags (S, M, L) and they are fantastic. Not only do I know exactly where to find things as they are always in the same bag, but it helps to slide things into my backpack when I am ready to go.
• Figure out what items you can share between the two of you (if you have a traveling partner.) We only have one bathroom bag with day to day toiletries like toothpaste and brush as well as small containers of shampoo and soap. We also only have one set of converters for our chargers and electrical items.
• Imagine you are just packing for a couple day trip, not a Round the World trip. It’s really no different. People all around the world wash their clothes and so can you. Granted it may not be in a Maytag washer, but they will get washed (not always to 100% cleanliness, but “washed” none the less.) And if all else fails, you can always find a sink. We made sure to pack a clothesline with pins and they have  already proved their weight in gold.

So what did I pack you may be wondering? Almost 6 months ago, I left Boston with the following:
3 tank tops from Target, 2 long sleeved dri-fit REI tops, 1 dress, 2 t-shirts, 3 sports bras, 1 bathing suit, 1 pair of jeans, 1 dri-fit pair of pants, 1 pair of yoga capris, 1 pair of capris, 3 pairs of socks, couple pairs of underwear, long underwear top and bottom, a light REI jacket/shell, a toiletry bag, small bottle of sunblock and insect repellent, clothespins,1 pair of Merrell Chameleon hiking shoes, 1 pair of Reef Flip Flops, small bag of electronics (memory stick, converters for ipod and camera charger), 1 Canon small digital camera, couple passport sized photos, copies of documents, 1 yogi toes, 1 sarong. 1 quick dry towel.

And now, almost 6 months later, I have pretty much the same items in my bag, give or take a couple. One tank top has been lost along the way (no idea how.) One of my t shirts got too stained to wear and got tossed. There has been a couple flip flop catastrophes along the way (blow out in Auckland, losing  a pair to the high tide in Thailand.) I picked up another dress and bathing suit in Thailand which I had figured I would do. 1 sports bra got tossed for lack of comfort. Some souvenirs got mailed home along the way but otherwise my bag looks more or less like it did when I first left….all 12 kg (26 lbs) of it.