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After an extended time at home with no international trips, I'm headed back out on the road this week. My journey will take me to the Caucasus region, including Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Armenia. Here's how I arranged the trip and what I plan to do.
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Today is Blog Action Day, where the blogging world (such as it is) unites to write about a single topic. I know, so conventional—but in this case, I don’t mind going with the flow. The theme this year is Climate Change, so I thought I’d contribute something about travel and its impact on the world ...
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My travel goal takes me to a lot of places, and the trips don’t always play out the way I expect. Things go wrong. Some trips are thrilling, some are boring, and most are somewhere in between.
Someone asked me recently, aren’t you on The Amazing Race? I saw you jumping around in taxis in Thailand.
Wrong guy.
My answer: “No, I’m doing my own Amazing Race. It’s better than the one on TV.”
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In 2008 I earned Executive Platinum status with American Airlines the hard way– through lots of flight hours logged all over the world. In 2009 I also earned the same, highest-level status with Northwest, Delta, and Continental, but I flew less than 10,000 miles with each of them.
On a recent Atlanta-Miami flight operated by Delta, my upgrade cleared three days ahead of the flight. I watched as more loyal Delta passengers waited at the gate thirty minutes before departure in hopes of getting a seat up front. Is it fair? Depends on how you look at it, I suppose– but travel hacking is all about gaining some kind of advantage over the system.
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Last year at about this time, I took what I called the Monster Trip of 2008.
It involved four continents, driving through Italy in the middle of the night, visiting Iraqi Kurdistan, roaming by train and bus across the Baltics and Moldova, and finally coming home through Asia – where I mistakenly double-booked myself on two non-refundable tickets home from Japan.
What fun that was. Now it's time to repeat the process, although with a completely different itinerary, and hopefully without getting stranded on a faraway continent three days before I'm supposed to come home.
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I've been home from my trip to Haiti and South America for about a week now, and I didn't expect to go anywhere for a while.
Then all of a sudden, I got an email from Air New Zealand... offering to bring me along with a group of journalists going to the South Pacific for a press event. The offer came via Chris Brogan, who recommended me to Air New Zealand – big thanks to Chris for that.
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After arriving in Paramaribo, Suriname on a long overland journey from Guyana, I was tired.
The week before I had been in Haiti, relearning humility thanks to missionaries and mosquitoes. The missionaries I liked, the mosquitoes, not so much – but as I tell myself from time to time, it's all part of the adventure.
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Part I: Georgetown to New Amsterdam, Guyana
My sleep schedule is still off from the 3:30 a.m. arrival a couple of nights earlier, but it's an early morning wake-up to get to the Guyana taxi station. I fall asleep at 2:00 a.m., and the alarm goes off at 4:45. Nice. By 5:15 I'm downstairs paying the bill and waiting for my first ride of the day.
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A number of people have asked what I take with me for long overseas trips, and how I travel with no backpack or checked baggage. I'm getting ready to head out on the road again in about 10 days, so this is a good opportunity to review how it works for me.
The biggest secret: packing light is actually easier than bringing a ton of stuff.
The overriding philosophy of my packing list is to keep it as simple as possible. That's basic, I know, but very important. At least for me, travel stress is directly proportionate to the amount of stuff I carry around. I don't own a backpack and haven't willingly checked a bag on one of my extended adventures.
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The flight attendant escorts me to my seat in 2B. She waits as I put my things down, and offers to hang my jacket. I spread out my books, journal, and iPod over the seat next to me, because I already know the front cabin is half-full and they’ve blocked the seat next to me at my request.
Not that I need the room – the seat is huge. It reclines fully flat so that I can go to sleep after the five-course meal.
As I’m getting settled, another flight attendant comes by with a tray of orange juice, champagne, and water. If I hesitate, he’ll ask, “Would you prefer a mimosa, or maybe club soda with lime?”
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Several times a year I check into a Sheraton hotel that is free to me. Most of the time, the check-in clerk mentions my Gold status. “Thank you for giving us your business,” she says. “No problem,” I reply. “Thanks for giving me free rooms.”
“Thank you for giving us your business,” she says. “No problem,” I reply. “Thanks for giving me free rooms.”
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In the lobby of the Sheraton Hotel in Dhaka, Bangladesh, I’m having lunch with a couple of West African gangsters. To be precise, I’m eating a cheese sandwich while they are chain-smoking and drinking espresso.
I started off sitting at another table, but then we said hello to each other and I moved over. Because I lived in their region for so long, I always enjoy talking with West Africans whenever I meet up with them while traveling. The encounter with the guys at the Sheraton in Bangladesh, however, is a bit unusual.
They are very friendly. We talk about Obama, about Bangladesh, and so on. I ask them how long they are staying in Dhaka, and they say “We’re not sure.” I ask if they are staying “here,” meaning the Sheraton, and they say, “We’re not staying here, but we keep a room here.”
Whenever they’re not traveling, one of them tells me, they live in Brazil or Columbia. They work throughout Latin America, Africa, and Asia, but never in the U.S. or Europe.
Hmmmm ...
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When I venture out in to the world by myself, as I am prone to do from time to time, people sometimes ask, “Don’t you get lonely?”
There are two answers to this question, both of which are true ...
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The Japanese man sitting next to me looks back and forth between the video and me. Finally, he takes off his headphones and asks, “Wrong movie?”
Yes. Wrong movie.
The wrong movie plays for nearly three minutes before it is turned off by a flight attendant. She comes on the p.a. after another three minutes. “Ladies and gentlemen… sorry… we can’t find the arrival video for Japan. If you have any questions about Japan, let us know.”
Other than that, the 11-hour flight across the Pacific is uneventful. I arrive in Narita and quickly transfer to a Cathay Pacific flight for Hong Kong. Another five hours goes by as I fitfully sleep in the back of the plane.
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It’s not technically last-minute – I’ve changed full itineraries right up to the day of departure before – but two weeks before I was scheduled to fly to Ethiopia, I decided to change directions and go to Southeast Asia instead. In fact, I’m leaving this morning! Yikes – after I write this, I really should think about packing.
This post will explain both the why and how of this decision. The why part covers the details of why I no longer wanted to take the trip I originally planned. The how part deals with Travel Hacking – in this case, how I was able to change the entire trip on short notice using Awards tickets and so on.
Take your pick – feel free to read both or either parts depending on your interest level.
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