I'm so bored with the USA
November 23, 2009 1:26 PM Subscribe
Where should my wife and I go traveling in January and February on less than $10,000 CDN?
Hi all,
Well, as a follow-up to my previous life-choices question, it looks like my wife and I will be able to do some backpacking in the New Year. And we're wondering where to go.
She has recently been laid off from her job (with a decent payout package) and I will be leaving mine as well. She has a good job offer in another small Canadian city, and if she takes it we will be moving there in February or March. This was not part of our long-term plan, but we're okay taking the plunge. The thing is, if we decide to do this (and if the final offer is good enough), we will be foregoing our actual plan of buggering off to teach English in Thailand for a while longer, so we want to reward ourselves with some overseas travel in January and February.
We will probably have about $8,000 CDN or so, and I'd like to be able to stretch this to cover our expenses for 6-8 weeks if possible. Our flights will have to come out of this amount as well and we'll be flying out of Canada. We've both been to Europe multiple times so would prefer somewhere a little more exotic. I'd like to go to the Old World, but we are really open to travelling pretty much anywhere. Where should we go? What should we see?
We are both experienced budget travelers, fully comfortable in hostels, budget hotels etc. It would be nice to get our own room once in a while of course. We're into things like history, archaeology, nature, museums, and tasty food.
Also, good resources for budget travel deals or websites would be welcome as well.
Where would you go? Thanks!
Hi all,
Well, as a follow-up to my previous life-choices question, it looks like my wife and I will be able to do some backpacking in the New Year. And we're wondering where to go.
She has recently been laid off from her job (with a decent payout package) and I will be leaving mine as well. She has a good job offer in another small Canadian city, and if she takes it we will be moving there in February or March. This was not part of our long-term plan, but we're okay taking the plunge. The thing is, if we decide to do this (and if the final offer is good enough), we will be foregoing our actual plan of buggering off to teach English in Thailand for a while longer, so we want to reward ourselves with some overseas travel in January and February.
We will probably have about $8,000 CDN or so, and I'd like to be able to stretch this to cover our expenses for 6-8 weeks if possible. Our flights will have to come out of this amount as well and we'll be flying out of Canada. We've both been to Europe multiple times so would prefer somewhere a little more exotic. I'd like to go to the Old World, but we are really open to travelling pretty much anywhere. Where should we go? What should we see?
We are both experienced budget travelers, fully comfortable in hostels, budget hotels etc. It would be nice to get our own room once in a while of course. We're into things like history, archaeology, nature, museums, and tasty food.
Also, good resources for budget travel deals or websites would be welcome as well.
Where would you go? Thanks!
Response by poster: The Old World is not just Europe. It includes Asia and Africa as well. But thank you for your suggestion; Argentina is appealing.
/the USA thing is mostly because I wanted the title of my question to be a Clash song... :)
But also because most of the travel we've done in the last few years has been in the US.
posted by hamandcheese at 2:00 PM on November 23, 2009
/the USA thing is mostly because I wanted the title of my question to be a Clash song... :)
But also because most of the travel we've done in the last few years has been in the US.
posted by hamandcheese at 2:00 PM on November 23, 2009
SE Asia. Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand. You'll spend a couple grand getting there, but everything else will be cheap.
posted by gnutron at 2:03 PM on November 23, 2009
posted by gnutron at 2:03 PM on November 23, 2009
I would fly into Lima Peru and start an adventure taking me to Machu Picchu then make my way north stopping in various destinations in South and Central America.
posted by bravowhiskey at 2:11 PM on November 23, 2009
posted by bravowhiskey at 2:11 PM on November 23, 2009
2nding SE Asia. That's way more than you'll need for 2 months.
posted by TWinbrook8 at 2:47 PM on November 23, 2009
posted by TWinbrook8 at 2:47 PM on November 23, 2009
SE Asia indeed. I spent two weeks in Indonesia once with my then-girl. Our resort on Bali for the the first three nights cost a princely $35 CND per night. She paid for that and we agreed that I would pay everything for the rest of the trip until we were square. I was hard-pressed to spend $100 in only ten days, including hotels, transportation and restaurant meals.
We lived quite comfortably on about ten bucks a day for the pair of us. With your budget in SE Asia, you could live like princes of the earth.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 3:45 PM on November 23, 2009
We lived quite comfortably on about ten bucks a day for the pair of us. With your budget in SE Asia, you could live like princes of the earth.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 3:45 PM on November 23, 2009
Yeah, don't say "old world". While it technically includes Asia and Africa, it's not used that way by anyone other than history profs. It almost always means "Europe".
$8,000 for eight weeks is quite doable, especially once you eliminate the boring touristy places. I use US$1000/wk as a heuristic for planning two-person vacations/trips of 2-5 weeks, and it works. Of course, I am a "eat on the street like real people" traveler who is happy collapsing in a cheap hotel every night, but if you're "backpacking", I can't imagine your expenses will be very high.
Thailand is a great idea. Kuala Lumpur is gorgeous. Or India if you want a different kind of crazy adventure.
posted by rokusan at 5:07 PM on November 23, 2009
$8,000 for eight weeks is quite doable, especially once you eliminate the boring touristy places. I use US$1000/wk as a heuristic for planning two-person vacations/trips of 2-5 weeks, and it works. Of course, I am a "eat on the street like real people" traveler who is happy collapsing in a cheap hotel every night, but if you're "backpacking", I can't imagine your expenses will be very high.
Thailand is a great idea. Kuala Lumpur is gorgeous. Or India if you want a different kind of crazy adventure.
posted by rokusan at 5:07 PM on November 23, 2009
My wife and I live in Southwest Ireland for 8-10 weeks every winter. We rent a three bedroom 1 1/2 BR cottage (with all modern conveniences--satellite. wifi,etc) in a rural setting that overlooks Kenmare Bay and Ring of Kerry, lease an auto and eat out once a day for much less than you have budgeted. We could easily include airfare and still come in under budget. My answer--go where it is off season, rent a cottage/apartment/house or two and do not travel constantly. You will be able to stay anywhere other than major metropolitan areas or where the exchange rate puts you out of business. BTW, Southwest Ireland is very temperate in the winter.
posted by rmhsinc at 7:29 PM on November 23, 2009
posted by rmhsinc at 7:29 PM on November 23, 2009
Response by poster: I guess we're going to have to agree to disagree about the proper usage of "Old World." But I want to thank everyone for the suggestions. Right now we are thinking:
Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand
Or Northern India, Nepal and Tibet
Or Greece and Turkey (I know I discounted Europe... but flights are cheap to Istanbul)
Or China
Or Morocco
Dammit. We're still not really narrowing this down. Anyone else have input?
posted by hamandcheese at 9:04 AM on November 24, 2009
Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand
Or Northern India, Nepal and Tibet
Or Greece and Turkey (I know I discounted Europe... but flights are cheap to Istanbul)
Or China
Or Morocco
Dammit. We're still not really narrowing this down. Anyone else have input?
posted by hamandcheese at 9:04 AM on November 24, 2009
This thread is closed to new comments.
I'd head to Argentina. Once you've paid for the flights the rest is gravy, with a peso worth about 25 cents Canadian. You could live in BsAs for about C$1000 each for an entire month. Maybe more.
Why is your question titled "I'm so bored with the USA" when you live in Canada?
posted by ethnomethodologist at 1:53 PM on November 23, 2009