Planning a great trip

My friend, Denene, made this comment to one of my Facebook posts: “Loving it. So, how did you plan all of this that you’re doing? I mean for places to stay (which btw have been awesome)... did you spend like a year pre-planning it all? It just blows my mind that you are doing all of this... and having a great success with not having much trouble along the way.” I thought that merited a bigger response than a Facebook post.

The answer is that most of my plans are made the day before they are executed. That might sound flippant, but it is fairly true. Let’s start at the beginning.

I woke up one morning three years ago and had this epiphany: I’m an author. I could do this anywhere. So why am I doing it from a basement in Bellevue?

I had no idea at the time how to go about it or what ‘it’ even was. I went to RV shows and truck dealers for three months before I selected my rig. It took three more months to get things together. I left Bellevue on August 10, 2013. I had two weeks of travel planned, as in places that I was going to go and stay. I’ve been gone 32 months. While traveling the country, I visited 44 states and 3 Canadian provinces and drove 55,000 miles.

After three months in Florida last year, which was a solid month too long, I decided to plan to spend the next winter in Hawaii. I shopped around for a while to find a place to stay because Hawaii is a favored winter vacation spot, but I found the Eco-Cabin on the Big Island through VRBO (Vacation Rentals By Owner). I booked it for four months. I bought a one-way ticket to Hawaii because I had no idea where I would go from there.

After the first of the year, I got serious about deciding where to go next. I figured I was this far west and it was silly to turn around, so why not go around the world. I’d often dreamed of doing that and had visions of Tahiti, New Zealand, and a dozen more places to go to. It was very expensive. Rather than give up, I started prioritizing places I really wanted to see. Thailand was one. Greece and Turkey, where I’ve set stories in the past but never visited, Central Europe, Berlin. I found an agent that specialized in booking round the world travel. We tossed things back and forth by email and finally decided that I could make a good trip of it by flying from Hawaii to Thailand, Thailand to Greece, Eurail around Europe, and Amsterdam to Seattle. And, by the way, I could have a three-day layover in Reykjavik, Iceland over Summer Solstice at no additional charge. I bought the ticket.

I still had no idea where I was going to go or stay. I made a couple reservations at different places and then canceled them. About three days before I left, I made a five-night reservation in Bangkok near the airport at a ‘luxury resort’. The pictures looked good and the reviews were good. And at $30 a night, I figured I could afford five nights while I adjusted to the time zone.

I’d been at the Vismaya Luxury Resort for three days before I started thinking about where I’d go next. I’d thought I would go south to the beaches, but everyone I knew told me I simply couldn’t miss Chiang Mai. I had two screens open on my computer. One with Airbnb and one with airfares. The match came with the Enchanted Garden Bungalows and Air Asia. I booked them both based on the availability here. I figured that even if the bungalows were primitive, I’d just spent four months in a tiny cabin where the shower was in the jungle and the toilet was out the back door. I booked ten days and am thrilled. People here have been great and both the staff and other guests are friendly and helpful. Got a lift to go get groceries. Had dinner with a group of eleven last night and am scheduled for a group dinner again tonight. Thai massage scheduled this afternoon. Tomorrow, some of the people are going on a tour to the white temple and I think I’ll join them. I guess that’s in Laos! Who knows what the next day will bring.

I have to leave this little corner of paradise in about eight days. Sometime during that time, I need to decide where I’m going next. Those beaches down south are sounding awfully good again. Several other guests here have been down near Krabi town and I’m collecting the names of different beaches and resorts. I’ll probably stay in Bangkok a couple days again before I head south. My flight out of Thailand is on March 29.

I will spend some time this week finding a place to stay for a few days in Athens. It’s always helpful to have a location when you arrive after several hours of flight time. Fortunately, I arrive about 1:00 in the afternoon, so at least it will be daylight when I arrive there. I have a list of places in Greece, Turkey, and Central Europe that I’d like to visit, but so far no schedule. My daughter is planning to meet me in Berlin the first week of June.

Years of planning? Hardly. I literally don’t have any idea where I’m going. The good part about that is that I’m never lost!