If you put our dream destinations into a very large spreadsheet then cross reference: the ideal seasons in the various parts of the world; interesting festivals; major air routes; the (surprisingly strict) constraints of a OneWorld Explorer air ticket; the availability of group tours on three separate continents; and the price of sushi you come up with the following.
Our main round the world ticket covering about half of our flights. Blank planners can be found at http://oneworldrtw.innosked.com/ for those interested...
Soundtrack: well, we had to include this at some point! Live version, remixed with Better Harder Faster Stronger, amazing.
- End of May to 23 June – road trip across the USA from NYC to LA via the deep South
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24 June to 1 July – sailing round the Galapagos
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2 July to 21 July – Peru & Bolivia (including the Inca trail and the Bolivian salt flats)
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22 July to 28 July – Easter Island for the stone heads
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28 July to 2 August – Sydney and Cairns, great barrier reef in passing
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2 August to 21 August – Papua new Guinea for the Mount Hagen show
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22 August to 6 Sep – Vanuatu, a quintessential Pacific island, complete with hopefully not too active volcanoes and a hopefully not too active culture of cannibalism
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Fly Sydney-Hong Kong, then on to Beijing
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8 Sep to 14 Sep – tour of North Korea including the Arirang mass games
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16 Sep to 11 Oct – East down the Silk Road, including Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan
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12 Oct to 22 Oct – western China (en route from Kyrgyzstan to Tibet), train to Lhasa
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23 Oct to 6 Nov – trekking in Tibet, then driving over the Himalaya to Kathmandu
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Back to civilisation for a lost weekend in Hong Kong
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10 Nov to 21 Nov – Japan for the maple leaf season
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21 Nov – 23 Dec Thailand, Cambodia (Angkor Wat) and Burma (Pagan, Mandalay etc.)
- Home for Christmas and some serious comfort food
- 3 Jan – fly to Buenos Aires en route to Antartica
- February – back to the UK to start the rest of our lives
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The master schedule. I have deliberately reduced the font size and resolution to replicate the full eye-bleeding impact of the original.
We would be delighted if anyone were to be passing through any of these areas when we were there and wanted to meet up.