No-plan Plan a.k.a. Itinerary

What plan? There isn’t any. Well, I know what I am going to do for the first couple of weeks (one has to start somewhere), but other than that? None. Will decide once I get there. Of course, I do have some general ideas of what I’d like to do but nothing is written in stone, nothing is booked and I am free to change my mind at a moment’s notice.

One way of traveling. (Fishing boat of the Kite Beach)

The only plan that is planned is to travel slowly, very slowly and stay in each country as long as visa will allow, which is between 1 and 3 months. Should a particular place require my attention for a longer period of time I can always do a visa run. So the plan still is – no plan.

One has to start somewhere, the starting point of this journey is Hanoi. Pretty cold Hanoi at that, which isn’t quite what I was expecting. The Hanoian winter chill came as a chilling surprise to me. Not only is the winter in Hanoi very chilly but also humid and windy so all that chill plus the factor plus no central heating anywhere or any other heating will undoubtedly chill one frozen soul like me to the bone. The chill I hate the most, the one that goes right through you and never ever goes away. The chill that I remember too well when living in Cyprus. The chill that requires full clothing at night and an electric heater. 

These abras and dhows are still operational and in traffic.

It would have been smarter (and much warmer) to make Ho Chi Minh City the starting point. It would also be much more convenient as there are no direct flights from Dubai to Hanoi but there are plentiful to HCMC.

Oh well, the Lunch Lady has “ruined” my plans again. Don’t know why but I always thought she was in Hanoi so it was Hanoi I wanted to go to. Wrong. Her little soup kingdom is in HCMC. My bad. I should have taken that direct flight to warm HCMC instead. Of course, I was free to change my itinerary once I realized the mistake but then it was too late. Defying my destiny? Always. But also by then, I was ready to “take Hanoi” (mistake of reading too much) and it was Hanoi I wanted to go to – first. Chill and all. Now the question is how am I going to fit extra winter clothes into my already overfull luggage. Do I follow backpackers example and simple wear it all? Why not. And once the weather warms up toss it all away without having to replace anything and thereby downsizing my luggage before the ‘real’ travel begins. So, that’s a plan. (there is a plan after all)

This is not Hoàn Kiếm Lake Hoàn Kiếm Lake in Hanoi but Tilapia Desert Lake in Al Ain

I’ll be staying in a hotel right on Hoàn Kiếm Lake, next to Old Quarters, that is exactly the part of town where first-time travelers to Hanoi, like myself, normally stay. What attracted me to my home away from home was its top roof bar. And no, no what you think. It wasn’t for the convenience of crawling back to my room after an evening up there but for the photo opportunity. 

10 days forward and I am off to Sapa. On the coach. The bus stop is on the other side of ‘my’ lake, not more than a 10-minute walk from the hotel so I will just grab my backpack and walk to the bus, leaving the rest of my luggage behind at the hotel. Until recently Hanoi-Sapa trip required staggering 10 hours on a night train but since the new highway opened it ‘only’ takes 4 hours to travel the 250 kilometers which is the distance between the two places. One can still take the train though. 

After 5 (or is it 6?) days in Sapa I’ll be back in Hanoi and on the lake again (not necessary the same one) to celebrate Vietnamese New Year. After that? After that the page is blank.

What I’ll do next depends on how much I like Hanoi. If I like it I’ll stay a bit longer. I may even rent an apartment for a month or so. But if not, I’ll get on the train and begin my journey South.

Sunrise at Tilapia Desert Lake

The general idea is to travel all 1800 kilometers from Hanoi to HCMC by train, some 4-6 hours at a time stopping at interesting places on the way like Halong Bay or Hoi An. Why train and not hop-on-hop-off sleeper bus that goes between those two cities and costs close to nothing? Because I am not suicidal. (Again too much youtube watching)

Once I reach the end of the road I’ll be traveling North again. From CHMC I’d like to take ferry or boat or any other water vessel and follow Mekong Delta to Phnom Penh in Cambodia where I plan to spend a month. Then another month in Laos, still another in Burma where I once again will be changing direction and travel South stopping for 3 months in Malaysia and Penang, an island to which I almost moved some 3-4 years ago. Then Indonesia and the Philippines – Cebu being ‘the last resort’.  

Well, that’s pretty much it. Places I am most curious about are Mekong Delta and Burma. 

So this is my no-plan plan. After that back to Dubai and … Panama.

p.s. just when I am about to click on publish-button to share this post following headline pops up in my feed. “Emirates to launch daily service to Philippines’ Cebu.” What a timing. And it happens again. First Panama. Now Cebu. Isn’t life fantastic?