It was with a lot trepidation once I mentioned sure to a month-long backpacking journey throughout three international locations. My spouse and I’ve definitely completed this a number of occasions earlier than, on even longer time durations, however this time, the deal breaker is we’re lugging a three-year previous child together with us. A really rowdy three-year previous child.
However what’s completed is finished. I agreed, the flight tickets have been booked, inns lined up, actions and itineraries had been deliberate. So, I suppose it is a go.
We’re really revisiting locations we have already travelled to years again throughout our ASEAN Summer time Loop, Seashore Hop Asia, Similar Similar Summer time Journey, SEA2Africa journeys. A consolation zone of kind—testing the waters, if you’ll. Simply to see if we might actually pull it off.
So, for this journey, which we dubbed Backpacking With A Child 2023, we’re touring to 3 international locations—the Philippines included—spanning eight cities for thirty 5 days. A little bit of a disclaimer, we initially deliberate on simply bringing backpacks with us—therefore the identify—like within the olden days, however the child simply wants a lot stuff that we finally gave in and switched to rolling baggage. So, the higher identify for this journey would have been, Baggage Trolleying With A Child 2023. Har. Har.
With that out of the best way, this is what our elementary route seems like:
Manila ➤ Kuala Lumpur ➤ Penang ➤ Langkawi ➤ Singapore ➤ Johor Bahru ➤ Kuala Lumpur ➤ Manila ➤ Siargao ➤ Surigao ➤ Dinagat Islands ➤ Surigao ➤ Manila
We’re flying by way of Cebu Pacific Air from Manila to Kuala Lumpur and again. From Kuala Lumpur to Penang to Langkawi, all the best way to Singapore, we’re taking a very low cost multi-city AirAsia flight (round ₱800.00++ per method per particular person), together with the Johor Bahru to Kuala Lumpur flight. The journey from Singapore to Johor Bahru could be completed by way of bus, since getting out of Singapore by way of airplane is kind of costly. From Kuala Lumpur to Manila, we’re heading straight to the provinces of Surigao Del Norte utilizing our CEB Tremendous Cross.
The one three locations we thought-about for this 12 months’s route was Penang, so we will go to the child’s grandma and grandpa; Johor Bahru, so he can run round Legoland; and Kuala Lumpur, so we will eat mee goreng on our favourite stall in Jalan Alor Meals Road. The remainder of the locations we included had been incidental, lol.
And sure, we additionally included a couple of Philippine locations for this journey as properly. From Manila’s airport, we’ll head straight to Mindanao to go to three provinces within the area. And to lighten our load, we’ll cheat a bit by sending our massive baggage stuffed with stuff we’d be shopping for alongside the journey to a pal who lives close to the airport by way of Seize or Lalamove, lol.
This 12 months’s journey might not be as grand as our final The Eurasian Summer time Bump which had us flying to Mongolia and Russia, however child steps first. If we will by some means pull this off with out dropping our thoughts and all our hair out of frustration and pure exhaustion, then we’ll most likely transfer to a grander stage subsequent 12 months.