Travel plans 2024

[drcam]

Revised plan - not long to go now.

May 21 I depart MEL for CAN on CZ J! to see some relations before heading up to Luoyang and Xi'an for some "domestic" leisure travel for me. Returning via HKG on June 9 to hopefully catch up with the AFF Asian pub crawl people, returning HKG-SIN-AKL (SQ J) and back to work.

In September it looks like MEL-SIN-LHR on SQ J and 2-3 weeks in Scotland and Ireland, and then going DUB-LAX and 3 weeks in California and Nevada: LA, Big Sur, Yosemite, Lake Tahoe and Vegas. Returning with Fiji airlines J redemption home.

 

[azza007]

Currently flying SQ212 SYD-SIN in first class

 

[jase05]

Bali trip early October with a few other couples we go there with regularly. Was looking for flights to get us there and found a couple of QF J CR’s on QF29 to HKG so going to head there for a week beforehand. Might have a couple of days in Macao as it’s been a few years since last visit there.

 

[SomeRando]

Had a nightmare six months late 2023/early 2024 and needed a holiday. Had a look around and nothing really stood out. Ended up booking a flight to Taiwan and spending ten days there. It wasn't somewhere I had ever really considered but I really enjoyed it. Very few western tourists and even at the really popular places it wasn't overly crowded. Truly a bit of a hidden gem and I'd highly recommend it. Amazing scenery, great food, excellent transport network and friendly people. Fairly cheap as well. Besides being able to butcher "hello" and "thank you" my Mandarin is non existent but I had no trouble at all.

I flew with EVA and their product is really good, even in Y. Decent leg room, good service and two full meals on an eight hour flight both ways between BNE and TPE. Only issue is the outbound flight was a 10pm departure and by the time you clear customs and immigration you still have forty minutes or so before the first train into Taipei leaves at 6am. There's nothing really open at Taoyuan at that time of morning either besides the foodcourt near the MRT station. For some reason the hotel I booked didn't allow check in until 4pm which made for a long day before I could relax.

I had planned on going to Japan later in the year but after Taiwan I figured I'd leave it until next year but then ANA had one of their regular sales and I ended up booking a J seat for September. Going for two weeks.

 

[Warks]

Had a nightmare six months late 2023/early 2024 and needed a holiday. Had a look around and nothing really stood out. Ended up booking a flight to Taiwan and spending ten days there. It wasn't somewhere I had ever really considered but I really enjoyed it. Very few western tourists and even at the really popular places it wasn't overly crowded. Truly a bit of a hidden gem and I'd highly recommend it. Amazing scenery, great food, excellent transport network and friendly people. Fairly cheap as well. Besides being able to butcher "hello" and "thank you" my Mandarin is non existent but I had no trouble at all.

I flew with EVA and their product is really good, even in Y. Decent leg room, good service and two full meals on an eight hour flight both ways between BNE and TPE. Only issue is the outbound flight was a 10pm departure and by the time you clear customs and immigration you still have forty minutes or so before the first train into Taipei leaves at 6am. There's nothing really open at Taoyuan at that time of morning either besides the foodcourt near the MRT station. For some reason the hotel I booked didn't allow check in until 4pm which made for a long day before I could relax.

I had planned on going to Japan later in the year but after Taiwan I figured I'd leave it until next year but then ANA had one of their regular sales and I ended up booking a J seat for September. Going for two weeks.

I keep seeing people promoting Taiwan on r/travel (Reddit) which has got me interested. A huge number of mountain peaks over 2000m alone makes it of note.