Steve did a lot of research, and came up with an option that we both like; Gate1 Travel (www.gate1travel.com). Gate 1 offers tours all over the world, and appears to offer a lot for the money. They have a package that they call "13 Day Classic Thailand" which sounded appealing to both of us. So after much discussion, and calendar reviews, we booked our first trip to Thailand through Gate1. But of course, that is just the first small step toward a wonderful travel experience.
We have traveled quite a bit in the past, but most of it has been destination-vacations where we go to a resort and stay for awhile, or on a cruise ship, where we see a lot of places, but basically, we move into our room on the cruise ship, and stay there until the cruise is over. We have not done a lot of traveling where we move ourselves around every few days, which is a lot different, because you never really have a chance to settle into a room, or a city for that matter.
Our trip to Massachusetts and Maine in August was our first trip in a long time where we have moved around almost every day, over a course of about two weeks. And with this trip, we learned a lot. Mostly about packing, or should I say, we learned how not to pack.
We each had one large suitcase, in which we packed all of our worldly belongings (for two weeks at least). And what we learned about ourselves is that we tended to wear the same things over and over because they were on top and easy to find, and if we went searching for something else, we would disturb the entire suitcase, and our entire wardrobe would be wrinkled, unless we took the time to refold everything. And, since we were trying to see and do as much as possible, this just wasn’t going to happen. So…..this trip taught us that we need to figure out a new way to pack.
LUGGAGE
So, as part of our preparations for Thailand, we did our research (or should I say; Steve did his research, since he is the researcher in our family). Many of the reviews say that packing cubes are the way to go. Each different type of clothing and accessories are packed separately, and therefore aren’t disturbed when you are looking for something else. And there is a folding cube for shirts, that allows you to fold and stack them in their own cube, where they can be easily accessed without disturbing anything else.
We are still struggling with the “little stuff”, like sunscreen, hygiene products, medicines, etc. We found two small bags that seem like they will work well. One is for medicines/first aid related and the other for bathroom products. They are both leak proof, which is a bonus. We’ll let you know how they work once we find out.
COMMUNICATION
We have traveled internationally before, but most of it was with our children, which removes the worry of leaving the country, and our children behind. We took a trip in 2013, where we hosted a trip as a couple. We were gone for 18 days, and our girls stayed behind and went to school. They are very responsible girls, so we really weren’t concerned. Their grandparents and other relatives are very close by, in case they needed any help, but we really hadn’t anticipated any issues.
Unfortunately, while we were gone, our youngest daughter’s car was hit in the parking lot where she worked (and the insurance company wouldn’t talk to her because she was a few months short of 18), and during the same trip, she contracted mono. Normally, neither of these would be huge issues, but we were on a cruise ship in Europe, so when we were on land during the day, it was night at home, and we couldn’t talk to the insurance company or doctors, and when it was daytime for the girls, we were at sea in the middle of the night. This was certainly not optimal for taking care of business. Luckily, our girls had plenty of wonderful people who helped them work through both of the situations, but it left us feeling like bad parents, and certainly made us want to make sure that nothing like that happens again.
So with that being said, even though our girls are older now, and definitely able to fend for themselves, we do not want to ever leave them high and dry as we pursue our travels. So again, Steve has been doing a lot of research on cell phones and communicating via other devices.
Although we think we know where we are going with cellphones we are not going to make any changes for this trip as we are worried everything will be in place in time….so we will just go without cellphone. We plan to use Facetime (Apple product) voice and/or video and texting via wifi. If necessary we will just pay the exorbitant cellphone rates our carrier charges.
MONEY
Money is always an issue when traveling internationally. The biggest issue being….how much to take in foreign currency, and when we get there, will we be able to get more if we need it. You never want to set yourself up for theft by carrying too much money with you, but you also don’t want to run out, and you certainly don’t want to incur huge ATM fees when you do try to get money. So this week, we made some banking changes to help with this.
When possible we like to arrive at a country with some local currency. Exchanging money in the airport is not something that we are at all interested in, especially after just getting off a long flight.
We opened a checking account at Charles Schwab, which offers free ATM use anywhere in the world. They will refund all ATM fees, no matter where they are incurred. From all of our research, ATM withdrawals are paid in the currency of the country you are in, and we believe that they are paid at the current exchange rate, with no exchange fees. We did withdrawals this way in 2011 in Barcelona and received Euro’s at the current exchange rate. We will be testing this again on our trip to Thailand.
The other thing that might be a good idea is to have an account at a bank that is an international clearing-house. They do a lot of international banking transactions, and are a bank where you can get currency before leaving for a country. A word of caution, foreign currency has to be ordered in advance. Typically, you can’t just walk into a bank and ask for yen, pesos or baht. They typically have to be ordered three to five working days in advance of when you will be picking them up. There is also usually a fee associated with getting a foreign currency at the bank. We paid about 5% to get the small amount of currency we will be taking with us, which is a lot in terms of a percentage but we don’t take much cash so not a big deal. Again we just like having a little cash when we hit the ground as it has come in very handy on other trips.
If you open new bank accounts for the purpose of international travel, it’s also a good idea to test out your debit and credit cards on small transactions before you leave home. That way if there is any problem it can be fixed while you are still at home.
PACKING
Because part of our trip to Thailand is through a tour group, there is a limit on the luggage that can be taken. Each traveler is allowed one suitcase and one small carry-on (back-pack/purse). On international flights, the weight limit of all checked luggage is 50 pounds, so we are using suitcases that when completely full should weigh in below 50 pounds. This will make it easy to monitor our weight without having to have a scale before our return flight. But another thing to keep in mind is that flights internal to Thailand have a weight limit of 44 pounds total (not per bag). At the end of our tour, we will be flying from Chiang Mai back to Bangkok before our return to the U.S. Therefore, we have to ensure that our bags remain less than 44 pounds until we arrive back in Bangkok. As we are leaving home, we have one bag that is 35 pounds and one that is 38 pounds, so if we find some things we want in Thailand we will be OK.
BLENDING IN
It is always a good idea to try and blend in when you are in a foreign country. I always laugh at this statement a little bit since I am 5’8” with blonde hair and blue eyes. There are a lot of countries where no matter how hard I try I will just not blend in. But that being said, I do try to choose clothes that don’t stand out too much, and make sure to respect the customs of the country we are visiting, like covering knees and shoulders before entering places of worship, etc. I also have what I call “travel jewelry”. I leave my jewelry at home and wear a plain gold band as my wedding ring. Not that my real jewelry is that expensive, but it certainly makes me less of a target by not having much.
BE PROACTIVE
We are generally very proactive people, and it always seems to pay off for us. When we got our itinerary from Gate-1 Travel, it said that if possible they would reserve the best seats available for us at the time our tour was booked, so we believed them, and continued on with all of our other travel prep.
When we got our final itinerary about 2 weeks before our departure date, we noticed that we didn’t have any seat assignments. So Steve called Gate-1 to see what was up. Unfortunately for us, we should have done this long ago because we are now sitting at the very back of the plane, in the middle of a four-seat section and we aren’t even sitting together for a 15-hour flight. This didn’t make us happy, but we can only blame ourselves. We should have checked into it when we got our initial itinerary instead of believing that they would take care of it for us. Now we know for next time.
And last but not least, before we leave for any type of international travel, we take copies of our passports, our itinerary and all of our foreign contact numbers and send them to our parents and our girls. That way if there is an emergency, they will know exactly where we are and how to get ahold of us even if our cell phone or Ipod isn’t working. We also carry a copy of our passport with us. It makes getting a replacement a whole lot easier if ours is lost or stolen during the trip.
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