Our updated travel plans are in their final stages as we prepare for our departure. With a little over 2 weeks we’ll be flying to Mumbai from the UK and then heading down to Palolem, South Goa in Southern India to set up base.
Updated Travel Plans
It’s been a busy month, as we’ve been finishing the final few jobs on our property in preparation to rent out. Electric & Gas certificates have been finished & submitted, and the property is now in the hands of our letting agent. They will manage the property while we’re on our travels of 3 years or more.
We had a quick jaunt to Cardiff in Wales to the Indian consulate for our 5 year Visa’s. The application is done online, but the long term visa requires you to make an appointment to visit the consulate for bio-metrics. Our choice was either Cardiff or back into central London. We opted for Cardiff and went on a Monday by train (over 3 hours each way). We were impressed with how quickly the process took, as we were only there for 40 minutes. Fingerprints and photo’s out the way we were on the train back to Devon. Our passports arrived with our new visa’s on the Saturday by courier, Wowzer.
With our Visa’s to hand, we’re hoping to depart mid October, and are just waiting for tenants to be vetted for our property before we book our flights. The 6 months in India is pretty straight forward, so we have been busy finalising our route once we leave. We’re planning from April 2020 which direction and destinations we’ll be heading to.
The pathway
Firstly, we’ll be heading through Thailand en-route to Hanoi in Vietnam, exploring the city and heading towards Ha Long Bay and Cát Bà National Park. Working our way down to the central area of Hoi An, Hue & Danang, we will hit the beaches and soak up some sun bathing weather. We’ll have a 3 month visa and hope to spend a couple of months exploring. We’ll then head down to Ho Chi Minh city before catching a flight to Singapore. After a few days there we’re off again to Bali, Indonesia.
Having explored around Bali before, we’ve settled on Sanur to base ourselves in for 2 months until August. We have made reservations at a great guesthouse we stayed at previously with a pool & breakfast delivered to your terrace each morning. It’s a great setting and location & just a few minutes from the beaches. And at £13 a night it’s very good value. It’s also a great base to explore more of Bali, with Ubud and more of Kuta on the list.
Further travel Plans
August to October our plans are still up in the air, but we are just researching Malaysia for these months. With a VOA on arrival it’s an idea and the possibility of Borneo & the Perhentian Islands could be the plan. Plenty of time before we need to decide on this and have a couple of alternate destinations.
We’re hoping to makes our way through Nepal to Kathmandu & Pokhara & eventually into Northern India around October. We have a few places to cross off our list before heading back down to our base in Goa. It should be a great first year on the road, and we’re both excited to be finally on our way, be it a year later than planned.
So much has happened in the last 18 months it will be good to finally be able to reach our goal. We can’t wait to get going on this journey. It will create memories for a lifetime. We also know that we’ll be returning to our new home in Devon as an added bonus. There’s so much more for us to explore down on the south coast.
Travel Insurance
Remember to have appropriate travel insurance to cover all eventualities on your travels. We use World Nomads insurance for all our adventures. Check out a quote for your travels below.
Happy & safe travels on your Global gallivants
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