momentum43

Friends,
My wife and I are planning a 6-7 week trip to include Bejing, Xian, Yangtze River cruise, Shanghai, Bangkok, Singapore, Sydney, Aukland nd Santiago Chile. We wanted to spend a few days in each city and take tours to maximize our time. We wanted to start in Bejing just after the Olympics to maybe save a few dollars. Any ideas? Thanks in advance

thursdaysd

Don't you think you might get a bit tired of nothing but cities for 6-7 weeks? I'd suggest visiting fewer countries so you can spend longer in each of them, and see more than the main cities. There's enough to see in NZ alone for three weeks, and you could still feel rushed.

What are your interests? Why are you picking these particular places? what kind of budget?

momentum43

Thank you for your reply, we do plan on getting out to various areas outside of the cities. We are thinking about purchasing a Round the World airline ticket and thats why we are purchasing As this is our first trip to Asia, we wanted to maximize our exposure and plan for a more precise trip when we return in a year or so. our total budget is about 15-18K. we wanted to travel business class for the long haul portions of our trip. Is this realistic? We chose the cities based on availability with the airlines. We do not have a specific order and we also did want to see Hong Kong and Vietnam, but we are now trying to choose.

easytraveler

Your trip sounds more like a "Circle the Pacific" trip than a "Round the World" trip. Are you planning on going to any of the other continents besides Asia, Australia, and South America?

thursdaysd

Suggest checking fares at airtreks.com, or alliance sites like oneworld.com. I've never paid for business class - I only fly business on FF miles. You need to subtract airfare from your budget and then divide by number of days. I've done SEA averaging $50/day, staying in clean en-suite accommodation with AC, and traveling by train and bus, of course you can go much higher if you want 4-5 star hotels. You also need a higher budget for the other places - I got sticker shock arriving in NZ from Asia.

With seven weeks, deducting for travel time, you would have four days in each place. Not enough, imo, for a whole country! I'd suggest concentrating on China and Thailand, or Australia and NZ. Just because you can get to all these places on a RTW ticket, doesn't mean it's a good idea.

momentum43

Thank you for your insight. You make a very good point. We are planning to narrow down our focus to China, Bangkok and maybe S.Vietnam We will also shorten our trip to 4-5 weeks which will allow for better accomodations in the same budget. Thanks for your assistance.