I have a dream that I would like to travel around the world *without flying*.

I have a dream that I would like to travel around the world *without flying*. For the sake of argument say starting and ending London. Length of time and cost is largely irrelevant but let's say around 1 year and about $50k. I'm thinking something like:

London / Eurostar to Paris / train to Istanbul stopping off at a few interesting places along the way / Silk road to Katmandu (car/buses?) / down through SEA to Singapore (trains, buses) / boat down into Indonesia and on to Australia / boat across to NZ / cruise ship across to something like Chile / work way up through S. America/ C. America to somewhere like Florida or New York / Cruise ship from miami back to Europe / train back to London.

The bit I'm really not sure about would be between Singapore to South America. Is there a better/surer route? I could wait to join a round the world cruise ship for that leg which I've seen do go from places like japan to Alaska and then down the west coast but not so sure about the more southerly route.

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  1. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    >Silk road to Katmandu (car/buses?)
    You can do a lot of that by train, e.g. Istanbul-China has multiple routes with minimal road usage.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      Yep good shout. Seat61.com is a bloody gold mine of Information for a trip like this.

  2. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    boat from indonesia to australia is gonna be a problem. I actually travelled german to australia without flying. found a rich australian who was willing to take me to cairns on his huge ass catamaran for a small fee. also if possible plan more than a year for that or else you will spend 80% of the time in a train staring out the window with no time to actually see the countries. also china being closed still will be an obstacle. this only leaves myanmar to get to sea which is a dicey but doable. also the part iran pakistan border requires an armed escort to cross safely so good luck with that.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      oh and there isn't a regular boat between aus and nz anymore. your only options are being a crew on a sailboat or finding a cruise ship. oh and freight cruises, which are boring and expensive

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      Just read an article from 2019 where the author had to pay 25 dollars for an escort by two police officers to the Pakistani border.

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        yeah the tribal areas there are not the best safety wise.

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          Yeah, but the price to pay for the escort doesn't seem that bad for western standards.

          • 1 year ago
            Anonymous

            its not the money its the overall situation that requires an armed fricking convoy to travers this area. personnally i have avoided going through pakistan and went thorugh turkmenistan usbekistan kirgistan into china and through tibet to kathmandu, nepal. that route is completely connected by train apart from the lhasa to kathmandu part where they put you in 4x4s to drive on the side of the himalayan cliffs. fricking wild experience.

            • 1 year ago
              Anonymous

              This sounds an amazing route. Will check that out, thanks.

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                you would have to get a guided tour in tibet. 7 days from lhasa to kathmandu is the one i took. Honestly worth the price as you get 4 star hotels and food and free tranportation for like a 1000 bucks

                Thanks for the info. Russia is obviously going to be off limits for a few years or I would have done the trans-siberian. I'm in the very early planning stages at the moment, I wouldn't be doing this for at least 18 months or so (house to sell, work to wrap up etc) but something like summer/fall 2024 would be a good target. Hopefully China opens up again by then.

                Another idea I'm looking at is going the other way round and doing something like:

                New York / LA / Hawaii / japan / china / SEA / India / Oman / Yemen / Egypt / Turkey / Europe / cruise ship to NY.

                But it doesn't hit so many of my bucket list places.

                anything is doable with enough money lol. there are also reposition cruises during the off seasons. might be worth a look

            • 1 year ago
              Anonymous

              How did you get from Kyrgyzstan to China by train?
              I thought you'd have to cross over two passes by minibus?
              It definitely is a very scenic route with a lot of different landscapes, very recommended.

              This sounds an amazing route. Will check that out, thanks.

              If Turkmenistan still hasn't open by your scheduled time you can take a ferry (or a very short flight) between Iran and Kazakhstan and head to Uzbekistan via Karakalpakstan from there.

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                >How did you get from Kyrgyzstan to China by train?
                >I thought you'd have to cross over two passes by minibus?

                ah yeah forgot about that. i took one of those small minivans from osh to the chinese border. arrived in the evening so had to sleep at dinghy rank kirgiz truckstop in the kitchen where they made plov for kirgiz truckers. arrived the next day at 8 am at the border post. no transportation in the "nomansland" so had to hitch a truck to the building where they made me open my bag and show my entire belongings and took my phone to look through my pictures and install an obvious chinese spyware kek. wanted to hitch with the same truck to kashgar because i was a poor stingy traveller back then, but they wouldnt let me and made me pay the like 50 usd to get chauffered in a small van all the way to kashgar. half way the driver asked for the money for the ride and suddenly it was 100 usd. wouldnt pay it so after long discussion he trew me out in the middle of xinjiang china at a gas station and called me a cab. cab driver picked me up and we drove to kashgar but there are controll posts literally every 10 km to check if you are a uighur terrorist or something. made me empty my entire rucksack each time. because that took too long the cab driver took a "detour" around the highway over some dust roads where we got stopped by chinese military police who where pissed as frick and yelled in chinese. they asked me with their text translator if I was a journalist and shit. couldnt even read my passport. thought i was fricking russian lol. finally let us go and we arrived at like 2 am at the outskirts of kashgar where the driver threw me out because he was annoyed at me i guess. payed 10 usd, so I saved 40 usd for that whole ordeal lmao. Had to walk to my hostel and made sure to avoid being seen by the police who patrol the streets with armored vehicles at night. arrived at the hostel at like 3am where they asked me if I was a journalist. .

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                Incredible. $40 in your pocket and a great dinner party story for life.

              • 1 year ago
                Anonymous

                oh and i also forgot turkmenistan is a complete b***h to travel through, but also fascinating to witness this north korean esue hellhole. they also have aliteral hellhole which is cool, but they will put it out soon i have heard. there is a train system but when asked around in ashgabat about the trains the people just lauhed and said the trains aint going so had to take a bus which is another borderline fricked up story in itself

                Incredible. $40 in your pocket and a great dinner party story for life.

                yeah its funny in hindsight but it was probably one of the most exhausting days of my life. i became completely passiv at a certain point and resined to the fact that I will end up in a chinese reeducation camp

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      Thanks for the info. Russia is obviously going to be off limits for a few years or I would have done the trans-siberian. I'm in the very early planning stages at the moment, I wouldn't be doing this for at least 18 months or so (house to sell, work to wrap up etc) but something like summer/fall 2024 would be a good target. Hopefully China opens up again by then.

      Another idea I'm looking at is going the other way round and doing something like:

      New York / LA / Hawaii / japan / china / SEA / India / Oman / Yemen / Egypt / Turkey / Europe / cruise ship to NY.

      But it doesn't hit so many of my bucket list places.

  3. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    British comedian and television presenter Michael Palin has made a bunch of travel documentaries where he does long travels without using planes. In "Around the World in 80 Days" he goes from Tokyo to Long Beach by container ship, but he's trying to recreate Phineas Fogg's route there. In "Full Circle", he somehow manages to go from New Zealand to Cape Horn from one episode to the other through the magic of television. If you haven't seen them already, you might enjoy those series as inspiration for your trip.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      He's a personal hero of mine already! I have signed copies of some of his books. His round the world in 80 days trip started this dream. Though I want to do it in more like 380 days to take it all in more!

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