Final Countdown...

As of this morning we are officially vagabonds! Which only means that we are closer to departing for our 3 month adventure. Kristin and her mom spent most of New Year's Eve day cleaning out the apartment and loading the last bits into the storage unit since Alex had to work. Our New Year's Eve celebration was pretty uneventful since we were in the middle of the move - we celebrating New Year's Eve on the East Coast and then were in bed by 11:10 p.m., but we figured that we'd have plenty of time to celebrate the New Year within the next 3 months.

Now that we are moved out and living at Kristin's parents' house, we just have to finalize the last details before we depart on Tuesday morning from Omaha. Many people we tell that we are going on the trip, ask why or why Southeast Asaia... We decided to go because we both love to travel and have a strong liking for Asia, since afterall that's where we met. But we also realize this time in our life is the best time to travel for an extended period of time before we get tied down with a house, careers, etc. Kristin was lucky enough to get a 3-month leave of absence from her work, so it will provide some stability when we return. We are really looking forward to the cultural experiences we will encounter.

But besides the cultural aspects and food, one of the parts we are most excited about is the extreme change of temperature that we will experience! We will be leaving single-digit temperatures to go Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam where it is currently 80-90 degrees F. This winter in Nebraska we have already been hit hard with two big snowstorms, including being snowed-in on Christmas Day. Moving out in the snow was difficult enough, especially since we couldn't move our furniture into the storage unit earlier this week because the snowed hadn't been plowed out yet. Based on this experience we have vowed never to move out in the winter months again!


The next few days we'll be preparing for our trip, but to give you an idea of what we'll be doing the next 3 months, here is a rough itinerary:

Jan. 5th - Depart Omaha / Arrive San Francisco in the morning (visit friend)
Jan. 6th - Depart San Francisco / Arrive Tokyo (Jan. 7)
Jan. 7th-12th - Check-out Tokyo
Jan. 12th - Depart Tokyo / Layover in Seoul, S. Korea / Arrive Ho Chi Minh (Saigon), Vietnam

Our tenative plan is to spend about 3 weeks in Vietnam as we head north, across Laos for a few days and into Thailand for another 3 weeks or so. Then we'll try to head down to Malaysia and Signapore before catching a flight back to Ho Chi Minh. However, this is just a rough schedule, as our plans may change as we go along; so stay tuned to our blog, which I'll try to update as much as possible.

March 20th - Depart Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam / Arrive Tokyo (March 21)
March 21st-April 1st - Travel to southern parts of Japan
April 1st - Depart Tokyo / Arrive San Francisco
April 2nd - Depart San Francisco / Arrive Omaha