This is the story of our 85-day trip around the world going westward. We started our trip on September 28, 2022, and arrived home on December 21, 2022, in time for Christmas – 20 plane legs later.
We’d miss travelling since Covid, but that wasn’t the reason. Last June, having turned 70 recently and seeing health issues with other friends, I realized now is the time for us to take an advanced and complicated trip.
In July 2022, I arranged our airplane flights via Star Alliance.
Then came the exciting part of making arrangements for each of the various places and countries we would visit.
Around the World Statistics
- United States
- New Zealand
- Australia
- Thailand
- India
- Poland
- Switzerland
- France
- Portugal
- Canada and Home
Reflections on our Around the World Decisions
Overall we were very lucky we had 20 flights and only had our luggage delayed once on our first transfer within the United States. It was delivered the next morning. There was only one flight change: going out of New Delhi. The flight ended up being six hours earlier in the middle of the night, and we were stuck in Warsaw for quite a while
Using an around-the-world ticket is very limiting.
Once I had purchased it, I realized that I could make no changes or upgrades when I wanted to, despite the fact that the airlines could make any changes they wanted to.
We went with StarAlliance flights so that we could collect our mileage points. We did nine legs with them, costing us just under US$6000 each. I think that’s a remarkable deal. Would I do it again? Probably not.
Overall we were very lucky we had 20 flights and only had our luggage delayed once on our first transfer within the United States. It was delivered the next morning. There was only one flight change: going out of New Delhi. The flight ended up being six hours earlier in the middle of the night, and we were stuck in Warsaw for quite a while
Since going on a world trip for us was quite new and different. I planned out virtually every detail before we left. The only accommodation I didn’t book was in Portugal since we were more familiar with the country.
One of the smart things I thought we would do was to ensure no flight was over nine hours travelling economy. That’s about the maximum that we could tolerate. In hindsight, I think we had just too many flights, and if we could afford an upgrade, we should do business on a long flight. That means a round-the-world ticket would probably not make sense.
We also added some extra flights in Hawaii and Australia. Although we allowed enough time between flights to other locations, it was very tight a couple of times.
We packed pretty well with one suitcase in a carry-on. There was no more room for us to buy anything great. We shipped 6 kg back from Australia to Canada, which provided just a bit more space. It wasn’t a weight issue, as there was no way we could manage a piece of luggage weighing 23 kg. Like everyone would tell you, we will pack a lot later on our next major trip.
