A Guide to Planning a Backpacking Trip Through Southeast Asia

I have been the ultimate type-A friend for years now, starting with planning weekend trips to 10-day long international trips, and now four-month backpacking trips across the world by myself. While planning comes natural to me and I enjoy the extensive research that goes into it, some may not know where to start. So I thought it would be useful for others to have a step-by-step guide on how to plan a trip, especially when it may feel overwhelming on where to begin. Asia is especially complicated to plan, as the best destinations are usually not reachable from major cities, compared to other regions such as Europe. Because you cannot always hop on the next train to another city, traveling throughout Asia requires some planning--especially when you are on a budget. So, as much as it is nice to go with the flow and see where your travels take you, booking flights and other transportation in advance can save you a lot of stress and money.

I am going to show you a step-by-step guide given my recent experience planning a 10-day visit to Taiwan--the first destination of my extensive Southeast Asia trip. I have found it helpful to plan country by country when I am going to be traveling for months at a time. Keep in mind, I was also able to be flexible with my arrival and departure from the country.

1. Lay out how many days you will have

I write out all of the days that I have in a region one-by-one, ranging from a week-long trip to one that is months long. Though that may sound excessive, it really helps me to be able to look back on where I plan to be during what day while I am booking accommodations and excursions. I do this on the Notes app, though sometimes revert to writing everything out by hand when I need a more visual representation.

In this case, I knew how long I was going to be here, but I usually start off with a rough approximation based upon what I know about the country

2. Figure out where you want to visit during your travels

For me, this takes the form of doing a lottt of research, specifically by looking through other peoples' itineraries, solely from smaller websites. I avoid reading any content from TripAdvisor or Reddit unless I have a specific question and cannot find the answer elsewhere. For instance, I will type in "one week itinerary of Taiwan." Once I have scoured through a bunch these itineraries, I pick out what is interesting to me. To ensure that visiting all of these places is feasible given my time constraint, I cross check what I have read by searching up, for example, "how many days to spend in Tapei?" and so on.

4. Map out your route

I find that visually looking at my route can be super helpful; it becomes easy to see what makes sense and what does not, especially when you are between two places.

Since Taiwan is pretty small and the main form of transportation is via high speed trains, it was not too complicated to map out

5. Check flights if your route requires flying

Most of the time, I end up having to add or subtract a day from my trip depending on when the cheapest flights are or when transportation is available (I have found that in Southeast Asia, it's not a guarantee that transportation runs everyday and at feasible hours). You want to avoid that frustrating feeling when discovering that your route is not compatible with transportation routes or budgets.

For instance, I had to add a day to my Taiwan trip because it was not possible for me to reach the airport in Taipei from Tainan by 6am, which was when the only affordable flight to the Philippines was being offered. This meant I had to decide in what city I wanted more time in.

6. Go between the previous steps until finding a route that is manageable for you. The feeling of successfully finding a route that included everything you wan to see via an efficient and budget-friendly route is super rewarding. When you have the basics, start adding specific sights and restaurants you want to visit. Here is a segment from the final product, after weeks of research:

   
   

   

   This is pretty extensive; it is my personal preference to have all of this mapped out for me. I never follow this itinerary exactly as written though I have found it helpful when unsure what to do next

7. Repeat for all destinations! Each country is going to be different so always be prepared to be flexible. And research research research!

8. As I begin booking accommodation, flights, and excursions, I insert them intro Tripit, which is an app I use to keep basic information in one place. I also like it because it is sharable with family members and friends who may be wondering where you are and where you are staying. Here is a glimpse of mine:

   

   What is also neat about this app is that it crosses the days off as you go

   Thanks for reading!