The Making Of A Mega Trip - A Parable On The Dangers Of Incremental Decision Making

How do Wife and I plan and create our trips. I'm sure you will hardly be surprised to learn it is all based on an exceedingly rational and complex algorithm that leads to incredibly logical results. Let's peel the layers off the onion and see what this incredible process looks like so perhaps you too can create your own phenomenal travel experiences.

Step One - Choosing where to go

Need to see daughter #2 who lives in Hong Kong. Go to Asia

Step Two - Choosing when to go

Get tip from fellow traveling friend The Count that Singapore Airlines is having a business class ticket sale. Book tickets for March and April because that's kind of when we've been traveling in the spring.

Step Three - Decide how long to go

After our last trip of 8 weeks we decided that was a bit too long. So we'll cut this one down a bit. Oops, see Step Two. We're already committed to 8 weeks.

Step Four -Decide where to go in more detail

The valuable lessons of the last trip had us focusing on limiting our travel to just two countries in this case Japan and Korea.

Step Five - Don't forget the kids

Oops see Step One, forgot we are going to see the #2's. We will have to include going to see them, maybe not in Hong Kong but at a resort someplace so the whole family can relax

Step Six - Account for weather

Remember the lessons of the last trip! No freaking cold weather. Check average temperatures in Japan and Korea. What the F@&! Korea is bloody cold in March. Well thank goodness we'll be going to a resort in a warm place with the #2's. We can schedule it during March.

Step Seven - Adjust for kids actual schedule

Darn, the #2's are actually only available at the very end of our trip. Well we'll put in three weeks in Japan to make use of the three week Japan Rail Pass and then add some time in Tokyo. That will use up most of March. We can go to Korea after that and it might not be that cold there.

Step Eight - Adjust for Japan school vacation

Oops, there is a countrywide school vacation that will be in the middle of when we're planning to be there. All guidebooks advise not going at this time as all of Japan is filled with local tourists. Guess we'll only go to Japan for the first two weeks of our trip.

Step Nine - Throw Korea under the bus because its still too damn cold

Got to find somewhere warmer! How about Bali. Exotic, tropical, very tourist friendly, economical

Step Ten - Account for how freaking big Asia is

Holy Moly it takes almost 8 hours to get to Bali from Tokyo direct and 17 to 20 hours if you do connections. And it is not cheap. The best connection, price, and time is through Taiwan.

Step Eleven - Why not Taiwan?

Hey we could stop over in Taiwan. Check out Taiwan and it seems pretty cool.

Step Twelve - Decide what we are actually going to do in these countries.

OMG so many things to do. Have to take advantage of our rail pass. Oh that new rule about not going to too many places and doing too much; we can get to that the trip after this one.

Step Thirteen - Review results of planning process.

Let's see the results of this precise process. We're doing Four countries, Ten cities and we'll be taking Eleven airline flights and Five train trips. This is a BIG improvement over last year's Asia extravaganza where we went to four countries, ten cities, and took seventeen airline flights...😞

Step Fourteen - Promise each other we will redesign travel planning system