People always ask me if I plan to travel overseas, but actually before COVID, I was an international solo traveler.

I was never happy with my life, and traveling was my escape. When I was 18 I took my first solo trip by air to Southern California. It then spread to New York and Oregon. By December 2018 I decided to spend my New Years in Australia. And that’s where it all started.

My first solo international trip- why Australia? I thought of many places, but I had always been interested in Australia, and felt like most people don’t choose Australia as a first place to travel to. I didn’t know anyone there except a couple of my followers from Instagram, and didn’t have much of a plan. Flying across the globe to the complete other side of the world, I also decided to make other stops.

A little exploration cheat I do, is I purposely look for long layovers in different countries. I then leave the airport for my long layover, do as much exploring as I can, then return to the airport to continue my flights. Sometimes I look at where the layovers are, and if I want to spend more time there I’ll just book a direct flight there and then book a flight from there to my next destination.

My first time flying to AU, I had layovers in China. I explored Shanghai as an adult, since the last time I went to China I was a child. I then went from China straight to Melbourne AU. I spent $800 for a roundtrip flight. I made a bunch of friends that gave me tours, took me to local events, took me on picnics, and even took me on a roadtrip down Great Ocean Road. I went to both Melbourne and Sydney, where I met up with online friends and went beach hopping.

I made so many friends and fell in love with Melbourne, AU so much I decided to fly back for my birthday in April. I used my credit card rewards and got a roundtrip flight for $400. My friends threw me a surprise party, bought me gifts, and took me on adventures. At this point my heart and soul live for Melbourne. My layovers were in Taiwan and China. I never want to leave Australia, I have so many great memories.

My best friend out there always did so much for me. He housed me, fed me, took me on adventures and introduced me to so many kind souls and spectacular beings. So I decided to surprise him for his birthday in September. I didn’t tell anyone I was coming back, asked his roommate if I could stay for a couple weeks and asked another friend to pick me up from the airport. Those were the only two that knew I was coming. Although many of my friends asked me when I was coming back, I’d say not for a while since I had to work and had other travel plans. On his birthday, I showed up at his apartment and surprised him. It was fantastic :)!

This time around I really planned my travels. It was too expensive to fly directly to Australia, so I flew to Bali, Indonesia. I spent a couple weeks there, another friend from America joined me for some of it, had an amazing and beautiful time with unforgettable memories. In fact, this is where my adventuring really starts. Read about my Indonesia trip here! The flight to Indonesia was about $275.

I then had a long layover in Singapore, where I hit all the Crazy Rich Asian spots and met some awesome locals.

From Singapore I flew to Melbourne, AU where I surprised my best friend. The flight from Indonesia to AU was about $200. After spending some time in my second home Australia, it was still quite pricey to fly straight home to SF, CA. So I flew from Australia to New Zealand. Boy was that an adventure, city girl was introduced to the outdoors. That flight was only like $100 or less. I went to different cities in New Zealand, and want to explore the other island. From New Zealand to home, was about $600, with a layover in China.

A roundtrip flight to Australia with not many layovers, would have been over $1000, usually close to $2000. For about $1200 I went Indonesia, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, and China. I should start my own travel agency to be honest LOL. Of course I had to pay for accommodations in New Zealand and Bali, and food and I ended up having to get a rental car in New Zealand because my friend let me down and completely ditched me. So I had some unexpected expenses and actually ran out of money at some point and I don’t know how I survived but I somehow made it. At least my return flight was already booked so I wasn’t stranded anywhere but I definitely had to work a lot more as soon as I got home.

My international travels came to a pause when the world shut down, which is why I started traveling my home country. Previously I have been to China and Canada with my family, but I want to revisit as an adult. My birthday plans for 2020 was London, Paris, Italy, Berlin (Germany), Japan, Korea, Australia, and New Zealand but all of those plans were canceled. Luckily, my job took off during COVID and I was able to make and save a lot of money to fund my country roadtrip.

I will be overseas again as soon as I complete my travel plans of experiencing all of the USA. Where to? Everywhere. I’m keen for it!

Update: Towards the end of 2022, my country traveling was put to a pause since my car broke down and wasn’t worth $2000 to fix. I ended up backpacking parts of Asia for a few months.

An online friend invited me to join her family vacation to Vietnam, so this was actually already planned. It just so conveniently happened that my car broke down right before I left for Asia- now I didn’t have to worry about my car being parked somewhere for months while I am in Asia.

It felt like I was going back to my roots, planning my international trips to maximize the amount of places I could see and explore for the cheapest prices.

Since I was flying to Vietnam, I knew I wanted to make as many stops as possible and explore more than just Vietnam. I booked to fly to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, with a 23 hour layover in South Korea. I spend one night in Itaewon, a few days in Kuala Lumpur, and then I was supposed to fly straight to Vietnam. Unfortunately my international traveler skills are a bit rusty- I fucked up the e-visa information for Vietnam and replanned my trip to arrive earlier than I said I would. So I couldn’t enter the country for a few days. I was already at the airport and didn’t have anywhere to stay, so I looked on Google Maps to see nearby places I could experience for just a few days. I ended up booking the next flight to Langkawi Island, where I had many fun adventures. Along the way, I decided to also check out Penang Island, and from there I finally made it to Vietnam where I spend a whole month with my friend’s family.

After Vietnam, I was already across the globe and overdue for a visit to my second home, Melbourne, Australia. Now that I didn’t have to worry about my car and have absolutely nowhere to go and all of my belongings were gone, I had no home to return to. So I returned to Australia, and lived with my best friend for a month there. I was supposed to go back to my parents house for Chinese New Year, but ended up extending my trip.

The plan was- to go back to America, but I really did miss New Zealand and it’s just so close to Australia…my mate out there actually has been working towards living the vanlife, even got a van, and suggested we vanlife together and explore both the norther an southern islands. I estimated about 1.5 months should be perfect for this. I changed my flights, my plans, everything, and in the end he wasn’t quite ready to do the big trip. I was able to change some flights to leave New Zealand earlier, but I wasn’t able to fly back to America from Australia. I told my friend, regardless, I am coming to New Zealand LOL. We took some mini trips, and I got to see parts of the southern island- which was awesome! I didn’t get to do everything I wanted, but we will definitely do the vanlife trip when we are both more prepared.

It’s March 2023 now, and I am currently back in America. Still figuring my plans out, but the adventure won’t stop here :)!