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Once I d dispensed with my unrestricted fantasies of scurrying from seldom-visited corner to seldom-visited corner (see Monday s post ) we got down to the essentials of figuring out where we wanted to go.
The Micronesian islands of Palau and Yap were our first priorities. Both destinations had been on our radar for years. Palau with its faintly stinging marine lake jellyfish and the Federated Micronesian state of Yap with its enormous stone money both struck us as appealing in a magical, fairytale sort of way.
Once we d identified our trip duration and got into the planning phase, however, hotel rome 4 star the inclusion of Micronesia on our itinerary hotel rome 4 star became a less appealing prospect. The flights there and onward were long. We d need to overnight in Guam at least once, possibly twice, and though that wouldn t be a hardship exactly, we wanted if at all possible to avoid layovers in places where we wouldn t also be spending several nights.
hotel rome 4 star The final clincher was the cost of zipping around Micronesia, which would have made an unavoidably pricey itinerary even more expensive. If we had been planning a round-the-Pacific tour, there is no question that Palau and Yap would have been included, but for a round-the-world trip they weren t quite right. Reluctantly we crossed Micronesia off the list.Where hotel rome 4 star else did we want to travel? We d settled into a Southern Hemisphere focus, and we were keen to get back to Australia. We both wanted to visit Sydney and Melbourne. For a jaunt to a third city in Australia, Matt had made noises about Cairns and I focused on Perth. The inclusion of these two cities would have made a round-the-world air ticket even more complicated (more on that on Friday) so we dropped them and decided to divide our time in Australia between Sydney and Melbourne.
Years of thinking about Palau and Yap had us fantasizing about a Pacific island and we didn t want to miss the opportunity to visit one. We glanced across the region and zeroed in on a Pacific territory easily visited from Australia: hotel rome 4 star New Caledonia, a French overseas collectivity three hours by plane from Sydney. We decided to sandwich six nights in New Caledonia between stays in Sydney and Melbourne. In New Caledonia we would spend most of our time on Lifou, one of New Caledonia s Loyalty Islands, with a day reserved for checking out New Caledonia s capital, Noum a.
Beyond that, we wanted some time on Mauritius and the French overseas territory of R union, two Indian Ocean islands. To journey from Melbourne to Mauritius we d need to break our rule against short layovers with a single night s stay in Johannesburg. We d then divide nine nights between Mauritius and R union, which is a short 50-minute flight from Mauritius.
Without hotel rome 4 star further ado, here is the full itinerary: New York (via a stop to visit friends in New Orleans) to Sydney to Noum a to Melbourne to Johannesburg to Mauritius to R union to London and then home to New York.
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