Europe

Manchester

England

Alicante

Spain

Copenhagen

Denmark

Charleroi

Belgium

Leeds Bradford

Warsaw

Poland

Newcastle

Bristol

Liverpool

Dublin

Ireland

Valentine's Day trips 💖 at £34-£87 rtn from North England

Toronto

Canada

Dublin 🍀 at $468 RT

Munich

Germany

Dublin 🍀 at €75 rtn from Munich

Birmingham

Verona

Italy

Bournemouth

Wrocław

Málaga

Valentine's Day trips 💝 at £37-£77 rtn from Bournemouth, Birmingham and Bristol

Aberdeen

Scotland

London Gatwick

Glasgow

Milan

Edinburgh

Cork

Bergamo

Valentine's Day trips 💌 at £31-£70 rtn from Scotland

London Stansted

Trapani

Zagreb

Croatia

Cologne

London Luton

Basel

Switzerland

London Southend

Barcelona

Valentine's Day trips 💘 at £31-£68 rtn from London

Loved the trip and got lucky that the dates were right after our anniversary!
Highly recommend using Jack&#39;s flights and visiting Dublin !

Postcard from RapturousPassenger13062

Your email came at the perfect time. Ive been wanting to go on a trip with my mum for a while. She has trouble flying so knew it would have to be business/first class for any flight. So to see this email! I hopped skipped and jumped to the flights and booked it! We&#39;re going istanbul whoop whoop! We both love Turkish culture (my mums been, I havent) ,I would have definitely missed these flights if i didnt sign up to your emails.

Thanks, 😊
J

Postcard from Janelle

Hey Jack &amp; team,
I booked this snack to Vienna from Copenhagen, dec 12 to 15!
Super excited to go with my husband and baby 🐥

Postcard from Elizabeth

Hi, I booked my return trip to India yesterday over December and got it for 399 without a checked bag (and 458 with). This is a direct flight via BA from London &gt; Delhi &gt; London. Thought I’d share!

Postcard from Sangam

I love a cheap deal from my local airport Leeds instead of heading to Manchester or London.. excited for a quick jaunt to Dublin next February!

Postcard from Abi

Going end of Sept (2025) for a mini trip to Dublin on my own! Pretty excited. Hope the weather will be decent and not rain.
😊


Postcard from Marilyn 

United States

United Kingdom

Hey there, Travellers,
My friend Rachel was recently telling me about her alter ego, Airport Rachel. Airport Rachel and Everyday Rachel are not the same person; one is caring, patient, and up for a laugh, the other has no time for your nonsense, and will see you at the gate.&nbsp;
And she's not alone. Those of us who regularly navigate airports on our own have our system worked out, and throwing someone you care about into the mix might not be the fun start to a trip that you'd hope for.&nbsp;
Enter: <a href="https://www.thetimes.com/travel/inspiration/comment-inspiration/airport-divorce-travel-trend-huw-oliver-7jgs8kncs">the airport divorce</a>. A temporary parting of ways in an overstimulating environment that's often full of people you might perceive as utterly bonkers.
What do you think? Is an airport divorce the secret to happy transit? Or do you have another trick to calm the turbulence before you take off? <a href="https://members.jacksflightclub.com/articles/detour-212-sale-predictions-travel-blunders#comments">Let us know in the comments</a>.
Happy travels and safe landings,

Katy - Editor of The Detour

Over the past few years, airlines have been dropping sales left, right, and center as that pandemic hangover has worn off and travel numbers have soared to pre-2020 levels and beyond. But, are these sales actually worth it?&nbsp;
We&rsquo;ve rounded up the best Black Friday deals from the most popular airlines we&rsquo;ve seen in the past, to shed some light on what you can expect from this year&rsquo;s sales.
Round-trip flights to Europe under $300, Tahiti at $644 including a checked bag, and five-star flights to Osaka at $690 only scratched the surface of Black Friday deals we've found from across the United States.
Since demand has remained high in the years since the pandemic, it&rsquo;s highly likely that prices might be a smidge higher across the board than a few years back. We&rsquo;re keeping our fingers and toes crossed that 2025 will be another year of (good) surprises!&nbsp;
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<h2 id="h_7267660882881698760985610">Southwest Airlines</h2>
Free bags, open seating, and a generous change policy once made Southwest our favorite &ldquo;no-frills&rdquo; airline, hands down. But a lot has changed over the past year, and they've recently embraced the same cost-cutting methods used by other low-cost carriers, putting an end to the generous policies they were known for. Free checked bags, we hardly knew ye!
Their Black Friday sales have traditionally focused on domestic trips under 100 buckaroos, but anything goes with the new Southwest.
<h4>What we expect in 2025</h4>
Southwest has ignored Black Friday in favor of Cyber Monday for the last four years, and we expect that to continue. They're not the only ones, either&mdash;we saw an overall shift to Cyber Monday in 2024. But hey, as long as the sales are good, it's all the same to us!
We figure Southwest's sales are likely to go in one of two directions this year. Either they'll continue to cut costs and deliver some lackluster discounts, or they'll make up for the new lack of perks by slashing their fares even lower. Either way, they'll be the first place to look for domestic flights in 2025.
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<h2 id="h_3436739416281698761090755">American Airlines</h2>
We had low expectations for American Airlines last year, after they completely skipped Black Friday in 2023. But they surprised us with some&nbsp;killer discounts this time around, landing at the top of 2024's nice list. Great job, guys!
American is the world&rsquo;s biggest airline and has the most robust network, so seeing them drop a BF sale is always a good thing. Especially as they usually tend to shy away from sales just like their friends at Delta, positioning their product on that more premium tier.
When they do offer sales, they typically focus on short-haul domestic routes. But American has an enormous international network with flights all over the globe, so there's always the chance for some top-tier fares to the rest of the world too.
<h4>What we expect in 2025</h4>
We're riding high on last year's great sale, so we have great expectations for American in 2025. We're guessing they'll probably focus on domestic routes again, especially since that's been a trend all this past year. But they might choose to leverage their global network and surprise us with some great international ones too.
We'll be keeping an eye on their Asian routes this time around&mdash;while American's reach is pretty limited in that part of the world, flights to Asia have been super popular in 2025. Could they be looking for a bigger slice of the transpacific pie?
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<h2 id="h_68266749033301698761151853">Alaska Airlines</h2>
Alaska has had a big year since last Black Friday, completing a merger with Hawaiian Airlines and solidifying themselves as the premier carrier for the western US. They've also turned their eyes to Asia, launching new non-stop flights from Seattle to Tokyo, with a Seoul route coming in September.&nbsp;
An Alaska Black Friday sale is almost a certainty - they absolutely love doling out discounted fares across their domestic and regional routes every holiday season.
<h4>What we expect in 2025</h4>
Alaska is one of the most consistent US airlines when it comes to Black Friday sales, so we're expecting the same from them yet again. We're sure to see some really terrific discounts on domestic routes, including to rarer spots like Bozeman or Redmond.
There's also the possibility of better deals on flights across the Pacific this year, falling in line with yearly trends and Alaska's new focus on Asian travel. Could this be the year we get crazy cheap fares to Tokyo?
<section id="sas airlines">
<a href="https://members.jacksflightclub.com/articles/black-friday-flight-deals-usa-what-to-expect-in-2025" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Read more Black Friday predictions for the US...</a>
</section>
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</section>

Black Friday Predictions

Over the past few years, airlines have been dropping sales left, right, and center as that pandemic hangover has worn off and travel numbers have soared to pre-2020 levels and beyond. But, are these sales actually worth it?&nbsp;
Canadian airline prices might be a bit higher than other markets, but there are still fantastic deals to be found. We&rsquo;re talking round-trip flights to Europe for under $400 RT, non-stop to Japan in the $600s RT, and&nbsp;five-star&nbsp;seats to Phuket for $894 RT &mdash; and that&rsquo;s just scratching the surface.
We&rsquo;ve rounded up the best Black Friday deals from the most popular airlines we&rsquo;ve seen in the past, to shed some light on what you can expect from this year&rsquo;s sales.
<h2 dir="ltr">Air Canada</h2>
On average, Air Canada&rsquo;s prices tend to be higher than the rest of the Canadian airlines, but with them comes better service and&nbsp;usually a cushier flying experience.&nbsp;
Unfortunately, as of January 2025, they&rsquo;ve nixed the free carry-on for their lowest short-haul fares. But they&rsquo;re still the largest airline in the country, and have an extensive flight network around the world. Plus, they offer nice amenities like seat-back entertainment and a focus on comfort.
We frequently see minor sales on routes within Canada and the US, but they also offer some bigger, rarer sales to Europe and Central/South America too.&nbsp;
<h4>What we expect in 2025</h4>
Air Canada left us hanging last Black Friday. Their 2024 sale was pretty underwhelming, and honestly, we&rsquo;re bracing for a repeat this year.
But don&rsquo;t despair just yet! In the past, Air Canada has come through with better discounts on both Cyber Monday and Boxing Day &mdash; and we think that&rsquo;s where the best deals will be again this year. So, if you&rsquo;re hoping to snag a bargain, keep your eyes peeled for those sales instead.
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<h2 dir="ltr">WestJet</h2>
Another Canadian favourite, WestJet also has an extensive flight network. Although we don&rsquo;t see quite the same level of coverage as their big brother Air Canada, their consistently lower fares are good enough. Similarly to Air Canada, they don&rsquo;t offer a free carry-on for their lowest fares unless you&rsquo;re flying to Europe or Asia.&nbsp;
You&rsquo;ll see consistent &ldquo;sales&rdquo; throughout the year, but the biggest ones tend to be Cyber Monday, Boxing Day and random September sales (don&rsquo;t ask us why). The sales tend to be best for Canadian destinations, so don&rsquo;t expect to find any dramatic deals for the rest of the world.&nbsp;
<h4>What we expect in 2025</h4>
WestJet knows how to throw a <s>party</s> sale. It might not have been the widest-ranging collection of destinations, but we did see their lowest prices of 2024 last Black Friday. That being said, we didn't get a random September sale this year, so fingers crossed that means they're going to toss it all into one massive BF extravaganza!&nbsp;
Whatever they decide to do for Black Friday, we expect to see the absolute best deals on Cyber Monday again.&nbsp;
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<h2 dir="ltr">ZIPAIR Tokyo</h2>
Not to beat this dead horse, but if Flair is the Flair of Canada, and Arajet is the Flair of South America, then ZIPAIR must be is the Flair of&hellip; ok, you get it.&nbsp;
ZIPAIR is a low-cost Japanese airline connecting Canada to Asia (just Tokyo). Although it is no-frills, they offer free in-flight entertainment and, shockingly, free wifi too! Even with consistently low prices,&nbsp; from time to time they offer sales with really low prices, so it&rsquo;s definitely worth holding out.&nbsp;
<h4>Last year</h4>
2024: Their Black Friday sale saw non-stop routes to Tokyo at $678 RT. They were the lowest prices of the year, so well worth the wait!
<h4>What we expect in 2025</h4>
ZIPAIR keeps things simple with its Vancouver&ndash;Tokyo route, but that&rsquo;s exactly what makes this one to watch for Black Friday. Demand for Japan trips is sky-high right now, and ZIPAIR consistently offers some of the lowest fares you&rsquo;ll find. 
We expect a solid BF sale, including the cheapest ways to get to Tokyo this winter &mdash; perfect for anyone itching for sushi, ramen, and neon lights!
<a href="https://members.jacksflightclub.com/articles/black-friday-canada-airline-flight-sales-what-to-expect" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Read more Black Friday Predictions for Canada...</a>

Black Friday and Cyber Monday are on their way once again&hellip; but is it all hype, or do airlines really make it worth the wait?
Last year, we saw a higher concentration of sales during the actual week of Black Friday. This differed to previous years when we noticed the first &lsquo;Black Friday&rsquo; sales pop up much earlier in the month.&nbsp;
For the first time, there were even a few airlines who, despite announcing a sale on or around Black Friday, attempted to distance themselves from the label of &lsquo;Black Friday&rsquo;&mdash;yet they still held a sale. Go figure! Maybe they wanted to try to stand out from the crowd?&nbsp;
We also noticed a decline in the &lsquo;one and done&rsquo; type of sale, with many airlines advertising multiple sales over the period, or even a different sale every day in the lead up to Friday. You can probably expect to see this again in 2025.
Read on to find out what kind of flight deals we&rsquo;ve seen in past Black Friday sales, and see more of our predictions for what to expect in 2025.
<h2 id="aer-lingus">Aer Lingus</h2>
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Ireland&rsquo;s airline isn&rsquo;t just for trips from Ireland. Their connecting flights to airports across the UK make them a compelling way to fly to the US &amp; Canada, especially thanks to the <a href="https://www.dublinairport.com/flight-information/travelling-to-usa/usa-preclearance/us-customs-and-border-protection-video">security preclearance in Dublin</a>.
They&rsquo;ve focussed their Black Friday sales mainly on their routes to the US, Canada, and the Caribbean over the past few years.
Considering they&rsquo;ve previously been one of the earliest to announce their BF sale, we were a little surprised they held off until 3 days before Black Friday last year. Along with plenty of long/short hauls from Ireland, their non-stop route from Manchester to Barbados was a standout.
<h4 dir="ltr">What to expect in 2025</h4>
In 2023 they launched early, in 2024 they launched (relatively) late, so maybe this year they'll go back to being early birds? They were one of the first airlines to announce their end of summer sale this year, so maybe that's a sign.
And speaking of summer sales, their Black Friday offering last year was essentially a re-branded version of what they'd previously offered at the end of August. So if you want a hint at what you'll be seeing this time around, it'll likely be <a href="https://members.jacksflightclub.com/tip/europe-canada-barbados-and-the-us-in-60s-520s60s-390s-rtn?utm_source=JFC-Deals&amp;utm_medium=share&amp;utm_campaign=%5BJFC%5D-deal-sharing&amp;utm_content=deal">similar to this</a>.&nbsp;
<h2 id="british-airways">British Airways</h2>
<img height="81" src="https://cdn.jacksflightclub.com/id/ac825bb482c6b11664c3733095f8ec020af8af09" width="518" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;">
If you live in the UK, and especially if you live in London, the British Airways sale is always one to watch out for. They fly to pretty much everywhere you&rsquo;re interested in travelling to.
If you&rsquo;re looking to go to any major US or Canadian city or to one of their many Caribbean island destinations, their Black Friday sale is likely a good time to book, too.
They usually have sales at the end of August and from Boxing Day on, but British Airways jumped into the Black Friday game properly in 2018 to bridge the gap between their main sale seasons.
Last year, the main bulk of the UK sale was made up of short-haul flights, with the unexpected exception of a pleasantly cheap route from Newcastle to Boston. Discounts from mainland Europe seemed a little more diverse, but still very USA-heavy. The stand-outs were a sprinkling of India and Mexico.
<h4>What to expect in 2025</h4>
British Airways holding a Black Friday sale is definitely something you can count on. Bagging an actually decent bargain, on the other hand, now that's a different story.
While you can safely assume to see reductions on their short-hauls across Europe, and long-hauls (mostly focused across the USA &amp; India), the prices appear to be getting increasingly underwhelming with every sale.
That being said, last year they just about pipped Virgin Atlantic to the post with a slightly stronger sale offering &mdash; a winning title they held on to during the battle of the end of summer sales. So, if we had to put our faith in one of the two airlines this Black Friday, it'd still be BA.
<h2 class="MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-h2 mui-lqgaod" id="sas">SAS</h2>
<img height="290" src="https://cdn.jacksflightclub.com/id/6d284f748a3cb43854bfd2cf057525ad5e2bba71" width="515" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;">
While 2023 was all about business class, 2024 was all about short-haul economy.
But what really made SAS stand apart from the other Scandi airline sales were the routes on offer. We don&rsquo;t often see spots like Lule&aring; (AKA Swedish Lapland) and S&auml;len go cheap from the UK. Plus, they came with a huge span of dates up until June.
Don&rsquo;t forget that SAS has a pretty decent year-round&nbsp;<a class="MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-inherit MuiLink-root MuiLink-underlineAlways mui-1broqmw" href="https://www.flysas.com/en/sas-young/">youth discount scheme</a>, offering at least 10% off all economy fares for anyone under the age of 26.
<h4 class="MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-h4 mui-1nst6g4">What to expect in 2025</h4>
Honestly if we could have a mix of the previous two years, with long-haul, short-haul, economy, and business, that'd be great!&nbsp;
SAS often delivers on cheap US flights, from Scandinavia in particular, but judging by what we've seen this year, we'll also be keeping an eye out for some bargain fares to Svalbard, and maybe some routes to Asia too.
<a href="https://members.jacksflightclub.com/articles/black-friday-uk-ireland-airline-flight-sales-what-to-expect">Read more Black Friday predictions for the UK and Europe...</a>

Travel Mistakes We'll&nbsp;(Hopefully)&nbsp;Never Make Again

We&rsquo;ve all been there. Wide-eyed, in a foreign land, full of glee. You no longer feel the sharp ache of life&rsquo;s shackles, those burdens feel a million miles away. The butterflies in your stomach remind you that you&rsquo;re on your path. You&rsquo;re doing you. You&rsquo;re alive!
And damn, is that not the most intoxicating feeling? That's what travel is about.
But then there are those moments in travel that we don't always talk about, when those butterflies suddenly turn into a giant pit.
Missed flights, forgotten passports, ten years on a secondary security screening list&hellip; Our members and the team at Jack&rsquo;s recently shared those travel mishaps they hope never to repeat. And honestly, some of these are a masterclass in exactly what&nbsp;not to do.&nbsp;
Except our Editor, Katy, that is. When asked, she simply said:&nbsp;&ldquo;I&rsquo;m really a very good traveller, so not much stupidity to offer.&rdquo; An admirable stance. A suspicious one, but admirable&hellip;
Here are some of our favorites (and a handful of lessons we&rsquo;ve learned right alongside you).
<h3 id="from-bali-to-frostbite">From Bali to&hellip; Frostbite?</h3>

&ldquo;When our visa for Indonesia couldn&rsquo;t be extended, I booked a week in Shanghai in February. While it was 25&deg;C in Indonesia, we arrived in Shanghai to 0&deg;C and frost!
Also, it was Chinese New Year &mdash; everything closed, no food stalls, not even local eateries. We made the best of it and booked tourist excursions until we could go back to Indonesia.&rdquo; - Elisabeth

Going from beach vibes to freezing winds wasn&rsquo;t quite the mid-trip refresh Elisabeth had in mind&mdash;but hey, at least she got to experience a very different side of Asia - sans dumplings.&nbsp;
Our takeaway: Always check the weather and the national holidays before booking that spontaneous side trip.
<h3 dir="ltr" id="never-again-gambia">Never again - Gambia.</h3>

&ldquo;Never go to Gambia ever again - rubbish on beaches, sea too rough to swim in, and constant harassment by locals asking for money.&rdquo; - Kaminee

Our takeaway: Sometimes a destination just doesn&rsquo;t click - and that&rsquo;s okay. Not every beach is a paradise, and if you&rsquo;re looking for just a quick sun holiday with your creature comforts, there might be better places. But we wouldn&rsquo;t write off Gambia just yet. 
Where the country shines is in the interior and&nbsp;<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vejPcqNLmHc">on its river</a>. Take a journey upriver, either as a day trip or a multi-day excursion, and you'll have the opportunity to learn more about the true Gambian lifestyle.
Whether that&rsquo;s spotting&nbsp;<a href="https://perchancetoroam.com/2025/05/10/chimpanzee-spotting-and-other-cool-things-to-do-in-river-gambia-national-park/">chimpanzees</a>, cruising along the Bao Bolong Reserve, or visiting <a href="https://perchancetoroam.com/2025/05/24/visiting-wassu-kerr-batch-and-other-megalithic-stone-circles-in-the-gambia/">megalithic stone circles</a> and traditional villages, can you really say you&rsquo;ve seen Gambia without venturing into its interior?
<h3 id="overpackers-anonymous">Overpackers Anonymous</h3>

&ldquo;Taking too many things on our trip to North and Central America meant we had to take an extra hold bag. Costing &pound;70&ndash;&pound;110 each flight we took!&rdquo; - Albert&nbsp;

That &ldquo;just in case&rdquo; sweater and 10 more pairs of underwear? Not worth a hundred quid per flight.&nbsp;
Our takeaway: Give our genius <a href="https://members.jacksflightclub.com/articles/one-bag-packing-hacks-to-change-the-way-you-travel">one-bag packing hacks</a> a read - non-negotiable.
<h3 dir="ltr" id="leaving-the-hotel-and-forgetting-where-it-was">Leaving the hotel... and forgetting where it was</h3>

&ldquo;This is basic, but leaving the hotel in a foreign country and not remembering its name or address so you can get back to it.&rdquo; - Robin&nbsp;

Our takeaways: A quick photo of the entrance (or a pin on Google Maps) can save you an embarrassing game of charades with taxi drivers.
<a href="https://members.jacksflightclub.com/articles/travel-mistakes-well--never-make-again">Keep reading...</a>

Travel Tales

All the important (or silly, or strange) travel news from across web this week.
<ul>
<li>Thailand may be known as a party destination, but don't get tripped up by their <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/thailand-alcohol-ban-drinking-fine-b2863488.html">new drinking rules</a> next time you visit. </li>
<li>If Saudi's recent push for tourists has put it on your radar, the country's <a href="https://www.experiencealula.com/en/places-to-go/hegra">first UNESCO World Heritage Site</a> should be firmly at the top of your to-visit list. </li>
<li>Level up your festive European trip with <a href="https://www.timeout.com/europe/travel/best-winter-train-journeys-in-europe">these wintry train journeys</a> beautiful enough to bring a tear to a glass eye. </li>
<li>And finally, most of us have wondered what it would be like to just sack it all in and hit the dusty trail. But very few of us have ever gone right ahead and done it. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2025/nov/09/hike-continental-great-divide-trail">Here's what happened</a> when one intrepid adventurer spent 5 months walking over 3,500 miles from Mexico to Canada. No mention of how many Compeed she went through, we notice...</li>
</ul>

Travel News

Our 2025 Flight Sales Predictions & Biggest Travel Blunders

Iceland

Howdy Travellers,
With Katy&rsquo;s last known location being Kosovo, she&rsquo;s a little tied up, racing the clock to reach Moldova on yet another Lupine Race.&nbsp;
So I&rsquo;ve been handed the mic this week &mdash; and I&rsquo;ve gone down a bit of a late-night rabbit hole.&nbsp;
Ever heard of&nbsp;Third Culture Kids? I hadn&rsquo;t until recently, but clearly Instagram&rsquo;s algorithm knows me better than I know myself.&nbsp;
Basically, Third Culture Kids (TCKs) are people who spend their formative years in places that are different from their parents' homeland. Children of immigrants, diplomats, missionaries, and military, they absorb bits and pieces of multiple places. And the &ldquo;third&rdquo; culture is a mishmash of both cultures.&nbsp;
It doesn&rsquo;t just stop at geography, though. They can be cultural chameleons with a knack for fitting in anywhere. Many are multilingual and can easily connect with people from all walks of life. But that comes with a flip side: a feeling of being too foreign for home and too foreign for here, and a restlessness that never quite lets you settle completely.&nbsp;
Personally, I came from Canada and grew up in Ireland. On paper, it might seem like a small cultural jump, but for me, it always made answering the question &ldquo;Where are you from?&rdquo; complicated. I&rsquo;d start with Canada, then add Ireland, realizing neither explanation really encapsulated the way I experienced the world.
I&rsquo;ve always felt out of step with the social rhythm and mindset of both places. A bit like standing in a doorway between two rooms. I can see and interact with both, but I never fully inhabit either. So discovering the term TCK was validating, and suddenly it made sense why I moved so much in my adulthood, hopping between countries, jobs, and cities.&nbsp;
I&rsquo;ve just discovered the book called&nbsp;<a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Third-Culture-Kids-Experience-Growing/dp/1857885252">Third Culture Kids: The Experience of Growing Up Among Worlds</a> by David C. Pollock and this <a href="https://tally.so/r/3jE4Z4">global online community called &ldquo;Home,&rdquo;</a> and I&rsquo;m so excited to dive deeper into the research and community.&nbsp;
So I&rsquo;m curious, how many of you are Third Culture Kids? Did you grow up living between cultures? How has it shaped your life and identity, your travels? Or maybe you&rsquo;re raising a TCK yourself&mdash;I'd love to hear your perspective in the comments.&nbsp;
From one doorway to the next,

Akasha - Guest Editor

It&rsquo;s not you, it&rsquo;s me: Breaking up with my nomadic lifestyle after years on the road

A San Diego native, Olivia left home a few years ago to live on the road. Since then, she's had homebases everywhere from Quebec to England to New Orleans, but she always ends up back on the West Coast.&nbsp;

By Olivia

It wasn&rsquo;t a decision, so much as a realization: I don&rsquo;t want to do this anymore.&nbsp;
I don&rsquo;t want to be constantly making new friends that I will never see again. I don&rsquo;t want to be shoving everything I own into a suitcase every couple of months. And if I have to harass my cell phone carrier about my international data one more time, I just might scream.
&hellip;Okay, let me go back to the beginning.&nbsp;
It&rsquo;s hard to overstate how badly I wanted to travel as a kid. We&rsquo;re talking &ldquo;10-year-old who wanted a globe for Christmas&rdquo; levels of desire here. But it simply wasn&rsquo;t something my family did &mdash; I was well into my twenties before I even left the United States, and I&rsquo;d only left California a handful of times prior to that. Even the East Coast seemed strange and exotic. Europe might as well have been another dimension.

I was a very bored, very rambunctious little girl. I didn&rsquo;t just want to see the world, I wanted freedom. In high school, I once told a counselor that my post-grad plan was to buy a school bus, paint it psychedelic colors, and drive around the country. I was dead serious about this, and I was incensed when they laughed me out the door.
So ten years later, when I found myself with a stable remote job and nothing keeping me pinned down? It seemed foolish to waste the opportunity. I wasn&rsquo;t going to just take a measly trip or two, I was going 24/7, non-stop, wherever I wanted to go.
I took the plunge. I got to see places that I didn&rsquo;t think I would ever get to see. I even made it to that strange, alternate dimension called &ldquo;Europe.&rdquo; I could fill entire books with all the things that have happened to me in my years of living nomadically, and maybe one day I will.&nbsp;

That&rsquo;s not what I want to talk about today. You&rsquo;ve heard plenty of exciting tales from around the world (including some of mine, if you&rsquo;re a regular Jack&rsquo;s reader!) but today&rsquo;s story starts with the uglier side of traveling, the one that you discover very quickly when you&rsquo;re moving non-stop: burnout.&nbsp;
That sickening feeling when you look at your itinerary, at all the plans you excitedly made months ago, and you think &ldquo;Do I even&nbsp;want to do this?&rdquo;
When people talk about &ldquo;burnout,&rdquo; they&rsquo;re mostly referring to work stress, but it can happen with anything. Even the dream lifestyle you&rsquo;ve wanted since you were a kid. It can also make you feel a little like a Debbie Downer &mdash; sometimes it seems like everyone in the entire world is desperate to travel, and you&rsquo;re the odd one out if you don&rsquo;t think it sounds exciting.&nbsp;

And I understand that perspective! I remember when I was first getting started, and I saw a piece of advice on the <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/digitalnomad/">r/digitalnomad</a> subreddit: &ldquo;You probably don&rsquo;t actually want to be a digital nomad.&rdquo;
&ldquo;Well that&rsquo;s stupid,&rdquo; I thought. &ldquo;Why wouldn&rsquo;t I? Why wouldn&rsquo;t everyone want to do this?&rdquo;
But&hellip; I get it now. Most people don&rsquo;t actually want to live like this. They want the freedom and the excitement that comes with living nomadically, but they don&rsquo;t realize how much of your life has to be dismembered in order to make it happen.
It&rsquo;s not just one big sacrifice that you make at the beginning, either. Sure, constant solo travel means you&rsquo;re giving up any chance at a stable in-person social life. You have to give up all the hobbies that can&rsquo;t fit into your luggage. You have to give up your home. That&rsquo;s the deal you make when you first take off.
However, I never thought about all the other sacrifices that just keep coming. Smaller, less significant sacrifices, but sacrifices nonetheless. You can&rsquo;t buy souvenirs from any of these cool destinations unless you want to lug them around for god-knows how long. You can&rsquo;t go to that concert tour because the dates don&rsquo;t line up with your itinerary. You find yourself buying&nbsp;another frying pan, because for some reason this kitchen doesn&rsquo;t have one and you had to jettison the last three frying pans you bought because you needed the luggage space and ugh.

When I first started living nomadically, none of these sacrifices &mdash; not even the major ones &mdash; seemed like a big deal. The allure of travel was so strong that it overshadowed any of the downsides, and it stayed that way for years. How could I be so stupid as to stop traveling, even to take a break? Didn&rsquo;t I remember how badly I always wanted this? How lucky I am to be in this position? How many people would kill for this lifestyle? How could I ever just&hellip; give it up?
To paraphrase the poet Frank Bidart, sometimes you can drink til you&rsquo;re sick but you can&rsquo;t drink til you&rsquo;re satisfied. Seasoned travelers know you cannot ever truly satiate the travel bug. You just have to make the conscious, difficult decision to actively ignore the sucker before it makes you sick. Because the travel bug might inspire you to get off the couch, but it doesn&rsquo;t always have your best interests in mind. If you let it call the shots for too long, if you start thinking life is something that exclusively happens anywhere but home, you start to miss out.
Recently, I was watching a YouTube video by the famous drag queen Trixie Mattel. She was talking about how she was grateful for her successful career and all the unique experiences it provided, but then she goes&hellip;
&ldquo;Sometimes I'm like, "Wow, I am living life in 4K fast forward, super speed&hellip; a whole life in a month, you know, and then sometimes I check in with friends from college and everybody has children&hellip; have I really lived life or has this prevented me from living my life? I don't know."

It was like a light bulb went off in my head. My twenties haven&rsquo;t exactly been average, to say the least, and I&rsquo;m grateful for that. I never wanted an average life. But the flipside is that you end up looking at your peers, the people you went to school with, and realizing there&rsquo;s miles and miles of distance between you, both literally and figuratively. You&rsquo;re burned out and lonely and no longer as easily impressed by your fast-paced lifestyle. And suddenly, that average life with the average apartment and the average social life and the average hobbies looks mighty aspirational.&nbsp;
Which brings us back to the beginning: I don&rsquo;t want to do this anymore.&nbsp;
I&rsquo;ve had that feeling plenty of times in the last few years, and I always told myself it just meant I needed to rest, maybe take a week off. The travel bug was persistent.&nbsp;
Besides the urge to take advantage while I still could, the thought of quitting entirely just plain made me nervous. I had set out to expand my comfort zone, and instead I created a new one, one where I felt safer while I was on the move. My single-minded pursuit of freedom had become its own kind of cage, and everything outside that cage seemed threatening. What if I have to commit to a long-term lease? What if I embarrass myself in front of a neighbor, and now I can&rsquo;t find solace in the fact that I&rsquo;ll never see them again?&nbsp;What if I get bored again like I did as a kid?
These fears have always kept me moving. But this time, the deep desire for some damn peace and quiet feels&hellip; different. Just like how the downsides to solo nomadding seemed minimal two years ago, now the downsides to being stationary seem like nothing. I handled living in a glorified shed for months in New Orleans, I handled losing my luggage in England with no cell service, and I handled five days in Alaska living off tortilla wraps. Sure, I can handle a long-term lease. Bring it on.
This summer, I drove from Utah to Canada by myself. These thoughts had already been floating around in my head, but while exploring Grand Teton National Park, I ended up talking to another woman on my hiking trail. We chatted for hours while we hiked up to a waterfall, and I told her all about my nomadic life on the road. Then I told her I was thinking of ending it. I hadn&rsquo;t said it out loud til that moment, but as soon as I started explaining the decision to her, it settled in my gut. Yep, I was done. As soon as I got to my next rental, I started shopping for long-term apartments.

It was a bit like breaking up with someone. You always know deep down that it&rsquo;s over well before you admit it to yourself.
So I guess this is my break-up letter to my nomadic lifestyle. We had some good times together. You taught me a lot about myself. I&rsquo;m smarter and stronger for having known you, and I don&rsquo;t regret a single second. I&rsquo;m lucky to have spent so much time with you and it hurts to say goodbye. Maybe one day, we can settle into casual friendship, and I will find excitement in the occasional airport chaos and overstuffed suitcase once again.
But right now, I have some gorgeous O&rsquo;Keeffe prints from Santa Fe that I&rsquo;ve been lugging around for god-knows how long, and all I want is a place where I can hang them up on the wall.

You Only Turn 40 Once

Based in California, Navigator Jake loves nothing more than traveling, saving money, and doing both things at once!

Answered by Jake

This week&rsquo;s Reader&rsquo;s Corner comes with an extra-special mission, travelers. A man&rsquo;s birthday is at stake here! Let&rsquo;s dive right into Ritchie&rsquo;s question:

&ldquo;Hey JFCers,
I can't believe it, but I'll be turning 40 next June. An avid traveller, there are still plenty of things I've not yet ticked off my list and my 40th is surely a good excuse to go big.
I've narrowed it down to two choices and I need to choose one:
<ul>
<li dir="ltr">BC, Yukon, Alaska road trip.</li>
<li dir="ltr">Icelandic Highlands.</li>
</ul>
It doesn't have to be in June, and I appreciate that there are limitations at that time of year for Iceland - F roads aren't open, some campsites are closed. And with the Western Canada and Alaska option, if time allowed, I'd even consider a few days in Calgary for the Stampede if we were around in July.
I lived in Canada back in 2014 and travelled through every province, but I never made it into the territories. My wife and I love a road trip, and she's never been to Canada. The Yukon and Alaska have always fascinated me. I'd consider a mix of campervan/RV and motels along the way.
Iceland is our favourite destination to travel together to and we have been many times, in all seasons. However, the option to do the Highlands has never been possible due to budget or season.
We are typically budget travellers and aren't bothered about the finer things in life - we'd rather see cool stuff. I love photography and we appreciate a nice landscape. We'd have a fortnight available.
Help me choose!
Thanks,
Ritchie&rdquo;

Happy birthday, Ritchie&mdash;and congrats on the big 4-0! It just keeps getting better from here.
Iceland and Western Canada/Alaska are both pretty terrific places to visit, especially if you&rsquo;re looking for stunning scenery.&nbsp;
Knowing we have the most travel-savvy subscriber base out there, we asked the JFC Facebook community to chime in:

The people have spoken, and their choice is clear: the Yukon &amp; Alaska road trip takes it!
Personally, I think you guys nailed it. I <a href="https://members.jacksflightclub.com/articles/the-solo-road-trip-survival-guide?utm_source=JFC-Posts&amp;utm_medium=share&amp;utm_campaign=%5BJFC%5D-post-sharing&amp;utm_content=post">love a road trip</a>, and while Iceland is beautiful at any time of year, the scenery in Western Canada and Alaska just blows me away like nowhere else.
I&rsquo;ll also give a big thumbs-up to the potential stop in Calgary! I&rsquo;ve never been to the Stampede (Navigator Kristi is our&nbsp;<a href="https://members.jacksflightclub.com/articles/detour-197-foodie-fever-dreams-magical-mexico#travel-tales">expert on that one</a>), but Jack&rsquo;s North American team met up for a little get-together in Kananaskis and had a blast hiking up the mountains. Just look at those smiling (and exhausted) faces!

You&rsquo;re not the only one dreaming of Alaska, either&mdash;I&rsquo;m taking a solo trip there myself in February. I&rsquo;ll be holed up in Fairbanks, hunting the northern lights and freezing my buns off, but you&rsquo;ll probably want to start down south by Anchorage instead. Coming from Western Canada, you can pass through <a href="https://www.roadtriplocals.com/blog/things-to-do-in-glacier-bay-national-park">Glacier Bay National Park</a> (and <a href="https://victoriastravelsandtribulations.com/2022/08/28/two-perfect-days-in-wrangell-st-elias-national-park-except-for-speedy-the-glacier-guide/">Wrangell-St. Elias</a> if you&rsquo;re feeling bold) on your way up the Panhandle. Take a quick detour south from Anchorage to <a href="https://danielleoutdoors.com/kenai-fjords-national-park/">Kenai Fjords</a>, and then you&rsquo;ll be ready to head north and hit the crown jewel: <a href="https://www.youralaskanadventures.com/blog/how-to-visit-denali-national-park-as-a-first-time-visitor-a-locals-guide">Denali</a>. You won&rsquo;t find better spots for photography anywhere!
What do you think, travelers? If you&rsquo;ve got more road trip tips for Ritchie&rsquo;s birthday bash, or you&rsquo;re an Iceland purist pushing back on the Facebook vote, just head to the comments or hit reply!

Reader's Corner

All the important (or silly, or strange) travel news from across web this week.
<ul>
<li dir="ltr" role="presentation">It&rsquo;s autumn for us folks above the equator, but one of the driest places on Earth is experiencing a very unusual (and colorful) springtime. Last week, a rare torrential downpour turned the Atacama Desert <a href="https://apnews.com/article/desert-chile-atacama-bloom-gabriel-boric-84e53ea84702abfb2f6c93c4970ebad5">into a wildflower rainbow</a>.</li>
<li dir="ltr" role="presentation">Millions of travelers rely on navigation apps, but how do brands like Google Maps or Waze decide what to show them? Here&rsquo;s a <a href="https://www.afar.com/magazine/how-digital-maps-decide-what-names-appear">peek behind the cartographers&rsquo; curtain</a>.</li>
<li dir="ltr" role="presentation">A little Belgian train news: SNCB introduced some serious discounts for riders this week, but the policies are&hellip; <a href="https://www.brusselstimes.com/1780013/sncb-to-make-train-travel-cheaper-for-up-to-80-of-passengers-tbtb">a bit confusing</a>.</li>
<li dir="ltr" role="presentation">&ldquo;Harvesting grapes on a vineyard in Southern France&rdquo; might sound like a cottagecore fantasy, but don&rsquo;t be fooled &mdash; it&rsquo;s back-breaking work. Nevertheless, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2025/oct/08/volunteer-grape-harvesting-vineyard-rhone-region-france-wine">volunteers return to this farm year after year</a> for the camaraderie (and probably the wine!)</li>
<li>Lastly, this Nordic archipelago may not recognize the concept of time, but that <a href="https://metro.co.uk/2025/10/08/arctic-maldives-a-european-island-spectacular-northern-lights-2026-24299571/">won&rsquo;t stop winter&rsquo;s light show</a> from arriving right on cue.</li>
</ul>

Breaking Up with the Nomadic Lifestyle 

I&rsquo;m usually not one for making the most of my own backyard. Too tempting is the thought of hauling my bruised and battered backpack halfway across the world to connect with something bigger than myself.&nbsp;
Give me the pale morning light in Alhambra, a celestial cloud storm in the mountains of Oaxaca or the shifting sands along the Pamir Highway. The further from the co-ordinates of my childhood home, the better.&nbsp;
But if there&rsquo;s one place close by that stills my wandering feet, it&rsquo;s down a country lane about 10 km west of Kenmare in Co. Kerry.&nbsp;
It&rsquo;s not so much of the road itself, if you can even call it that, but what it promises the inquisitive type, a reward for taking heed of Robert Frost, opting for the road less travelled. Not a tour bus in sight.

Snaking through the valley, sharp turns and sheep, the brown craggy rocks jut from the earth like slabs of centuries-old soda bread. You&rsquo;ll reach a point where it appears you can&rsquo;t possibly drive further. Drive further. Someone in the village can take a look at the axel on your car later.&nbsp;
Once your eyes fixate on the small crooked sign propped up by two planks of wood that reads &ldquo;Entry Fee 5 euros per person&rdquo; you know you&rsquo;re in the right place. Now, I can&rsquo;t guarantee it&rsquo;ll be a fiver at the time of your visit. Over the years, that tiny weather-beaten honesty box has grown heavier, as has the pockets of the farmer who owns the land. Perhaps one day there&rsquo;ll be a gift shop, but for now, just pay the fee &mdash; the faeries are watching.

A slight left at the tin box, up the short path leading towards the valley. It's not long before you&rsquo;re rendered speechless at what spills out in front of you. A cluster of megalithic standing stones guarding space in front of a lonesome body of water. Across the lake, a waterfall drifts down the mountain so slowly, almost pulling itself backward. The stones huddle together like ancient elders, watching centuries whip past.&nbsp;
4,000 years of solstices are difficult to comprehend, and not much is known about the purpose of this exact site. They could be sites of burial or ritual, most likely astronomically aligned. It doesn&rsquo;t take a scholar to see why they were placed here among mesmerizing beauty beyond words.&nbsp;
Upon discovering some carefully placed crystals of amethyst and quartz wedged at the base of the 10ft monolith, I realized I wasn&rsquo;t the first to be moved by this place, compelled by the same pull down a forgotten country road.

Hidden Ireland: Stumbling upon the Uragh Stone Circle

Vietnam

Hey there, JFC-ers,
While everyone else is frantically preparing for the holidays, enjoying a spot of Bubl&eacute; and a mulled wine or two, our Flight Finders are enjoying the calm between storms &mdash; those strange few weeks between Black Friday madness and the post-Christmas follow-up. So, should you be setting aside your money from Santa to bag a tropical bargain? Our team has <a href="https://jacksflightclub.com/travel-hub/heres-when-airlines-run-sales">all the intel right here</a>.
And in the meantime, we&rsquo;ve got a bundle of travel inspo and tips below to help you plan.
Happy travels and safe landings,

Big Tour Vs. Little Tour - A Solo Travel Conundrum

Flight Finding Team Lead Allan is your expert on the inner workings of the airline world. If you&rsquo;ve ever seen a debut deal on a brand spanking new route or a bonkers drop on an old classic, you've got him to thank!

Written by Allan

I spent the entire month of September 2024 in Europe (the beauty of being between leases) and it was an awesome time. I&rsquo;m not going to bore you with the &ldquo;American goes to Europe and sees how much better it is&rdquo; stories, but I do want to talk about one thing I did: tours.
Scotland &amp; Ireland were my two final stops, and I really wanted to get out into the countryside. The problem? I was a solo 24-year-old budget traveler who was in no way going to rent a car for my 10 days there. The solution? Organized tours!
Based on recommendations from family &amp; friends, I picked a Loch Ness tour from Glasgow and a Cliffs of Moher/Galway tour from Dublin. The Loch Ness tour was in a small, 16-person van and the Cliffs tour was the stereotypical coach, seeing me jammed in with 60 other tourists. I was gearing up for wildly different experiences, and after doing both, I&rsquo;ve now worked out exactly what&rsquo;s important to me in a tour.
I&rsquo;ve named a winner for each of the major factors that contributed to the overall vibes of my day trips. Keep in mind, this is all anecdotal. Your tour experiences may vary, and while I&rsquo;ve been on other tours in my life, I&rsquo;m only comparing my two recent Celtic escapades here.

Comfort: This one is absolutely going to the Loch Ness tour. The van was newer, the seats were more forgiving and the van was less packed. It also helped that although the vehicle fit 16 people, we were only 10, so I was able to put my backpack on the seat next to me without an issue. There wasn&rsquo;t an empty seat in sight for the trip to the Cliffs. Point: Loch Ness.
Solo Traveler: I was alone on both of my tours, and it was a radically different feel. On the first, I was the only solo traveler, and the guide kept singling me out. Not in a bullying way, just in a personable, &ldquo;is someone listening?&rdquo; kind of way. While some people might appreciate that, I liked the Cliffs a bit more because I was able to slink into the shadows and be in my own world. No one expected me to be paying attention (I usually was, don&rsquo;t worry) and I could be a bit more introverted. But this will differ based on your guide and what you want. Point: Cliffs.
Coverage: Here, Loch Ness shines. The smaller bus was ideal for quicker stops, going to more &ldquo;off-the-beaten track&rdquo; places (as it fit in more parking lots) and generally being able to ask the guide for a quick stop if you absolutely need it. I wouldn&rsquo;t recommend it, as they are on a strict timetable, but it felt possible for Loch Ness.&nbsp;
Meanwhile, the Cliffs trip made you feel a bit more like a cog in the machine. I would also add that because we visited Galway itself on a lovely September Saturday, the city was packed. That meant more time looking for parking and navigating around people. Loch Ness didn&rsquo;t have to deal with that (due in part to not visiting a city) but the flexibility was really just that much better. Point: Loch Ness.

Guides: I really did like both of my guides. With Loch Ness, I had an older gentleman who would gleefully regale us with stories of his glass work during the pandemic or what his children were up to today. He went more off-script and clearly wanted to keep us entertained the entire time (even if the rest of the group didn&rsquo;t understand much of his Scottish English). The second guide was a college student, who LOVED the history of the region and Irish writers. I identified a bit more with him (blame the age) so I even spoke to him briefly at one of the rest stops. I also really enjoyed his storytelling. He gets the point here. Point: Cliffs.
Time: Both tours left too early in the morning for me and got back late in the evening. They were 12&ndash;14 hour, &ldquo;all-day&rdquo; tours, though, so I can&rsquo;t fault them for that. The boarding process with the Loch Ness tour was a lot simpler, starting in the Glasgow bus station and feeling &ldquo;official.&rdquo; The Cliffs tour was on a random street in Dublin, with at least 8 buses worth of people there. It was also confusing to find which bus was yours (especially since half were unbranded), so it was impossible to not feel stressed that you might get on the wrong one. Otherwise, both tours adequately used their allotted time, and the stops were properly paced. For their smoother boarding process, Loch Ness takes it. Point: Loch Ness. 
Value:&nbsp;This is an easy one. Although the small tour had lots going for it, it&rsquo;s just not a better value. For context, the large tour was about $70 for the day, while the small tour was closer to $120 (including a Loch Ness boat cruise). So while you do get more privacy, flexibility and a tour that seemed more personable for that price difference, it&rsquo;s not the smartest choice for a budget savvy traveler. The difference in quality between them was decently big, but not 40% big. Point: Cliffs.

Conclusion
So where does all that leave me in the end? Well, firstly, in empty parking lots or busy street corners (get it, like at the end of the tours? I&rsquo;ll keep going). But actually, sharp readers may have noticed that each tour got 3 points in the end, so it seems like a toss-up. And, yeah, it kind of is. A small tour is great for a certain kind of traveler, one with a bit more money who appreciates the flexibility and the humanity of the tour. A big bus tour, on the other hand, is for someone travelling cheaper, who is alright with just being another line item in BIG CORP&rsquo;s pocketbook.
The Loch Ness tour was beautiful and exactly what you expect it to be. It was a scenic drive through the Scottish Highlands to a lake that was (don't shoot the messenger) a bit underwhelming. Sure, it was pretty and all, but Loch Lomond (which we stopped at for 10 minutes) was way prettier, I thought. Maybe the fog shifted my perspective, but I'm not sure you'll ever not get fog. The cruise through the lake was an extra nice touch and Fort Augustus at the base of the lake was really calm if super touristy. And to save you some guff, yes, I did see the monster. 
The Cliffs of Moher were a bit nicer to me. Perhaps they had less hype in my mind, as I've heard about Loch Ness since as far back as I can remember and the Cliffs of Moher are "newer" to me. But I liked walking around there, the slight rain and mud, and the views out over the water. The other stops like <a href="https://www.nationalparks.ie/burren/">The Burren</a> (fun but quick) &amp; Galway (lovely but too packed) were also a really good time, rounding out the whole thing. No monster there, besides a cup of tea that was way too hot.
In the end, though, I would probably lean towards the big bus Cliffs tour. I think the differentiator to me was that ability to sink into the background.&nbsp;
By the time my tours rolled around, I&rsquo;d been in Europe for 3 weeks and I was ready to go back home. I didn&rsquo;t really enjoy the interactive side of the Loch Ness tour, as it gave me a sense of social pressure and awkwardness. The Cliffs tour let me listen when I wanted, read a book when I didn&rsquo;t, and speak no more than 50 total words throughout the course of the day. And sometimes that&rsquo;s all you really need!
Of course, the larger groups won&rsquo;t be ideal for everyone &mdash; it really depends on what you want to get out of your day trip. It&rsquo;s important to remember that smaller and pricier does not always = better for you. And when you&rsquo;re paying, you get to choose!&nbsp;
Hopefully my experiences have given you a slightly different angle to think about before booking your next tour :-)

Last week, I asked you all about Vietnam &mdash; and, my goodness, did you deliver tips by the bucket load! As well as advice that is genuinely helping to shape our plans, one incredibly kind reader has even offered to show us around Ho Chi Minh City. And what better way to get to know a place than with the help of a local?
A few of you also wrote in to let me know that you&rsquo;ll be visiting next year, too. So to make sure you&rsquo;ve got plenty of time to get planning, I won&rsquo;t delay sharing those tips any longer.
First up: Ho Chi Minh City.&nbsp;
The classic starting point and a great base for trips up the Mekong Delta. Beyond that, you weren&rsquo;t all completely convinced&hellip;

&ldquo;Hey! Vietnam is AMAZING. Definitely try and get to the Mekong delta and do the <a href="https://www.roowanders.com/an-unforgettable-trip-to-the-cu-chi-tunnels/">Cu Chi Tunnels</a> in Ho Chi Minh.&rdquo; - Frances
<hr>
&ldquo;Was there Feb 2020 &mdash; Thailand, Cambodia, and my fave, Vietnam. Spent 3 days in Ho Chi Minh, with its tower blocks, food markets and thousands of mopeds. Gets quite fumy from mopeds because they use cheap fuel.&rdquo; - Martin 
<hr>
"The war museum in Ho Chi min is very good, along with the sky tower."&nbsp;- Gill
<hr>
&ldquo;Just returned from Vietnam.&nbsp; Ho Chi Minh has surprisingly few things to do.&nbsp; We had 1 full day there and that was enough.&nbsp; <a href="https://anansaigon.com/">Anan Saigon</a> is a fabulous spot - especially the rooftop &agrave; la carte menu.&nbsp; Michelin star.&rdquo; - Carolyn
<hr>
&ldquo;Hi Katy! For your trip to Vietnam we are just finishing ours so a few thoughts for you! Ho Chi Minh City is OK - very busy noisy &amp; buzzy, but I would only spend a couple of days there!&rdquo;&nbsp;-&nbsp;Jen

Next: Phu Quoc.&nbsp;
As it turns out, Phu Quoc has you divided. Lots of you thoroughly enjoyed it, but reports from those of you who have visited in the last five years or so point to a complete loss of character and an influx of resort hotels. For some, the resort life may be the perfect antidote to the city buzz, while others should probably reconsider. Here&rsquo;s what you had to say:

"On the Island of Phu Quoc, I would suggest you visit the night markets. Very different from Thailand but still good. The cable car is a must as it&rsquo;s the longest in the world. The temples are also nice to visit.&nbsp;
I would think a lot has changed since we visited in 2018, the island had only had electric for 4 years."&nbsp;- Gill
<hr>
&ldquo;I&rsquo;m very familiar with Vietnam. Phu Quoc is a great shout - make sure you know what clothes you want tailor made and what leather accessories you want - they can work from Pinterest pictures.
Don&rsquo;t forget to eat a banh mi from Anthony Bourdain&rsquo;s favourite sandwich shop in the world. Nobody hates a night at the emerald bay at phu quoc&rdquo; - Julian
<hr>
&ldquo;Highly recommend Phu Quoc for a beach stay. Was there 30 years ago. Idyllic!!&rdquo;&nbsp;&nbsp;- Anon.
<hr>
&ldquo;In response to Vietnam, my thoughts on Phu Quoc was it was OK but no better. Lots of new pseudo European mock towns popping up for Chinese tourism market (mostly vacant when we visited, locals suggested this was a money laundering issue, who knows). Areas either very touristy, or very basic with few facilities to access. Beaches are so-so, except in front of some of the nicer hotels (we just gate crashed anyway!). Loved Vietnam, Phu Quoc didn't meet expectations for me&rdquo;&nbsp;- Del
<hr>
Phu Quoc is a great place to visit but I would recommend Da Nang for beaches and there's lots more to see and do, and you could fit in a visit to Hoi An - David
<hr>
I'm sure other readers will give you the same warning/advice; avoid Phu Quoc at all costs. We went in 2019. It's a tragedy. The overdevelopment and destruction of what was clearly a beach paradise not so long ago was heartbreaking. We managed to find one beach that hadn't suffered but were told that the land had been bought for a large hotel to be built.&rdquo; - Alan
<hr>
Decided to finish the trip and flew to Phu Quoc. Lovely beaches, always felt safe, and has a large kind of safari. Most hotels will supply mopeds (around &pound;60 for week). My hotel was &pound;25 a night, basic but clean. Plenty of boat trips looking for coral etc. - Martin

Surprise entrants: Hoi An &amp; Da Nang
As you can see, there were still a few decent reviews in there for Phu Quoc among the negative. But honestly, all your emphatic recommendations for Hoi An and Da Nang have made me completely rethink my plans after HCMC, and it looks like we&rsquo;ll be flying up the coast instead:

"Must go to - Hoi An. It's a lovely town and you can get clothes or footwear made to measure. Buy an extra bag in the market to take your purchases home."&nbsp;- Veronica
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&ldquo;I lived in VN for 10 years until quite recently.&nbsp; Here's my advice: For 'beachy', it's well worth taking the short internal flight to Da Nang (where I lived).&nbsp; A far more interesting city (and much smaller) than HCMC, and at the northern end of a 35 km-long beach lined with hotels.&nbsp; At the other end lies Hoi An - the No1 tourism destination in VN.&nbsp; Cute, traditional style with endless eating opportunities. At least look at the Hoi An/Da Nang area - full of things to see, both traditional and modern, and with a superb beach alongside.&rdquo;&nbsp;-&nbsp;Ian
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&ldquo;Hey! Read your email about Vietnam, my husband and I go every year!&nbsp;
My advice is to avoid Phu Quoc, it&rsquo;s been trashed now and there is loads of rubbish on the beaches. We go for our two week holiday to Hoi An (fly in to Danang) and spend some time in around Hoi An and then time in An Bang, a very nearby beach. (You can stay in Hoi An and still get to the beach easily).&nbsp;
Danang is all high rise but some lush hotels, but personally would just do a day trip if you do head that way!&rdquo; - Elise
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&ldquo;Phu Quoc is OK, but I'd really recommend Hoi An instead, its beach is gorgeous, and you can stay on it (Under The Coconut Tree) but be a short hop to the town which is stunning.&rdquo; - Frances
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"If you want the beach&hellip; Da Nang is the best!&nbsp; While you're there, check out Hoi An too.&nbsp; Especially at night for the lanterns on the river." - Johnny

Now, I knew when I booked this trip that ten days would never be enough to see everything, so I&rsquo;m fully intending on returning to northern Vietnam next time. And when I do&hellip;

&ldquo;Pls make sure to take a boat ride at Ha Long Bay while in Northern Vietnam.&rdquo; - Michael
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&ldquo;One of the most beautiful tours which is a must-see would be through Ha Long Bay - spectacular!&rdquo; - Frances
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&ldquo;Ha Long Bay.&nbsp; Board a junk overnight.&rdquo; - Russell
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&ldquo;I have to put in a word for the most amazing country - Cambodia - especially Siem Reap! Vietnam had been on my bucket list for years but I wasn't so sure about Cambodia - but how wrong was I?! Lovely people, so much to see &amp; experience &amp; cheap as chips!!&rdquo; - Jen
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&ldquo;The detour to <a href="https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Hotel_Review-g297390-d9514361-Reviews-Viroth_s_Hotel-Siem_Reap_Siem_Reap_Province.html">Viroth&rsquo;s Hotel in Cambodia</a> is heavenly, especially if you request the Rolls-Royce airport pickup&rdquo; - Julian

&hellip;I guess I&rsquo;m going to Ha Long Bay and Cambodia!
Thanks so much for all your contributions. No doubt they&rsquo;ll help others as much as they have me. I&rsquo;m now even more excited than before about my first big trip of 2025, and you bet I&rsquo;ll let you all know how it goes! Keep those tips coming!

All the important (or silly, or strange) travel news from across the web this week.
<ul>
<li>The phrase &ldquo;<a href="https://jacksflightclub.com/newsletter-2023-23-06">set-jetting</a>&rdquo; may have been left in 2023, but the fun of visiting movie sets doesn&rsquo;t have to be! Today, JFC&rsquo;s Flight Finders were caught whispering about <a href="https://www.google.com/travel/flights/search?tfs=CBwQAholEgoyMDI1LTAxLTE5KABqDAgCEggvbS8wNGpwbHIHCAESA09aWholEgoyMDI1LTAxLTI2KABqBwgBEgNPWlpyDAgCEggvbS8wNGpwbEABSAFwAYIBCwj___________8BmAEB&amp;gl=GB">super cheap fares</a> to one of the <a href="https://www.timeout.com/news/where-was-gladiator-ii-filmed-the-locations-behind-the-roman-epic-111424">locations used in Gladiator 2</a> (Pedro Pascal and Paul Mescal not included). </li>
<li>From one fun travel trend to the next, an increasing number of air passengers are taking a chance on &ldquo;<a href="https://nypost.com/2024/12/12/lifestyle/seat-squatters-on-planes-is-latest-travel-trend-taking-over-social-media/">seat squatting</a>&rdquo;. </li>
<li>KLM hopes <a href="https://simpleflying.com/klm-taxibot-first-passenger-flght-schiphol-airport/">these new bots</a> will help reduce carbon emissions and noise pollution at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport. </li>
<li>And finally, it turns out country counting can be more than just a personal goal &mdash; for some <a href="https://www.afar.com/magazine/country-counting-is-a-competitive-sport">it&rsquo;s an actual sport</a>. And what happens once you&rsquo;ve been everywhere? If you&rsquo;re a member of Most Traveled People or NomadMania, you apparently move on to the groups&rsquo; lists of over 1000 territories, then regions, and even sub-regions!</li>
</ul>

Big tour Vs. Little tour - Flight Finder Allan on the pros and cons of group travel

Trinidad and Tobago

Antigua and Barbuda

Philippines

United Arab Emirates

Australia

India

South Africa

Portugal

Who does Christmas best, according to the JFC Team!

Cuba

Colombia

Peru

Georgia

Halloween is around the corner, so it&rsquo;s time to share some of the JFC team&rsquo;s creepy travel experiences. A few of them, you might want to recreate for yourselves, others&hellip; not so much.
<h3>Lauren says&hellip; </h3>
&ldquo;<a href="https://jacksflightclub.com/travel-hub/welcome-to-the-weird-world-of-atomic-tourism">I'm a sucker for anything remotely abandoned</a>, I find it so fascinating to see how buildings are just left to decay. These are some of the most interesting and spooky that I've visited:
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">A derelict <a href="https://diplomatictimes.net/2018/12/22/cubans-still-embrace-derelict-abandoned-sports-complex-in-havana/">sports complex</a> in Havana, Cuba, still used by locals despite its decrepit condition.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Tenerife&rsquo;s abandoned <a href="https://therealtenerife.com/posts/the-abandoned-leper-village-of-tenerife/">leper village</a>, built to control an outbreak but ultimately never populated thanks to revolutionary treatments.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">The now-famous <a href="https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/la-manuela-hacienda-ruins">holiday home of Pablo Escobar</a>, a shell of what it once was after being blown apart by a bomb in 1993.&nbsp;</li>
</ul>
<img src="https://cdn.jacksflightclub.com/id/0fe770a0dc6a6d95295c08ca00814c4f17670903" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;">
<a href="https://www.chescaislost.com/legend-wistmans-wood">Wistman's Wood in Dartmoor</a> National Park is also one of my faaaave spooky places. It's so quiet and eerie! The trees are so unusual and twisted, but just remember to keep your eyes peeled for the hellhounds&hellip;&rdquo;
<h3>Akasha says&hellip; </h3>
&ldquo;I once went exploring around <a href="https://adamxphotos.com/2018/08/22/explore-220-ballyvourney-de-salle-college-county-cork-ireland-september-2017/">Col&aacute;iste &Iacute;osag&aacute;in</a>, an abandoned Christian Brothers boarding school in County Cork, Ireland.
The school had a brutal reputation for abusing its students, and you could feel the sadness as you walked around it. The desperate messages scrawled on the walls only made it all the more eerie and depressing.
<img src="https://cdn.jacksflightclub.com/id/0eee9b95e5ee061de9fa0136e579d429a544501f" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;">
It was also known locally as a place where people would go to do seances and perform rituals. I&rsquo;d thought those were just rumours, until I got there and saw the open books on the floor about exactly that.&nbsp;
It was also one of the filming locations for a film called <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Song_for_a_Raggy_Boy">Song for a Raggy Boy</a>. The storyline had some uncomfortable parallels with the school&rsquo;s own history, which only made the experience all the more grim.&nbsp;
<h3>Fran says&hellip; </h3>
&ldquo;We were doing a late <a href="https://blog.atlasobscura.com/trips/night-hike-pitch-black-in-the-amazon">night walk in the Peruvian Amazon</a>, near the three-border point with Colombia and Brazil. It was super dark, and we only had a tiny torch on our head. It was two of us, plus the guide, and thousands of tiny spider eyes staring at us.
At some point, we heard some noises coming from a bush close by and our guide froze, whispering, &ldquo;it may be a jaguar, don't move.&rdquo; I thought to myself, &ldquo;bye mum, it's been fun.&rdquo;
He got close to the bush, stomping on his old hiking boots and shook the leaves with his machete... it was a tapir mum with her baby! Our guide got SO excited and said it had been three years since the last time he saw a tapir. Took me a few seconds to start breathing again!&rdquo;
<img src="https://cdn.jacksflightclub.com/id/f8653772b4742a9fe2e54fd25eb118d1277fda2b" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;">
<h3>Robin says&hellip; </h3>
&ldquo;I fell asleep on a <a href="https://travelnevada.com/outdoor-recreation/sand-mountain-recreation-area/">remote sand dune mountain in Nevada</a> whilst star gazing.&nbsp;
I woke up in the middle of the night, no moon to light the sky, and panned my torch about. There was a quick, reflected flash from two forward-facing predator eyes away in the distance, on the crest of another dune.&nbsp;
My heart rate elevated. &ldquo;They don't have cougars in Nevada, do they?&rdquo; I wondered&hellip; (<a href="https://www.ndow.org/species/mountain-lion/">they do</a>).&nbsp;
I panned the torch around again. The eyes are closer than before. I start walking slowly away&hellip; Probably just desert fox. Probably.&nbsp;
I try the torch again. Four eyes now.&nbsp; Loping. Even closer, only another ridge away. Probably just curious. Probably.&nbsp;
<img src="https://cdn.jacksflightclub.com/id/2aaaa8b2605ac22f7e32ce07bd6134cedde0b693" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;">
Confident walking away quickly turns into a terrified, careering run down 400ft of sand dune in the dark back to the safety of the car. Foxes (probably) laughing.
<h3>Katy says&hellip; </h3>
&ldquo;After a late flight into Georgia earlier this year, our coach transfer to Tbilisi got held up by a landslide on the motorway around 50 minutes into a 3.5hr journey. There was no way around it, so the driver parked up in the main square of a small town in central Georgia for the night.&nbsp;
We were free to leave and find somewhere to stay for the night, but we quickly realised that accommodation in <a href="https://wander-lush.org/things-to-do-in-zestafoni-guide/">Zestafoni</a> was few and far between&mdash;especially at 11pm. Plus, with snow up to our calves, none of us fancied abandoning the warmth and occasional Wi-Fi of the bus.&nbsp;
<img src="https://cdn.jacksflightclub.com/id/d6e583e7984d7d3ac1e66067684e8d67bfd512a3" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;">
<h6 style="text-align: center;">&ldquo;I &lt;3 Zestafoni&rdquo;</h6>
After a restless night aboard the coach with 40-odd others, it became clear that the driver had no idea when we&rsquo;d be able to move again. Thankfully, the one passenger who spoke both Georgian and English knew that the first commuter train out of there would leave at 6am, headed to Khashuri, which would perfectly circumnavigate the closure. So off we went.
Tickets acquired, we made our way towards the <a href="https://wander-lush.org/trains-in-georgia-country-tips-map/">beaten-up, single-carriage Soviet relic</a> on the platform. It was still dark, there was no indication that this train would take us where we wanted to go, and we couldn&rsquo;t speak the language. As I grabbed the handles by the door to pull myself up into the unlit train, my partner jokingly said the words, &ldquo;welcome to the abattoir.&rdquo;
And that&rsquo;s when the stench of raw meat hit me like a ton of bricks. As I moved through the first compartment, I was greeted by huge plastic containers full of mystery cuts of mystery animal, accompanied by grubby older guys in dusty work clothes. I quickly averted my eyes and made my way onwards through the darkened compartments.
Eventually, in the second-last of 8 compartments, I found a couple I recognised from our bus and joined them&mdash;this felt safe. Ish. We sat down on the solid bench seats, knowing we had a couple of hours of discomfort ahead of us, but at least there would be safety in numbers, right?
A few minutes later, the train started squeaking ominously along the platform, still in complete darkness. Sleep-deprived and basing our whole onward journey on the word of one seemingly kind man on the bus, we began to accept that we may be chugging along to our deaths.&nbsp;
<img src="https://cdn.jacksflightclub.com/id/bda9fe02b599a64ba6e13d57cf0ba9addc4c6f1b" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;">
<h6 style="text-align: center;">My friend Mary, tired and suspicious of our surroundings</h6>
And then the light in our compartment came on. And then it went off. And then it flickered for the next two hours. All we could see out the windows was the occasional glowing neon cross on the hillside, which only added to the discomfort.
Then the darkness lifted somewhat, and the sky became navy blue, allowing us to make out the snowy, <a href="https://youtu.be/BoP-KlDyoRI?si=VY9wPv1t8CK962vt&amp;t=14">mountainous landscape of the Imereti region</a> around us. It was breathtaking. The train meandered on for a couple of hours, squeezing in an unfathomable number of commuters along the way. But eventually we arrived in Khashuri, victorious.&nbsp;
Holding our breath, we manoeuvred our way off the train past containers of meat and into the snow. Then we remembered that we still had to get to Tbilisi.

Ireland

£34-£87 rtn

Dublin at $468 RT

€75 rtn

£37-£77 rtn

£31-£70 rtn

£31-£68 rtn