There are literally TONS to prepare before going on a major trip like this, in order to best utilize my time there.
Flight tickets and Insurance
Singapore (SIN) – Taipei (TPE) – Los Angeles (LAX) via China Airlines Los Angeles (LAX) – New York (JFK) via Delta Airways New York (JFK) – Taipei (TPE) via China Airlines Taipei (TPE) – Singapore (SIN) via China Airlines
Travel Insurance
Permits
USA Visa Canada Visa Taiwan Visa
Apparels and Personal Care
With autumn temperature forecast of 8-24°C in USA and 20-30°C in Taipei, there isn’t any need for heavy sweater. Light jackets, a couple of long sleeves, and many short sleeves should suffice. Enough pair of jeans for the trip, I don’t know seven pairs? Suitcases. I reckon I should bring at least two suitcases. I am allowed to bring 2 pieces of luggage of 32kg (China Airlines has revised this to 23kg each) max each + 7kg max hand luggage + one laptop bag. Toothbrush, toothpaste, shampoo, soap, shaver, shower gel, and usual daily personal care stuffs. Sport shoes Sandals
Gadgets
A digital camera, top of the list currently is Canon Digital IXUS 860IS + at least 4GB SD card + one spare battery + one tripod. Macbook with enough disk space. Load USA, Canada, and Taiwan Nokia maps using Nokia Map Loader. Prepaid mobile phone card that I can use for phone call, SMS, and Internet over there. Have checked T-Mobile, Verizon, and AT&T, any idea which one is best? So far, I found T-Mobile Internet plan at US$49.99 per month, but not sure if there’s a prepaid card for it. If there are ubiquitous hot spots and free Internet in all hotels, I may not even need this. Two flat parallel pins Type A or B – 110V, 60Hz power socket converter for USA and Canada. Two flat parallel pins Type A or B – 120V, 60Hz power socket converter for Taiwan.
Itinerary
TripWiser is a great online social trip planner with lots of description of each places, rating, and other people’s trip plan, so you can see where are the famous and must-go places. While TripWiser is better for planning trip and places to go, TripIt excels in managing flight schedule. However, since TripIt is the only one that provide mobile version of its website, once I’m done planning using TripWiser, I’ll probably move all the entries into TripIt so I’ll have a single consolidated place for all my itinerary which is accessible via mobile phone on the road.
Miscellaneous
Learn tipping policy for each city. Anyone care to share some guide on tipping in USA?
When you have any ideas on more things I need to prepare, do let me know in comments.
