I’m not done with Asia yet — not even close. I just booked back-to-back cruises on the NCL Spirit, 34 days total, sailing from Taipei all the way down to Sydney. Hong Kong, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Indonesia, then the wild western and southern coasts of Australia. Two blogs’ worth of adventure: this one takes us from Taiwan to Singapore, and Part 2 picks up from Singapore to Sydney.
Kaohsiung was going to be round two for me, so I’d skipped booking tours — good thing, because the captain had other plans. Weather rolled in, and instead of Kaohsiung we got a surprise: a full evening in Hong Kong, arriving early enough for a proper night out in the city. I practically sprinted to the excursion desk and grabbed the Open Top Bus and the Temple Street Night Tour. Sometimes the best stops are the ones you didn’t plan.
The next morning brought a different lens on Hong Kong: NCL’s Panoramic Hong Kong tour, winding up into the mountains for the views everyone comes here for. And Victoria Peak doesn’t disappoint — the skyline unfolds beneath you, skyscrapers stacked against the harbor like something out of a movie set. What caught me off guard was the top itself: a full-scale mall, shops and food vendors and all, perched at the summit like its own little city in the clouds.
After a day at sea, we sailed into Hanoi’s gateway — Ha Long Bay, in northeastern Vietnam. I’d booked NCL’s Cruise Through Ha Long Bay, and it lived up to every photo I’d ever seen: thousands of towering limestone islands, rainforest-topped and rising straight out of emerald water. This UNESCO World Heritage site is the kind of place that looks digitally altered until you’re actually floating through it — a fairy tale landscape best experienced the only way that does it justice: by boat. Back on land, I squeezed in a last-minute hop-on-hop-off bus loop around the city of Ha Long, chasing a bit more daylight before we sailed on.
The weather wasn’t done with us yet. Severe flooding and cyclone activity hit southern Vietnam hard, and our next two ports — Nha Trang and Ho Chi Minh City — were scrapped entirely. But the captain pulled off a save, rerouting us a few days later to Sanya, China, a stop that wasn’t even on my radar.
Sanya turned out to be one of those happy accidents travel sometimes hands you. Nicknamed the “Hawaii of China,” it’s visa-free for cruisers, just like Hong Kong, which made the detour painless. I booked NCL’s City Tour and got sweeping views over a city I knew almost nothing about: Sanya sits on the southern tip of Hainan Island, ringed by bays and beach resorts. Yalong Bay does the upscale-hotel thing in style, while Wuzhizhou Island lures divers and surfers to its coral reefs. Two canceled ports, and somehow we came out ahead.orts.
Back on schedule after a day at sea, we docked in Sihanoukville, Cambodia, and I’d booked NCL’s Highlights of Sihanoukville tour. This coastal city is the main gateway to islands like Koh Rong, but it’s also become something stranger: after a 2020 online gambling ban, a wave of Chinese-funded construction projects stalled mid-build, leaving entire skyscrapers standing empty. What was once a scrappy backpacker haven now has this surreal, half-finished skyline — vacant towers and shuttered casinos next to signs of a city slowly clawing its way back.
Our tour cut right through that contrast: a serene stop at a temple with a reclining Buddha, then a golden tiger roundabout sculpture gleaming against all that concrete, and finally a beach stop for fresh coconut water — simple, sunny, and a good reminder that Sihanoukville is still very much alive.
Our primary stop was Laem Chabang, the port gateway to Bangkok, and I gave myself two full days here with a lineup of tours: Best of Bangkok in a Day, followed by Bangkok Canals and Royal Barges.
Bangkok doesn’t do anything small. It’s Thailand’s capital and largest city, 11.5 million people deep, a sprawl of ornate shrines and street life that never quite stops moving. The Chao Phraya River threads through it all, boats crowding its surface, canals branching off past the Rattanakosin royal district — home to the dazzling Grand Palace and its Wat Phra Kaew Temple. Not far off, Wat Pho holds an enormous reclining Buddha, and across the river, Wat Arun’s steep steps climb toward a Khmer-style spire. Locals say there’s a temple every 500 meters here, and after a couple of days, I believed it.
The mood in the city carried extra weight during my visit — the queen mother had recently passed away, and tributes and mourning were visible everywhere I went, a quiet undercurrent beneath the usual buzz.
Two days let me hit the highlights, but Bangkok laughed at my itinerary. This is a city that wants a full week, minimum — especially if you’re chasing its legendary nightlife and food scene, neither of which reveals itself in a rushed visit.
Our final port before Singapore — and the end of this first leg — was Koh Samui, Thailand. I’d booked NCL’s Koh Samui Highlights tour, a bus route that took us past two striking lake temples, Wat Plai Laem and Wat Phra Yai.
Koh Samui is Thailand’s second-largest resort island, and it feels built for exactly that: palm-fringed beaches, coconut groves rolling into mountainous rainforest, the kind of scenery that explains why people never quite want to leave. It’s also refreshingly diverse in who it draws — backpackers and luxury travelers rubbing shoulders across beaches like Chaweng, Lamai, and Bophut’s Fisherman’s Village. A fitting, easy-breezy note to end the first half of this journey on before Singapore.
We pulled into Singapore the next morning — the hinge point of the whole journey. Some cruisers disembarked here for good; others came aboard fresh, ready for Part 2’s unique route down Western and Southern Australia, an itinerary stacked with maiden ports that had a noticeably Australian crowd buzzing with excitement to be sailing home.
I’d explored Singapore before, so I kept it low-key: just a plan to ride up to the Observation Deck at Marina Bay Sands for the day. The weather had other ideas — a steady rain rolled in and swallowed the skyline, so I called it and skipped the trip up. Some port days are made for exploring, and some are made for a quiet morning aboard instead. This one was the latter.
A Note on Costs
Since I know a lot of you are dreaming up your own version of this trip, here’s the real number behind it. As a solo traveler, this 35-day journey ran me:
- Cruise fare (Oceanview cabin, solo): $5,097 USD
- Airfare (Business Class): $3,600 USD
- Shore excursions (frequent cruiser discount applied): $660 USD
- Total: $9,357 USD
Solo travel means eating the single supplement on the cruise fare — no way around that one — but I’ll take it every time for the freedom to set my own pace and wander where I want. Business class made a real difference on the long haul, especially to Asia. The frequent cruiser discount also shaved a nice chunk off the excursion total, which added up over 35 days of tours. All told? Worth every dollar.
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