The Monsoon Diaries: How to travel the world with no time or money -

Grenada Más

by Calvin Sun | November 4, 2025 | Grenada, October 2025: Pirates of the Caribbean's At World's End | 0 Comments

🇬🇩 190 down. 3 to go. After our 3 day stay in Dominica, we took a long hour-and-a-half drive back to the airport from our Portsmouth lodgings, stopping for a quick photo opportunity along the way. Dominica's airport is tiny. You...

Dominica-n’t Miss This

by Calvin Sun | November 1, 2025 | Dominica, October 2025: Pirates of the Caribbean's At World's End, Way Way Off the Beaten Path | 0 Comments

From St. Vincent, we boarded InterCaribbean Airways JY 717 at 12:20pm. Their new airport, however, was built just 8 years ago and still has some operational quirks. The staff double-printed my first leg itinerary from St. Vincent to Barbados without including...

Dead Men Tell No Layovers: St. Vincent & The Grenadines in 12 Hours

by Calvin Sun | October 29, 2025 | Layovers, October 2025: Pirates of the Caribbean's At World's End, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines | 0 Comments

Fresh off a quick overnight in Grenada (courtesy of a free JetBlue voucher from last October's Welcome to Chinatown gala), we touched down at Maurice Bishop International Airport at 1:53pm. This marked the beginning of a 3-country Caribbean...

Getting Away With Robbinsville: The Akshardham Redemption

by Calvin Sun | October 6, 2025 | Camping, Layovers, New Jersey, October 2025: Camping in Robbinsville | 0 Comments

One of my more unique camping trips to have monsooned; this is what happens when you plan a camping trip months in advance just to visit a temple arguably worth seeing as a world-class destination. I was stuck at work all day Friday as Eddie took the initiative...

A Quick Halifax Check

by Calvin Sun | September 12, 2025 | Layovers, Lessons Learned, September 2025: Newfoundland to Saint Pierre & Miquelon, Walking Tours | 0 Comments

After two days in Saint-Pierre (and a turbulent ferry ride to Miquelon and back), we boarded an hour-and-a-half direct Air Saint-Pierre 9am flight to Halifax, landing around 9:30am local time (Halifax runs an hour behind Saint-Pierre), Our onward...

Miquelon Impossible

by Calvin Sun | September 11, 2025 | Doctor in the House, September 2025: Newfoundland to Saint Pierre & Miquelon, Way Way Off the Beaten Path | 0 Comments

Sometimes the most spontaneous detours leave the strongest impressions. That morning in Saint Pierre, we hadn't planned on leaving the island. But after completing two walking tours around St. Pierre and checking the ferry schedule, we realized we could still...

48 Hours in a Little Saint-Pierre-ce of France

by Calvin Sun | September 11, 2025 | Saint Pierre and Miquelon, September 2025: Newfoundland to Saint Pierre & Miquelon, Way Way Off the Beaten Path | 0 Comments

After three days soaking in St. John's charm, we dropped off our rental car at YYT Saint John's airport to catch the rare 5pm direct flight (PH1127) via Air Saint-Pierre to Saint-Pierre & Miquelon: one of the few weekly connections between Newfoundland and...

Don’t Be Dildo-Dallying

by Calvin Sun | September 9, 2025 | Canada, September 2025: Newfoundland to Saint Pierre & Miquelon, Way Way Off the Beaten Path | 0 Comments

While based in St. John's, we took a spontaneous day trip by rental car to the now-famous town of Dildo. You'll know when you arrive; they're incredibly proud of their distinctive name. Though a vocal minority has repeatedly raised referendums to...

St. John’s: The Eastern Edge of Everything Everywhere All At Once

by Calvin Sun | September 9, 2025 | Canada, September 2025: Newfoundland to Saint Pierre & Miquelon, Serendipitous!, Way Way Off the Beaten Path | 0 Comments

Months ago I decided to gift myself a week off after Labor Day...simply because I could. After a year as wild as this past one, I craved actual and intentional self-prioritization to restore some balance. Finding fares under $200, I booked a morning departure:...

Singapore Airlines Business Class FRA-JFK

by Calvin Sun | August 5, 2025 | Flying Fancy, Germany, Summer 2025: The Long Road to Berlin | 0 Comments

After a slow morning walk and talking about our villain (antihero?) origin stories in Berlin, I hugged Daniela and Gabe goodbye, hopped on the tram for a few stops, went underground for the metro, and made it back to the hostel in time for a 1:30pm check out. Nisha,...

A Trip To Louisiana, Copenhagen

by Calvin Sun | Aug 9, 2015 | August 2015: The Baltic Circle, Denmark, Fit for Foodies, Public Transportation

Because we had already seen most of the sights in the main part of Copenhagen, we decided to head to Central Station and venture into the suburbs for the highly recommended Louisiana Museum of Modern Art. From Central Station we took a half hour...

Essentially, The Odyssey

by Calvin Sun | Aug 9, 2015 | August 2015: The Baltic Circle, Crisis, Denmark, France, How Did You Do That?, Italy, Mo' Money Mo' Problems, Serendipitous!

The following is a guest post by twice monsooner Ambrose Chu, who graciously asked if he could contribute to the Monsoon Diaries adventures. Ambrose first discovered us when googling how to obtain a tourist visa for Iran. He reached out and met me in NYC to see if we...

Copenhagen By The Canal

by Calvin Sun | Aug 9, 2015 | August 2015: The Baltic Circle, Denmark, Fail, How Did You Do That?, Lessons Learned, Public Transportation, The Nightlife, Walking Tours

How the 17 of us got to see most of Copenhagen's City Center in only 7 hours. We arrived today at around noon into Copenhagen's Kastrup Airport, south of the city's center, about 30 minutes earlier than scheduled. Good job Norwegian Air Shuttle....

26 Take Off!

by Calvin Sun | Aug 7, 2015 | New York

Today the majority of our group of 26 depart for Scandinavia. 3 of us are already waiting for the rest of the group in Copenhagen, and 20 should be arriving in within the next 12 hours. To make things more interesting, a mom-and-daughter couple just signed up today on...

Meet The Nords

by Calvin Sun | Jun 25, 2015 | Introductions

Please welcome the following monsooners as they embark on our upcoming trip to Scandinavia & The Baltic States:[gallery size="medium"...

Staycation

by Calvin Sun | May 5, 2015 | How Did You Do That?, Mo' Money Mo' Problems, New York, United States, Way Way Off the Beaten Path, What Dreams May Come

What better way to recover from a grueling 1 week road trip across the USA followed by 1 week shlepping it across Venezuela and the Great Guyanas, with a free night at the Park Hyatt, New York? If you spend $1000 or more within 3 months of signing up...

One Day In Trinidad & Tobago

by Calvin Sun | Apr 21, 2015 | April 2015: Extreme South America, Blitzkrieg!!!, Lessons Learned, Suriname, Trinidad & Tobago, Walking Tours

In leaving Paramaribo for the airport, I had the choice of choosing a private taxi for 40 euros that would pick me up at 7am or a shared airport shuttle taxi service for 15 euros that would pick me up at 6am. I chose the latter. What ended up was that I not...

The Road To Cayenne

by Lei Zhao | Apr 21, 2015 | April 2015: Extreme South America, Border Crossing, French Guiana, How Did You Do That?, Public Transportation, Way Way Off the Beaten Path

The road to Cayenne, French Guiana (Guyane Doyen) from Paramaribo, Suriname was arduous, but almost a cakewalk when compared to the journey from Georgetown, Guyana to Paramaribo. For starters, there wasn’t a four-hour waiting period to cross the border. Our...

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