In fall of 2025, I was in Bangkok, waiting out the rain with a coffee, and took a photo out an open door. A woman cooking under an umbrella, a guy with a backpack heading somewhere, the street getting on with its day. It’s still my favorite picture from that trip.
The money was the loudest part
When I stopped drinking in early 2025, the first thing I noticed wasn’t clarity or sleep or any of the things people promise you. It was my bank balance. Money that used to leave every week without asking just stayed put.
So I gave it somewhere to go. Not “travel someday.” A camera first, six hundred dollars, and I watched the number climb like a kid with a jar. Then plane tickets, bought four months out, before I had saved a dollar of what I’d need once I landed. That sounds backwards. It was the best decision I made all year, because a paid ticket has a date on it, and a date does half the saving for you.
The part that made it stick was dull. For sixty days I kept the same hours, the same meals, the same two coffee shops, and moved a little into the fund every day like it was a bill. A bodybuilder friend of mine told me to treat those first days like sets and reps: the daily repetition is the foundation, and the gains come later. He was right. By the time the habit could stand on its own, the fund could buy five months in three countries.
The trip was wonderful, but I slipped a bit
Frankfurt for a week in the cold, long walks with the camera and nobody who knew me. Then Thailand, three weeks between Bangkok and Hua Hin, eating better than I ever have. Then four months in the Philippines that stopped feeling like a trip and started feeling like a life. I remember almost all of it, and “almost” is the word I have to leave in.
I was nearly a year sober when I boarded the flight out. I ordered a drink somewhere over the Atlantic, before I had seen a single thing I’d saved for. A few more nights followed out there. That’s the whole of it. I had planned the money with care and the staying-steady part hardly at all, and I found out at thirty-five thousand feet which of those two plans I actually had.
Sober since the plane landed
I flew home in February 2026, and I haven’t had a drink since I got off that plane. Not as a vow. It was more that the phone had two trips on it, the one I’d saved for and the one I’d slipped into, and I knew which one I wanted the next year to look like.
What the months since have looked like is not dramatic. I took a new job. I built the website and the app I’d been talking about for years, the thing I wished I’d had on that flight. I put my name on all of it. And I called the friends who’ve done the real work of getting and staying sober, the ones with a lot more years than me, and asked a question I should have asked before the first trip: if you were me, what would you actually worry about?
Their answers were small and practical. Don’t isolate. Have people you can reach in more than one time zone. Decide what you’ll do on a bad night before the bad night. Stop trusting “I can handle anything,” because that voice is usually the last one talking before something goes wrong. I don’t have a formal program. I have people who do, and they pick up the phone, and that’s been enough.
Mornings are the other thing. I live in St. Petersburg now, and most days start before the city does: downtown while it’s still quiet, the same coffee shop, the same corner table, laptop open to the site, a camera on the table, maps up, the next trip taking shape. I’m not a sunrise person. I’d rather shoot a street waking up than a sky. The fund is climbing again. It has a job again. It feels exactly like the first time, except now I know what the flight is for.
The river I’ve seen many times, but never been on
The last week of October 2026, I fly into Bangkok, and from there it’s all overland. A week in the city first, working my normal hours from a coffee shop on Sukhumvit and eating my way back through the streets I photographed last time.
Then the sleeper train north. It leaves Bangkok in the evening and rolls into Chiang Mai around breakfast, thirteen hours of rice paddies going dark and then going gold again. Second class, the seats fold down into a bunk with a curtain, and the dining car sells coffee and noodles, even for breakfast. It’s the best night’s sleep I know of that costs under forty dollars. I’ll work another week from Chiang Mai, cool mornings, khao soi at lunch, and go see a friend who runs a sober house outside town.
Then the part I’ve wanted for years. A bus to Chiang Rai, another to the border town of Chiang Khong, and a short hop across the Mekong on the Friendship Bridge into Huay Xai, Laos. The slow boat leaves from there, usually late morning once it’s full. It’s a long wooden boat with rows of old bus seats bolted to the deck, a diesel engine you stop hearing after an hour, and not much else. Day one is six or seven hours downriver to Pak Beng, a one-street town on a bend where the power sometimes cuts out at night. Day two is eight hours more, the river widening, villages on the banks, water buffalo in the shallows, until it drops you at Luang Prabang in the late afternoon. Little or no signal for long stretches.
In Luang Prabang there’s a public library that runs Library Boats, which carry books up the river to villages with no other way to get them. I’m going to see it in person, help where I can, and film what I find. From there the new Laos-China railway runs to Vientiane in two hours at a hundred miles an hour, which feels like cheating after the boat. Then south to the Philippines for four months, in time for the holidays, which Filipinos start celebrating earlier and seem to take more seriously than anyone I’ve ever met. Christmas starts in September there, and they mean it.
I’ve written the whole thing out day by day on my own site, including the parts that are boring on purpose.
The Laos leg is five days of mostly moving, long stretches with no signal, a lot of quiet. The money got me the ticket, same as before. What’s different is everything I’m bringing with it: the list, the people, the mornings, and a phone full of photos I’m not afraid to look at.
Two days on the water with nothing to do but soak in life along the river. A year ago that was the risk. Now it’s the whole point.
By Contributor: Jay Hon
Jay Hon runs TravelingSober.com, a travel publisher and trip planner for people who don’t drink and the people who are curious about it. He writes from St. Petersburg, Florida, between trips.
WHAT A TRIP! 26 Airports with Alcohol-Free Calm Spaces That Support Sober and Neurodivergent Travelers
WHAT A TRIP! Sober Business Travel: How to Thrive on Work Trips
SOBER TRAVEL – WHAT A TRIP! is The Sober Curator’s guide to exploring the world alcohol-free. From insider travel tips and honest destination reviews to our curated Sober Retreats Calendar, we help you plan trips that are fun, fulfilling, and booze-free. Whether your jet-setting overseas or planning a weekend getaway, our stories and resources prove that sober travel is anything but boring. Looking for a sober getaway? We’ve got your back with our Sober Retreat Calendar. Need a night out on the town? Check out our Sober Events Calendar.
We also recommend soberscribing to The Sober Sip for weekly and monthly travel + events updates. Have a life-changing sober trip to share? Send your tips and photos to thesobercurator@gmail.com—we’d love to feature your journey.
🏝️ Submit a Sober Retreat Recovery-focused, wellness, spiritual, creative, and adventure retreats. Listings start free. Featured and Sponsored placements available for retreats that want full editorial coverage. Submit your retreat →
SOBER RETREATS: with Senior Travel Sober Curator Contributor Teresa Bergen is your go-to space for alcohol-free travel tips, insider guides, and honest reviews from a sober perspective. Teresa blends her passions—animals, wildlife conservation, sustainability, geography, culture, outdoor adventure, and yoga—into enriching travel stories that inspire mindful exploration. From kayaking and hiking to visiting historic cemeteries and sacred spaces, she uncovers the beauty where history, art, and spirituality meet.
🏝️ Submit a Sober Retreat Recovery-focused, wellness, spiritual, creative, and adventure retreats. Listings start free. Featured and Sponsored placements available for retreats that want full editorial coverage. Submit your retreat →
You’ve got mail from The Sober Curator
Resources Are Available
If you or someone you know is experiencing difficulties surrounding alcoholism, addiction, or mental illness, please reach out and ask for help. People everywhere can and want to help; you just have to know where to look. And continue to look until you find what works for you. Click here for a list of regional and national resources.
Follow The Sober Curator on Pinterest
How can quitting drinking help fund travel?
Jay redirected small amounts of money he previously spent on alcohol into a dedicated travel fund. Consistent daily saving eventually helped him pay for airfare and several months of travel through Germany, Thailand, and the Philippines.
How is Jay preparing to stay sober while traveling?
He is creating a support plan before departure, including people he can contact across multiple time zones, strategies for difficult nights, consistent morning routines, and plans to avoid isolation.
What route is Jay planning through Thailand and Laos?
His planned route begins in Bangkok and continues by sleeper train to Chiang Mai. From there, he plans to travel through Chiang Rai and Chiang Khong, cross into Huay Xai, Laos, and take the Mekong slow boat to Luang Prabang before continuing by train to Vientiane.
