Southeast Asia Travel Route in 2 Months, Ending in Indonesia

Six to eight weeks, four countries, and one of them is ours. This guide is written by a company that runs trips in Indonesia, so that is the leg with the detail: the flights that exist, the boats that sail, what the park fees actually are. Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam we can arrange through partners on the ground, but this page sketches them rather than walking you through them, because they are the forgiving part of the route and cheap to improvise as you go. Indonesia is the opposite: it is the leg where booking ahead decides whether the last fortnight works.

We plan trips across Indonesia and work with trusted partners in Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam, so we help travelers stitch the whole thing together. That is why we put Indonesia at the end: after the temples and cities of the mainland, the reefs of Raja Ampat, the dragons of Komodo, and the volcanoes of Java land differently. It is the crescendo, not the warm-up. If you only have a month and want the tighter version, our Indonesia and Vietnam in one month guide covers the two-country cut of this same trip.

The route at a glance

The flow is north to south down the mainland and then a flight to Indonesia. Bangkok in, overland through Thailand, east into Cambodia for Angkor, on into Vietnam and down its length, then south by air from Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh City. Running it in reverse works too. Starting in Thailand is simply the softer landing, and it puts the leg that needs planning at the end, when you have found your rhythm and know what you actually like doing.

Leg 1: Thailand, about 2 weeks

Thailand is where almost everyone starts, and for good reason. It is cheap, easy, endlessly comfortable for a first-timer, and it has the best street food on the continent. Land in Bangkok and give it a few days: the Grand Palace and Wat Arun, the canals, the markets, and food so good and so cheap you will recalibrate what dinner should cost. From there the country splits two ways. Head north to Chiang Mai for temples, mountains, night markets, and elephant sanctuaries, or head south to the islands for the beaches. With two weeks you can do Bangkok plus one of those, comfortably; try to do all three and you will spend the trip on night buses.

For the islands, the Andaman side around Krabi, Railay, and the Phi Phi islands has the dramatic limestone cliffs, while the Gulf side of Koh Samui, Koh Phangan, and Koh Tao is calmer and cheaper to reach. Koh Tao in particular is one of the cheapest places on Earth to learn to scuba dive, which is worth knowing before Indonesia, where the diving is world-class but pricier. Thailand is the leg to find your travel rhythm on: get a local SIM, learn to love the 7-Eleven toastie, and get comfortable with buses and boats before the trip gets more demanding.

Leg 2: Cambodia, about 1 week

Cross east from Thailand and the tempo drops. Cambodia is poorer, quieter, and more raw than its neighbors, and its centerpiece is one of the great sights of the world: Angkor. Base yourself in Siem Reap and give the temples two or three days, because Angkor is not one building but a sprawling city of them. Watch the sun rise over the reflecting pool at Angkor Wat, lose an afternoon in the tree-strangled ruins of Ta Prohm, and climb the faces of the Bayon. It is genuinely worth the trip on its own.

With the extra days, Phnom Penh gives the country its context. The Killing Fields and the S-21 museum are heavy, essential history that explain modern Cambodia, and they are not to be skipped just because they are hard. If you want to unwind before Vietnam, the southern coast around Kampot, Kep, and the island of Koh Rong offers pepper farms, sleepy river towns, and quiet beaches at a fraction of Thai prices. One week is enough to hit the highlights; two lets you breathe.

Leg 3: Vietnam, 2 to 3 weeks

Vietnam is long, narrow, and packed, a 1,600 kilometer ribbon of coast, cities, mountains, and some of the best food you will eat anywhere. Most travelers run it end to end, either north to south or south to north, using the cheap internal flights and the sleeper trains and buses to cover the distance. In the north, Hanoi is a whirl of old-quarter streets and coffee culture, the launch pad for a cruise among the limestone islands of Ha Long Bay and for the rice terraces of Sapa near the Chinese border. Give the north a good week. The one-month guide linked above goes deeper on how to combine Vietnam with the Indonesia leg if those two are your priority.

Labuan Bajo, Flores

The Indonesia finale of the loop

Three days two nights around Komodo from Labuan Bajo, sleeping on the boat. A fair fit for the last leg of a long overland run.

See what is includedFrom $336 per person

The middle of the country is the sweet spot for many: the lantern-lit old town of Hoi An, the imperial city of Hue, and the beaches and caves in between. The south is faster and hotter, centered on the chaos and energy of Ho Chi Minh City, with the Mekong Delta and the Cu Chi tunnels within reach. Whichever end you finish on, that city is your springboard. Ho Chi Minh City to Bali is a daily nonstop of about four hours on VietJet, which is the simplest join, while from Hanoi you normally connect. Either way, Indonesia is where the trip changes gear entirely.

Leg 4: Indonesia, the finale, about 2 weeks

Indonesia is where the improvising stops. A flight from Ho Chi Minh City or Hanoi puts you in Jakarta or Denpasar, and from Denpasar it is a non-stop hour and ten to an hour and a half on to Labuan Bajo with Batik Air or Indonesia AirAsia, indicatively USD 54 to 103 one way. That is the gateway to Komodo National Park, covered in our Komodo National Park guide, and one of the island-hopping routes that define the country. The numbers here are fixed rather than negotiable: entry is IDR 250,000 per foreign visitor per day under the 2024 tariff, trekking and snorkelling included, diving IDR 25,000 more. Since April 2026 the park has run a 1,000-visitor daily cap booked through the SiOra system, so there are no walk-ins. A day trip from Labuan Bajo to Padar, Pink Beach, Komodo and Manta Point starts from about IDR 1,450,000 (about $81) per person, out at 06:30 and back at 17:00.

Two weeks is enough for two regions, not five. The two weeks in Indonesia itinerary lays out the routes, and the three weeks in Indonesia guide covers it if you can stretch the finale longer. If Bali and the Gilis are the shape, the crossings are weather-dependent and they are not interchangeable: Eka Jaya runs Padangbai to Gili Trawangan in about an hour and a half with departures through the day, while Gili Getaway leaves Serangan once, at 08:00, and takes about three hours forty-five because it calls at Nusa Penida, Gili Gede and Senggigi, at IDR 700,000 one way. If Komodo is the finale, three days and two nights on a phinisi starts from about IDR 6,000,000 (about $336) per person, and the Sape to Labuan Bajo ferry is the slower alternative at one daily sailing of six to eight hours.

Visas for the route

Visas are the admin that catches people out, so sort them leg by leg. Many nationalities get Thailand visa-free or on arrival for a set number of days, Cambodia offers a straightforward e-visa or visa on arrival, and Vietnam has an e-visa most travelers use before flying in. Indonesia offers a visa on arrival for many passports that can be extended once for a longer stay. Every one of these has its own rules and its own clock, so check the current requirement for your passport before each border rather than trusting an old forum post. For the Indonesia leg specifically, our Indonesia visa guide walks through the visa on arrival and the extension.

Budget for 6 to 8 weeks

The mainland legs are famously affordable. Backpacking Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam, you can travel comfortably on roughly 35 to 50 dollars a day including dorms or cheap guesthouses, street food, local transport, and the odd tour. Indonesia is a step up on the transport, because inter-island flights, fast boats, and the pricier activities like Komodo trips and diving add real cost, so budget more for the finale. Over eight weeks, a lean backpacker spends roughly 2,050 to 2,850 dollars on the ground, before the flight from Vietnam to Indonesia and your flights from home, while a mid-range traveler with private rooms and more tours will spend two to three times that. For the Indonesia end specifically, our Indonesia trip cost guide and the Indonesia under 1,000 dollars guide break the numbers down.

The mainland rate is our own estimate for dorms, street food and local buses. The Indonesia line comes from our two-week Indonesia budget, which assumes one domestic flight and a Komodo day trip, so it is the leg that moves most if you add a liveaboard or more flights.

When to go

The route has one convenient truth: the mainland dry season, roughly November to March, lines up well with a good window for much of Indonesia too. Those months bring the most reliable weather across Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam, though Vietnam’s length means the north and south do not always share a season, so check your specific stops. For the Indonesia finale, the dry season of about April to October is ideal for the islands and diving, so a trip that starts on the mainland late in the dry season and finishes in Indonesia early in its dry season threads the needle nicely. If your dates are fixed, plan the legs around the weather rather than forcing a route through a monsoon.

Getting around the region

Between the mainland countries, overland is genuinely the way: buses and sleeper trains cross the borders cheaply, and the Vietnam to Indonesia leg is always a flight. Inside Indonesia two things catch people out, and both sit in the how to get around Indonesia guide. The first is that Flores has the flights at one end only. Ende and Maumere have no service to Bali at all, and between them reach Bima, Kupang, Makassar and Labuan Bajo, so drive the Trans-Flores road east to west and finish where the Bali flights are. The second is that in the wet season, November to March, fast boat crossings are suspended wholesale by the harbourmaster. On 21 January 2026 every Bali to Gili and Lombok crossing was stopped on a forecast of 2.5 to 4 metre waves, and booking a different operator is not a workaround.

Make the finale count

The mainland legs are easy to improvise, and half the fun is doing exactly that. Indonesia is the leg where planning pays, because the distances are big, the boats sell out weeks ahead in July and August, and the connections have to line up. That is the leg we run rather than sketch. If you want the Indonesia finale booked instead of winged, tell us your dates, or browse our small-group and private trips to see the routes already built. And if you want a head-to-head before you commit, our Indonesia vs Thailand comparison weighs the two ends of this route against each other.

Cover photo: Padar Island, Komodo National Park, by YUS JULIADI via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0).