This YouTube travel vlog follows Nate and Kara Buchanan on a long multi-leg trip from Canmore/Calgary via San Francisco and Singapore en route to Chiang Mai. They redeem an IHG free-night certificate to stay one night at the Intercontinental Singapore (chosen to maximize value of the certificate for a ~$400–$500/night property), revisit favorite Singapore food spots (hawker centre), try rideshare scooters while noting strict local laws, visit airport lounges and fly Thai Lion Air Bangkok→Chiang Mai, and explain their plan to spend about a month as digital nomads in Chiang Mai while scouting longer-term accommodation.
Chapters
First we have to drive from Canmore to Calgary.
Then we have to uber to the airport.
And then we have to fly from Calgary to San Francisco.
Then we fly 16 hours from San Francisco to Singapore.
And once we get to Singapore, that's not even our end destination.
Morning. Morning.
It's not gonna zip.
You can't do it.
I didn't even buy anything.
See what we're working with? Come on. You can do it. Come on.
It's not gonna work. I gotta redo it. I gotta repack. I have to repack. I got lazy.
I'm encouraging my packing cubes. Vital step in the process that I skipped. Okay, you can do this stink. Small thoughts only. Have to go to Thailand. It's not that far. I'm gonna put some slippers in here.
I believe in you. You've gone around this corner. You're almost there. Come on.
Yes.
Yes. You're almost to the finish line.
Good morning from the Intercontinental here in Singapore. We are going to start today's video off with a little bit of travel hacking knowledge because in yesterday's video I promised to explain to you why we decided to spend one night here in Singapore before continuing on to Chiang Mai. I signed up for this card a couple years ago and in addition to an 80,000 point sign up bonus, it also comes with a free night certificate that you can use at any IHG hotel around the world. You get one of those per year when you sign up for this card. So my free night certificate was going to expire in just a couple weeks and I like to try to maximize the value of that certificate as much as possible anytime I get the chance. And this Intercontinental hotel here in Singapore costs between 4 and $500 per night. Plus we just love Singapore. So this seemed like a great opportunity to redeem the free night certificate, maximize the value and just spend a day exploring a city that we love.
Which is exactly what we did. We came to Singapore for the first time three years ago. We were so new at vlogging, we were so new at traveling, we were so new at Asia and now we have a lot of experience in all of those areas. So we had the best time going around doing all the things that we did last time that we were here and feeling so, so nostalgic. We started at our favorite hawker center, which is basically a Singaporean food court. All of this delicious food was only 5 Singaporean dollars, right? Chicken soup, sauce.
And.
Then jet lag. And our 16 hour flight caught up with us and we crashed hard. So we came back to our hotel room, took a little nap, and then we were ready for the afternoon.
Turns out they have rideshare scooters in Singapore. We shared a code. We both. What a free hour. What a fun way to see the city.
There are also a lot of laws in Singapore, which makes this a little scary.
Like, you can get fined for chewing gum here, and you can also get fined $5,000 for speeding on your scooter or six months in jail, one of the other.
So I'm just nervous that there's laws that we don't know that we might be breaking.
Okay. I don't have a break in when I'm holding the camera.
It was so fun exploring the town on these scooters, Especially at sunset. It felt so good outside. We were road to the harbor. It was beautiful. Then we ended the night at Chinatown for the food. We went for the food.
I feel like we really made the most of our time here in Singapore.
But now it's time to go to the airport. I'm gonna carry her to the airport.
Oh, it's.
What is happening?
It only takes twos and fives. We had it ready. The guy saw us having trouble and already had change ready for me. That was so sweet.
Next station.
Today we are flying from here to Bangkok and then Bangkok to Chiang Mai on a new airline that we've never flown before called Thai Lion Air.
We have access to four different lounges in this terminal. How will we decide? Winner.
Thank you. I needed this. How great is this lounge? It is massive and beautiful, and the coffee is really sharp.
This lounge is a make your own waksa bar. Let's see if we can figure this out. Waka is an iconic, popular noodle dish originating from the. I'm not going to lie. We tried this. This is the first time we came to Singapore, and I did not like it at all.
Not everything we try can be a.
Winner because my hands are gonna get so gross trying to open this crayfish. And I'm gonna get, like, one bite of food.
She hates it when she has to work for food.
How are you supposed to eat this?
None of this is edible.
Would you like me to open it for you? No.
You don't like sticky hands either. I'm gonna give it a second chance.
Step one, blanch bowl noodles.
Blanching.
We're blanched.
Step two.
Step three.
Let's see how I did. Smells super.
Shrimpy.
Oh, wow.
That's really good.
Seriously, it's delicious. There's also a hard bowl of egg in here. The Combination of coconut with spice and the broth is delicious.
Yum.
I love cultural experiences in airports.
Okay, as usual, we waited the very last minute and we have coffee so we can't run.
Goodbye.
Singapore, Thailand. Here we go. Safety information card is located in the seat pocket in front of you. Please read it carefully. If you have any queries, please contact cabin crew. Thank you.
And two hours later, we have arrived in Bangkok, where we're going to be spending the next seven hours on purpose.
We booked a late flight on purpose to stay here longer. Now we're a little jet lagged.
Still, it seemed like a really bad idea.
Since we have so much time in the airport, we thought we would explain why we're going to Chiang Mai. So if you follow us on Instagram or you're on our email list, you know that our vlogs are behind our real life and they have been for a really long time. And it's because we film every single day, but we only upload every other day. So we can have a semi normal life and sleep schedule. And so we're just going to get behind no matter what. We never take long enough off to actually catch up.
So we basically had this opportunity to choose anywhere in the world we wanted to to spend a month. We came to Chiang Mai in early 2016. We fell in love and we've always had this, this like vision that it would be really fun to spend a small season of our life there. So that's what this is for. It's like the next month hanging out as digital nomads in Chiang Mai.
Not even sad that we booked a long way over anymore because there's a sushi buffet and sparkling rose. I just arrived. I didn't even wait to go. I'm not even tired anymore.
That wasn't even planned.
How was your nap?
Oh, this was such a better idea when I booked this like weeks ago.
I'm so tired.
I feel like a zombie.
I actually feel a lot better after my nap. Oh good, you feel better after your two cups of coffee. I feel better afterwards.
I just feel kind of crazy.
It is dark outside. It's gonna be dark on the plane. It's gonna be dark when we land in Chiang Mai. And because I feel like I videoed 10 airplane rides in the past 48 hours. We're going to teleport to Chiang Mai. We made it.
And now we just have to take a grab to our place because there's no Uber. Let's grab.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I bought a new car one week ago. It's a nice car.
Thank you.
Back to when I was.
The apartment that we booked came with a family of teddy bears that are going to keep us company for the next few nights. We're in this apartment for three nights, and we're going to check out a few different parts of town before we commit to the apartment that we're staying in for the next month. But now it is time to go to sleep. You ready for bed, Kara?
Yeah, right.
Cute.
Did you ever think it would be normal for you to order food at a place with four chicken heads hanging in the front of it?
No.
I want to do it selfie while I'm riding.
You can't ride in selfie. No way.
Yeah, I'm gonna do it. You good? Ow. I'm sorry that I stepped on your toes.
So violent.
Oh, my gosh.
We match.
This always happens.
Look at church shirts. I haven't zipped my bag yet.
I haven't either.
I feel like you're thinking about choking. Because we match.
I'm not changing.
Wow, that's fun.
This literally always happens.
This is like.
But it's always with my green shirt and your green shirt or your green shirt.
I'll change it to my green shirt.
I'll change.
No, no, no, no. I don't mind.
I know. My bag's not even zipped.
Mine's not either.
Okay, will you hold it higher? I feel like I'm looking down.
