Travel Itineraries

Day-by-day itineraries, built around the health of the trip.

Physician-authored trip plans with altitude pacing, disease seasonality, and a real travel-medicine kit woven into every day — not bolted on at the end.

Multi-region8 daysSouth Korea

The 8-Day South Korea Itinerary: Seoul and Jeju, The Health-Smart Version

An 8-day South Korea itinerary splits cleanly into 4 nights in Seoul and 3 on Jeju Island, connected by a roughly one-hour domestic flight. It needs no malaria pill (CDC limits the country's small vivax malaria zone to rural areas near the DMZ) and no altitude prep (Hallasan tops out at about 1,947 m, under the roughly 2,500 m threshold where acute mountain sickness becomes a real concern). What it does need is a plan for the clock and the food. Seoul runs 13 to 16 hours ahead of the continental US, and CDC's 2026 Yellow Book puts eastbound adaptation at about 1 hour per day, so this plan front-loads easy daylight-heavy Seoul days. CDC groups South Korea with Japan as a lower-risk travelers' diarrhea destination, but night markets and Jeju's raw seafood still justify carrying azithromycin plus an antispasmodic. Every article is reviewed by a licensed clinician before publication.

12 min read

Trek15 daysFrance

The 15-Day GR20 Corsica Itinerary: The Health-Smart Version

A 15-day GR20 traverse runs Calenzana to Conca across 16 official refuge-to-refuge stages, most hikers combine two of the shorter southern stages to finish in 15 days instead of 16. CDC classifies France as a low-risk country for travelers' diarrhea, the same category as the rest of northern and western Europe, but that baseline assumes hotel kitchens and municipal water, not two weeks of shared refuge meals and spring water drawn near grazing livestock. The structural fix is carrying azithromycin and dicyclomine before you fly, not sourcing them mid-trail: refuges are staffed only mid-May through early October, and stretches like the Ascu-to-Vizzavona middle third put you a full trail-day from the nearest pharmacy. A PA-C co-founder of Wandr Health recommends packing the GR20 Corsica Trek Pack (azithromycin, Rx-strength ibuprofen for the cumulative descent load, and dicyclomine) before departure rather than hoping a village pharmacy has stock mid-traverse.

15 min read

Cultural6 daysChina

The 6-Day Beijing & Great Wall Itinerary: The Health-Smart Version

A 6-day Beijing itinerary needs no malaria pill (WHO declared China malaria-free in 2021) and no altitude prep (Beijing and the Great Wall corridors sit near sea level). What it does need is a plan for two things: street food and the clock. CDC rates travelers' diarrhea risk as moderate outside luxury hotels, driven by hutong stalls and Wangfujing snack streets, so carrying azithromycin plus an antispasmodic for cramping is the standard precaution. Beijing also runs 12 to 13 hours ahead of the US East Coast, one of the largest shifts in international travel, and CDC's 2026 Yellow Book notes eastward adaptation averages just 1 hour per day. Build 2 buffer days before the Great Wall hike and consider a short-acting sleep aid for the first nights.

11 min read

Adventure5 daysUnited States

The 5-Day Mauna Kea & Big Island Itinerary: The Health-Smart Version

A 5-day Big Island loop that pairs Kona coast time, Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, and a Mauna Kea summit sunset into one route, built around the trip's real health hazard: going from sea level to 13,803 feet, the highest point in the Pacific, in a single afternoon. The University of Hawai'i requires every visitor to stop and acclimatize for at least 30 minutes at the 9,200-ft Visitor Information Station before continuing to the summit, and bars anyone who has been scuba diving in the previous 24 hours, is pregnant, or has significant heart or lung disease from going higher. CDC's high-altitude travel guidance notes that acute mountain sickness symptoms can appear within hours of rapid ascent even without an overnight stay, which is why the summit day here is sequenced deliberately rather than squeezed in.

10 min read

Beach7 daysMaldives

The 7-Day Maldives Itinerary: The Health-Smart Version

A 7-day Maldives trip works well split between a local-island guesthouse in Kaafu Atoll and a resort in South Ari Atoll, connected by speedboat and seaplane transfers. The health story here is not altitude or malaria, the Maldives has been malaria-free since 1984 and WHO certified that status in 2015. It is motion and food. Twin Otter seaplanes and open-water speedboats, the standard way to reach any atoll, are exactly the small-craft transit CDC flags as strong motion-sickness triggers, so a scopolamine patch applied hours before boarding, not after symptoms start, is a genuine day-by-day decision. The Maldives also sits in CDC's high-risk South Asia band for travelers' diarrhea, with azithromycin preferred over fluoroquinolones because of resistant Campylobacter in the region, and CDC reported nearly 3,000 dengue cases nationwide through the first half of 2026.

12 min read

Adventure9 daysTajikistan

The 9-Day Tajikistan Itinerary: The Pamir Highway, The Health-Smart Version

A 9-day Pamir Highway loop out of Dushanbe through the Wakhan Valley to Murghab and Karakul Lake, built around one fact that shapes everything else: the M41 spends three straight nights above 3,500 m and crosses Ak-Baital Pass at 4,655 m, the highest paved point in the former Soviet Union. CDC's Yellow Book caps sleeping-altitude gains at 500 m per day once you're above 3,000 m, and this route's jump from the Wakhan Valley to Murghab runs well past that limit, so we build in a full rest day at Murghab before pushing higher toward Karakul. "The elevation numbers on this route are not exaggerated for effect," says Mark Karam, PA-C, co-founder of Wandr Health, "and acetazolamide timing matters more here than on almost any trip we itinerary."

13 min read

Adventure8 daysIndonesia

The 8-Day Komodo and Flores Itinerary: The Health-Smart Version

An 8-day Komodo and Flores itinerary runs Denpasar to Labuan Bajo, a 3-day liveaboard through Komodo National Park, then an overland leg across central Flores to Kelimutu's three-colored crater lakes. The health-defining moment happens on day 2: Bali carries no malaria risk, but Labuan Bajo and the rest of East Nusa Tenggara sit inside CDC's year-round malaria zone, so the flight between them is also a chemoprophylaxis boundary that most standard Bali-plus- Komodo trip plans miss. CDC also puts Indonesia's two-week traveler's diarrhea attack rate at 30 to 70 percent, and the liveaboard days put open-water motion sickness on the daily schedule rather than as an occasional risk. A licensed clinician should confirm your specific antimalarial and dosing before you fly.

13 min read

Trek6 daysMalaysia

The 6-Day Mount Kinabalu Itinerary: The Health-Smart Borneo Version

A 6-day Mount Kinabalu itinerary runs Kota Kinabalu, two nights at Kinabalu Park, the Timpohon Gate to Laban Rata climb, a pre-dawn summit push to Low's Peak, and a Kinabatangan River rainforest add-on before flying home. The climb itself is a single compressed elevation jump: trailhead near 1,866 m to a mountain-hut sleep around 3,272 m in one push, well past the roughly 2,500 m mark where CDC's Yellow Book says acute mountain sickness becomes a meaningful risk. Most climbers are advised to discuss acetazolamide with a travel-health provider before the ascent. Malaria risk on Borneo is real but narrow, confined to Sabah and Sarawak's forested interior per CDC, not Kota Kinabalu or Peninsular Malaysia, so prophylaxis only matters if the rainforest leg is on the route.

13 min read

Trek8 daysKyrgyzstan

The 8-Day Kyrgyzstan Itinerary: The Health-Smart Song-Kol and Tien Shan Version

The standard Kyrgyzstan trip drives you from Bishkek at roughly 800 m straight over the Kalmak-Ashuu pass at 3,446 m to a Song-Kol yurt camp at about 3,013 m in a single day. That is a sleeping-altitude gain of more than 2,000 m, and CDC notes that with rapid ascent profiles like this, rates of altitude illness approach 50%. This 8-day version breaks the drive with a night in Kochkor at 1,767 m, puts two nights at Song-Kol instead of one, and treats Tash Rabat at 3,200 m as a day trip with a lower sleeping altitude. Most travelers on this route should discuss acetazolamide with a provider, since CDC describes the standard prophylactic dose as 125 mg every 12 hours starting the day before ascent.

13 min read

Trek6 daysGeorgia

The 6-Day Georgia Itinerary: The Health-Smart Svaneti Trek

A 6-day Georgia itinerary that wraps the classic four-day Mestia-to-Ushguli high route through Svaneti, roughly 57 km guesthouse to guesthouse across the Greater Caucasus, in the travel days it actually takes to reach the trailhead. The health factor that shapes this trip is not altitude. The route tops out at Chkhutnieri Pass around 2,722 m but sleeps between about 1,400 and 2,200 m, below the roughly 2,500 m threshold the CDC associates with acute mountain sickness. The real exposure is bacterial traveler's diarrhea from family-style guesthouse kitchens, and the CDC puts TD attack rates at 30 to 70 percent over a two-week trip. Mestia holds the last pharmacy on the route, so a Wandr clinician-reviewed kit carried from home is what keeps a bad gut day from becoming a day walked backward.

10 min read

Trek7 daysKenya

The 7-Day Mount Kenya Itinerary: The Health-Smart Version

A 7-day Mount Kenya itinerary that climbs the Sirimon route to Point Lenana (4,985 m) and descends via Chogoria, built around one change: a rest day at Old Moses Camp (3,300 m) before pushing on to Shipton's Camp (4,200 m). The standard 4-day guided version skips that day, moving sleeping altitude up 900 m in a single push, nearly double the 500 m-per-day pace the CDC recommends once you're above 3,000 m. Acetazolamide (Diamox), started the day before the climb begins, compresses the body's normal 3-to-5-day acclimatization into one, per CDC Yellow Book guidance. This is the altitude-first version of the climb built by a Wandr Health physician co-founder with ER experience treating returning travelers.

10 min read

Trek10 daysPapua New Guinea

The 10-Day Kokoda Track Itinerary: The Health-Smart Version

The Kokoda Track is a 96-kilometer trek across Papua New Guinea's Owen Stanley Range, typically walked in 8 to 9 trekking days between Owers' Corner and Kokoda village, with a cumulative climb and descent of roughly 6,500 meters. Papua New Guinea has year-round transmission of all four human malaria species and, per the CDC, the world's highest burden of chloroquine-resistant P. vivax, so chemoprophylaxis is currently recommended for every traveler with no regional exception; atovaquone-proguanil is a standard choice, started 1-2 days before departure. The trail's high point, Mount Bellamy at about 2,490 meters, sits just under the roughly 2,500-meter threshold where CDC says acute mountain sickness becomes common, so the bigger risk on Kokoda is cumulative fatigue and heat, not altitude. "Most trekkers train for the elevation and get caught out by the humidity and the climb-and-descend grind," says Mark Karam, PA-C, Wandr Health co-founder.

14 min read

Safari9 daysNamibia

The 9-Day Namibia Itinerary: Sossusvlei and Etosha, The Health-Smart Version

This 9-day Namibia self-drive loop pairs the malaria-free red dunes of Sossusvlei with Etosha National Park, which sits inside the CDC's malaria chemoprophylaxis zone for northern Namibia. The route runs Windhoek, Sesriem, Swakopmund, Damaraland, and Etosha, roughly 1,670 km of tarmac and gravel. CDC recommends malaria chemoprophylaxis, such as atovaquone-proguanil, for all travelers to Etosha and Namibia's northern regions, where every regional strain of Plasmodium falciparum is treated as chloroquine-resistant and transmission peaks February through April after the rains. Sossusvlei and the Namib-Naukluft dunes are too arid for Anopheles mosquitoes to breed. Start your antimalarial before the Damaraland-to-Etosha leg, not on day one.

12 min read

Trek10 daysEthiopia

The 10-Day Ethiopia Itinerary: Simien Mountains and Lalibela, The Health-Smart Version

This 10-day Ethiopia itinerary links Gondar's castle complex, a graded trek through the Simien Mountains, and Lalibela's rock-hewn churches, sequenced around one structural fact: nearly the entire route sits above 2,000 m, and the trek itself climbs from Sankaber (about 3,200 m) to viewpoints above 4,000 m. CDC guidance flags altitude illness risk above roughly 2,500 m and recommends gaining no more than 300-500 m of sleeping elevation per day past that point, so this plan spreads the climb to Chennek over three trekking days instead of two. Most of the route also sits above Ethiopia's malaria transmission band, which occurs predominantly below 2,000 m, so bite precautions matter most on the Addis Ababa arrival day and any lowland transfer, not on the trek itself.

14 min read

Cultural9 daysGuatemala

The 9-Day Guatemala Itinerary: Antigua, Atitlan and Tikal, The Health-Smart Version

Guatemala splits its health risk by elevation, so the order of your route is the clinical decision. Per the CDC Yellow Book, malaria prophylaxis is recommended only for travelers visiting Alta Verapaz, Baja Verapaz, Escuintla, Izabal and Peten, and Antigua, Guatemala City and Lake Atitlan are explicitly not risk areas. That means atovaquone-proguanil timing keys off where your Tikal leg falls, not off your arrival date. This 9-day route runs highlands first (Antigua at 1,530 m, an Acatenango overnight near 3,600 m, then Lake Atitlan) and drops into lowland Peten at the end, so prophylaxis starts on day 7 and the seven-day post-exposure tail finishes at home. As a PA-C, that is the sequencing I would build first and adjust the sightseeing around.

13 min read

Adventure10 daysIceland

The 10-Day Iceland Ring Road Itinerary: The Health-Smart Version

A 10-day counterclockwise loop of Iceland's Ring Road covers roughly 1,322 km of Route 1, the longest ring road in Europe, from Reykjavik through the South Coast, Jokulsarlon, the East Fjords, Myvatn, Akureyri, and Snaefellsnes. Iceland is a low infectious-risk destination with potable tap water, so the two health factors that actually reshape this trip are jet lag and motion sickness. Because the circadian clock realigns at only about 1 hour per day after eastward travel per the CDC Yellow Book, and because sleep loss makes motion sickness worse, this itinerary puts no driving on arrival day and places the whale-watching boat on day 8, after your clock has caught up. Speak with a provider about scopolamine or meclizine before you go.

14 min read

Adventure8 daysChina

The 8-Day Tibet Itinerary: Lhasa to Everest North Base Camp, The Health-Smart Version

Tibet is the rare trip that begins at altitude instead of building toward it. Most travelers fly straight into Lhasa at roughly 3,700 m (12,100 ft), and CDC notes that rapid ascent by air to above 3,400 m places travelers in a high-risk category for acute mountain sickness, with rates of altitude illness approaching 50%. This 8-day itinerary front-loads three nights in Lhasa before any driving, then splits the climb toward Everest North Base Camp across two nights instead of one. The single change I would make to a standard Tibet tour is that extra night near Shegar at about 4,350 m. Most travelers should also start acetazolamide the day before flying up, since CDC notes it is not reliably available in China.

13 min read

Trek7 daysScotland

The 7-Day West Highland Way Itinerary: The Health-Smart Version

The West Highland Way runs about 96 miles (154 km) from Milngavie to Fort William, most commonly walked over 7 stages through Loch Lomond, Rannoch Moor, and Glen Coe. This is not an altitude or malaria trip; Scotland is a low-risk destination by CDC criteria, and the trail's highest point, the Devil's Staircase, tops out around 550 meters, well below the altitude where mountain sickness becomes a concern. The real risk is logistical. Consecutive 9-to-19-mile days eating from bunkhouse kitchens and trailside cafes, refilling water across remote moorland, put real distance between a walker and the nearest pharmacy if a gut bug or overuse injury hits mid-route. Most travelers should carry azithromycin for traveler's diarrhea, prescription-strength ibuprofen for cumulative joint strain, and dicyclomine for cramping before they leave home.

9 min read

Trek11 daysFrance

The 11-Day Tour du Mont Blanc Itinerary: The Health-Smart Version

A health-smart Tour du Mont Blanc runs 11 stages counterclockwise from Les Houches through France, Italy, and Switzerland, roughly 170 km with close to 10,000 m of cumulative climbing. The health factor that actually shapes this trek is not altitude. The highest point on the classic circuit, the Grand Col Ferret, sits at 2,537 m, but you cross it in an afternoon and sleep well below it, and the CDC places the threshold for altitude illness at sleeping elevations of about 2,500 m or higher. The real risks are gut illness spread through shared refuge kitchens and dormitories, tick-borne encephalitis in the Swiss forest sections, and cumulative knee and tendon load from eleven straight days of 700 to 1,300 m ascents. Plan a self-start antibiotic, not an altitude prescription. Speak with a provider about your dates and history.

13 min read

Trek7 daysPeru

The 7-Day Inca Trail Itinerary: The Health-Smart Version

The classic Inca Trail is a 4-day, 43-km (26-mile) trek that tops out at Dead Woman's Pass, 4,215 m (13,829 ft). The health-smart version wraps it in three days first: two nights acclimatizing in Cusco, then one night lower in the Sacred Valley before you start walking. That structure matters because the CDC Yellow Book puts a day-one sleeping altitude above 3,400 m (11,150 ft) in its highest risk category for acute mountain sickness, and almost every trekker flies into Cusco from sea-level Lima in about an hour. As an ER physician, the altitude problems I see are usually pacing problems rather than fitness problems. Most trekkers should discuss acetazolamide with a provider, who may advise starting it the day before flying up.

12 min read