Christmas Aboard

Every time we start telling people we are leaving in the first week of December until April the following year, the first response we get is "Why aren't you staying for Christmas?" followed by a look of confusion. We celebrate an early "Christmas" with both sides of our families prior to leaving with a big dinner, drinks and just hanging out. We also have a get together with all our friends a week or so before we leave, where we go out bowling and then for drinks after.

It's not that we do not like Christmas, we truly do. We enjoy seeing all our friends and family, seeing all the nieces and nephews open their gifts, having big dinners and drinks with everyone. Ryan’s work is seasonal and I can work remotely. December is when his work slows down, we could wait and see what the weather does later in December or out of experience, it’s nicer to beat the Christmas rush and possible snow storms that shut down countries.

So here are the big questions we get asked. How do you make Christmas abroad work? What do we do? Do we do a gift exchange?

Love or Hate Christmas aboard?

Love! We love to travel and we enjoy travelling together. We both like seeing how other cultures celebrate Christmas and what other holidays they have specific to their culture around that time. The different decorations, traditions, foods and music it's really interesting and exciting.

How do we make Christmas aboard work for us?

We do not have a HUGE traditional dinner while aboard on Christmas. We do not go and get a turkey and do all the trimmings, for two people that is a lot of work. We normally grab a couple of bottles of wine, a couple of different snacks munch throughout the day and pick up something different for dinner. A small roast or 1/2 a chicken and cook that for dinner.

What do we do?

We do not make any plans for Christmas. Maybe we will go for a hike, a walk on the beach, watch some movies or binge some series on Netflix. We eat those snacks, drink the wine and eat the dinner we cooked that I mentioned above. We make sure to FaceTime or message back home saying "Merry Christmas" to everyone and check in.

Do we exchange gifts?

This question makes me laugh now, in the past We have bought each other gifts however we stopped this. We go away for 4 months out of the year. There are sites we want to see, places we want to go, dives we want to do so we prefer to spend a bit more on these memories than buying each other gifts.

What did Christmas look like for us?

This year was a bit different, there are no restrictions here in Vietnam. Last year in Greece, we could not go anywhere or do anything or see how they celebrated. So this year we made the most of it!

On Christmas Eve we went for a Korean BBQ at a restaurant we went to 2 years ago with friends, called Tokyo BBQ. IT IS AWESOME! It is on the more expensive side so this was a treat for us. We got a BBQ meat plate, a plate of sushi and a few beers, below is what our Christmas eve dinner looked like.

Photo Credit: V.Gray

Photo Credit: V.Gray

Yes, we paid to go to a restaurant and grill our own dinner AND it is so much fun. The food is amazing and the company was pretty great as well. We discussed our plans for Christmas Day, which we suppose to be NOTHING. Have a bottle of wine, cook a nice dinner at home and get ready to leave for Hue and Phong Nha National on Boxing Day.

We finished our night with a quick tour down to the Dragon Bridge to watch the fire and water show, then we came home and relaxed.

Photo Credit: V.Gray

Well that changed Christmas morning when it was gorgeous outside, 25C and sunny. We wanted to take the Hai Van Pass from Da Nang to Hue. We had eaten breakfast, it was 11:00 am and we were not doing anything so we packed up and left for Hue a day early. We drove to the Hai Van pass and were in Hue by 3:00 pm and checked into our Hostel. We spent the rest of the time touring around Hue and just enjoying ourselves.

This was our Christmas Eve and Christmas 2022, it was simple, easy and fun.

Cheers!

**Please note that all opinions and views expressed in this post are my own, from my own experiences. If you would like to see more pictures follow me on Instagram vikki.gray **