Planning for the big one

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This blog is my way of both keeping a record of my travels (and travel plans) and letting the folks back home know that I'm still alive, roughly where I am, and what I'm doing.

It's been two years since my last trip to Africa, after which I thought my travelling days were over. I'd had a good time, but thought that I'd never get the opportunity to go away for any length of time again.

It wasn't until the Summer of 2007 when the urge started to take me again and I realised that the travel bug hadn't entirely left my body. When I got back from my last trip in 2005, I'd told people that my work would never let me take another sabbatical, and that I'd have to quit my job if I were to go again - something I'd never seriously contemplated before. The more I thought about travelling, the more I realised that I'd lost my fear of giving up work for a while, and so thought that if I was going to go, I might as well go for a year.

A trip with Dragoman across Central Asia to Beijing had been on my mind for a few years, and so thought this would be as good a way as any to begin my trip, especially seeing as I'd intended to travel through South-East Asia at some point, and this would put me in the general area. It also had the added bonus of getting my travel confidence back before actually backpacking solo.

So, in my head, I already had Central Asia and South-East Asia planned. It wasn't a great leap from there to including Australia, when it struck me that I had the opportunity to travel overland from the UK to Oz (with a little Oversea travel too, obviously). I began to search the net for vessels that took fare-paying passengers from mainland Asia (possibly Singapore) to Australia. The were several freighter-cruise agents that could take this booking, but I thought it prudent to not book it til closer the time.

In the last few days I have heard that due to changes in US homeland security policy, many global ports are deemed unsecure and therefore NO freighter companies are now taking passengers from any of these ports - including all mainland Asian ports.

I'm told this situation may change and, in fairness, I probably won't be needing passage for at least a year. Needless to say, I'll be keeping my fingers crossed.

Hopefully, I'll be updating this blog with reports on the planning and preparation of my trip, which officially starts at Dover, UK, on Monday the 17th March 2008

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Photos

Earth
Travelling the Blue Planet