Some Details

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If you've received multiple 'notification' emails, my apologies. I'm trying to post two entries in one day, and somehow I botched it. I'm posting this one under the 21st, even though today is the 20th.

The reason for two entries, well yesterday marked the end of the North American portion of our trip. Some numbers:

• Number of countries: 2 (US and Canada)
  
• Number of states (including DC): 20 (CA, NV, AZ, UT, CO, NE, IA, IL, IN, OH, PA, NY, NJ, DE, MD, DC, VA, NC, SC, GA)
  
• Number of state capitals: 4 (or 5) (Denver, Lincoln, De Moines, Trenton (close), Atlanta
  
• Number of great lakes in view: 3 (Michigan, Erie, Ontario)
  
• Number of interstates that we drove on (2 digit): 16 (I-10, I-15, 70, 76, 80, 86, 88, 90, 94, 86, 95, 83, 97, 64, 85, 40, 77)
  
• Number of time zones that we were in: 4
  
• Number of miles driven (based on the odometer): 4,678
  
• Number of days from Redlands to Atlanta: 23
  
• Approximate number of hours driving: 76
  
• Approximate percentage of time Sherry spent sleep while Cory was driving: close to 85
  
• Approximate miles driven on driving days (not including side trips on rest days): 4,500
  
• Approximate mi/hr on driving days (including time stopped, mileage not including side trips on rest days): 59
  
• Number of minutes spent using GIS software or a computer to calculate any of the above values: 0
  

On July 30th we depart on our round the world trip. I’ve had some requests for more specifics.

Start/End of Trip
We leave Atlanta on July 30th and we’ll likely return November 2nd. However, we don’t just have any old round trip plane ticket…

Flights
…our journey will gel (thanks MS Word thesaurus!) around some pre-booked (and pre-paid!) flights on specific dates. The hub locations (i.e. the start and end points of each flight) are fixed and won’t change barring some major incident. However, the date that we take a given flight may change. In fact the later flight legs can be changed without any additional charge. We are traveling west. Our flights:

• July 30, Atlanta to Fiji
  
• August 15, Fiji to Sydney, Australia
  
• August 20, Sydney to Auckland, New Zealand
  
• September 5, Auckland to Bangkok, Thailand
  
• October 5, Bangkok to Stockholm, Sweden
  
• November 2, Madrid, Spain to Atlanta
  

Detailed Itinerary
Other than the above flights, we don’t know where we’re going to be and when. There’ll be no “If it’s Thursday it has to be Tienamin (sp?) Square. We’re going to figure out how to fill the time between our flights as we go along. Having flexibility is half the fun of it!

Other Transportation
By the time we make it all the way around, we’ll have traveled by perhaps more means of transportation than Phileas Phogg (sp?) on his trip. We plan to travel ‘overland’ by bus, train, car, bicycle, etc. We plan to travel on water by boat, ferry, hydrofoil, kayak, etc. We will also book a few (hopefully not too many!) flights. Sherry got Fiji and I got China, so the current plan is to book flights from Bangkok to one point in China (e.g. Beijing) and then to return from another point (e.g. Hong Kong).

Hotels
With the exception of our first night in Fiji, we are not booking hotels before our trip. (See note above about flexibility and fun). Depending on cost, which depends on supply, demand, and of course location, we’ll stay in less expensive hotels and hostels. We will probably not camp, although some of our accommodation may be less comfortable than doing so. Because we’re traveling together, our research and experience tells us that it’ll often only cost a few dollars more (like $5) to split a hotel room, rather than paying for a couple of hostel beds.

Luggage
Sherry and I are backpacking. This means that each of us is taking a large-ish backpack with all our our stuff, and that’s it. We’re not embarking on some kind of Forest and Art walk around the world, and we won’t be carrying these things every minute of every day, (or even every day). This just means that we have backpacks and not suitcases. To borrow some terminology, our aim is to travel, not just tourist…

…oh yeah, closer to our departure, once I’ve got the pile of stuff on the floor that I’m going to actually bring (or is it take? My mother always got on me for this one), I’ll post a list of the items we’re packing. I’ll certainly have more than my friend Brian a.k.a. Buck-30 for his 2000+ mile hike this summer along the Continental Divide Trail - I will be packing and wearing underwear. (Buck-30 Trail Journal). However, I will certainly be packing less than my sister did for her 17 day tour of Europe - I will be leaving the rolling suitcase at 62 pounds packed weight at home.

Insurance
Moms out there can take comfort that Sherry and I have purchased travel health insurance for our trip. This insurance can reimburse us for the cost of our plane tickets if we can’t take the trip for certain reasons and also includes emergency medical care. Other benefits include: reimbursement for lost/delayed luggage and cost covered for evacuation by helicopter from a remote location to a hospital.

Passports/Visas
We’ll be carrying our US passports, but I won’t be packing my CIA or defense department credentials. ; ) We already used MyChinaVisa.com (I’m not kidding) to get our Visas to enter China, and we did some kind of online thing that lets us into and out of Australia. All other countries along our path either don’t require visas, or make them available at the border (for example Cambodia does this, at least we’re told).

Language
During the last 18 months that I was employed at ESRI, I was intensely studying Mandarin Chinese and Thai, both spoken and written, for 2-4 hours of my billed time… I’m kidding of course! I don’t speak or read a lick of those languages. However, many of the places we’ll visit English will be widely spoken/understood. Things will be very tough in China, and we may end up taking organized tours/hiring guides to translate. Sherry and I both speak passable Spanish, but that won’t help us until the very end of the trip.

Purpose
I left this until the end. You might be wondering why we are taking this trip. I can only speak for myself. I’d start by saying that I don’t have a profound reason for doing this, but that I do want to do it, and I always have. I like traveling and I enjoy seeing new places.

Second, I’ve been a “map person” for as long as I can remember, and I’ve been working in a field where I look at maps all day long. It seems silly to sit there at a desk looking at maps of all these places, and to never visit any of them.

Third, I have had the privilege to travel to some parts of the world: much of the US, some of Canada, Mexico, some of S. America, S. Africa, and one of those beer-crawls through Europe. But, there are places far, far away, both physically and culturally. Some of these places are on our list for this trip.

Timing and companionship are the final and perhaps most important elements. In terms of where I am (ehm, where I was) professionally, and where I am personally, this is the time to do it. I’ve also found someone that I want to take this trip with, so we’re doing it!

-Cory

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Comments

[Muranda]

Good luck
Everyone here in Redlands is living through the two of you. Keep us updated. Enjoy!!!!

[Brian & Lisa]

Don't forget about the hookers in Thailand...
Hey Cory and Sherry - Cool journal. Only was able to read a couple of entries due to 28,800 dial up internet. I believe I saw a couple of Eicher's, a Reetz and a Kuo. You disappoint me...."soy chops"? I cooked my own 18oz steak last night at "Peat's" in Lima, MT. like a real man. Lisa says hi and underwear is overrated so lighten your pack and toss the tighty whities.