This trip began with a plan to travel right the way around the World over a couple or three years with the whole thing funded by keeping to a neat little budget and finding work along the way.
But having now been away a few months my plans have changed quite considerably. Here’s how...
I am now very happy to travel for 'just' a year. Whilst I’m in no rush to get back, I feel like I’m going to be ready for whatever comes next after having a year off. Consequently, the scope of this trip has now changed somewhat and instead of taking on the World I’ll now focus on just travelling the Americas from Mexico down to Brazil with pretty much everything in between.
I am not going to find work. I’m 'just' going to have fun and enjoy myself. With only a year of travel now to fund, finding work to support myself is no longer a real necessity and instead I'm now just going to focus on having fun and enjoying myself.
My trip will end in Rio on the 7th June 2018. To end the uncertainty about when and where from I might be heading home, I decided to just go ahead and book my flight back from Rio on the 7th June 2018. Just in time for the Great British summer.
Sod the budget (but not really). The concept of keeping to a backpacker’s budget went out the window a long time ago!! In fact, I’m probably spending 2-3x more than what I could be spending if I really put my mind to it. But please... don’t misinterpret this as self-deprecating, because its not... I just decided early on that I’m not willing to make certain sacrifices in order to save myself more money. I mean, sure... I could stay at cheaper hostels, cook most of my own means, stop drinking so much beer and travel on local buses… I just... Well... I just don’t want to.
This all being said, my end date of the 7th June does now give me a finite number of days for which my budget must now stretch so I do now have a theoretical daily budget if I want to be coming back home free of any debt.
My trip will end with cheering crowds and an actual finish line. From day one of this trip my health and fitness have been under constant attack. My diet has gone through the floor, my alcohol consumption has gone through the roof and whilst I might be being active most days its nothing in comparison to the level of activity I was doing back home before. The undeniable consequence is that my waistline has expanded, my fitness has plummeted and everything is starting to feel just a little bit urgh.
To combat (and hopefully reverse) this worrying trend I figured the best thing to do would be to just run a marathon. I mean, you can't really be out of shape and overweight if you run a marathon, right? Also, I should probably add that I quite like the idea of my trip finishing with cheering crowds and an actual physical finish line. #DramaQueen
Anyway, its too late for doubts now... its booked.
And on that note, I should probably go for a run.