Day 120: Central America by the numbers.

countries visited: 6
# of buses:53
# of boats: 14
# of long-distance taxis: 5
# of planes: 2 (in and out)

Average daily spend:
Mexico: $94
Belize: $137
Guatemala: $88
Honduras: $121
Nicaragua: $77
Costa Rica: $116
Panama: $121

most expensive bed:$40/night for shared bath private room in San Jose, Costa Rica
least expensive bed: $3/night at language school in Xela, Guatemala

biggest surprise: Mexico which was a lot less touristy and 10x more amazing than I thought it would be
biggest letdown: Costa Rica (minus Cahuita) which was far more touristy than I even suspected
best value: Mexico City, awesome street food, cheap subway, lots to see.

best meal: tie - Panama Canal buffet; any meal made by Aska at Hotelito Perdido
worst meal: almost any one we had in Belize, thanks to Semana Santa we ate more much gas station food than I ever hoped to

nicest people: Overall Guatemala or Nicaragua, although the town of Cahuita gets two thumbs up too
rudest people: Honduras overall, but all taxi drivers specifically (would rather walk for 45 minutes than take a 10 minute taxi ride anywhere)

best buses: Panama
worst buses: Belize
worst road: Ometepe

best ruins: Palenque (beats out Tikal because it's a fraction of the cost)
best beach: San Blas
other highlights: ATM caves, diving in Utila,
lowlights: losing my bank card, Honduran taxi drivers, Tamarindo

Moving on up to the east side to a deluxe apartment in the sky

That's right folks for the first time in our lives, we are moving east of Yonge Street. For you non-locals, let me explain. Ask any Torontonian; this is a big deal. If you grow up on one side of Yonge Street chances are, baring any extenuating circumstances, you stay on that side of Yonge Street. No idea why but it's the truth. But after 35 years, west of Yonge I'm making the move east. Sure it's only for 17 days but it's still a pretty big deal.

In order to get here, we had to purge our apartment of 1024 cds, 843 books, 165 dvds, 42 playstation games, and all our furniture. We did it. But through a combination of craigslist, donations to goodwill and the furniturebank.org we did it. And all our remaining worldy possessions now reside in a 5x10 storage unit. We made almost $3000 from our sales. And there were a few tears shed as we packed up.

But that means that tomorrow when we check into our temporary far east deluxe apartment in the sky, we'll truly be starting over with just the packs on our back.

So where are we now?

location: Toronto
departure: March 17, 2009
savings: $49,540
return fund: £7,455

Making a list checking it twice

a peek into my obsessive compulsive planning mind 

No this isn't a post full of the Christmas spirit. Rather this post is a list of lists. No, wait! Come back! Actually, I'd like to run too. 

We've entered the home stretch. Less than 3 months to go and so much to do, hence the lists. Lots of lists. 

But you've already seen the first one. The "Where are we going?" list. And that only took a year to compile. And it's only rev.7. 

The second list is medical. There's the list of doctors to visit. Travel Doc. Family Doc. Eye Doc. Dentist. 

Then there's the list of shots to get. And their prices. Oy-vey.

Yellow Fever - $75 - already have 

Typhoid - $30 - right before we leave

Hepetitis A - $120 - already have

Hepetitis B - $90 - first shot done, second shot due now, and the last shot we'll have to get on the road (the Doctor reco'ed Costa Rica as a good country to seek medical attention in)

Menengitis - $130 - right before we leave 

Flu Shot - FREE 

Japanese encephalitis - $270 - yikes, but not until we're getting ready to head to Asia. 

Between this and all the blood I've had taken, no wonder I'm feeling like a pin cushion, a very poor pin cushion. 

And let's not forget Malaria. Oh Malaria, we've never met and I already hate you. For the first year we'll be travelling in and out of at risk areas for the first 6 months and then solidly at risk for the next 6. That's a whole lot of medication to carry around - and let me tell you, it's not cheap. Malarone, the one with the least side effects and the most effective, is also the most expensive. That's about $20 a day for 365 days which means for the first time in 30 years I've written to Santa.

Dear Santa, 

I have been moderately good this year. For Christmas,  Adrian and I would like a year supply of Malarone. And if you can't afford the whole $6000 we'll take half of that. 

Thank you,

Liz.

P.S. I'll leave beer and peanuts out for you. 

Rather that visions of sugar plums dancing through our heads, it was dreams of a sugar daddy to pay the way. Good news. There is a cheaper drug option. Bad news. It's been known to cause severe depression, violence and hallucinations in a very small amount of people who take it. So let's hope my insurance covers the other one. If not, I'll give you the heads up before we start taking the cheaper option so you can take the appropriate cover. 

And if I wasn't feeling poor already, there's the third list. Packing. 

Yes, I have discovered despite an apartment full of crap, we still need (or want) so much stuff for our trip. It's a reminder of how much our lifestyle is going to change once we're on the road. 

There's the techie stuff:

laptop - $600 on craigslist - so I can update this silly little blog 

camera gear - $2000 and counting - so I can take purdy pictures

hard drive - $250 - so I can store all those purdy pictures

iPod - FREE with airmiles - for music and movies on long bus rides to nowhere

PSP - FREE with christmas present - so Adrian can be amused on long bus rides to nowhere

There's the clothing: 

I'll spare you the list this time (although if you really are interested, I've added links to my lists over there on the right under Odds and Ends). Even unfashion plates like us are struggling to come up with a year's wardrobe that fits in a small back pack. The key appears to be multipurpose clothes, i.e. pants that turn into shorts, sweaters that turn into vests, bras that turn into emergency flotation device. okay, I made that last one up but you get the idea. 

To the manufacturers of these travel clothes, I have a couple of complaints. Must everything be made of fleece? And have you not received the colours of '09 from Pantone? Or any of the last 10 years.  I don't recall hunter green, plaid, or tropical prints appearing in any of the swatches. I wish Fluevog made some footwear appropriate for jungle treks. 

And finally there's the travel gear, the things I've never had a use for in the last 35 years but have been assured by every resource that we'll need on the road: 

multitool - 100 tools in one, for only $75 

headlamps - for midnight trips to the loo, outhouse, hole in the ground

silk sleep sheets - for avoiding bedbugs and bugs in general, 2 for $50

portable clothesline - $10

travel towels - remarkably like a sham-wow (without the creepy sales guy) 2 for $50

compass - hoping to find a dollar store keychain one with a thermometer

universal drain plug - ?

and... 

What am I doing here? What are you doing here? It's Christmas and there's turkey leftovers to pick at, sentimental movies to cry over, alcohol to drink, cakes to snack on, family to fight with and presents to return. 

See you in 2009 with (hopefully) less lists and more fun. I better put that promise down on my to do list before I forget.

Edit: Good news Malarone is covered by my insurance. New eyeglasses and contacts however are not. Oh well, you win some and you lose some. 

AC 993 now boarding, well, soon anyway.

A very quick update to say the first tickets have been bought. Woohoo! Yippee! Yay! No turning back now.  

And that's it really.

I was reminded that it had been a long time since I'd written anything. It may appear that way but behind this wall there are many entries waiting for me to hit spell check and publish. But all in good time, my friends. 

So where are we now?

Location: Toronto

Departure: March 17, 2009

Savings: $46,290

"I love it when a plan comes together"

- Col. Hannibal Smith, The A Team.

View Larger Map

If people could be classified as one of the A Team, I would say I was Col. Hannibal Smith with a dash of BA Barcus. My friend Cheryl is a bit more like Murdoch, loveable but slightly, um, well how do you say it - insane. She's the delusional one who is convinced that Vancouver is a nice place. And she's also a crazy lady that demand I post more often even though I'm not convinced I have much to say at the moment.  See, told you she was crazy. 

The biggest news to report is the new map up above and to the right. It's all new complete with multi-coloured route markers - ooooo, aaaaahhhh - that show the new itinerary we've decided on. After my momentary panic of what to do and where to go I think I've figured it out (well for now at least). So here's what we've got so far.

Central America:

Southern Mexico: 3 weeks

Belize: 2 weeks

Guatemala: 3 weeks

Honduras: 3 weeks

Nicaragua: 3 weeks

Costa Rica: 2 weeks

Panama: 2 weeks

South America: 

Ecuador: 3 weeks

Peru: 3 weeks

Bolivia: 3 weeks

Chile: 3 weeks

Argentina: 5 weeks

Paraguay: 1 week

Brazil: 5 weeks

Africa: 

South Africa: 4 weeks

Lesotho: 1 week

Namibia: 3 weeks

Zambia: 2 weeks

Malawi: 3 weeks

Tanzania: 6 weeks

Rwanda: 2 weeks

Uganda: 2 weeks

and then

Ethiopia and beyond.

And that's where the dots on the map stop. Not because that will be the end of our travels. I hope not. But because that's as far as I'm allowing myself to plan at the moment. And by planning I mean, filling in an excel spreadsheet that looks a lot like a day planner. We still hope to carry on travelling on into Asia via Russia. But there's no need to get ahead of ourselves (that's a note more for me than you btw).

As it is, I've already been collecting tonnes of hostel, tour and adventure links in my del.icio.us profile. You can check them out there. Yes, I'm a bit of a freak when it comes to planning.

Another list I've started is things I'd like to do. This trip is completely selfish for me, in the sense that it's all about trying things I want to do. Here's a list of the top 10 in no particular order.

1. Learning to scuba dive in Honduras
   
2. Seeing the Galapagos
   
3. Seeing Easter Island
   
4. Getting competent in Spanish (and revive my French)
   
5. Taking the slow boat through the glaciers of Chile and Argentina
   
6. Cage diving for sharks in South Africa
   
7. Searching for gorillas in Rwanda
   
8. Climbing Kilimanjaro
   
9. Seeing the big 5 on safari (although I'm sure I'd settle for 1 out of the 5)
   
10. Experiencing the world with Adrian
    

Out of these 10, the closest to being ticked off is the language thing. I've been teaching myself Spanish off and on for about a year. And how's it going? You tell me.

Puedo hacer los phrases basicas. Y puedo leer despacio los libros sin el diccionario. Pero hablo muy malo. ¿Verdad? 

Well, I'm working on it, okay. I've finished my intro spanish tapes, I mean mp3s. I'll soon finish my beginner's book before I undertake the first year MIT spanish course. So hopefully I'll improve before I have to put it into practice.

As for the other things on the list, some of them are pretty crazy and I'm not even sure if I'll actually go through with them. But if I do, I hope Cheryl doesn't mind if I start classifying myself as crazy Murdoch. 

And with that it's time for an update ( I actually first posted this without it).

So where are we now?

location: Toronto, Canada

ETD: March 15, 2009

savings: $36,498

Let's start at the very beginning - wherever that is.

Excuse me, do you know the way to... to... wait where are we going? Good question and one we thought we'd answered.

However, circumstances intervened - Adrian found himself without work for a few months, our anniversary trip required an expensive detour, pre-trip expenses are adding up - and our savings haven't accumulated as fast as we hoped. But we're not too far away. In fact we're only a couple of months behind. But all these hiccups made us realize that we should probably over save - justincase (justincase of natural disaster, justincase of a tough returning job market, justincase we need to pay ransom to our kidnappers, etc) .

Unfortunately, this means redoing our itinerary. Now understand, I'm a closeted control freak (okay, maybe not so closeted), so I need the security blanket of a planned route. But I know that these itineraries are never set in stone. And thankfully, when we've had to deviate from past travel plans, Adrian has stepped in to take care of stuff while I sit rocking in a corner clutching my itinerary.

So here I sit, once again looking at a map of the world and wondering where to go. And there are so many options it's a little dizzying. In fact I just starting typing out a list of options and when I got to number 11, I deleted the list for fear of losing the few readers I have. So this post is far less informative than I hoped it would be.

I posted to Lonely Planet's Thorntree looking for advice, and only got one response, from Donna, my virtual travel friend. (thanks Donna! lots of great tips and I halfheartedly blame you for introducing options 6-11 ). But I'm realizing that Adrian and I are the ones that have to make the decision.

Our requirements are complicated.
The only must do things on our trip are South America (Adrian) and Africa (Liz). So these our priorities.
I've been learning Spanish and would hate to lose it before we can use it.
We want to fly on as many StarAlliance carriers as possible to capitalize on Aeroplan points.
We don't want to spend more than $1000 on any airfare leg.
Our savings will probably cover 500 days (at $100/per day)

And this is where we've ended up (mentally): either Central American to South America to Africa to ?, OR South America to Africa to ?, OR Africa to South America to Asia to ?. Each have their pros and cons and each time we think one is in the lead, something makes us change our mind.

Feel free to add your two cents. Literally (if you visit any of the google links on the righthand side). And figuratively (by adding a comment).

Oh and slightly good news. Adrian's contract has been extended for another 4 weeks so we have a bit more cash to look forward to. And I finally got a retroactive raise (only 6 months late).

So where are we now?

location: confused in Toronto
ETD: March 15, 2009
savings: $30,998 (but hoping for a big jump in the next month)

I know this priceless antique says 25¢ but how about a nickel

(not our car boot sale but close enough, thank you wiki)

People are cheap. That's all you need to know about garage/yard/lawn/church/car boot sales.

Oh and that they're a helluvalotta work. We spent two weeks of scouring the apartment for things to sell then polishing, scrubbing and cleaning the crap to make it look good, pricing it way below the 30% what we paid for it, and packing it all up to survive the trip to the sale in one piece. Then loaded up the van the night before for the trip out to a park in the almost burbs.

And this was just for stuff we couldn't be bothered to list on ebay or craigslist: vases, vhs, books, junk jewelry, children's toys, kitchen crap, assorted small appliances, as well as a couple of things we just wanted to get rid of, like mismatched speakers, an air conditioner, our 100lb tv with reception issues, and a box or two of magazines and comics.

Oh and did I mention we're on the third floor of the walkup. My body aches just thinking about it.

But sell we did. Not a lot and not the things we expected. VHS tapes and ugly jewelry were a hot commodity. While books and and any nice looking or valuable knickknacks weren't. I sold a dirty table cloth but not Royal Daulton crystal wine glasses (2 for $15). So I give up.

And after 4 hours of the sale we had made $245.

More than the $150 I wanted just to make it worth while but less than the $350 I was hoping for. And after the van rental, gas and parking ticket, our net was more like $175.

We dropped off the worthless stuff at goodwill as well as the heavy tv that we almost killed us to carry. We kept about 4 boxes of stuff to try again at a later date or keep.

So where are we now?

location: Toronto
savings: $30,175
ETD: March 15, 2009 (or earlier)

(and it's time to start thinking happy thoughts for Adrian - his current contract finishes Oct 3 and he'll need a new one)

so much to do so little time and money

Before I post about our Storm Watch Tour 2008. I have a big change. 

I'm going to do this post backwards, starting with so where are we now?

location: Toronto

savings: $28,600

ETD: March 15, 2009 (although we may go earlier)

Yes, you'll notice a new date there. 

No, we're not getting cold feet.

Our trip to New Orleans and the resulting flight changes not only ate into the savings but also made me realize that emergencies can cost a lot more than you realize. And for The Big Trip™ that meant saving up for a bigger resettlement cushion and boosting the ever important just in case buffer.  

A later departure date also means a rejigging of our itinerary - either starting in South Africa and pushing South America to the end of the trip or adding Central America to the itinerary. But that's another post once we have a better idea of when we'll actually be leaving.

I know this city like the back of my hand. Hey what's that there?

I love Toronto. I really do. However, my heart is set on living in England once we've travelled around the world. 

But before we leave this city, we thought it was important to try and see as much of it as possible. Sure there's the philosophical reason: experience your own country before you experience others. But there's also the economic reason: it's cheap. 

Since we're saving for the Big Trip™ free has become our favourite word. And we've discovered that Toronto has a plethora of free stuff to do. 

• We've seen great free concerts - Ladytron and many others at Harbourfront, Dragonette and tonnes o' other bands at Pride.
  
• We've learned about different neighbourhoods on free walking tours - ROM walks have taken us to Rosedale, Cabbagetown, Front Street, Parkdale; Heritage Toronto taught us about the 60s folk scene in Yorkville. 
  
• We took in a day of free cricket at Sunnybrook Park. 
  

There's lots of other stuff that we're looking at doing, like Frommer's self-guided tours, Afrofest, Masala Mendhi Masti, all the Taste of festivals, more walking tours. So we scour the listings in NOW for fun free things. Never mind, the pay what you can events like Shakespeare in the Park. 

The only downside is the more we see the more we realize that we'll miss this city when we're gone. 

In the words of Pepe Le Pew, le sigh.

I guess it's time for an update. Adrian did indeed find another contract and the savings continue. However, I've started purchasing gear for the trip (fancy camera, laptop, etc) so there's no big jump since the last update.

So where are we now?

location: Toronto

savings: $22,100

ETD: November 15, 2008

And the score is taxes 0, liz 1000.

I know, I know. I haven't posted the London or Vancouver trip reports. I'll do it this weekend, I promise but not if it's really beautiful out or I have to work again. Okay I promise nothing. Works been rather nutso lately and I haven't slept much. So how about a financial update instead. 

So where are we now?

location: Toronto

savings: $19,400

ETD: November 15, 2008

Adrian may have found a contract - nothing is signed yet so please cross your fingers. You're probably wondering, if Adrian hasn't been working and we haven't won the lottery how have we been able to save money? Actually, you most likely weren't wondering but I was. So I went and looked at the bank statement to figure out what we did. And then I remembered. 

Co-workers told me that I was able to write off some things as employment expenses. Curious, I did a little digging and found out they were right. My job requires me to have a mobile and internet access, so I can write them off. I went back and adjusted the last three years worth of tax returns and found $1000. Not bad. And that money went into the Big Trip™ fund. Moral of the story? Read every line of the tax return booklet; you might just find some money in it. 

Picture perfect

It's the long weekend so I've been using the time to scan old pictures from the prehistoric days of film cameras and upload them to our flickr page. Feel free to have a poke around there. 

Thankfully (or not) there aren't as many photos from these earlier trips. I used to take photos as punctuation now I use them like narrative. Don't know if this new way is better. 

Just this week, I was having a conversation with a co-worker about people's facebook photos. Craig hates vacation photos. He says he prefers memories to pictures. I totally agree, especially when travelling. It's important to put the camera down and pick the brain up and remember to experience not just document. 

Unfortunately, I take pictures because I like taking pictures. A lot. So I'm constantly trying to keep the snap happy part of my brain contented while remembering to experience stuff. It's probably why I'm so torn about what camera to bring with me. I have a 4 year old point and shoot digital that has done me very well. It's been to Moscow, India, South East Asia, the UK, France, the US and Canada. However I know it's getting old. So before we go I will probably want to get a new one. So I get a fancy schmancy DSLR and try to take much better photos (snap happy says yes)? Or do I get a new and improved point and shoot digital? (traveller says please)?

When we get closer to leaving, I'm sure how much stuff we have will help make the decision. Adrian already wants to take his PSP. I just got a new 160GB iPod (free using my airmiles). And I'm also contemplating buying a laptop. So more gear seems kinda dumb at this point. 

Plus there's the money issue. All this stuff costs money and will we have it? 

So where are we now?

location: Toronto

savings: $12,200

ETD: November 15, 2008

Getting into the 5 figures feels good - we're officially more than 20% there. 

Money makes the world go round (or us go round the world)

Money. If you're going to travel around the world you need it. And at the moment it's our biggest obstacle. Unlike other trips which we charged and then paid off on our return, the Big Trip requires cash in the bank before we go. 

In June of 2007, we had planned to leave in January but some quick calculations revealed we had a huge deficit. Too much of our savings would be needed to pay our student loans. So we refocused our money on paying them off. We did and I can't tell you how awesome it felt to be free of them. I think I was literally skipping and jumping around the day I saw a big juicy zero on the student loan website. Then in January we started saving to get the hell out of Dodge. 

How are we saving? Very simply we have a budget. Budget. Budget. Budget. I can't stress how important this is. Budget. Budget. Budget. And I can't repeat it enough. We wrote down what we needed to pay our bills, feed ourselves and have a bit of fun. Everything beyond that goes into a high interest savings account with President's Choice Financial that we can't touch. Almost daily I'm at the spreadsheet tracking our expenses - not because I need to but because it helps me stay motivated. I may post a simplified one here later so you can check follow along.

We also re-evaluated our day-to-day expenses to see where we could trim them and we stuck to them. We shop at No Frills not Loblaws (savings of $100/month). Rather than do take out we've learned how to make our favourite Thai, Mexican and Indian foods as well as homemade pizza (this costs less than $10 to make as opposed to $30 take out). I take a lunch to work - everyday (savings of $160/ month). No more cabs ($20/month).  We keep a minimum balance in our chequing account so we don't have to pay bank service fees and we only use our own bank's ATM machines ($40/month). These small changes add up to at least $350 a month or $4200 a year. Not bad for doing nothing. 

We also gave ourselves an allowance. $100 each every week. That's fun money for whatever we choose to spend it on. On paper that sounds generous and that was deliberate. We didn't want to be miserable; if we started hating saving then there's a possibility we'll loose sight of our ultimate goal. However, $100 doesn't go all that far - one night out with friends can easily eat up more than that. But recently, I've actually been underspending my allowance and socking the money away to take with me to the UK and Amsterdam later this month. 

Of course it helps that Adrian and I don't have kids. And that we're at a point in our career where we actually make money when we go to work. But I've met lots of 20-somethings travelling around the world and they find the money. I think it really adds up to if you want you'll find a way to make it happen. 

We've also started gathering up belongings to sell. Adrian got rid of 30 playstation games. And I've got 200 books to get rid of. The money is incremental but every little bit helps. Plus, selling things now is helping us get ready for the great purge before we go. 

I've also looked at other ways to bring in some money. You'll notice the google ads on the right hand side. Clicking on them ads pennies to our savings so feel free to click to help us out. We'd really appreciate it and we'll click yours. Currently we've made exactly  -42¢ and, yes, that is a negative sign. 

So where are we now?

location: Toronto

savings: $11,200

ETD: November 15, 2008

We've determined that $50,000 is what we'll need to get away so we still have a way to go. Since Adrian is still looking for a job, the savings have slowed down. The good thing is that they haven't stopped. I'm confident he'll find something soon and we'll be back on track.

Oh and here are some great resources on saving and budgeting:

• Allround great budget advice

• Dave's detailed budget from gobackpacking.com
  
• Megan's budget from past trips
  
• How much will you need

• How to make money on the road courtesy of nerdynomad.com
  
• How to make money blogging links

• How about couchsurfing on the road
  
• Or volunteering at an organic farm
  

This is just a quick list. There are also countless other travellers out there who have offered invaluable advice to us via the Lonely Planet Thorntree and their blogs. I just wanted to thank all of them. You guys rock.

Getting closer

Adrian still doesn't have a new contract started so I've been freaking out about our plans and budget - particularly since I'm headed to London at the end of March. 

A month ago that seemed like a good way to use up my vacation time. A month ago I also thought the flight would be free thanks to air miles. D'oh. I didn't read the small print which limited my gift certificates to holidays not travel. So I'm stuck with AirTransat. Hating them as much as I do, I've paid for the upgrade to their club class ($600 cha-ching or six days of rtw travel, ouch). Hopefully, comfy seats and free booze will offset my hatred.  

While I'm in London, I may try to visit another friend in Amsterdam if money allows. But he's already warned me that he may be moving to Barcelona which is a longer and more expensive flight so it's looking increasingly iffy.

Anyhow here's the budget update promised. 

And where are we now?

location: Toronto

savings: $10,700

ETD: November 15, 2008

1-800-how's-my-blogging

adjusting my mirror, checking my blind spot, signal and pull out...

I've never blogged before. I've never kept a diary. But I do write. A lot. Because I'm a writer. But hopefully by November 2008, I'll be unemployed. That's right I hope to be unemployed. 

Adrian and I are saving fast and furiously to take off and travel the world.

Of course certain things keep getting in the way. Like Adrian needing a job. Going to Cuba for a much needed vacation. Using up vacation time to visit friends in London and Amsterdam. But I've still got the eyes on the prize. But more on that later. 

Perhaps you're wondering why we're going. The short answer is why not. Both of us love travelling. We love the chaos of trying to figure out bus routes and meals and accommodation when you can't read the alphabet let alone speak the language. And our meagre vacation time has made it difficult to see as much of the world as we've hoped - although many would disagree. 

We've been to Ireland, Buenos Aires, Tunisia, Gambia, Moscow, India, Bangkok, Shanghai, Cambodia, Ho Chi Minh City, Paris, Cuba, many places in the US, and of course the UK and Canada. And every time we have to come back we get depressed and spend weeks talking about how great it would be to just keep travelling. Finally we actually stopped just talking about it and just started doing something about it.

So in June 2007, we did some calculations and by we I mean me (although adrian is an accountant, he hates doing our finances). And quickly discovered that leaving in January 2008 was not going to happen. The dreaded albatrosses known as student loans were just too big. in the words of Pepe le Pew, le sigh. But those same calculations also showed us that by January 2008 we could pay off our student loans - all $35,000 of them, 7 years ahead of schedule. And we still managed to sock away a bit of cash for the big trip. We're pretty chuffed too. 

Now with 9 months to go, I've started this blog to write a little a bit about our planning and preparations but also to get used to this whole blogging thing. And this is the place where we'll be writing about our adventures. That should be easy right? I'm a writer. Unfortunately, coming home to write this blog after writing all day is sometimes hard, hopefully it will be a lot easier once we're on the road. And this whole html blogging stuff is new to me. Hence the title of this post. So be patient. I'm learning. But I'm almost ready to take the "L" off the back windscreen.

And where are we now? 

location: Toronto

savings: $8500

ETD: November 15, 2008