All our stuff

All our stuff [Enlarge]

We decided to do a trial pack today, now that we have bought everything. This is all we are taking, apart from the clothes we will be wearing. It's scarily little, but great when you find that the bags are actually light enough to lift.

We are taking: Malarone antimalarials, Ciprofloxacine antibiotic, 50% DEET insect repellant, Hand cleanser, Sunblock, Gorillapod, Isla's underwear, Isla's silk sleeping bag liner, First aid kit, Glenn's T-shirt, Isla's T-shirt, Glenn's silk sleeping bag liner, 2 silk money belts, Glenn's underwear, Hair clippers, Soap in soap dish, Dental kit, Passports (including old passports), Washbag (standard contents, not shown), Sterile needles kit, Passport photos for visas, Spare high-capacity AA rechargable batteries, Ear plugs, Iodine, Chlorine tablets, Travel towel, Vaccination books, Thread, Sewing needles, GPS, Elephant tape, Bath plug, Wind-up phone charger and torch, Phone, AA battery charger, Another travel towel, Inflatable globe, Playing cards, Velcro, Penknife, USB keys, Combination wire lock, Notepads and pens, Zip-lock bags, Spare glasses, Sunglasses, Carabiners, Torch, Comb, Universal phrase book, Washing line, 1GB memory cards, USB card reader, Carbon monoxide detector, Sun hats.

Power Trip

Since leaving work and moving out we've been staying with Glenn's parents in Scotland while we do the final planning for our trip.

Thanks to a power supply fault we haven't been able to get as much done as we wanted. The power was out most of the day last Wednesday for planned maintenance. Fair enough, it happens. But then on Friday at around lunchtime it went off again, this time without notice. We called the automated faults reporting line ("Your call is important to us") and began the long wait in the cold. The house is entirely dependent on electricity for its heat, and thanks to the super efficient modern combi boiler, it doesn't have any hot water storage tank. So when the power fails on a typical Scottish November day, it gets cold and stays cold.

Power cuts always remind us of just how reliant we are on electricity, but the timing was particularly annoying since we are spending most of the time on the web at the moment, researching, planning and shopping for the last few bits and pieces. When the power went off we were just about to order the shoulder bags we will be taking with us, aware of the fact that they have quite a long delivery lead time. We managed to piece together the order codes we needed from the browser history and phone the order through. The power came on again around 5 o'clock. OK, it's a remote-ish area, it's a bit windy, the power went off, it's fixed now, get over it.

Yesterday we woke up, had breakfast and hit the web again. And then the power went. More waiting and staring at the comatose router. We considered trying to hook it up to the car's power supply via an inverter, and got as far as wondering whether we had a telephone cable long enough to reach back into the house, before realising that such an action would be an admission of the seriousness of our addiction to our always-on connection. So, as it was quite stormy outside and the waves were crashing over the rocks we decided to go to the beach, find a rock to sit on, face into the wind, and get soaked. (This is a pleasure that Glenn has occasionally enjoyed at this same spot since childhood.) We came back around lunch time and shortly afterwards, the power came back on. Excellent. We had something to eat and resumed the planning—this time we were trying to book our first night's accommodation. And then the power failed again. Time to put the phone on redial to the hotline.

Please make our power work [Enlarge]

This time was quite annoying, especially as the day turned to night and the candles came out. And then around 8 o'clock, the house sprang into life again. We discovered that coffee machines and laser printers get very excited when they have power restored suddenly. Never noticed that before.

This morning we woke up, had breakfa… no; no time to have breakfast before the power went off. And on. And off. And on. And off. Lost count, but we reckon this happened about half a dozen times before it finally settled in the "off" state.

The problem—a major short up a telegraph pole quite near us—was eventually found and fixed a couple of hours later and so far since then we've remained firmly in the 21st Century. We knew that this trip was going to give us some lessons in just how lucky we are and how much we take for granted, but the first one came considerably earlier than we thought.

Why does buying travel insurance have to be so hard?

(Come to think of it, why does buying any sort of insurance have to be so hard? But that's a topic for a whole blog in its own right.)

We spent eight hours on the web yesterday looking through the small print from as many backpacking/extended travel insurance policies as we could find. Every one has all sorts of headline-friendly cover that we don't need. Example: "Your valuable items are covered!" (which typically translates in the small print to "we only cover the first £125 ($232) of each valuable item, and there's an £85 ($158) excess, and we make a deduction for the age of the item, and you need to provide us with a police report, and full purchase receipts, and …"). Anyway, why would anyone take anything of any real value with them on a backpacking holiday?

Most policies, on the other hand, do not cover something that we think is absolutely necessary: terrorism. The risk of being caught up in an attack are incredibly small, but then so is the risk of getting caught in an Ebola outbreak, and that's covered. We believe that's exactly what insurance is for: the low probability but high consequence events. Not stolen alarm clocks. If we find ourselves being blown up by a crazed loony who thinks he's going straight to paradise, we want full cover to put our bodies back together and get us the hell out of there (not necessarily in that order). We do not want to have to start re-reading the small print of our insurance policy and preparing for an argument over semantics.

The British government has recently confirmed that we can forget about getting any support from them in the long term if we are attacked while abroad. But the Foreign and Commonwealth Office does suggest that the local embassy will at least help us out with immediate medical needs in an extreme case.

And why do most providers force us to say how long we're going to be away for, and refuse to cover us for longer than some arbitrary time (usually 12, 13 or 18 months)? We don't know how long we will be away. The whole point of this trip is to slow down, take time to discover the world, and see what experiences come our way. We don't want to be hurrying home because our insurance is about to run out.

It turns out that the backpackers' perennial favourite, World Nomads, looks promising initially because it is reasonably cheap, fully online (perfect for when you're on the road), and it can be extended as many times as you want during the trip. But whatever you do, don't be in a country when it decides to have a terrorist incident because you won't be covered. Unless you're an Aussie or Kiwi, in which case you might be, but not for cancellation costs. Confused? You will be if you start trying to read the Aus/NZ small print. Even World Nomads' staff don't seem to understand the finer points of their contract, although they are very friendly. We emailed them to ask about why the Aus/NZ wording provides some cover for terrorism but the UK wording does not. They denied that this was the case, saying that terrorism is never covered. Make your own mind up—here's the relevant wording:

The Aus/NZ wording:

We will not pay for any of the following losses: […] 8. A loss that arises directly or indirectly from an act of terrorism. The exclusion only relates to section; 2a Cancellation Costs [our emphasis].

The UK wording:

You are not covered for anything caused directly or indirectly by the following, unless You have contacted us and we have confirmed in writing that You will be covered: […] 16. any consequence whether direct or indirect of war, invasion, act of foreign enemy, hostilities (whether war be declared or not), discharge, explosion or use of a weapon of mass destruction whether or not employing nuclear fission or fusion, or chemical, biological, radioactive or similar agents, by any party at any time for any reason, terrorist activity [our emphasis], civil war, rebellion, revolution, insurrection, blockade, military or usurped power.

ACE Travel Insurance also looks good because it is cheap and it covers you for terrorism! As long as the martyr who chooses to make an example out of you plays nice and doesn't use nuclear, biological or chemical weapons. So by all means get attacked, but please stick to conventional means.

In the end we decided to go with Insure and Go's Backpacker Bronze policy. It is one of the cheapest policies we found, does not come with unnecessary cover for personal effects and luggage, and the exclusions do not mention terrorism at all! On the down side, their website doesn't quite work on the Mac. In such cases we normally close the window and find a product from a standards-compliant competitor, but in this case we had to just get over it. Also we won't be able to extend the policy, so we will have to switch to World Nomads if we're still travelling when the term runs out.

Last day at work

Leaving do #1 [Enlarge]
 
Leaving do #2 [Enlarge]

The next stage of our life change is finally here. We are now voluntarily unemployed.

Since we told our colleagues of our plans they have been amazingly supportive and enthusiastic… Hopefully it's not just that they are glad to get rid of us!

For both of us it's been a long wait since deciding to sell most of what we own and go on a round the world trip. Having made up our minds, we just wanted to get on with it. But that didn't make it any easier to leave when the day actually came.

Isla's last day was Thursday and Glenn finished on Friday. All week we have both been experiencing a strange mix of emotions. At the same time we are happy, excited, sad and anxious.

To our colleagues and friends: thanks guys. You know who you are.

Vaccinations

Got the jabs, got the stamps [Enlarge]

The world is a scary place… At least it is if you go by the number of vaccinations needed to travel around it.

Since January, we have been making regular visits to the travel clinic at our local surgery. In initial discussions with the nurse we learned that we were going to need pretty much everything in the book. Since then we've been back six times and we have three more visits scheduled.

Although rare, the list of possible side-effects from all the vaccines is impressive. By now we could have had nausea, headache, fever, rash, urticaria, angiodema, respiratory distress, hypotension, optic neuritis, myocarditis, anaphylaxis, and death. We've been lucky and had no side-effects other than a day of flu-like symptoms after our Yellow fever jabs.

In total it will cost us each GBP £353.00 (USD $660.50). Below is the list of vaccinations we have had for our round the world trip. Note that if you live outside the United Kingdom you should check whether these vaccines are licensed in your part of the world.

Typhoid fever: a serious infection caught from contaminated food or water. It is prevalent in areas where sanitation is poor.
Vaccine: TYPHERIX® (1 dose, booster after 3 years)
Cost: Free

Hepatitis A: like typhoid fever, this disease is spread by contaminated water or food, wherever there's poor sanitation.
Vaccine: HAVRIX®MONODOSE® (1 dose, booster after 1 year)
Cost: Free

Hepatitis B: a highly infectious virus spread through blood and other body fluids. Contact even through tiny quantities of an infected person's body fluid can pass the virus on.
Vaccine: ENGERIX-B® (3 doses, booster sometimes recommended)
Cost: Free

Cholera: a serious bacterial disease that occurs in regions of the world where sanitation and food and water hygiene are inadequate or lacking.
Vaccine: Dukoral™ (2 doses by mouth, booster after 2 years)
Cost: £14.50 ($27.00) prescription charge

Diphtheria: a serious disease spread through droplets contained in coughs and sneezes. This is a significant risk in some parts of the world including Russia and the Ukraine.
Tetanus: a potentially fatal disease contracted when spores in the soil enter the body through cuts or scratches. It exists all over the world.
Polio: may cause paralysis and, in some cases, can be fatal. Although it has almost been wiped out in industrialised nations, it is still a risk in some developing countries.
Vaccine (combined Diphtheria/Tetanus/Polio): REVAXIS® (1 dose, booster after 1 year), provided you have previously had primary vaccinations for each disease.
Cost: Free

Japanese encephalitis: a life-threatening virus which affects the brain. It is spread by mosquitoes during the rainy season in South East Asia and the Far East.
Vaccine: JE-VAX® (3 doses, booster after 2–3 years). Unlicensed in the UK but available on a named-patient basis ('named-patient' is the term used to describe the use of an unlicensed medicine to meet the special needs of an individual patient).
Cost: £122.00 ($228.00)

Meningococcal meningitis: a dangerous illness which is spread through coughs, sneezes and close contact. The types that are common in Africa, the Middle East and some parts of Asia are mainly preventable.
Vaccine: ACWYVAX® (1 dose, booster after 5 years)
Cost: £31.00 ($58.00)

Rabies: a fatal disease which humans can contract from the bite of a rabid animal. It is present in many countries but is a higher risk in some developing countries.
Vaccine: Rabipur® US: RabAvert® (3 doses, booster after 2 years)
Cost: £135.00 ($253.00)

Yellow fever: a potentially fatal disease that is spread by infected mosquitoes. In some areas of the world, you have to carry an International Certificate of Vaccination as proof of vaccination to gain entry into certain countries (available at designated Yellow Fever Vaccination Centres). This is valid for 10 years from 10 days after vaccination, and immediately after revaccination.
Vaccine: STAMARIL® (1 dose, revaccination after 10 years)
Cost: £50.50 ($94.50)

Useful links

The Travel Doctor: Comprehensive UK-based travel health site

The Beginning

Career Crisis

Glenn says: For a while now the daily grind has been getting me down. I've been watching life tick by a weekend at a time. It's not that I don't have a good job—I work with good people doing good stuff. The only problem is, I just don't enjoy what I do for a living. I got to where I am completely by accident during the narrowing down process that you have to go through in the education system.

I just kind of ended up here.

I'm happy in every other way. Isla and I got married last year and we're really enjoying life. We have a great house, we both want to start a family. We have everything to look forward to. The problem is, I just can't face the thought of keeping doing what I'm doing now until one day (if I'm lucky) I get to retire. That's nearly 35 years away.

I need to do something I enjoy. So what am I going to do about it? I'm not the world's best person at seizing opportunities and just going for it. I tend to over-analyse—and by the time I'm finished, I've missed whatever chance it was that came my way… Or I can't be bothered any more. As I have done with similar off-the-wall ideas lots of times before, on 29th December I just happened to say to Isla "Why don't we sell up and disappear for a while?" She's a lot like me and she often says OK to hair-brained ideas like this, but we both know we don’t mean it, or at least, won’t do anything about it.

The difference this time was that when she said yes, somehow we both knew the other one meant it. "I've been thinking the exact same thing. I'm in a rut at work too. Let's do it."

Stop the Train

Isla says: I can't help feeling that my life so far has been a bit directionless: school, college, uni, job… in the proper order and without really stopping to think whether each choice was the right one to make. For the past 28 years I've been on a life-path that is heading, like a slow but unstoppable freight train, towards pensionable age, at which point I suppose I'm just hoping that I'll have the time, income and health to do all the things I want to do. Not that I feel that I've been unlucky—quite the contrary—I've had some great experiences, I've met and married a lovely bloke and I have a very comfortable existance, but…

At some point last year I began to wonder if it wouldn't do the pair of us the world of good to spend some time being a bit less comfortable, but up until now I'd thought that having a house and possessions and a pension plan and a career meant that taking time out wasn't an option—we'd have to sell everything and quit our jobs.

And then, at Christmas, after eight months of marriage and with a new feeling of self confidence we both just said "why not?"