Departure imminent

The summer has come and gone and with it my time in Blighty is once again drawing to a close. The rain clouds loom ever on the horizon (if not directly above us) and i am reminded of how little sun we actually get here. The summer has been fun though. Catching up with friends and relatives has been the main stay of my summer, not a bad way to live life at all if you ask me, but not one that is sustainable as i am constantly reminded by the ever decreasing figure that is my bank balance. Good job, then, that there is little under 2 weeks until i fly to Tunisia and begin my Africa adventure.

The past couple of months have given me plenty of time to think about, plan and organise the various stages of my journey. They have also given me plenty of time to prepare myself for what i think will be the ultimate adventure, Kilimanjaro. Training for this is going well. My fitness is very good right now. I am managing to run about 40 to 50 km's per week as well as fitting in 4 weight training sessions. I am eating myself into poverty though as i am hungry so much of the time. Being super active means you are capable of destroying food without a second thought.

The last week or so i have been preparing all the last minute things i need. Visas are being obtained as we speak, vaccinations, jabs, malaria pills and all the essential medicals are being dealt with and i have been checked over by the doctor to make sure i am not in any serious ill health. Far from it really, apart from my smoking habit, I'm in good shape, possibly the best shape of my life and i have a very healthy blood pressure (105 over 60 for anyone that cares) and nutrient levels in my blood stream.

Winding down my time here i am reflecting heavily over the past few months. I have done very little, not that i was doing a great deal the previous 8 months, but i feel in some ways i have wasted time here in the UK. I'm sure my mum would argue the point in case here but would it not have been better to carry on the travels straight from the previous one? Yes, possibly it would have been a good idea, but also my first travelling experience was just that, completely new, i had no clue what i was doing before i went away and to say that i over packed and picked the wrong things to take is an understatement. Taking a whole bunch of white clothes travelling, for example, is just a stupid thing to do if you want to keep them for more than a few weeks. This time i hope to be much better equipped. My new hiking boots are beginning to break in nicely now and with all the equipment (and probably a load of stuff unnecessary) i need for the various stages of my trip i am relishing the date i get to pack it in my rucksack and leave...

So what is the plan? Well, the first step of the trip is Tunisia. A country i have wanted to visit for some time. Being a film lover i am itching to get to the locations used for filming Star Wars and the Bourne Ultimatum. The coast of Tunisia is meant to be superb and Jerba island sounds simply divine. I have 3 weeks to dive into this historical land which has been one of the Arab centres of the world for a long time. With history all the way through the Roman, Greek and Persian eras i have no doubt that this place will be steeped in history. I'm also looking forward to sampling the cuisine. Tagines with meat and cous-cous...i could eat one right now.

That is only the first leg. The legs that follow i have no doubt will only get more interesting and with them build memories in my life that i will never forget, that will be part of my history and with that i shall leave you with a little snipet i read a little while ago

“Each man lives for himself, using his freedom to attain his personal aims, and feels with his whole being that he can now do or abstain from doing this or that action; but as soon as he has done it, that action performed at a certain moment in time becomes irrevocable and belongs to history, in which it has not a free but a predestined significance.

There are two sides to the life of everyman, his individual life which is the more free the more abstract its interests, and his elemental swarm-life in which he inevitably obeys laws laid down for him.

Man lives consciously for himself, but is an unconscious instrument in the attainment of the historic, universal aims of humanity. A deed done is irrevocable, and its result coinciding in time with the actions of millions of other men assumes an historic significance. The higher a man stands on the social ladder, the more people he’s connected with and the more power he has over others, the more evident is the predestination and inevitability of his every action."