Wookytravels Are Go!

And we're off!

Well not quite but we are starting the plan.

The moment I received the email from the estate agent back home advising that an offer had been received on the house was the moment that the fog cleared and the chains felt as though they were melting away.

We had planned a change since December while on holiday in Indonesia and had had to wait until now because financial commitments meant we were unable to leave the house back home empty until now.


Now we are able to to cobble together some kind of plan which goes something like this (subject to change, as always).

1. Sell the house in the UK.
2. Resign at work.
3. Give notice on the flat.
4. Sell everything we own and throw out the rest.
5. Apply for Indonesian visas.
6. Book flights - first stop Donggala.
7. Get the fuck out of here and not look back.

Until we exchange contracts on the house items 2-7 are on hold but that doesn't stop us planning and it certainly doesn't stop Paul spending endless hours looking at Youtube videos of fish and dolphins.

We are going to make a bit of a holiday of it, having felt that we have been dragged to hell and back over the last couple of years.  We will then enrol in a Celta course in Thailand, head back to the UK, take a deep breath and leave again.

In deciding where to head for the next adventure we were initially influenced by the job Paul applied for in Uganda.  He applied the day before we left for Indonesia in November 2014 and we had spent much of our holiday researching Uganda to reach an informed decision as to whether we could live there and fell in love with the country putting Uganda and Africa generally firmly on our "places to go" list.

Paul made it onto the short list of 6 candidates (out of 60) and interviewed just before Christmas but was bitterly disappointed when the job was offered to someone else.  Knowing that the disappointment would almost be too much to bear to had already decided on a plan B: to sell up and head off anyway.

With Africa fresh in our minds we initially researched the cost of a 9 month overland trip from Morocco to Cairo via Cape Town but that plan is currently on hold.  Instead it is likely we will take the teaching English route to China which, in fairness, was already on our list and it only seems right that we follow that dream for now.

Meanwhile, as we wait to exchange contracts, we are quietly preparing for the off.  We have two of most things either by necessity or to prevent arguments:  mini laptops, dive computers (which should by rights come with a 10 year old to explain how to use them although 2 solid days of study and Paul reckons he knows his way around them), decent walking shoes for stomping around tropical jungle and one new day pack.

We still don't know our dates.  We are currently hoping we will make the Celta course in Chiang Mai which starts in November but if exchange takes much longer we might have to rethink.  It's the waiting that is the worst of it but at least there is light at the end of the tunnel, we just don't know how long it will take before we get there.