Sathfilms

My travel plans are in place and concrete.

It’s quite exciting.

Usually I don’t know what I’ll be doing or where exactly I’ll be in seven months time, so It’s kind of strange knowing that I fly out on the 18th of November and land in Amsterdam on the 19th. And then I’m in Europe for a good 15 weeks – at least. 

A mate is travelling with me, and I’m meeting another mate who will be in Amsterdam. Two other friends are meeting me up there – one from early December to Early January; and the other will leave just before Christmas. The mate who is doing the entire trip with me might travel off to the USA for a couple of weeks just after we land in Europe, so I’ll probably travel around with the other three while he’s away. The mate who gets to Europe last will land in Frankfurt, so whoever is game will meet him there and we’ll travel around Frankfurt and Berlin, then we’ll move off to Switzerland, then Italy (Florence and Rome at least), then to London and then back to Amsterdam for Christmas and finally to Paris for New Year. All these countries will get five days at least. One friend will leave us just after New Year, and whoever is left will remain in France for a good two weeks, before we go back to Italy.

The strange thing in all this, is that there are two of us (and the third guy who’s already there) who are spending over three months in Europe, and the other friend who is only spending a month there. So for this friend who is there for the month, the rest of us are basically going to travel around with him, rushing through a lot of cool places, and then return back there to “redo” some of these places in more detail. So that’s a bit weird, but I can’t really think of another way to do it unless we let my friend travel around alone. Any ideas?

For example I want to visit family in London and Switerzland and another mate will need to visit his family in Italy. So, it’s probably a little silly to meet them when I’m just in the country for the 5 days when I visit those countries first. So I’ll need a good 10 days in London and probably a week in Switzerland. Let’s see how it goes. My ticket is flexible so I can come home later, but then money becomes an issue. Going back to these places is going to be strange, and in the end we’ll probably end up wasting time in total because we’ll be settling down (sort of) in each place again.

The issue is that my friend visiting Europe for a month hasn’t travelled before and he’s treating it like he’ll never travel again (I hope that isn’t the truth). I tried to tell him that he should maybe stay a tad longer in each place to enjoy it a bit more, rather than trying to visit every country that exists in western Europe for two days. I think we’ve sort of reached a compromise, so each place gets almost a week. I guess it’s sort of good to do a “review” of Europe when going for the first time, so that one can travel back to the places that they like. However, since we are backpacking and since we’re travelling in the off-season, we can play a lot of this trip by ear – so if we’re enjoying Rome we could stay there longer.

The ticket confirmation and the planning for all this has sort of just “happened” so it’s almost a shock. So, now what needs to be done?

• I need to tell work that I’d like to take time off (annual and no-pay) for the time I’m away – because I like it there and I don’t want to leave the company.
• Have to tell family of my dates, and sort of draw out a basic plan so I can tell them when I’ll be in their neck of the woods.
• Have to sort out a holiday-working visa (maybe?)
• Need to sort out a clear budget for the trip.
• Need to sort out a clear budget for me in Melbourne so that I can afford to live overseas!
• Need to pre-book places to stay around the Christmas to New Year time because those times will be busy.
• Need to make sure my US university applications are sent long before I leave.
• Need to lose 30kgs.
• Need to buy a warm jacket.
• Buy good walking shoes (all-purpose shoes).
• Need to buy a backpack.
• Need to make all my bill payments automatic
• Need to plan out what else needs to be done…

What else?