The Last Goodbyes
The older I get, the harder I find saying goodbye. I’m not entirely sure why that should be.
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From the road
Journal
The Journal is where life on the road is shared in full. Every week brings a new chapter, capturing not only the places visited, but also the realities of living by bike, creating the guides, articles and stories that make up FTtouring. It's an honest account of the highs, the lows, the unexpected moments and everything in between, offering a deeper look at the person behind the adventure.
Africa Bound
The last of the goodbyes were said on Monday and Tuesday, which meant that by Wednesday there was only one more familiar place left to leave behind: the library.
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Two Weeks To Go
As I write this I have two weeks to go until my ferry leaves for Bilbao and just ten days until I’m due to leave Kent and begin the cycle down to Portsmouth. It’s all feeling very real now but, for the first time since beginning to plan this trip, I’m starting to feel like I might just be prepared. Well, as prepared as I can be anyway.
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Change In The Air
For most of the last few weeks, the weather has made life here at my woodland camp remarkably easy. Just the way I like it. Long, dry days. Warm evenings. Plenty of chances to sit outside in the evenings and just appreciate the lifestyle. It was easy to imagine that late summer might continue indefinitely, certainly up to the point I was due to head south. But over the last week, a change has begun to take over the woods. I believe they call it autumn.
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The Postponement
A lot can change in a week. Some changes are helpful and constructive. Others just seem to throw up more questions and doubt. But all of them are, I’ve come to learn, integral to the process when your life is about to change in almost every sense.
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Testing The Plan
Monday was a Bank Holiday, which meant the library was closed and, for once, there was little I could do about the growing list of jobs that need completing before my departure. Normally that might irritate me. The library has become something approaching an office over the last few weeks, mostly because it provides three things that make organising an extended trip much easier: electricity, internet and somewhere to sit for several hours without being expected to repeatedly buy coffee.
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A Month To Go
There is now roughly a month between me and departure. That sounds like plenty of time until I look at the list. Then it sounds alarmingly close. For the last few weeks, Africa has existed mostly in research tabs, notebooks, maps and conversations. The idea became a plan, the plan slowly became something I could imagine actually doing, and now I seem to have reached the stage where there is very little left to decide except whether I am genuinely going to get on the bike and start riding south. The answer to that is increasingly obvious. Yes. I mean, why not?
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A Step Closer
Last week Africa still felt like something I was mostly just preparing for. After this last week it has started to feel like something that is actually happening. There is a big difference here. A list can remain a list for a very long time. You can research routes, look at maps, read about borders and convince yourself that all of it is useful without ever quite crossing the line between thinking about a journey and committing to one. That line now seems to be getting closer to being crossed.
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Back ‘Home’
There is something slightly absurd about being back at ‘home’ and still packing my entire life away every morning. Most people, when they return home after months away, probably enjoy the simple things. A bed. A shower. A kitchen. Somewhere to leave their belongings without first checking whether an inquisitive fox has taken an interest in them or if the rain is about to make everything soaked and life much harder.
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The Next Chapter
Coming back 'home' has felt a little stranger than I expected. Not because anything here has particularly changed. If anything, that is maybe the problem. Home is familiar. I know where everything is, I know how life works here and, after months of moving every day, there is something slightly dangerous about how quickly familiarity starts to feel comfortable.
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