The excitement of planning a trip…

How often do we hear the statement that it’s the journey not the destination that counts. Prior to any journey commencing is the planning – this is were the fun begins!
A journey between two locations can be extremely dull and mundane unless planned in advance. The planning – creating a trip budget, researching routes and cross referencing overlanders opinions – extends the journey by adding days, weeks or months of pre-trip planning. The excitement, the anxiety and dealing with the negative soothsayers heightens the senses, evolving the planning into the journey itself.

My excitement for an upcoming trip is brewing. In late September 2015, I will be heading back to the Australian outback to cross the Simpson Desert (West to East) in support of the Simpson Desert Mountain Bike Challenge event. The cycle event, now in its 27th year, is a multi-day stage race for endurance mountain bikers. The route varies each year, with each day divided into two stages. A morning stage, which starts at 6am and an afternoon stage starting at 2pm. The distance covered is roughly 100km per day. A sweeper vehicle ensures that riders make the time cutoff and contributes to the pressure of finishing the stage in the allocated time.

Simpson Desert Bike Challenge - 2015 Route

Overland Trip Budget Planner

How do you budget for an overland trip?  That's a tricky question to answer and a question that majority of overland trips don't event attempt to answer.  Nick from Langebaan Sunset attempted to provide a full years worth of budgeting from his recent UK to SA trip.  It is worth visiting his website to get an insight into the costs.

Budgeting and planning is often the most important aspect of any trip, however, the multiple countries and currencies often play havoc on budget planning.  Francois, a member of the Overland Forum, kindly created this spreadsheet which allows for multiple countries and currencies to be integrated into a budget.  It's a fantastic tool which will be very useful for planning.

Here is the link to the Google Group page and the link to download a copy: Overland Forum - Overland Trip Planner.

Desktop day dreaming.

Another day and another desktop image (photo taken of my monitor)

Overland Preparation:
I am relatively impatient.  When I get an idea, I want to go out and do it.  Forget the training - I want to do it now.

However, reality is not quite like that.  In my quest to prepare for http://www.bigsky-adventures.com, I came to the conclusion that preparation is part of the trip.  In the analogy of an amateur athlete, getting to the start line is the hard bit.  Like wise in preparing for an overland trip.
At the time it seams like hard work as the departure date seems to take forever to arrive - but my key point is this.  Preparation time for an overland journey adds to the time off.  It enhances the journey as you scan maps, read blogs, watch videos and get inspired by other overlanders.  It's important to stop and relax and enjoy the thought that you are about to go on an overland journey.

I am a keen advocate on planning and preparing well - however, there is an element of over planning... more on that thought later.