Fantasy trip #1 - The 'It kinda makes sense' odyssey

It's a matter of simple curiosity that has inspired all of this. I just want to know what the world is really like, I want to see the great and lesser known sites and basically just want to know is actually out there. Books and television can paint pictures in your mind of what the world looks like but at the end of the day only once you have been there do you know what it feels like and the true dimensions of life in the world. This trip stems from the basic curiosity of what is the world really like. Alot of people can and do relate to this. Who hasn't ever dreamed of cutting your ties and setting off for somewhere new. I have always wanted to see the world. All of it. I want to mosy around picking up healthy habits, novel approaches to life and living and soaking it all in. Taking the bad with the good, the ugly with the beautiful, the morbid with the sublime.

Not long ago, as a fresh entrant into the bigger and bolder world that student living had offered I was messing around with friends in a kitchen, fantasising about all the places we wanted to see and we spat out all the places we wanted to see - India, South East Asia, Australia, of course South America, Mexico... Oh and don't forget all of Africa. We figured out that most of us wanted to see all of the world but many weren't that keen on the Middle East or Sierra Lione. We agreed that it would be pretty tricky but why not do it all at once, in one long shot. It kinda makes sense.This is that long shot;

Start in Patagonia in Chile in South America. Criss Cross up through the continent through Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Columbia, Venezuala etc. taking in the festivals, maybe coincide it with the 2014 World Cup in Brazil and explore a large part of the Amazon. Through the smaller countries of Central America and then Mexico up to North America. Take my time in some American and Canadian cities I haven't been to like Miami, New Orleans, Austin, Seattle, Montreal and Vancouver and up the West Coast of Canada. I had the romantic notion of walking from Alaska to Russia along a bridge of ice or get some huskies but maybe that wouldn't be ideal so maybe just some kind of boat across to the East to move with the sun. From there down through China to my mental picture of paradise that is South East Asia visiting Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand and all the others in the vicinity. Make my way towards India where I will attempt to grow a beard because that's what people do in India, casually seek enlightenment and drink green tea. Leaving India I would prefer to skip any turmoil and get up to Eastern Europe through all of First-World Europe to Spain where I will pop on over to my final of five continents to Morocco. After rocking some Kasbahs I will move East through Tunisia and Egypt to Israel where from there it will be a straight shot down through the pesky Sahara towards the Serengetti, Mount Kilimanjaro (that I will hike), the scenic coast of Tanzania, Kenya and Mozambique. I will check out Lake Malawi and some others and then shoot across for the Namib desert and some sandboarding and then catch a good old Greyhound down to where I was born and the oppposite corner of the world from where I started, good old Cape Town. And that's it.

I would alot six to seven months per continent so all up it will be about two and a half years closer to three. You could get a degree in that time if you're lucky but I think this would be more fun. I would have to learn Spanish to assist with South America. I might start the trip by popping on over to Antarctica to take up the tally of continents to six. I would have to carry a big ass knife to thwart off the baddies and a guardian angel to ensure that it all goes smoothly. The romantic idea is to start in one corner of the world and end in the other without ever flying. The odyssey to end all odysseys. Time in my itinerary is open and maybe this will sort out the travel bug that's been with me for so long now. So why not right? You tell me.

Sidenote: Does anyone have a spare few million dollars lying around going to waste? Because that would come in handy.