Hello! Been a while since my last trip (an agonising year and a bit). I returned from Africa in October 2009, and returned to work for Blacks temporarily - that temporary return turned into a year. Never, ever, ever under any circumstances work in a clearance store!
So anyway - from January I will be in the USA. I've signed up to volunteer in the Grand Canyon - trail maintenance, fencing and re-vegetation among the projects. I'm told there's a lot more to it than that, but it will be a lot of hard work, and I'm really looking forward to it. For every 4 days on project you get 3 days off - sometimes it may be 8 days working then 6 days off in return. In my free time I hope to do a bit of travelling - from the base in Flagstaff, Arizona, you can get to Los Angeles, Vegas or a number of other places quite easily. I can't wait to get on that open road.
The project ends two days before my birthday - then I have 3 full weeks before my visa ends in which to travel the US - the plan for that will very much be formed on a whim!
So I come back to the UK in April - the plan from then is to start planning for New Zealand. I have tickets to see John Cleese in June (which will be AWESOME), so I am free after that. You can get a working holiday visa for a year until you're 30, and with various film projects (i.e The Hobbit!) and a rugby world cup going on it shouldn't be too hard to scrounge some sort of job while out there.
After that, who knows? I may go to Australia, or there might be a chance to extend my stay in New Zealand. Something that will always be on the to-do list is my return to Africa. I feel that my time in the beautiful place will never be over. My car took nearly a year to be fixed and is now sold - I now no longer own a Mitsubishi Pajero Jr called Colin ;-( Though this is quite sad and depressing to me, I really, really hope to get back out there soon. The BIG PLAN has always be to go from Cape Town to Cairo then back to the UK. This will be a long and expensive trip, but will be as relaxed as I want. ONE DAY - definitely!
So there it is - updated blog, new design! I've not booked my flights yet - work buggered up my pay AGAIN, so it will have to wait until they sort themselves out until I can afford them. (Twats).
Ian....
The countdown begins.....
