No motorcycle, no route and no clue. A good start to the trip of a lifetime

Firstly; Mike, Chad, Richard or anyone else at Hendre, if you are reading this then I truly am fuct as you now know what I am planning. I really was going to take the contract but you took too long about it. Please don't fire me!

The leaving date is set for the 9th of June which gives me 5 weeks to buy a motorbike, summer motorcycle gear, reinforced luggage rack, crash bars, new helmet, first aid kit, tent, sleeping bag, some kind of camera... daaaamn... PLEASE don't fire me!

It also gives me 5 weeks to get a Carnet, several visas, off-road training, oh yeah and to plan a route! Maybe actually do fire me!

I am truly shitting one. How do you sum up the emotions that go through your head when you decide to do something like this? It's taken me an hour to get to sleep every night since deciding to go. Reading some of the most inspiring accounts of life on the road have filled me with excitement and a buzz which I can't explain. Reading some of the scariest accounts of near death on the road fills me with a dread that actually makes me feel sick. And the most scary thing of all? I can't plan for tomorrow, how the hell am I going to plan the next 365 days of my life in advance?

So this is it, this is my way of forcing my own hand. Here and now I, Oliver T Francis, commit myself to this trip. No getting scared and bottling it, no more false promises to myself that I will do it next summer and no getting bogged down in the practicalities of life and work. I'm finally doing it! I am really, honest to god, doing it and I have never felt so good in all my life!

p.s. Next person who mentions Ewan McGregor gets a slap.