Introduction

Getting started

During the second lockdown of 2020, Nneka and I decided to sell up and see the world – or as much of it as is possible during the current pandemic. How much we will be able to see, and for how long, is still unknown. The original Masterplan included places not (presently) accessible so we have had to trim it – to both follow the rules (!) and keep safe. While there may be fewer countries on our hitlist now, we hope they will still provide many great experiences. Through this blog we aim to share our journey with family and friends across the world while the pandemic and its aftermath continue to pervade our everyday lives. 

The Masterplan

Any plan to sell up and travel around the world is a big undertaking. The pandemic has only made it bigger – there are more barriers and so more motivation is required to overcome them. A lack of desire was never going to be our biggest challenge, rather a surfeit of restrictions – both home (rules and guidance in the UK) and away (visitor admission criteria in other countries). 

After four months of relative inactivity – I was not officially ‘working’, nor were we in a position to begin our travels – May 2021 was probably one of the most frenetic of my life. On 1st May I celebrated my 40th birthday. In the ensuing days we packed up, moved out of and completed the sale of our home. This included dismantling the kitchen – sink and all (don’t ask). We put into storage everything we thought we might want again; flogged many of my old, now ill-fitting clothes on eBay; moved into an hotel, then an Airbnb in west London; sold the car; caught up with as many friends as we could in the time of Covid; and on 19th of May flew to Athens, two days after passenger flights there were allowed to resume.  

So it’s been pleasing to find that I can still organise, prioritise, project manage and remain on top of a shed-load of obstacles. Beginning this blog from a Greek island at the beginning of June suggests that those four months of ‘downtime’ probably did what I wanted them to; focus my attention on our trip of a lifetime in a wholly unique environment. 

To some, deciding to pack up everything and head off around the world might seem a bit odd. While friends and family have been generally supportive, there has also been occasional bewilderment, consternation and even derision. But we like a challenge, and getting to where we are now has required fortitude, determination and opportunism. And as I now relax with a morning coffee in Catania (while doing the final edit of our ten-week, six-island Greek journey), where life feels back to normal and cafes, restaurants and bars are open amid a very low count of the ‘delta’ variant, we feel vindicated. Ahead of us lies the unique opportunity to see the Acropolis, the Great Pyramids, Petra etc. with far fewer tourists than normal and travelling on half-empty planes for which we have paid less than half the usual summer-time rate.

Whether this happy state of affairs remains the case only time will tell, but so far, so good.