My travels finally have an end date: I’m currently planning to head home on May 28. If I make it that long, I will have been gone for thirteen months. So with four months to go, I’m in the last third of the trip.
I’m also in a markedly different phase of the trip. Halfway through January, I left We Roam. I flew from Cambodia halfway around the world to South Africa and spent a couple weeks with my mom, on an Adventures by Disney trip that took us to the Garden Route and on safari. More on all of that—both the South Africa trip and the decision to leave WR—soon.
On safari!
From this point on, I’ll truly be flying solo. I have a few meet-ups planned—a We Roam friend whom I met in Barcelona will be joining me in Mexico City for her birthday and a longtime friend from my law school days is coming to Peru for the Machu Picchu trip finale. But I’ll be on my own day-to-day, setting my own itinerary, and making my own travel arrangements.
Just a couple weeks in, I’ve already exercised that freedom. Lately I’ve had some doubts about my ability to last until May. The first six months of my trip were pretty orderly; I was based in one city and generally took one side trip each month, usually just a long weekend, sometimes a week. It was manageable. But ever since late November, my travel has been out of control. In summary: Myanmar to Hanoi to Hong Kong to Hanoi to Da Nang to Hanoi to Ha Long Bay to Hanoi to Phnom Penh to Hong Kong to Siem Reap to Phnom Penh to Cape Town to Knysna to Kapama to Auckland. In the last two months, I’ve spent no more than eight consecutive nights in one bed.
So now I’m in New Zealand, and I was supposed to embark today on an eighteen-day road trip through both islands, making my way down to Queenstown, partaking in adventure sports and wine tasting along the way, and not staying in any hotel longer than two nights.
I just couldn’t do it.
I’m completely worn out from the last couple months. I’m in the beginning stages of a cold, which will either be mild or terrible, depending on how much I let myself rest right now. I’m jet lagged. I still have a lingering bit of traveler tummy; I don’t think my stomach has felt wholly well since I got to Asia in October.
And I’ve also been overwhelmed by work lately. I launched my own freelance book editing company, Hyphen, at the beginning of November. I’m extremely proud of how well it’s done so far. I just sent my 50th client invoice, I nearly doubled my target take-in for January, and I’m currently scheduling edits for early April. But I’m working much more than I was before, and it’s tough to do that with short-term travel and nonstop tourism. I was tuning out the guides on the bus in South Africa to work and finishing “one last paragraph” at lunch. You may have noticed that I didn’t write a single blog post in January; I didn’t have one spare hour.
A friend once used the phrase “emotional resilience,” and I’ve thought of it often. When I’m tired and stressed, my emotional resilience dwindles. Yesterday, I found myself having a mini-breakdown in the Waiheke ferry terminal, trying to get back to Auckland in the midst of a storm, and I realized I had fully drained my reservoirs and was no longer having fun.
So I’m accepting my physical, mental, and emotional limitations. I thought about just going home, to be honest, but winter and a terrible flu season are making New York less appealing. Instead, I’ve decided to head to Sydney early. I was scheduled to be there for twelve days at the end of February; instead, I’ll spend the whole month there and take in the city at a more relaxed place, with time for work and rest.
I’m a little disappointed in myself. Planning is my strength, and this road trip was impeccably planned. Part of me feels like I should just suck it up and execute it. But I know that it’ll be worthless if I can’t enjoy it. So I’m tucking the itinerary Word doc into my travel folder, with the tentative idea to come back next winter. And I hope that cutting myself a little slack here will allow me to fulfill the ultimate plan of staying on the road for a year.
So on to Australia!
