Only 24 days left

Hi there,

My first post of my Australasia blog and I'm not even away yet. You can't start soon enough though ;) My trip is just one month away and I can't wait to go. Since my sportstrip in 2006 the idea of 'definitely going back to Australia' evolved into a half around the world trip.

The masterplan is to head for Sydney once again, get myself a car (anyone interested in joining me?) and head for Bowral and Canberra to visit my friends. After that I'm planning to head north up to Cairns, cross through the outback all the way to Uluru and back to Sydney via Adelaide and Melbourne. Back in Sydney, I'll sell my car and fly to New Zealand. Starting in Christchurch and ending in Wellington, from which I'll fly back to Australia.

After a couple of days back in Sydney, it's time to leave Australia behind for three months and head to Hong Kong.

From Hong Kong I'll travel all the down to Singapore or maybe Indonesia, depending on how much time I have left at that point. Going from Hong Kong to Singapore means I'll be travelling through China, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand and Malaysia. I'll be leaving Holland solo, but I'm sure to meet heaps of great people on my trip!

As for preperations, I may have started a bit slow, but most things have been taken care off. I bought my tickets at World Ticket Center (WTC). I've got mixed feelings about this company. I think they charge fair prices and their deals are okay, but they had a hard time getting everything right; mixing up airports, dates and routes. The tried to blame it on the system, but yeah, whatever. Although it's all sorted out now, the proces was far from relaxed. I also got my Australian Working Visa sorted, received my injections and insurance is taken care of. That leaves a couple of things I still have to do; firstly, buy additional gear. I'm don't want to buy a whole lot of the stuff here that I'll only use in Asia. There'll be plenty of opportnities to buy them in Australia and New Zealand, and in that way I won't be carrying around unnecessary weight. Second, I got to get myself a creditcard. I've got a savings account which I want acces to, and I hope they can provide me with a creditcard. Gotta check on that. I should also check on hostel reservations for some specific dates, especially christmas/new year's eve in Sydney.

That's for now :) I'll be updating this blog infreguently, but I'll defenitely make sure to bring you the juiciest and wickedest of my stories, so no worries! I probably post the blogs on my MySpace page, and I'll mail some of you guys personally.

Have a good day!