Champagne fuelled race across America - place your bets now!

Stephen and I have known for "years" that we would go travelling at some point. When Stephen recently passed his accountancy exams a proper holiday seemed an appropriate and just reward for the hard slog to attain chartership. He can now add "ACMA" after his name, although I think the letters "FAT" are probably also appropriate. Post TransAm he is expecting to replace the "A" with "I" :) For most of the time since we made the decision to go travelling it was something that was firmly anchored in the future. We have yet to fully comprehend what we are doing, which is a good thing. I am sure it will become real once we step onto the plane. If we always knew the exact outcome of every decision we make there are probably lots of things we would never do. Today it is one week till we go and there is no turning back.

Since making the decision to take a gap year we have discovered that we are "old" travellers. Most insurance companies do not offer back packer insurance to people over 36! In light of changing lifestyles, the fact that people live longer and have children at on older age, I think the age limit should be adjusted upwards to beyond 37 at least. There's another good reason to travel: travel while you are young, fit and can get insurance at a reasonable price! It seems we may have missed the boat on "young". But we are still fit (at least we think we are) and we have had time to earn enough to afford extortionate insurance.

We thought that it would be good for our well being to take some time away from work. It is so easy to become engrossed in a job and to forget that it is not the only option. Maybe we will see the bigger picture when we go travelling. Although, I have no expectation that I will understand the meaning of life just because I have been swanning around for 7 months while my peers have been working. Our assumption is that it is more difficult to make the decision to travel than it will be to find a new job. We will find out later this year if our assumption holds true. Work may even seem like something fun after battling wind, rain, high temperatures and the Rockies on a bike. We live in hope.

There were some other extraneous circumstances that propelled the decision to go travelling. Two days prior to buying the flights I had come back from my 2nd conference in Amsterdam and my ability to think straight had been lost somewhere at the Amsterdam Hilton - or maybe I had gained an ability to make snap decisions. The other driver in the decision was drinking a bottle of champagne between getting the quote for the flights and paying the deposit. And, why wait till tomorrow with what you can do today???

Why are we cycling across America? Well, because we both think we look really good in lurid, yellow lycra. And, because Stephen wants 4,100 miles to prove that he is faster than I am. Oh, yes the race starts here!