The Money Plan

So firstly we had to come up with a total amount of money needed for the trip and then decide on a cunning plan to acquire the bucks. This has taken a fair amount of research and of course this is an estimated cost. For some security we added 25% to our calculated amount. We have only booked the first hotel in Delhi. For the rest we researched the general cost of accommodation  in the area and used that for our budget. Air travel costs are by far the biggest expense followed by accommodation and then local transport. Food appears to be extremely cheap, especially vegan. I'll elaborate more on the details of the destinations and travel methods etc. later.

One restriction we put on ourselves is to limit our baggage to one small backpack each. Just the essentials, after all people live in India so we should be able to find all we need when we get there. We'll detail the contents of these backpacks later.

Some of our main sources of information have been: two books, Lonely Planet India, Lonely Planet South East Asia on a Shoestring, a couple of maps, Travel Maps of India and Southeast Asia, and many websites, blogs, and forums including http://www.indiamike.com/, and http://www.seat61.com/India.htm .

The figure we came up with to do this trip on half a shoestring is $10 000! This is for 2 people for 10 months in India and Southeast Asia combined. Now we had to find a way of earning this money in the 11 months to our planned departure date. Once before when I needed extra money for college we had driven a truck so this seemed to be a good option.

Trucking in the US is pretty unique as far as jobs go. You can walk in and get paid in a week and they don't care if you leave and come back whenever you want. You can live in the truck and save on rent and you get to choose where you want time off and they just send you there. We have got to see a lot of the country this way.



Our rig and home for 11 months

Sometimes life on the road is interesting..............

And sometimes it sucks.................

Although truck driving can be frustrating at times there is a steady flow of money and so in 8 months we reached our goal. (we also sneaked in a quick trip to Mexico and a trip to South Africa for me to see family) We were not quite ready to depart so decided to stay on and earn some extra cash. This also meant no rent until our departure.

According to one of our books, a good way of learning about Indian culture and just the general way Indians talk and conduct themselves is to watch Bollywood movies. So we bought a pile of them from an Indian shop in Orlando and have spent many hours watching them. Very entertaining once you get used to deciphering the Indian English subtitles.  We have also bought several Indian music CD's to get into the swing of things before we go.

We have our air tickets from Atlanta to Delhi via London on British Airways which was not quite the cheapest we could find but it does break the trip into two 8 hour legs instead of one 14 hour leg. Also we get 8 hours in London. Our passports are at the Indian Embassy getting the visas, expecting those back in the first week in August.

Only 5 weeks to go now and all seems on track and we are ahead on the money, our first hotel, the SB Inn, (http://hotelsbinn.com/) in New Delhi is booked. Mike, the owner emailed us and assured us that our room is booked and "his man" will be waiting outside gate 6 for us!

Next: more info about our destinations and schedule.........