I have been asked by more than one person why I have titled this project as A Man, A Jeep, No Real Plan. I mean you can clearly see (or at least you could up until now) a very detailed route for this summer. To the outside world, it looked like a plan. However it was the dream, hell it still is a dream trip.
I don’t know if it’s this way for everyone, but for me, I dream big. I make plans for perfect worlds and I announce them loudly and boldly. Nothing ever goes as planned, I accepted that as just being part of life.
I mean I once got married, there was plan there, clearly I am no longer married. I once ran away with the circus, it wasn’t a great plan, but it had all the earmarks of a plan. Totally ran off to work on a ship, that did not survive either. Ok, maybe I just have horrible plans…. At any rate, I had this wonderful route planned out, and now I can’t do it.
Have no fear, the road trip is still going to happen this summer, but for reasons I can’t announce yet, I will not be leaving Bloomington on May 12th. The earliest I might escape now is mid-June, but I might not be leaving until as late as early July.
So how is the trip getting changed? Well here are my options:
1. Do the exact same route, just push my start date back. There are a few problems with this plan. For beginners that would have me getting home in mid November, missing 2 months worth of work that I was not currently planning on missing. Also, camping will be cold by then.
2. I cut 4 to 6 weeks out of the trip so I can end on the original end date. This has the obvious drawback of not being the trip that I had planed. It also would require me to try and figure out what is “a must do” and what I can live without.
3. Form a new plan, throw everything out and create a new route that fits my new timeline, but doesn’t try to look or feel like the old one.
4. Have no plan. Instead of having a route, I would make a list activities that I must complete before coming home. Downside to this one, people who I end up visiting will not have a lot of warning before I show up. Also it means I don’t know how long this trip is going to take. I may be back in Bloomington in time for Welcome week, I might not be back till Christmas…
So, what do you guys think? Let me know in the comment section (also because I want to know the damn thing works).
Oh, and here is a photo from an old adventure:
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Seriously friends, does this thing even work?
It does indeed work. You could always do half of the trip one year and then the rest next summer?
I think you should go with option #3 listed. Make a new route that fits your timeline.
You need to get out there and just wander, do you, think all your dark and light little thoughts – explore them, explore the map, explore YOU.
Do #3. (Im not good at delivering opinions that aren’t direct).
Yeah, I’d say go with #3 as well. (I mean, umm, nobody replies to this thing, please continue yelling incoherently into the void.)