Fork in the road! Which way to go?
 

Hey all,
Off the bat I would like to say that I hate posts that ask you to make life decisions for someone.
What I'm asking is: 'is it possible?'

Life in the Uk has taken a bit of a down-turn in the past 6-months, separated from wife(not actually that bad :S), family death and last friday, the cherry on the cake, was made redundant.

I'm now sitting thinking about heading off! I've been seriously thinking about emigrating to Oz for a long time, and i'm starting to think that now might be that time.

The problem I have is, how to get there. The choices I have are take a big bag of money and fly over. Or take a smaller bag of money and bike it there!
Again I have always wanted to tour the world after getting up on two wheels. I'm currently 25 and see it as two choices, I can do it now, turns out to be the best thing I've ever done, or fly over wait till I'm 40 to save up enough money and do it then.

The question I have for you is: Is it possible to bike through EU, Asia and on to oz. I have plenty of time to do the trip, thats not the problem.After I have bought out the bike I want to take(currently on HP). I will have a budget left of £15000($21000). From what I've read, EU would be the most expensive part of the trip, where as Asia would be very cheap and could travel around there for months. I have a friend that lives in Bhukket(Thailand) who told me I could be travelling around for less that £10($15) a day.

Am I being realistic? Can this be done, with some change left over to setup in Oz? Any thoughts or comments welcome!

Easy
 

Hi, the fact that you're wondering tells me this is an easy decision. You must do the trip or you'll never get a night's sleep in Oz. You'd probably be disturbed by an overpowering urge to know, "what if I'd done it?" Grab the chance with both hands while you still can. Linzi. ps don't forget to budget for a backup vehicle and film crew, otherwise you'll not get the real adventure experience.

25 years old? great big bag of money? no schedule to follow? No career tying you down?

Sh*t mate. Anything is possible!

Matt :)

You have the money and time.. do the trip!!

Only thing you need to do is find out if you can emigrate to Aus. Aus government is not open with immigration these days.

The Job market there is not that much better then here (some say worse). The Aus gov wont just let you come in (immigrate) if you dont have a job/sponsor or really needed skill. read though this site Department of Immigration & Citizenship

So step one is look at your job situation (Job Search, Employment Information and Career Advice at careerone.com.au or SEEK - Australia's no. 1 jobs, employment, career and recruitment site). The difficulty may be finding a job (that will sponsor) you and allow you to take your time getting to it.

Then talk to the high commission in London to see if they will give you a immigration visa. If you dont get permission to immigration you will not be allowed to bring the bike in with you with out a carnet du passage and that last for only a year (and it may not be possible to import the bike after that). if you do get permission to immigrate then go here (Importing Vehicles to Australia) and get import permission for your bike.

Good luck mate
Xander

this one is a no-brainer, what are you waiting for?

Well, it all points to Go Do It :mchappy:! My best friend's emigrating to Oz very shortly and it's taken a bit of time (several months) sorting the paperwork out, so i guess it's not simply a case of tipping up there and expecting to stay. But spending a fair bit of time there'll be really useful to find the best place for you (with your own transport there, a real boon). SE Asia's pretty good value most any time, but Thailand now is especially good with an apparent drop in tourist numbers driving great deals there :thumbup1:.

And as for...- Yawn!

Hey man sounds like a great plan. If I were doing it I would sort out the Aus side first like Xander said. Difficult to get in and get a job, but if you stress out over that now and get sorted over there with a job waiting, you can hit the road happy. Robert Wicks said any motorcycle trip is about the journey, but having a destination helps bundles as you have something to aim for and will give yourself a time plan.

This is a dream situation, take time to sort it out.
:thumbup1:

if I was 25 again and was asking this question the answer would be... Bike and ride overland. :scooter: Go RTW. Go the whole way around.

I would say the budget you have would get you RTW.

When I was 25 I had money like you. I didn't follow my dream. Now I have very little money due to family etc and so want to tarvel around the world. :helpsmilie:

Down Under here we are going into recession so jobs are not going to be that easy to find. We are about 6 to 8 months behind the rest of the world. :censored:

choices!
 

"If you come to a fork in the road, take it."

-Yogi Berra-


Do the trip, it will transform you. You'll make a 10 year leap in life experience which will be a great benefit once you're in Oz!

Noel
exploreafrica.web-log.nl

do it do it do it do it do it do it.

whats that bloody irritating saying about regretting the things you didnt do more than the ones you did???

life is for living!!

and if you start in 2 weeks you can meet up with us on the way!!
:thumbup1:

Back in '65 when I was invalided out of the forces, my best buddy and I had planned to ride to india, me on my Triumph T100 he on his velocette MSS. As it turned out he changed jobs that year and could not take the time off, so we did not go. It did not seem like a big thing then and life went on. I have though always regretted not going. looking back on my life I have few regrets, nearly ALL of them are things I did NOT do, not things i did do. Given the chance now I would still do it.