'Really good way to kick things off from the UK is a little jaunt down into Morocco'

I totally agree with you there, and in your subsequent comments. I spent about a month rolling around Morocco a couple of years ago, and absolutely loved the place. I could see myself settling one day in a little qoria on the edge of the Sahara. The scenery is fantastic, the prices are low and the life slow, and the people are supernaturally nice. So over hospitable in fact, that last time I went, I got accidentally married to a young muslim girl at her families insistence. But that is another story. (Ah Zahara, my beautiful Saharan flower...)

'Whatever you choose won't be wrong. Get the head down, do some research, and getting going sooner rather than later.

Enjoy!'

Thanks, good advice. My research tends to err more towards fleshy daydreams and lounging in boozy sundrenched brain patina than flow charts and border regs, but my heart is in the right place! Sooner can't come soon enough, unfortunately we are both tied in jobs with long contracts to play out, so that keeps us here for a bit longer. Sensible I suppose, otherwise I would leave tomorrow with nothing but a spotted bundle and some kendal mint cake. I'm spending this summer in the Middle East again, to stash some cash.

Thanks to all of you so far who I haven't acknowledged in quotations. I still don't really know where we are going, but I do realise that I don't need to. In reference to my first post, at least I know which way I am going out the gate - left - the rest is in the arms of God or Allah, or providence or luck, or any one of those million unseen hands that make us believe we have free will.

Birdy.

Happy riding