And we're off...

We've landed safely in San Diego where we will spend one week visiting Eric's parents before heading off to Chico where Eric will start his new job. We are thrilled to be traveling again, after a brief hesitation about leaving our friends behind back in Mississippi. We’ve left them countless times over the last 5 months traveling back and forth for this trip, but this time was a bit more surreal as we have no idea when the next time we will be seeing them again may be. I should clarify: I felt a sense of hesitation while Eric only felt excitement about what was to come.

The day before we left I started to feel a sort of ambivalence I hadn't quite expected in preparing for this trip. We have been traveling through Mexico via motorcycle since November on and off again and I only just now thought twice about my own mortality. While people remind me all the time how absolutely insane the idea of driving across the world on the back of a motorcycle actually is, my own sense of fear never really kicked in until I found myself preparing my house for a 6+ month leave. Thoughts crossing my mind consisted of things like “what if I never make it back home, what happens if we get arrested in some southern country, fall to our deaths from a cliff, or simply get lost in a lifestyle of travel which could very well consume the rest of our lives”. I couldn't help but think of the reality of the situation. People hardly believe danger will find them in beginning their own trips, but it’s true that some people never make it back home. If we happened to belong in that category later on, would our short lived journey have made up for the lifetime we would be missing out on? The answer is no, but I suppose after all it would be worth chancing. Looking at our fully packed bags on our last day reignited that hesitation, but those feelings slowly dissolved as I looked forward to the flight to San Diego and our friend Terry arrived to give us a ride to the airport. Since we left home, I've once again found myself only feeling optimistic about the future and what will come of this trip. I blame my hesitation on fear of change and not fear itself, and my emotionally overrun heart in knowing I wouldn't be seeing the good friends that I've made again for what seems like a long, long time.

San Diego has been fantastic. It is easy to forget how great this part of the world is, and I enjoy its peaks every time I come back home (Eric’s home) - especially the weather. We've spent the last few days with Eric’s parents and brother lounging around the house and catching up on our journey and theirs- I think they travel more than we do! Eric built a computer for his mom, has been keeping up his practice by draining an infection from his brothers foot and leg: a bad luck mosquito bite, and we've both been exercising quite a bit since the weather actually allows us to do so.

We also got the chance to meet up with some relatives and friends we havnt seen in quite some time. Edward, Eric's cousin through marriage came down for a visit which gave us the opportunity to eat some great italian and chinese food, Eric's childhood friend just happened to be in town at the same time so he invited us over to his dads house for a BBQ, an impromptu drum show, and a night out drinking, and lastly we had the chance to meet up with Eric's cousins, aunts and uncles who live down the road but happen to be impossible to catch every time we are in town. We always have a great time visiting in San Diego, but this one was more special to us than normal and gave us a good "farewell for now" before leaving the country for a month. So far, no complaints at all living life on the road, and thankful for a good start to our trip.

Nerd alert and side project for Eric Liu. This is reason 7384597836434 why I love him- building a computer for his mom-just because

Eric and I are obsessed with Nina, Kevin and Suri's dog. If we could steal her away without them knowing we would

Eric continues his practice off duty as Kevin needs his foot and leg drained. I'll keep the grotesque photos for myself :/

Dinner with the Ikezi's and Chihiro's incredible family

Chihiro's father and son play us some good music

After dinner drinks at Chihiro's hotel

Mahjong can last well into the night and early morning at the Liu's

16 days left in OS

We've been busy the last few weeks since we decided to hang around OS until the start of our long trip. We've planned, purchased items for the trip, read other ADV reports to prepare for what sort of packing we might need, and dealt with real life around the house. Since we've been back, I've gone to Liberty University for two weeks in order to knock out a few intensives required for my MA degree before leaving for our trip. Eric's been counting down his shifts one by one and happy to do so. It's hard to imagine he really only has 10 shifts left at this point in time. After a month of us debating, I think we decided to leave the back milk crate the way it is for now and leave camping gear at home until the rainy/hot season passes, and pick it up when Eric flies back to work one month.

We leave Gulfport on June 26th. Eric's last day of work is June 25th getting off at 7am on the 26th. Our flight out of GPT is at 6:55pm on the 26th. This will be our last time in GPT for .. who knows how long. We will fly to San Diego for about 5 days before heading to Eric's new job in order to get a good visit in with Eric's family before the trip. We fly to Chico, CA, where Eric's new job will be on the 4th of July. We'll be there for 6 days in which 4 of them Eric will be working his first shifts in Chico. Here we plan to leave a bag of non motorcycle clothes and our camp gear/other misc. motorcycle equipment with a friend until we need it again later on. Chico will be our new home base until the end of our trip. On the 10th, we start our flight to Cancun, but have a nights layover in San Francisco which we intend to take advantage of and have booked a hotel in the city near Chinatown.  The next day, we continue our flight to Cancun where we will then take a bus down to Paamul in order to pick up our bike.

We'll spend at least 2 days at a B&B in Puerto Aventuras where will will have access to aircon, wifi, and a good place to prep our bike before heading off again.

We leave in 15 days. Until then, I will be trying to finish post work from my two classes I took a few weeks ago and practicing a bit of Spanish along with us planning our close upcoming trip. While we thought this month and a half off would be way too much down time, we've learned that the next 15 days will fly by much faster than expected.

Pics of the last month can be viewed here:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/whereruericliu/