Into Darkness

... and rain and cold and debt too for that matter...

Yes, Ive finally finished my trip through Africa and am now back in my home city of Vancouver Canada... And true to form, it has done nothing but rain for the two days that Ive been back :)

Ive done my unpack, and Ive re-populated all the drawers and closets with my own clothes in the house (it was home to a friend while I was away so Id packed away most of my personal belongings before I left). Ive also got one of my motorbikes out and started it up and re-licensed it, and Ive been getting it all set up for riding through the winter (trying to make it as comfortable as I can for the horrid conditions).

And thankfully I think Ive got some work lined up to start paying off the depressingly large amount of debt that I accumulated over the trip...
On that note, I seem to burn through about $2000 per month on the trip which is about $13000 total. Then there were a few "extraordinary expenses" during the trip (like paying to go see the mountain Gorillas etc) that added up to about $2000 more.
The motorbike cost me about $5000 to buy and set up and then I also spent about $5000 more on the Carne De Passage for the bike at the start of the trip and for shipping at the end of the trip.
And then there was about $2000 for the airline flights.
So, one way and another the trip its self cost me between $25000 and $30000.

And then to add to that there were ongoing mortgage expenses from home as well as significant property taxes etc... which all totaled quite a few thousand dollars more, so as I said, Ive built up quite a little treasure trove of personal debt over the past six months... and now its time to start paying it off.

... But bad weather darkness (its winter here) and debt aside, the really depressing thing about the trip being over is that, as I knew I would be, Im right back in the same situation I was in before I left... with a complete lack of anything "meaningful" to do with myself!... Running away from this sort of a problem is NEVER a solution for long :)

... Guess Ill keep working on finding a solution to that one too :)