I have come to a point in my life where I am unsure of which path to follow; I am looking for honest answers and advice. In the end the decision is my own and I am not looking for anyone to make it for me, rather I am looking for advice from those of you who have more experience than I in life. I am 27 years old and luckily I realized years ago to learn from others mistakes, life lessons, regrets, and triumphs. Forgive me if this is to long but I feel that I must provide a certain amount of details to help others understand where I am coming from.
All my life I have been looking for adventure since I was a little kid, needless to say I have done a great amount of hiking, backpacking, Mt. biking, USMC, motorcycle racing, and a multitude of other activities I’ve gone cross country for 5 weeks as well. So this draw is nothing new for me. What I am thinking of doing, and have been seriously considering it for months now, is to sell what I have and pack my life onto my KLR and ride for a year or more till I just feel like I’m done and want to go home. I would ride from my home in CT starting approximately May 2010 to wherever the road takes me at minimum I would want to go to Alaska, then down to TDF taking my time along the way no strait lines not the fastest way possibly spending days at a time in the same spot if it was looking like a good spot. If possible I would ship myself and my bike to Europe and travel the same way there. This would be a self funded trip and the chance of a lifetime. So here is the fork in my road. If I take this trip I will lose my girl of 3 years as she does not want to wait any longer, we were going to move to Colorado buy a house and start off there, we have known each other for 13 years so 3 doesn’t really count. I have asked her to come along and she wants nothing to do with the trip. I’m afraid that if I don’t take this trip that I may be resentful to our relationship for the rest of my life with the could have would have should haves. But if I do take this trip I may be missing out on a family and a home for some years. But I could also possibly meet someone with the same interests as me and that would be great. If I don’t do it now I’ll be stuck with a mortgage payment and probably kids for the rest of my life and never have the opportunity to do something like this.
My budget for the trip would be approximately $9000 US per year while on the road; I will have prepaid a year’s worth of medical coverage and motorcycle insurance as well as a year subscription to the Find Me Spot with the tracking and the rescue coverage to give my family some peace of mind. Tax on my bike is only $50 a year so not a big expense. I do have someone at home to take care of my mail and bills if need be but I will be debt free in a year, damn student loans. As a backup I will have a credit card of course. I have no problem if low on funds getting a job wherever I find myself for a while and then continuing on, so that is always another option. Financially I know it’s not a lot of money but I don’t need much, I am planning on camping everywhere unless offered a room, and eating well but not too well I’ll make all my own meals.
I feel fairly prepared, I’ve done plenty of traveling in the past but the Dual Sport style is a bit new to me but I’ve been racking up the miles and have been riding various other bikes for years. The gear is not a problem like I said I’ve been hiking and doing things for years so I have all the necessary gear (cooking, sleeping, tents, medical, water filtration, clothes….).
So what advice do you have to offer? And what questions do have?

EDIT: im getting all kinds of support for going from everyone and i greatly appreciate it. i have to say i think that you are right it is something that i should do and if i didnt i would regret it later on down the line for numerous reasons. im definitely going to try to make it work between us and give her lots of options because she is great but as of today i wont be letting her/us stop me from going.
i also would like to know what else you guys think about the trip. do you think its possible on $9000 US, thats about $24.65 a day, it would severely limit my range but give me the time to take it all in. im thinking i could use $5 a day for food, cook my own stuff of course and fish in my down time (i would not count on catching fish im a pretty bad fisherman) so what do you think about the logistics of it all?
EDIT: I HAVE DECIDED TO GO!! AFTER YEARS OF DREAMING AND MONTHS OF CONSIDERING I FEEL THIS IS WHATS BEST FOR ME THE PLAN IS TO LEAVE MAY 2010!!!!

Cheers

josh

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