Hello people! i know i tend to be a bit absent, spending most of my time over on ExPo. I'll start my story with a bit of a back story.

I bought my first motorcycle in 2011. a brand new Zuki Vstrom 650 which i still own and don't see myself parting with any time soon. In March of 2012 i was supposed to spend 4 weeks down in Baja with a friend and his jeep. Supposed to was the key word to that story, I work for the Canadian Coast Guard 4 weeks on 4 weeks off, and had a trip off (12 weeks off) and had been looking forward to this trip for some time, the only issue is i am not a permanent employee. In the CG we do competitions internally to fill permanent jobs, and one just so happen to land right when i was supposed to do the trip and forced me to pull out last minute. This was a fairly crushing blow for me. Later that summer we bought a condo, and life took over. This spring there was no way i could do the trip. and this coming winter is out as well due to financial restraints.

I will be 28 this coming March, In my line of work the years pass by VERY quickly. My lovely wife recognized how much i wanted to do this trip and suggested that i plan a Big trip to do for my 30th in 2.5 years. While to some of you this seems like a long way down the road to me it's right around the corner.

Now here comes the fun part, i plan to take a full trip off (12 weeks off) and was contemplating going down to baja for 6 weeks of it or so. but now i am thinking with that much time, i could do a trip i have always dreamed of doing. Shipping my bike to Panama and taking my time riding north.

So starts the planning, first i really need to decide what i want to do during the time, if i would rather spend the time camping and fishing on the shores of the Sea of Cortez in a much slower, lazy pace, or kick it up a notch and cover the 10000km+ i would want to do to cover central america to my home in Victoria BC.

As per your comments, time moves fast and things change. Do the big trip while you have the time and the money and the motivation. The small local trips, biking or fishing, can be done any old time. Panama to home on your 30th birthday, what a cool trip.

(Beware though, these things have a way of growing on you. Sounds like you have some flexibility in your schedule so you could even break it in to stages. Next you'll be thinking, hey, if I did Panama to Victoria, then I could do Victoria to Alaska to finish the top half of the Pan American Highway. Then you start looking at maps and you think, hey, if I went from Colombia to Tierra del Fuego then I will have ridden the entire length of South America and Central and North America.)

oh i know what you mean... as i was reading that i was thinking "Hey, that's not a bad idea." but i have to keep it realistic. My wife, although understanding, is not stoked on the idea of me leaving when i already spend 4 months of the year away from home. 6 weeks is what i would like to keep it to and the chances of me being able to stop, then pick up later is not realistic. i have been looking at the countries i want to go through and i could easily spend a month in each one if i had the time! i can always re visit countries later on with my wife and rent a 4x4 or motorcycle later.

"first i really need to decide what i want to do during the time"

What I am saying here won't be much use to you, but anyway -
When I was aged 28 I didn't know what I wanted to do either; I had lots of ideas and not much disposable cash.
I found my outlet for my need to travel etc etc via other than motorcycles, so you just have to consider all of the factors, including the considerations brought to you by your wife!

Incidentally, 10K Km (about 6000 miles) is not so far - I've done 3000 mile trips within Europe in about 10 days and that was not by running really long days of riding (average of 300 miles per day of course).

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Dave

great advice so far! thanks guys! More and more really thinking that the panama-Canada is the choice to go, Baja is realistically not that far away, and only a $350 flight away. Been doing some research for the trip and it seems very doable in the time frame i would like to do it in, and there is a lot of flexibility with ride millage. 250 miles a day is very easy to do in my strom. and if i want i can always stay longer in Central america, Costa Rica and Belize are pretty high on my list for countries to see, i can always power through the US and do big millage days to compensate. Got my hands on the box set of movies to go over.

on that note i am starting to make a list of "must see" vs. "would be nice to see", so if you have any suggestions throw them out! hoping to camp most nights, prefer to camp on the beach. Just read that all beaches in Panama are public and allowed to camp! will have a backpacking rod and my heavier hand line to do evening/morning fishing.

also, who says i can't do both trips? take the ferry from Mazatlan to the Baja and come up that way! really the trip from panama isn't that much longer if you factor in the round trip millage of Baja.