You could join me for a year and a half for the tidy sum of £18,000.


That Includes staying in backpacker Hostels around Australia and Europe and some irregular camping episodes of an unknown time frame due to excessive ingestion of alchohol.

The Hire of a DR650SE for 8 months in Oz.

Fuel,Food and fun,fun, fun....well, my kind of fun anyway.

Waking up in strange but very friendly places after a all-night bender.

Working a couple of weeks every once in a while on construction sites and as a second driver to top up your spending money.

Developing international communication skills in the respected field of " talking bollocks to impress the chicks "

Discover that maps and GPS are totally over-rated and taking roads at random are much more fun and mis-adventerous.



Who wants to book with me right now?

WOW 75k for 40 weeks is nuts even for a paid tour,if I had that kind of money don't think could part with that much - it is about a fifth of our budget for out two year RTW trip!!

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www.mudandknobblies.co.uk

I think what Mrs Fox meant to say is it's in excess of 5 times our budget for our 2 year round the world trip otherwise, I want to know where this money tree is that is going to magically going to come up with this £375000.00.

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http://mudandknobblies.co.uk
http://www.justgiving.com/FMFox

Maths has never been my strong point evidently.

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www.mudandknobblies.co.uk

While this figure does shock many people, and most of us are indeed doing it for WAY less per day, it can depend.

It's 275 per day. A few top end African game parks, and you'll make a serious dent in it. Easy to blow over 1,000 per day there. A few flights and you could burn another 5k to 10k off that (more if all were first class).

When I worked in software, I would tell clients there were 3 variables they would need to juggle. A project could be A) Cheap, B) Fast or C) Good. I let them pick any 2, and the third would suffer. Always.

To do a Good trip, Fast, it will probably not be cheap.


And no, I wouldn't pay it, but that doesn't mean someone else wouldn't take it in a heart beat. And it may be right down their alley.

And there is a difference between surviving, and living. We have decided we want a really good trip, and I'd prefer 18 great months than 24 miserable months (no booze, skip all attractions, no dinners out....). That said, we don't need to drink hundred euro bottles of wine and eat lobster every day either. Ever actually.

What about the folks that buy €250K+ unicat trucks, and use them for a year and park them up. What's cost per day in depreciation? But still it happens.

Merv.

To be fair to Globe Busters it really does depned on what is included in their package.

For some people the best way to go is an organised tour - it's much more time efficient and you probably get to see the best bits without any research on your part.

Looking at their website they do offer a lot of tours at much lower cost but it isn't clear from the site what's included.

My own experience of overland tours is that a lot of time is wasted in administration and whilst it's all part of the 'experience' I would hope that paying £75k for a tour would mean that it was:

1. Quite luxurious in terms of accommodation and food.
2. Stress free - just get up every morning and ride my bike.

But I bet it's not!

In all honesty I would expect an organised tour to be at least double the cost of going it alone, so Globebusters price isn't to far wrong.

At the end of the day they are a buisness and need to make a profit to not only pay a living wage to the owners, guides and administrators but also to ensure the buisness has value for the day Kevin Julia decided to retire and sell the comapany on.

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http://mudandknobblies.co.uk
http://www.justgiving.com/FMFox

I have no affiliation with GB but once asked Julia who their clients were that paid their exuberant prices and why they were so high. Like many on the HUBB, my holidays are DIY so it's hard to comprehend why someone would spend that much cash.

Customers with the cash tend to be:
1. self employed reaping the rewards of a successful business
2. people spending redundancy /retirement funds
3. people celebrating a special anniversary
4. rich folk

The Price covers:
- full support before the trip. Some include the BMW off road training or advanced road training prior to departure and all the necessary paperwork is outlined
- very experienced guides (such as Tiffany Coates!)
- complete organisation - no need to spend time figuring out how to get to the next destination / where to sleep / where to eat / what to see along the way
- support vehicle and medical assistance
- knowledge of the local language / country or access to one who does
- salary for all: guides, office staff
- pre-selected accommodation
... the list is quite extensive

A huge majority of riders would never organise or go such a tour on their own. It's why many tourists go on package holidays!

It's not something I could afford and even if I had access to such funds I'd still travel on a budget as it's in my nature. But best wishes to those who want to spend their money on such trips - at least they're getting out on the road and supporting a British company

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Elaine

Striving to live the ordinary life in a non ordinary way

This ^


There seems to be an unsavoury tendency on here of late to bash people trying to turn 'our hobby' into 'their livelihood'.

If the price someone is charging for a service seems astronomically high to you, it probably means one or more of the following:

1) You're not their target customer.

2) You've utterly underestimated the time/cost/effort/manpower that it takes to provide that service at a level of quality which is acceptable to a paying customer. It's easy to skimp on things when it's only yourself affected.

3) You're not valuing your time highly enough.

There is also a possibility that:

4) Their assessment of what the market will bear is wide of the mark.

However if that were the case, you might expect to see them radically dropping their prices fairly soon. I suspect that won't happen.


Don't get me wrong, I'm not their target market for this tour either. But I don't begrudge them the right to try and make as much money as they can from the people for whom £75k is pocket change. Similarly, were I hand-making customised 'adventure overalls', I'd be damned if I'd be doing it for any less than Austin is charging - it just wouldn't be worth the time it takes.

Unsavoury? It's a chat forum! = No useful content required. = The same sort of chat you'd have in a real bricks and mortar pub. It's all very civilised and amicable as far as I can see. = Savoury = The only savoury food I can think of at the mo =

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Brighty's website: TheBrightStuffDotCom

CURRENT RR WITH REGULAR UPDATES: The Wife Takes on Chlamydia: A South American Retrospective

I think is 'in the nature' of the vast majority on here so collectively we do not represent their target market.

I suspect that a lot of people with the ambition of doing a Round the World Tour look in here, spend a few minutes in the 'Trip Paperwork' section and then go off and book a Globebuster tour

A lot of people are just noting how much money they've saved by doing it themselves.

A lot of people need to go the 'organised' route because they need to be told when they're going and for how long, exactly what they need to take and what they have to do to prepare and then they can just get on with earning the money to pay for it.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who has found when it's just you the start date slips by a week or two and the trip ends up lasting a year instead of the intended six months etc.

Nicely said

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www.mudandknobblies.co.uk

Nope... Not at all. Where's the fun in that ??

However, I do own a rather powerful, bright yellow water pistol..

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Did some trips.
Rode some bikes.
Fix them for a living.
Can't say anymore.

To be totally honest, I would go for that RTW trip without hesitation if I had the financial resources to do so, and it would not leave me destitute.

i.e. if i won the lottery.

I went on one of those BMW Morroco trips, years ago when I got a very short notice offer for a place due to a riders cancellation....I was working in a well paid job/owed some leave, so went on it and really enjoyed myself, and yes it did make a relaxing change to have everything sorted out for me.....As I was in a group I did have to modify my usual riding style of wearing nothing but goose fat and a miners helmet ( aerodynamics ) but apart from that it was great.

SO for me, These trips are totally out of my scope in my present situation. But If I become one of the idle rich/internet porn star/lottery winner then I would be spending the rest of my days doing them.

P.S. It also sends you batshit crazy when you travel on your own for a long time...A lot of people and friends and family are too polite to tell you, but you are starting to edge into that " eccentric uncle/aunty " category with every solo trip you do.After talking with myself for several weeks I managed to catch it before I got that far.

It's a good point that company and socialising are very valuable to most folk. Perhaps we can start a dating/matching section? I'll kick it off here.

I'd love to travel with a woman on the back of the bike. I'd do all the riding and navigation.

She only needs to be light weight and slim, sexy and smiling. Spoken English not essential. Good cooking and washing skills, but not ironing, and sense of smell not important, or wanted!

Fast and competent tyre changing skills needed or ready to learn these. Good with spanners would be appreciated.

Lastly, financially secure and generous of nature.

She'd be seeking a good natured, courteous, non sexist male companion with a sense of humour. Lindsay.