I'm a new member and I hate to be negative with my first post, but I honestly can't see any other way to be.

Having read the bulk of this thread it appears that adventure motorcycling is a relatively exclusive activity. If you're not able to finance yourself by selling property you own, and you have no vocational qualification or skill to aid you in working whilst on the move, most of the advice in this thread is useless.

Granted, a few people here do write accounts of scrimping, saving and working all the hours God sends in an effort to pay for a trip, but they are notably in the minority.

The irony seems to be that adventure motorcyling is so often viewed and portrayed as an escape for the free-spirited who care neither for wealth or commercialism, yet from what I've read here the reality seems to be that you need to be in a position of relative privalege to be able to make that choice to become free-spirited and care neither for wealth or commercialism.

Again, I hate to be negative, but this thread has put me off the idea of adventure motorcyling being anything more than a 2 week holiday-level experience.

If however anyone who doesn't own their own house, doesn't have independant financial means, and doesn't have a BA or an IT qualification wishes to offer me a tale of how they managed to travel at length on two wheels, I'm all ears.