One Week to Go!

A week from today is departure day; Fortunately for us, Jeff's parents are going to drive us to the airport to save taxi or airways transit fare. It will be a long day as we wait until our late evening flight. We're leaving late at night and yet arriving late in the morning in Portugal; a 7-hour flight actually becomes a 12-hour flight with the time change (kind of neat but it'll make for a super long day once we get there!).

Jeff's excitement is mounting along with mine, although he's much more covert than I am. I'm practically bouncing off the walls ready to go.

I'm going to attempt packing my carry-on today, just to see how much I can fit and then start laying out everything else for my backpack. Jeff and I'll have to figure it out this week and by the weekend we should be ready to go.

At my grandma's birthday party yesterday, family and friends encouraged me to blog as often as I can and seeing as I'll most definitely have better access to Internet cafes (not to mention electricity) in Europe than in Africa, I'm sure I'll be able to oblige.

As our trip draws ever nearer I'm beginning to take notice to the things in my comfortable life that make it home (because I've missed them before after long journeys)... #1 My super comfortable, warm, soft, welcoming, cushy bed - I always miss my bed while I'm away and I'm sure many of you can relate if even for a couple of nights in a hotel room. #2 Our hot, high pressured shower - after bathing in Ecuador and Ghana with cold water and sometimes out of buckets, I'll probably miss my shower too, even though I hope not to shower out of bucket on this journey. #3 My kitty, who is a member of our little family - even if he did pee on our bed yesterday because my parent's dog scared the beejesus out of him! #4 The comfort of 'home base' which I've had on other journeys but won't have on this one.

Even though my previous adventures have taught me a lot about travel, nothing has quite prepared me for this backpacking experience. Jeff and I'll have to navigate it for the first time together - what a team! We're ready to get this party started :)