9. The Final Weeks Before Departure

The time had come to pack my bag.

PLEASE NOTE: Before continuing, make sure you’ve read the earlier parts of my journey. Click here to view all chapters.

9. The Final Weeks Before Departure

After saying goodbye to London, I returned to the place where it had all started — the town where I was born.

For the next few weeks I stayed between my mum’s house and my dad’s. 

It felt strange being back. Familiar, comfortable even, but also temporary. Almost like I was just passing through.

What surprised me most about that time was how little planning I actually did.

You’d think that with no job to go to, no routine to follow, and all the time in the world, I would have spent my days carefully mapping out the journey ahead.

But I didn’t.

In fact, I barely planned anything at all.

Looking back, I’m not entirely sure why.

Was it because I didn’t know how to plan something like this?

Was it because I didn’t really want to?

Or was it because deep down I knew there was no real way to plan it anyway?

After all, I had booked a one-way flight to the other side of the world — to a place I had never been before and knew very little about.

And beyond that?

Nothing.

No route.

No schedule.

No long list of destinations.

Just a one-way ticket to Bangkok.

The only thing I had organised was somewhere to stay for the first few nights. 

A small private room in a modest hotel just off Khao San Road — an area famous for backpackers and travellers passing through.

I suppose my thinking was simple.

Go there.

Meet people.

Figure it out along the way.

That was the entire plan.

Around that time, I also bought the backpack I’d be travelling with. 

A proper one — an 80-litre pack that was big enough to carry everything I thought I might need.

Standing in the shop choosing it felt like one of the first real moments where the trip started to feel tangible.

This wasn’t just an idea anymore.

It was happening.

Despite that, the days themselves passed in a strange kind of autopilot.

There were things already in the calendar. Moments that felt like natural markers before leaving.

One of them was Glastonbury.

It wasn’t the first time I had been there with my family — in fact, we’d been together a few times before.

Glastonbury had always been a place full of memories for me, and by that point I had already been six times.

So it felt fitting to go once more before I left.

A weekend of music I loved, bands I had grown up listening to, and the familiar chaos and magic that makes Glastonbury what it is.

After that came the catch-ups.

Seeing friends one more time.

Conversations that drifted between excitement and disbelief.

Most people said the same thing.

“Fair play to you.”

“I wish I could do something like that.”

I smiled and nodded each time.

But inside, I wasn’t always sure they were right.

There was also one final football match

I went to see my team play, knowing it might be a long time before I stood in that stadium again. 

At the time I didn’t know when I’d next be back in England, or even where I might be in the world.

Everything was open.

And then, just over 24 hours before I was due to leave for my travels, my mum organised a small gathering at home.

A goodbye party — or perhaps more accurately, a see you soon party.

Family and close family friends came over. 

It was meant to be a simple evening, but it quickly became something much more emotional than I had expected.

Sitting in that room, surrounded by people wishing me well, it suddenly hit me.

This was real.

For months the idea had felt almost abstract — something exciting, something different, something far away in the future.

But now the moment had arrived.

And with it came a mixture of emotions that were difficult to untangle.

There was excitement, of course.

But that wasn’t the strongest feeling in that moment.

What I remember most clearly were the nerves.

The uncertainty.

The overwhelming sense that I was about to step into something completely unknown.

Everyone around me was encouraging. Telling me how amazing the experience would be. 

Saying they wished they had done something similar back in the day.

Yet deep down, there was a quiet question running through my mind.

Am I actually making the right decision?

It’s strange how those moments work.

From the outside it might look brave or exciting.

From the inside, it can feel very different.

Later that night, after everyone had left and the house was quiet again, the reality of it all slowly settled in.

The journey I had been talking about for months was now just hours away.

The next morning I said goodbye to my mum, my grandparents, and my siblings.

Those goodbyes felt heavier than the others.

I packed my things into the car and drove down the motorway to my dad’s house, where I would spend one final night before the journey began.

Everything I needed for the trip was now packed inside that backpack.

Eighty litres containing the beginning of something completely unknown.

The alarm the next morning would be painfully early. A bus was waiting that would take me to Heathrow Airport.

And once that bus left…

Everything would change.

For now though, there was nothing left to prepare.

The bag was packed.

And in just a few hours, I would be leaving.

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