And I'm Off

Hello future loyal readers!

Welcome to the first of what will hopefully be many posts detailing my adventuring through South America. I'll start with giving the answers to the questions that literally everyone asked me once they learned what I was planning on doing.

1) Where are you going?
I'm currently at the airport in Atlanta waiting for my flight to Lima, Peru. So I'm starting in Peru and generally making my way South through Bolivia and Chile before crossing into Argentina and heading Northwards to Buenos Aires where I'll be flying home from.

2) Who are you going with?
Me, myself, and I with notable exceptions of kbekel and my familia meeting me in Argentina. Anyone who wants to meet me somewhere is very welcome to.

3) Do you have a plan?
See number one. That's about the extent of it. I'm planning a mix of classic tourist activities and workaway/WWOOFing.

4) Why are you doing this?!?!
This is the question I have the hardest time answering. The easiest answer is that I want to go to grad school next year and that effectively puts an end to any extended travel I'd like to do. Why I want to take an extended trip in the first place is harder to answer. The best I've been able to come up with is that I like to know things and I can read or watch movies all day long and still not really know what something really looks like or how the culture really functions. In order to really get a handle on something I need to experience it first hand. Plus it's a challenge. Something I can test myself with. Can I improve my Spanish to fluency? Can I navigate a less than ideal infrastructure? Can I make friends and connect with people from different places? It's something so different from my day to day life it will keep me engaged and interested and allow me to learn an entirely new set of skills. Finally since research science is such a time intensive activity, I've been wanting a chunk of time to do something totally different so I don't look back 20  years from now and regret that I never took time away from the bench to see what else was out there. I'm doing it because it's there. Plus a little bit of wanderlust.

I'm off!