Be The Jam

It's been raining, you may have noticed, it was on the news, floods - bridges swept away - damn almost bursting - motorway closed. Not really the time to be outside, without a tent. It has been particularly miserable. To make things all the more fun I ran out of money quite a while ago and found myself sat huddled from the rain in the one dry spot in my shelter with my last fiver burning a hole in my pocket, all my pockets already have holes in them but you get the idea, so as I settled down to yet another meal of lentils the level of despondency I was feeling grew to previously unknown levels. What was there to look forward to? Apart from having some dry clothes to change into before going to bed, not a lot. The idea of going to the jungle seemed further away than ever, how can I consider going away when I'm all out of money, food and work. "It's time to pack it in, start a career and forget about the whole stupid idea" I thought to myself, "this aint going nowhere". It would have been easy in that moment to pack it in, head back to the comfort of the parental home and forget about the whole stupid idea. However, I looked at my muddy sodden trousers, one knee torn open both legs rolled up to avoid the worst of the water held on the undergrowth and I began to grin. I realised that moments like these are character forming and that no self respecting jungle explorer is going to go running home just because of a little bit of rain and some hunger. What better practice can there be for surviving than being cold and wet and hungry and wanting to give up? None. It's best to find out what I'm made of here in the UK where there is at least the option of giving up than out in South America where everything is all a bit more serious.

Which is all very well, but the question still remains of how on earth to get to the jungle and, more importantly, how to raise the necessary funds for the trip. The brief answer to which is," I don't know". It seems that the idea of running an online business from the jungle is a non-starter as I lack the ability to make money from the travel guide when running it from Oxford. So with the help of Ian at Bushmasters I came up with another idea, well it's Ian's idea and I adopted it. It makes sense though, might as well make things harder for myself seeing as they are seemingly impossible anyway. The new idea is to walk across South America from coast to coast through the jungle, across the planes, over the Andes and to the sea. No worrries. This of course presents a challenge even more pressing than the "how to raise the capital" challenge and that is, how on earth am I going to get fit enough to pull that off? Well I went for a run and had to stop in order to catch up on breathing after 15 minutes, then got bored and went home and had a cup of tea. Clearly I'm not going to be much good at pushing myself to get fit. So I signed up with 4 Para (The Territorial Army Parachute Regiment) they should get me fit quick sharp and teach me a few useful things along the way.

In all probability it's going to take a year to get fit enough, tough enough and learn all the things required to have a good chance at making it across South America on the first attempt. A year should be plenty of time to save up the required amount, if only someone would give me a job.

This new found positive attitude is great, I rebuilt my shelter before breakfast on Sunday (admittedly breakfast didn't occur until midday) and now not only is it waterproof but I have space to stand up and walk around!

The plan is to

Find some kind of financially viable employment, for some reason no one will give me a job at the moment, and save lots of money.

Learn Spanish

Start collecting the equipment I will be taking to the jungle and field test it by using, that way by the time I get to the jungle it will all be second nature and I can get on with learning about the jungle.

Become as good at navigating as it is possible to become.

Pass P Company (entrance test for the parachute regiment - quite taxing).

Work on my bushcraft skills, lighting fire by rubbing sticks together, fishing etc etc.

Find an accomplice.

Any questions?