“The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.”

Everyone’s heard this cheesy quote, but even though you find it on those shitty photos from Tumblr shared by that one chick you’re not sure why you’re friends with, it is actually a great quote that really does ring true. Travel is ubiquitous in culture lately, thanks to endless Nat Geo documentaries and the like people have grown up seeing all the exotic things the world has to offer and they want to get out and grab a slice of the pie for themselves.

International tourist arrivals exceeded 1 billion in 2012. The only thing that people don’t usually consider when making their plans is that there actually are totally different styles of travel. The same as music has different genres I would go as far as to say that there are completely different genres of travel. How could you argue against this when in Thailand for example you will find one dude hanging out at his 5 star resort sipping on a pina colada in the air con for kicks while there’s another guy just a few kilometres away smashing through the jungle getting pilfered by mosquitos in an effort to find a secret beach that a creepy Austrian in a hostel told him about. There are completely different styles of travelling that give you completely different experiences and not enough people go the extra mile to try the other side of the coin when it comes to travel.

There is nothing in a person’s life that can prepare them for their first proper travel experience. There are dormant aspects inside of everyone that they won’t know existed inside of them until they travel and everyone should try it at least once, just to see what is over the horizon. When your mug of a taxi driver drops you off a few K’s short of where you asked to go because you don’t know the difference, that ‘ah shit’ moment is simultaneously the greatest and worst feeling around. The overcoming of the challenge in front of you combined with the awesome and completely unexpected things you’ll see in the middle get the endorphins pumping like you’ve just necked two pills and it’s your birthday.

I am about to go on my second travel experience to enticing Cambodia. I’ll be riding a 250cc dirt bike all over the country, solo, and keeping a blog so you guys can see what I get up to. I don’t know a single thing about the mechanical side of motorbikes and short of the few-hour-long course to attain my license and a few hours of riding in India a couple of years ago I’m a complete newbie to the field.

If I get a flat tire in-between towns I’m going to be screwed and you bet you’ll be hearing about it (sucking a khmer dick on the side of the road for a lift on a tractor). Considering there are 2400 deaths on the road per year in Cambodia, with motorcycles making up 70% of those, you can expect that I’m a pretty nervous little westerner.

This is when another quote comes to mind: “A coward dies a thousand times before his death, but the valiant taste of death but once.” - Shakespeare

This is what it’s all about, even though I’m admittedly a little afraid, I’m gonna hop on that motorbike, kick Cambodia’s butt and come back knowing how to tackle the road on two wheels, level up. So come with me as I attempt to keep a semi-regular blog as I go through temples, beers, rainforest, land mines, messed up dirt roads in the middle-of-nowhere and hopefully no tigers. See you on my next update, which I’ll be sending from Bangkok after I get wasted on free booze on my probably pretty terrible plane ride. Ciao.