Originally written on July 9th....

I am a lucky, lucky boy.This last-minute trip to Africa has been a wonderful change of pace to the stressful, jam-packed days that I have had for the last twelve months.To the random strangers reading this blog this is 100% pure sarcasm as today is my one-year anniversary of being an unemployed traveling bum.

As you can see from the now over 5,000+ photos I have seen and done some pretty cool stuff.In the last few weeks alone I have walked in the footsteps of Nelson Mandela, toured vineyards, viewed a sunrise in the Nubian desert, a sunset in the Okavango Delta, bungee jumped over Victoria Falls, seen more wildlife in one park (Chobe National Park) than I had ever seen before in my lifetime, and of course my favorite, had a cold beer at a township bar in Zimbabwe.

I have another twenty days or so left in Africa before heading back to Europe for a couple more months.After that I plan on going to Panama with a couple of friends and make my way back to Texas overland no later than December 24th.With that said, I truly have no clue what to expect in the next twenty days because I have gone out of my way to make sure that I have never read the itinerary again since first signing up for the trip.As I tell my fellow travelers, every day is a surprise.The biggest stress in my life at the moment is whether we have to put up or put down our tents the next day or not.

For the folks that have emailed me about my weight loss never fear, five-eight hour truck rides followed by high caloric meals with next to no exercise is making sure that I am still the same short, fat guy that you have all known all these years.Life is still good on this end.I wish you all well and drop me a note or two from time to time.