Or rather on the rails, as we begin our trip by getting the train to Gatwick. This is the only part of our journey which will be in first class and we take advantage of Richard Branson's generosity with a gin and tonic. Start as you mean to go on. There will, however, be plenty of 'on the road' during our seven week journey as we are taking several long-distance bus trips in South America. I can't say I'm looking forward to those or the long-haul flights across the Atlantic. Looking at our itinerary I wonder if we might be doing rather too much travelling but given that we've decided to book most things in advance then it's a bit late to worry about that now. And South America is big, so if we want to go to the places we do then not much choice. We often forget that we live on a small island and that the rest of the world is a big place. Something that is not helped by the map projections we are used to which by placing Britain at the centre, greatly exaggerate its size in comparison to other countries.

However our first leg is a relatively short one to Lisbon. We're flying with TAP, the Portuguese national airline, so having a couple of days in Lisbon on the way to São Paulo. TAP get pretty rubbish reviews but they can't be too bad, surely? We shall see.