Moving on -

[jarrbyrd]

Hey there Travelers!

My name is Jay - well not really but that's what we'll go by, k? Anywhoozles, true story I'm ready to travel. I have a friend in Spain who wants me to come visit him. No, I didn't meet him online. He's a friend I met here in sunny Southern California and he teaches English all over the world.

But that's not the point.

The point is that I'm ready to move on from Los Angeles and discover other metropolitan cities. I don't know where to start. I recently (October '13) went to Jamaica with about 300$ USD; and was able to survive for a week.

So, I thought to myself Jay - you have no debt, a fancy camera, and nothing - NOTHING to lose. Just do it, just buy a one-way ticket to Spain and hope for the best.

Only problem is I'm flat broke (well I can afford the ticket). I can imagine being able to save up 1,000 dollars for the trip but let's be honest. 1,000 is about enough for a hostel for 20 days? Simply put I don't want to be there for 20 days. I wanna be gone for much, much longer.

I am an artist and I have no doubt I will be able to sell my wares on the street for food (sketches, paintings) - but what I'm more concerned with is shelter. I don't mind sleeping in parks, subway tunnels, you know outside. I am an experienced back-packer. But I don't want to sleep outside everyday. But if that's what it comes down to... Anyone else have experience in this?

I know it's not impossible to be able to survive; so I don't want to hear the whole: "It's going to be difficult." I get it - life is difficult (I grew up in the ghetto + and I graduated Suma from the School of Hard Knocks).

I plan to back-pack starting from Spain. I would like to see most of Europe. Spain, England, Scotland, France, Sweden, Finland, Norway you know the whole damn thing...

So here I am, a dude. Who is going to go to Spain in July. With a 1,000 dollars hoping that he'll survive.

Heres what I will be taking:

1. MacBook
2. Canon t3i dSLR
3. 1k
4. Equipment (tent, water bottle, et. al.)
5. Clothes

All fitting into a single back-pack.

I hope I've given you enough information to get an idea of what's going on here. I'm looking for advice from people who have dropped everything: stability, a promising career, to just be free from the beast. To see how other people live. To grow. To just be. Any and all advice will be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

-j