Trip Plan Complete!

It's midnight and pouring with rain outside. Moments ago I pulled back the curtain and watched a black cab drive through our cobbled mews, lit by the single streetlight against the brickwork of the ENO. The scene appeared to be a prelude to a movie, and I can well imagine the camera panning back to reveal an actor sitting in a cafe staring glumly out of the window. I love London!

Speaking off, regarding Russia.. yes St. Petersburg is a beautiful city, but at the moment I would have to say it's hard work for independent tourists. If you are determined, then go, but otherwise leave it till you're a retired couple, then let some expensive agency organise everything for you, like 95% of the tourists there. The visa stuff is a pain, and clearly needs reform. The airport is grim. Transport from the airport is either expensive taxis or ageing mini-buses where one has to cram in with luggage and negotiate a price with the driver. Then everywhere.. cyrillic alphabet! Not unreasonable, but for all major tourist sites there should be English signs too. The Hermitage in particular suffers from this.. amazing exhibits but without an explanation, that flint tool from 150k years ago is just a piece of rock!

Anyway, today I punted email off to BA in Mauritius to try to get my flights ticketed. Here's my plan:
First fly out to Mauritius somehow. Then buy OneWorld Explorer ticket there, first class, five continents, with following routing:

Mauritius -> LHR -> AMM (Jordan) ->land-> CAIro -> LHR -> EZE (Buenos Aires) -> LIMa

Then I'm leaving the following sectors open dated:
Lima -> Rio -> Santiago -> Easter Island -> Papeete -> Auckland -> Melbourne -> Sydney -> Tokyo -> Hong Kong -> Karachi -> Bangkok -> Hong Kong -> Johannesburg -> Cape Town -> Finish!!

By the way, if you need to buy Memory Cards etc, get 'em from Memory Card Zoo, a fantastic site run by my friends Mike Sowa and Pete Derbyshire.