Jemma Beedie

I’m so pleased that I finally get to come clean and share my plans for the next little while. A few select people have been privy to the information as we’ve set everything in motion, but we have tried to keep it quiet as I didn’t want anybody at my workplace to hear it from anyone but me.

I’m leaving Lewis in November and will be embarking on a bit of a travel odyssey.

From Lewis we’ll drive down to London and drop Basil off with good friends, who will be looking after him for six months. I’ll fly to Bahrain via Istanbul, where I have a layover of around 16 hours. I’m excited to spend some time exploring the city.

I arrive in Bahrain on Wednesday 25th November and will run the Bahrain Marathon Relay as part of a two woman team on Friday 27th November. This will be the first time this has been done. I can’t wait to finally run this race, which my father has been involved with for decades.

After a wonderful Christmas and New Year in Bahrain, I’ll be flying to Sri Lanka. While there I will do some volunteering, some exploring, and some surfing when Duncan flies in to meet me.

From Sri Lanka I’ll be heading off to Bangkok for a couple of days, then Vietnam, Cambodia, the Isaan and back to Chiang Mai for Songkran. I love Thailand so much and I’m happy that I get to go again (my fourth time!). From Chiang Mai I fly to Krabi for eight days, then on to Kuala Lumpur for a couple of nights and finally back to London.

I intend to run the Hoka Highland Fling for the second time on Saturday 30th April, and I intend to take a couple of hours off my time. Hopefully training in the heat of Asia will prepare me a little better than treadmills throughout the Hebridean winter.

Then Duncan, Basil and I will be trundling off in our motorhome. We picked up a 1978 Ford Transit last week, and we’re going to live in it permanently.

I intend to write, write, write, so if you have some freelance work for me, that’d be swell. It might not be the safest plan, and I might crawl back with pennies and need to just take a job by the end of the year, but if we don’t do it now, we might not get another chance. I’ve handed in my notice, and the flights are all booked. Adventure awaits.