Oli's leaving behind Anna, 'a girl I've adored since I was 13 who I've only just started seeing,' while Tom – the more bashful of the two – already has longtime girlfriend Hannah in Australia wondering when she'll see him again.

Both girls will be tuning into lifebyte over the weeks ahead to see up close and personal just what impact Belize's heat, mosquitoes and hard work has on these two best friends.

Oli thinks it'll be quite a challenge to their friendship: 'We've prepared for over a year for this, and who knows what'll happen to the two of us – I'll probably hate him one month in!'

Tom sounds more confident about them surviving the rigours of life on the road still on speaking terms, saying that if he can survive digging his own toilet, parasites and a diet of tinned and dehydrated food, Oli's annoyances shouldn't get on his nerves too much.

At any rate, we'll all be hearing about it in the pair's regular correspondence with lifebyte where they'll dish dirt on steamy Belize, their Raleigh travelling partners and each other.

Lifebyte's explorers aren't packing sleeping bags, bog roll or deodorant – 'May as well stink like everyone else' says Tom.

Tom's sporting a motley new shaved head to stop the bugs crawling too deep into his skull while he lays back and smells the Belizean coffee.

Oli, the more pensive of the two, is throwing a book of poetry in his pack and Nicholas Evans' The Horse Whisperer for quiet moments (life must've been busy for Oli of late – he's been reading it for two years now).

By the time you read this, Oli and Tom will be sweating, digging or diving on pristine Belize beaches.

Over the weeks ahead we'll get to know them (as Tom says, 'just like the characters from Castaway or Shipwrecked, eh?') and take an intimate gander at what happens when two young British boys get out amongst the insects of South America.

— Clay Lucas 07.07.00