We would have liked to have sent you all... Out of nearly 500 qualifying entries we could only pick a handful for the shortlist. Thanks again for all the wonderful ideas, funny stories and the time you took over your entries. To show how difficult it's been to decide on the best, here are a few edited favourites.
Look out for the shortlist and your chance to vote here on Saturday.
Jenny, 22
"You're going to get lots of worthy people applying to be Netjetters. People with worthwhile and serious causes: delousing orang-utans in Borneo, freeing Tibet. People who desire only to broaden their horizons, who want to experience the wonders of nature. Essentially, people who deserve a writing spot in your fine newspaper.
"Well, not me. My plan entails something altogether more lowbrow. Yes, my Netjetter dream is to go on the trail of my favourite movies, to forsake the splendour of the natural and ancient worlds for the squalor of the urban landscapes I know (from a lifetime in the fourth row from the back) and love."
Jonathan, 31
"For the past seven years I have had a constant companion on my holidays. Purchased in a misguided attempt at self-improvement, The History of the World by JM Roberts condenses into 1,200 or so pages everything of note that has happened on Earth since the Big Bang. It's a tough read.
"So, if I'm honest, a part of my dream holiday would involve finishing the book and then ceremonially disposing of it, killing the monkey on my back once and for all. And where better for a resting place for the book than the Ganges, the holiest waste disposal system in the world?"
William, 28
"Flexibility is our itinerary. It is essential to be able to say to your companion over breakfast, 'I quite fancy the southern Japanese island of Shikoku today, lover' and then be there in time to dine on fugu, a highly venomous puffer fish. Our quest will be guided by such impulses.
"Dominique, with whom I fell madly in love in Santiago, will be once more pooling her resources with mine in Barcelona in November. There we shall gorge ourselves on all of the Catalan capital's juicy fruits ... We will then plot a leisurely anti clockwise course, scaling the Pyrenees, sipping the wines of La Rioja, retracing the steps of the ancient pilgrims' trail to Santiago de Compostela, hitchhiking along the Portuguese coast, and finally swooping down on the Moorish tip of southern Spain. From here a vault over Gibraltar into Morocco, our springboard into north Africa from which we plan to execute a pin drop dive deep into the heart of the continent before resurfacing in the Red Sea. Once our scuba gear is rusty, we will shuffle on towards Australia ..."
Mo, 32
"At school I'm daydreaming again. I'm browsing through a battered atlas and exotic names appear before me - Timbuktu, Chittagong, Addis Ababa, Samarkand, Sapporo, Sheffield. Well Sheffield could sound exotic to a Bedouin in the Sahara desert!
"My job involves guiding delinquents who have been excluded from their classes. My errant pupils idea of travel is to "TWOC" (taking without owners consent) a car and joyride to Barnsley with the police in hot pursuit. I desperately need an extended break to maintain my sanity.
"I envisage an itinerary that would take me off the beaten track. A journey where beards and booze (hopefully) prevail. I am fascinated by facial hair and I'm on a quest in search of the perfect beard."
Gareth, 28
"It's tragic really, I'm 28 and have never been in love. On the bright side, however, there are roughly 2.8billion females in the world. If we guess 15% of them are in my age range, which gives 420 million. Being cautious about this, let's say I'm compatible with 0.5% of them, that means there are 2.1 million women with whom I could fall in love. Having once made the mistake of nearly falling in love with a lesbian I don't want to make the same mistake again, so we can knock off another 10%. That leaves 1.8million. If I can meet just one during my four months away - and God knows I'm going to try - that would make the whole thing worthwhile."
Laura
"Ever since I can remember I've always wanted to dance - I've just never known how. I don't mean jigging around on a dancefloor to da riddims or a wedding singer; I'm talking about real dance - a fast-moving lindy hop, a rump-rolling rumba or a pirouette par excellence. I need to stretch more than my legs and learn to swing, kick, jump and sway, with a sultry look and a nonchalant toss of the hips and hair.
"I want you to send me to tango in Buenos Aires, to salsa through Havana, and to Vienna to learn how to waltz. I want the best teachers in Seville to show me a real flamenco and be taught to tap dance down Broadway. I'm tired of sitting in the stalls with twitching limbs when I could be up on stage swanning around in a tutu...
"I want to work hard, to drop at the end of the day exhausted and exhilarated. I need to learn that I'm not too old and it's not too late. There's just one proviso if I go, please don't send me line dancing. Formation boot twisting in a Stetson just ain't sexy and, frankly, I'd rather chop off one of my two left feet."
Meg, 29
"Sometimes it's tough being a vegan in Scarborough, north Yorkshire. It's not that restaurant owners don't understand what a vegan is (it is after all, a simple concept), but rather that they don't understand what makes a good vegan meal (and I can tell you now - it's not a baked potato with beans). For too long the mention of the word 'vegan' has conjured up images of thick wholemeal pastry filled with dry flavourless lentils.
"That's why I lust after four months of pure unadulterated vegan culinary bliss. I want to break free from Scarborough's lardy chip culture, and experience the finest traditional vegan meals in the world."
Riikka, 31
"...I find Russia deeply bewitching and want to get to know this huge, mysterious country and to understand the different aspects of Russian culture. It will be an especially challenging adventure for me because I see the world from the height of my four-foot stature. Being a small person gives you a different perspective on even the most ordinary sights. Just imagine what it must be like when your eye level is at other people's bums. Or how difficult it is to try to withdraw money from the cash machine when you cannot see the screen even when you stand on your toes."
Emily, 30
"It is more a flare-up of my conscience which makes me genuinely want to take that step further. My dream would be to offer readers (hopefully in a non-patronising, non-worthy way!) a real insight into two communities and two conservational projects in four continents. I would spend the first three weeks researching and caring for wolves and shepherd dogs in the mountains of Bulgaria. The following two consecutive months would see me helping an East African community in their quest to build a school and hospital, before moving on to an orphanage in Nepal. Finally, the last five weeks would spirit me onwards to South America to sweat while studying rare and endangered species alongside a local indigenous community in the Amazonian jungle.
"If I was chosen as a Netjetter it would bring me the depth and experience to open my eyes beyond my current safe existence. For my husband, his life would be infinitely more bearable minus my nagging..."
Julie, 59
"I want to travel from Punta Arenas, southern tip of South America, to Anchorage in the north of the USA. I will clean people's houses as I go.
"Why? Well I'm not some sort of anal-fixated fan of cleanliness, it's just that everyone I know needs a cleaner, no one can find one and what better way to see a whole continent than by cleaning, and staying in its private homes? Oh! and making people happy as I go.
"No hotels or backpackers' for me ... I will spend two hours everyday cleaning different homes along the way, doing a bit of honest work in exchange for a bed and some breakfast. For the rest of the day I'll sightsee, I'll sit and write and I'll dream of course, whilst applying good, thick, liposome-enriched hand cream!"
Hugh, 22
"One of my favourite things about Asia is the prominence of the tuk tuk or auto rickshaw as a means of transportation. I love the noises they make, the way they look and their easy attitude towards travelling. In the absence of doors and windows the passenger can really get involved with the surroundings, while its slow speed and small size make for an enlightening experience on busy roads where weight and velocity are ruling factors in road politics. Tuk tuks appear to be in constant state of change; rickshaw garages with frames and spare parts clutter the roadsides in abundance. It is my dream to drive a tuk tuk on an epic journey."
Simon, 27
"It seemed grandad had no adventures of his own. Modesty prevented his revealing the true reason he was 'mentioned in dispatches' for bravery. His generation's stiff upper lip meant he merely referred to 'a walk' that he undertook before liberation as a PoW - never disclosing that this was a gun point march across half of Europe in the coldest winter of the century.
"For my Netjetters trip I would like to follow the route of my grandad's second world war expeditions - honouring his life and countless others, by adding the colours of his unclaimed medal ribbons to black and white photos and brown memories. My grandad reluctantly made this journey to fight for freedom and peace. I would love and relish the opportunity to use this freedom so expensively won to see these countries in the peaceful times that he sacrificed his youth for."
Emily
"Due to economic pressure, Transport for London wishes to remove the iconic double-decker from the streets replacing it with a more modern, higher capacity bus. The loss would be unimaginable as the Routemaster is simply more than just 'a bus'.
"To prove this, I propose to drive the Routemaster overland from London to Shanghai stopping in cities, towns and villages along the way to gain worldwide support; this fantastic driving adventure would be shared with Guardian readers. The problems loom before even setting out: petrol costs, having never driven a bus, and the insane ability to sit still for more than 10,000 km terrify me."
