Building a bike from scratch is both good and bad. I built my Surly LHT from scratch for $2400. You can actually buy a Surly LHT for about $1400 with stock parts. The nice thing about my bike is that custom built it with high quality parts, hence the extra money. I used the higher end components. Best thing to do is what most people here said. Buy a stock bike. $1300 is the lower end limit for a touring bike.
Also look online for used touring bikes. You'll be surprised what you can buy 2nd hand.