Latest / The Overland Journal Podcast / EP319 | Global Traces on the Realities of Full-time Expedition

Transcript

EP319 | Global Traces on the Realities of Full-time Expedition · The Overland Journal Podcast

• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to the Overland Journal podcast. I'm your host,
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: Ashley Giordano, joining from the Gobi Desert in my mobile
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: podcast studio. And today I welcome Jess and Dave of
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: Global Traces, who are traveling Europe, North Africa, Central Asia,
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: and beyond in their MAN X60 expedition truck. Welcome both
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: of you to the podcast.
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: Thanks, Ash. Good to be here. Hello.
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: Hello.
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: I was going to say, we're joining you from the
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: shores of Lake Issyk-Kul in Kyrgyzstan right now.
• 0:37
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: And it's been so great because we have met you
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: guys along the way in various locations.
• 0:46
  Speaker 3: Morocco, Italy, Kazakhstan.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: I'm sure there are a few more, but it's fun
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: to have you on the podcast now after traveling together
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: a few times. And yeah, good times.
• 0:58
  Speaker 4: And a special thanks to Hankook Dynaprotire.com for supporting this
• 1:02
  Speaker 4: week's Overland Journal podcast. Be sure to visit expeditionportal.com to
• 1:09
  Speaker 4: see our features on the recent Honcook experience at the
• 1:13
  Speaker 4: fourth annual Bronco Stampede in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. We took
• 1:19
  Speaker 4: a look at the full line of DynaPro tires and
• 1:22
  Speaker 4: some great Ford Broncos from all over the country as
• 1:25
  Speaker 4: they gathered at this community event of enthusiasts and top brands.
• 1:31
  Speaker 4: Thanks again, Han Cook.
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: You guys are traveling in an expedition truck and you
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: have a dog, Otis, and of course your daughter, Isla.
• 1:38
  Speaker 3: How old is Isla? Five and a half.
• 1:40
  Speaker 2: How did that happen?
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: Time flies. And I want to talk to you a
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: bit about the truck, first of all, and why you
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: decided on the MAN HX60.
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: Firstly, why a truck? And then why the MAN HX60?
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: I guess we actually sailed across the Atlantic in 2019
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: and we spent the whole month crossing the Atlantic, deciding
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: whether we should buy a yacht or a truck. We'd
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: already had a van. We had a sprinter van converted.
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: So we'd done sort of shorter trips away. And then
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: we concluded we wanted something bigger that could get us
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: to further afield to more wild places, but also have
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: comfort and space so that we could be away for
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: extended periods of time, that we could have autonomy away
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: from having to find water, power. all of that kind
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: of jazz and actually explore the wild spaces. So that's
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: why a truck, basically, it's a camper van on steroids
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: with access to, you know, places we otherwise wouldn't necessarily
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: have got to with all the comforts of home. So,
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: you know, a 10, eight kilo washing machine, tumble dryer,
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: a full fridge, freezer, you know, a full toilet and shower.
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: And it's just like being at home, but on wheels.
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: And then in terms of the HX60, At the time
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: we were buying a truck, the choices were either former
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: commercial vehicles, which were probably 50, 60, 70,000 pounds as
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: a base truck, or the MAN HX-60, which is an
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: ex-British military truck. And the British military, for whatever reason,
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: were deciding to get rid of a whole bundle of
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: their vehicles. They were downsizing, and now they appear to
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: be upsizing again, or at least holding on to So
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: there was a glut of HX60s coming out, huge supply,
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: very low demand. People didn't know much about them. Sidebar,
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: it is basically just a man TGM. It's a commercial
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: truck with a military cab and a little bit of
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: beefed up running gear. But people didn't know much about them.
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: So the prices they were commanding were not very high.
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: So we got this and we paid 20,000, no, 19,500
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: pounds for the base truck. compared to equivalent ex-commercial vehicle
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: would have been 60 000 pounds plus and this only
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: had six thousand six and a half thousand kilometers on
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: the clock it had basically never been used so it
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: made a really good blank canvas for us to.
• 4:07
  Speaker 3: Build onto and we love the look of it as
• 4:09
  Speaker 3: well we do very cool yeah.
• 4:12
  Speaker 5: And it was different nobody'd done anything with them yet
• 4:14
  Speaker 5: you know it was a real kind of like yeah
• 4:16
  Speaker 5: we could we see something really special with this.
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: Truck It does look very in place in like a
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: Star Wars movie.
• 4:23
  Speaker 2: It does.
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: Like in the premiere, when you guys are in the
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: desert or wherever, it looks so at home.
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: We should probably send you a picture from where we
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: are right now because there is BB's clone parked next
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: to us. Our truck is called BB. Ash obviously knows this,
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: but for the rest of you. After this was built,
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: everyone went, oh, we like the HX-60 and we love
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: that style of box on it. So there is parked
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: next to us an almost identical version. So now there
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: are two of them side by side on Lake Icicle.
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: It probably looks like an invasion or something. Amazing.
• 4:52
  Speaker 3: We've certainly had some looks driving along, that's for sure.
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: When you were building out the interior, did you have
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: somebody else build it? And if so, what were the
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: considerations for the layout?
• 5:04
  Speaker 5: So we didn't personally build it inside for a number
• 5:07
  Speaker 5: of reasons. Number one was I was pregnant and then
• 5:10
  Speaker 5: we went on to have Isla, obviously.
• 5:12
  Speaker 3: We were living in London in the flat. It was
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: COVID as well.
• 5:16
  Speaker 5: So there was a real restriction on what we kind
• 5:18
  Speaker 5: of couldn't do from a kind of movement. And also just,
• 5:21
  Speaker 5: you know, we didn't have the space to have the truck. Obviously,
• 5:23
  Speaker 5: you're not going to park it up in London and
• 5:24
  Speaker 5: build it there. We would have been incredibly unpopular with
• 5:27
  Speaker 5: our neighbors. But so we had it built by Motorcraft
• 5:30
  Speaker 5: Adventure Developments from the outside, the box, everything, the chassis
• 5:34
  Speaker 5: and many other things. And then the inside, we decided
• 5:36
  Speaker 5: we were going to go with a company that we'd
• 5:38
  Speaker 5: used for the Sprint already for the interior, a company
• 5:41
  Speaker 5: called Off-Grid Campers. And we did, so therefore we did
• 5:43
  Speaker 5: a split build, which was fantastic. Interesting at times. We
• 5:46
  Speaker 5: project managed it basically between the two. So we, as
• 5:50
  Speaker 5: Dave said before, we designed everything inside from every single
• 5:54
  Speaker 5: minute detail from like, you know, the layout. We had
• 5:58
  Speaker 5: a hundred different iterations of the layout and how we
• 6:00
  Speaker 5: wanted it through to, you know, the lighting, the, you know,
• 6:05
  Speaker 5: the everything, the wiring, absolutely everything. Like I never want
• 6:07
  Speaker 5: to have another conversation about lighting ever.
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: Again for a while.
• 6:10
  Speaker 5: But yeah, we designed it and the considerations were number one,
• 6:13
  Speaker 5: We had to feel that it wasn't camping because we
• 6:17
  Speaker 5: knew that we were going to be doing this for
• 6:18
  Speaker 5: a long time.
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: Well, that's the plan anyway.
• 6:21
  Speaker 5: We had to feel comfortable and we had to have
• 6:23
  Speaker 5: a space where, you know, if we went outside, we
• 6:26
  Speaker 5: could all be inside and we were comfortable.
• 6:28
  Speaker 3: We all had an area.
• 6:30
  Speaker 5: We had a really nice seating area. Everybody had their
• 6:33
  Speaker 5: kind of space for themselves and their things. So that
• 6:37
  Speaker 5: was a real consideration. And also, you know, we're not short.
• 6:40
  Speaker 5: We're both day six, four, you know, five nine we
• 6:44
  Speaker 5: needed to have the head height after living in a
• 6:46
  Speaker 5: sprinter where the only space that dave could stand up
• 6:48
  Speaker 5: was like underneath the skylight in the middle of the
• 6:51
  Speaker 5: sprinter otherwise he was hunched over yeah so we had
• 6:55
  Speaker 5: to have space in height and we also wanted to
• 6:57
  Speaker 5: have the ability to kind of walk past one another
• 7:00
  Speaker 5: as well so we had to have that space we
• 7:02
  Speaker 5: also had at the point of which we took delivery
• 7:05
  Speaker 5: of the truck and it wasn't you know it was 100%
• 7:07
  Speaker 5: ready we still had to do stuff inside get used
• 7:09
  Speaker 5: to it we had an eight month old baby And
• 7:12
  Speaker 5: we have a dog that's, you know, medium sized. So,
• 7:15
  Speaker 5: you know, we needed to have this space and little
• 7:18
  Speaker 5: things like being tall. We wanted, you know, a decent
• 7:21
  Speaker 5: counter height, you know, so that when we're washing up
• 7:24
  Speaker 5: or doing something, you're not stooping over and, you know,
• 7:26
  Speaker 5: knackering your back. So we were like, well, let's make
• 7:28
  Speaker 5: the counter height to the height that we want.
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 7:31
  Speaker 3: You know, what else do we do?
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: I mean, it was, it was every little bit, as
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: I said, all the details. So, you know we spent
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: weeks months mapping out in our flat how big the
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: shower space.
• 7:41
  Speaker 3: Pieces of cardboard on the floor if.
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: The shower space shower toilet space was this big would
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: that be acceptable could we snug it down a little
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: bit or is it better to make it a bit
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: bigger how much wardrobe space are we going to have
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: where are we going to put you know my camera
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: kit for example Jess was adamant that while she was
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: giving up her dishwasher with an eight month old baby
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: she was not giving up a washing machine so we
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: had to have space to fit a proper washing machine.
• 8:07
  Speaker 5: A decent size one so we're not doing like you
• 8:09
  Speaker 5: know three t-shirts and two you know sets of baby
• 8:11
  Speaker 5: grows so yeah it had to be a decent size
• 8:14
  Speaker 5: on the so you know we had to make we
• 8:16
  Speaker 5: had to make what.
• 8:17
  Speaker 3: Was the word we had to make compromises is.
• 8:20
  Speaker 5: The word we had to make compromises whereby you know
• 8:22
  Speaker 5: okay you have a full-size washing machine you only have
• 8:24
  Speaker 5: one drawer for utensils you know or you don't have
• 8:27
  Speaker 5: you know underfloor more more storage space than you maybe
• 8:30
  Speaker 5: would have liked but i feel it works i feel
• 8:33
  Speaker 5: you know we've Some of the sacrifices we had to make,
• 8:37
  Speaker 5: we've gained in other ways. Like we've gained a really
• 8:39
  Speaker 5: lovely seating area. One thing, actually, yeah, we forgot. One
• 8:42
  Speaker 5: thing that was an absolute deal breaker for us, and
• 8:45
  Speaker 5: this was from, you know, in the pre kind of,
• 8:47
  Speaker 5: you know, two, three years before we went for the truck,
• 8:50
  Speaker 5: looking at other trucks, going to Overlander shows, you know,
• 8:53
  Speaker 5: in the UK and abroad, looking at designs, you know,
• 8:56
  Speaker 5: just literally like raking through people's, you know, YouTube, Instagram,
• 9:00
  Speaker 5: speaking to people. The big deal breaker for us was
• 9:03
  Speaker 5: we had to have a bed. above us here, not
• 9:06
  Speaker 5: this one.
• 9:06
  Speaker 3: This is the alcove. This is Isla's space here.
• 9:09
  Speaker 5: We had to have a lowering and raising bed. Like
• 9:11
  Speaker 5: I did not, number one, I did not want to
• 9:13
  Speaker 5: be making a bed every day and every night, like
• 9:15
  Speaker 5: categorically not. And I wanted to feel that there was
• 9:18
  Speaker 5: a distinction between where we slept and where we sat
• 9:21
  Speaker 5: and lived and that the bed could go away and
• 9:23
  Speaker 5: create this really lovely kind of open seating area.
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: But also Jess was adamant that, you know, you see
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: a lot of expedition trucks and you have to climb
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: over the seating area to get to the bed.
• 9:33
  Speaker 3: And that's lovely. And I have seen designs since. I'm like, actually,
• 9:37
  Speaker 3: you know what? That does work in here for them.
• 9:39
  Speaker 3: That works. It looks good.
• 9:41
  Speaker 5: You know, it has a really, I'm not dead against it.
• 9:42
  Speaker 5: But for us personally, I was like, I do not
• 9:45
  Speaker 5: want to climb over my sofa to get in my bed.
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: Sorry, Ash.
• 9:49
  Speaker 3: It's all good. I'm also 5'3.
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: I was thinking about that. I'm like, yeah, our OEV
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: camper I love and it's perfect for my height and
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: Richard but we are smaller people.
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: You're like 5'3 and 5'6 and you're both both slender
• 10:06
  Speaker 2: whereas Jess and I are like the opposite end of
• 10:09
  Speaker 2: that scale at six, four and five, nine and just
• 10:13
  Speaker 2: big people, big people, big truck, right?
• 10:15
  Speaker 3: And we have a.
• 10:15
  Speaker 5: Child, you know, and she comes in the bed and
• 10:17
  Speaker 5: we have a dog, you know, so it all just
• 10:19
  Speaker 5: kind of what is going to make this as comfortable
• 10:22
  Speaker 5: and as easy for us long term, basically, with, you know,
• 10:26
  Speaker 5: minimum amount of sacrifices and compromises, but understanding that you
• 10:31
  Speaker 5: can't have everything.
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: I think Jess touched on it before, actually, like I,
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: in my head, I was very clear. whether I said
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: it to her or not, in quite so many words,
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: that I'm probably, it's fair to say, the slightly more
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: adventurous outdoor one.
• 10:46
  Speaker 3: Initially.
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: Initially, but Jess has obviously grown into it quite a lot.
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: I mean, to be fair, she said yes to a truck,
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: so she can't have been that unadventurous. But I'm probably
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: the one that would just, hey, this is great and
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: I'll keep doing it because I love doing it and
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: I will put up with a little bit less comfort. I,
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: in my mind, needed to make sure that the truck
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: was so comfortable and so like being at home that
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: jess wasn't going to get bored of it after two
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: years or go god this is just a chore this
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: is uncomfortable and let's go home so by having a
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: bit more space by having a few more creature comforts
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: it kind of made in my mind it made the
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: transition and it gave it more longevity and now actually
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: since you know we've been in the.
• 11:30
  Speaker 5: Truck what we've nearly five years nearly five years we've
• 11:33
  Speaker 5: had you know a small break due to kind of
• 11:35
  Speaker 5: like family reasons whether that be back at home or
• 11:37
  Speaker 5: you know in a in a rental for like you
• 11:39
  Speaker 5: know a month or so when dave's away i go
• 11:42
  Speaker 5: into a house house something that's not the truck now
• 11:45
  Speaker 5: and i'm just like wow this is like it's really
• 11:48
  Speaker 5: annoying to have to keep this tidy and it really
• 11:51
  Speaker 5: takes ages you know and whereas in the truck you
• 11:53
  Speaker 5: kind of you know you sweep around or whatever work
• 11:55
  Speaker 5: a cloth over the floor and, you know, hey, presto.
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: You're done. The floor was mopped in 20 seconds.
• 12:00
  Speaker 5: And you get into a house and you're just like,
• 12:02
  Speaker 5: how many rooms do I have to clean here?
• 12:04
  Speaker 3: You know, it's actually, it's.
• 12:05
  Speaker 5: Gone the other way where I'm like, no, I never
• 12:08
  Speaker 5: not loved being in the truck, but I really appreciate
• 12:11
  Speaker 5: the truck more for all of those reasons. And also,
• 12:15
  Speaker 5: you know, having a little break from it after, you know,
• 12:18
  Speaker 5: eight months of Central Asia, Europe, whatever, the Pima Highway
• 12:22
  Speaker 5: really made me appreciate it even more.
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: It's funny, actually. I think everyone with vehicles does the
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: same thing. You always look at other vehicles and I'm
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: sure you're probably going to ask us about the pros
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: and cons of big truck life. But, you know, we
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: look at other vehicles now and sometimes you're like, that
• 12:38
  Speaker 2: big one's really nice. Oh, but that small one's really nice.
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: And what could we do with that?
• 12:42
  Speaker 3: We're always thinking about like the next vehicle.
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: What might the next vehicle be? What might the next
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: platform be? How might that look somewhere down the line?
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: Spoken like true overlanders.
• 12:52
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 12:52
  Speaker 5: Your first one, for us, this is our first big...
• 12:56
  Speaker 5: First overland vehicle. You're never going to get the first
• 12:59
  Speaker 5: one right, whatever right is. And you'll always have... Could
• 13:03
  Speaker 5: you tweak that a bit and whatever? But to say that,
• 13:05
  Speaker 5: I feel, and correct me if I'm wrong, that.
• 13:07
  Speaker 3: We don't have.
• 13:09
  Speaker 5: many major things that we're like, we should have done
• 13:12
  Speaker 5: that differently, or would I do that again?
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: There's very few things that we would change on here. Majorly, yeah. Like,
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: if we could go back in time, would we come
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: up with different decisions to get us to a slightly
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: different point? And I think the answer to that is no,
• 13:28
  Speaker 2: there's probably very little we would actually change for this.
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: That doesn't mean that this is always right. And right
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: whatever right might be changes over time because your needs
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: change where you are in the world changes what you
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: want to go and see changes you know when you've
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: got a child they grow so your requirements get a
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: little bit different because they're no longer a baby you
• 13:50
  Speaker 2: can just stuff in the corner of the of the
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: sofa area not that we ever stuffed either in the
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: corner of the sofa area maybe perhaps But now she's
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: genuinely a person who wants to do X, Y, Z
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: and she's sassy as all hell and she has her
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: own ideas and her own personality. And that in itself
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: impacts how you live in a vehicle or outside a
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: vehicle and maybe what you may or may not do
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: differently next time.
• 14:14
  Speaker 3: And how you travel as well.
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: And how you travel.
• 14:16
  Speaker 3: It's evolved, you know, like we.
• 14:19
  Speaker 5: We can do a little bit longer journeys now. You know,
• 14:22
  Speaker 5: we don't have to get her out. You know, we
• 14:24
  Speaker 5: can go to different places. It's a little bit kind
• 14:26
  Speaker 5: of easier now that she's bigger.
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: We took her up a sand dune the other day.
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: She hiked all the way to the top of the
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: singing dune in Elton Emel. So, you know, she's now, yeah.
• 14:34
  Speaker 3: A little person.
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: A little person. So, no, that, you know, to bring
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: it back to the vehicles, that changes everything. I guess,
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: what right is for you at any given time. But
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: I don't think there's anything we would have done differently
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: if we could go back in time and redo this platform.
• 14:51
  Speaker 6: Nice.
• 14:52
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: Great success.
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: Yes, absolutely.
• 14:54
  Speaker 3: That's awesome.
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: I mean, the fact we're still in it five years
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: later is probably enough of a testament to that.
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: Are there any pinching points where you're like, oh, like
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: I can't even with this?
• 15:03
  Speaker 3: I wish it was. I would say that we've.
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: Yes, there are two. Two in my head. I'm going
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: to let Jess answer and then there are two in
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: my head.
• 15:11
  Speaker 3: Fused with about the size and weight?
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: Size and weight, yeah, basically.
• 15:15
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 15:15
  Speaker 5: So we love our truck. And again, ties into the
• 15:19
  Speaker 5: previous kind of things we just said. It works for
• 15:21
  Speaker 5: what we need. But we have moments sometimes where we're like,
• 15:25
  Speaker 5: it would be nice if she was a little bit smaller. Like,
• 15:29
  Speaker 5: you know, like for example, we look at something like
• 15:31
  Speaker 5: you guys drive and we've got, you know, friends of
• 15:34
  Speaker 5: ours or whether that be, you know, a troopie or whatever.
• 15:38
  Speaker 5: And we kind of think, it would be nice sometimes
• 15:40
  Speaker 5: if we weren't. quite so heavy or you know we
• 15:43
  Speaker 5: for example you know like we couldn't do the wakan valley.
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: In the wakan and the bartang were out for us
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: we're just too big and.
• 15:49
  Speaker 5: They were out for us and that was also like
• 15:51
  Speaker 5: a personal choice from a kind of safety perspective as
• 15:53
  Speaker 5: well we saw that you know a couple people got
• 15:55
  Speaker 5: into a bit of trouble and stuff you know with
• 15:57
  Speaker 5: with trucks bigger than ours you know even but we
• 15:59
  Speaker 5: kind of took the decision that that wasn't the right
• 16:02
  Speaker 5: place for us to be you know in the truck
• 16:05
  Speaker 5: and you know we're not massively city people even though
• 16:08
  Speaker 5: like i'm a londoner but it's Going into cities with.
• 16:11
  Speaker 3: A truck is, it's just, we do it.
• 16:13
  Speaker 5: We do it because we want to see them, you know,
• 16:15
  Speaker 5: mostly and whatever supplies and blah, blah, blah.
• 16:18
  Speaker 3: But it's stressful.
• 16:20
  Speaker 5: It's stressful parking. It's stressful, you know, finding somewhere to sleep,
• 16:23
  Speaker 5: especially with the dog as well. You know, you can't
• 16:25
  Speaker 5: just let him out or whatever. Like it's not really
• 16:28
  Speaker 5: our thing in the truck. So we do have moments
• 16:30
  Speaker 5: and also from a kind of unoff, off-road perspective we've
• 16:33
  Speaker 5: had to find river crossings as opposed to going over
• 16:35
  Speaker 5: bridges sometimes because you know they're either we're definitely too
• 16:38
  Speaker 5: heavy or we're not quite sure it's got holes in
• 16:40
  Speaker 5: it and it's a bit sketchy so we'd rather kind
• 16:42
  Speaker 5: of go through a river and that's fun and that's
• 16:45
  Speaker 5: great you know and touch wood you know we've never
• 16:47
  Speaker 5: had any situation where it's been you know from from
• 16:49
  Speaker 5: a dangerous perspective but there have been times where we've
• 16:52
  Speaker 5: gone nicer if we were a little bit smaller you
• 16:55
  Speaker 5: know we could sneak off down there you know or.
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: Smaller forest tracks we could access you know we're three
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: point eight five meters tall so low branches become a
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: problem i i'm quite adept at standing on the door
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: with a saw and chopping the odd branch down but
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: things like you know those those slightly more technical narrower
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: tracks are probably out for us for the most part
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: also i mean just mentioned cities yesterday we we went
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: into caracol which for those of you who want to
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: locate it on a map is at the east end
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: of lake issacol which is like the eighth largest freshwater
• 17:31
  Speaker 2: lake in the world i think or eighth deepest 11th
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: largest anyway it's pretty it's a massive lake ash knows
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: that you've been here caracol is like the big city
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: at one end of it city and we drove in
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: there because we needed to go shopping let's pick up
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: some supplies because we knew we were going to be
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: wild again for a while and we we turn in
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: we follow google maps and all of a sudden we
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: get an eight ton limit sign now there's two of
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: us in convoy so there's two 15 ton trucks no
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: hiding and we're on the radio and i'm like uh
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: what do we do we kind of need to go
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: down here But we're now stuck in this kind of
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: eight ton limit seemingly everywhere.
• 18:04
  Speaker 3: With cables hanging down.
• 18:06
  Speaker 2: We'll just go quietly and hope that nobody sees us.
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: So we went through a few of them and then
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: we were like, no, now it's getting a bit too busy. Okay.
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: So then we took a veer off to the right
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: and found a side road that didn't have a weight
• 18:17
  Speaker 2: limit on it. And then managed to, you know, park
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: up there. But it then meant it was a bit
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: of a walk to get into the supermarket.
• 18:23
  Speaker 3: I was still a shopping trolley, let's be honest.
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: She's such a Londoner. She stole a shopping trolley to
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: push the shopping back to the truck. I took it back.
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: I took it back. No, you didn't. Nick took it back.
• 18:34
  Speaker 3: Well, it went back.
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: It did go back.
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: Did you say, like, your, what is it, how much
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: of a jerk you are is related to if you
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: bring your shopping cart back or whatever?
• 18:44
  Speaker 5: Yes, yes.
• 18:46
  Speaker 3: You brought it back.
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: Someone brought it back.
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: It's all good. Someone brought it back. We arranged for
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: it to get back.
• 18:50
  Speaker 3: You have to improvise when you're in an overland. Yes.
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: All the time. Even if improvisation means stealing a shopping trolley,
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: that's an acceptable improvisation. Borrowing. Borrowing. Temporary borrow. Anyway, so yeah, that's,
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: you know, when you're driving a big vehicle, there are
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: those considerations that you guys in a Tundra with your
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: OEV back on don't think about. What are you, four tons,
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: three and a half tons? Perfect. So there's, you never
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: really find roads that you can't access because a Sprinter
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: van can go anywhere and that's three and a half tons.
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: It's funny because it's like the perspective. So we've had
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: a lot of Europeans say to us, your vehicle is huge.
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: And we're like, in North America, I feel like it's not.
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: And then looking at your vehicle, our vehicle is small.
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: But then sometimes we even wish that we had a
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: vehicle that was a little bit smaller. So it's all like,
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: from your own, you know, the perspective of where you're at.
• 19:45
  Speaker 3: It's so relative.
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: I'm curious, though, for you guys, like what some misconceptions
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: are about expedition truck living or the most common questions
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: or people's curiosities and assumptions about the truck life.
• 20:01
  Speaker 3: So do the most common questions first.
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: There is one most common question. I mean, it's funny, actually.
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: When we started traveling in the truck, probably in the
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: first year or two, we'd be driving along and we
• 20:11
  Speaker 2: were like, we should just write an FAQ of the
• 20:15
  Speaker 2: top five questions because we get the same questions every
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: single time.
• 20:20
  Speaker 3: Laminate it and stick it to the window.
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: And we were like, we just need to stick it
• 20:23
  Speaker 2: to the window and go, really? Okay, now ask.
• 20:26
  Speaker 3: And it's fine. We don't mind. We really don't mind.
• 20:29
  Speaker 5: But sometimes when you're trying to sort dinner or you're
• 20:31
  Speaker 5: trying to go somewhere quickly, it was quick as we go.
• 20:33
  Speaker 3: And you're like, I just don't need to answer this
• 20:36
  Speaker 3: question right now. But I will because it's fine.
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: So, okay. So number one question is?
• 20:42
  Speaker 3: How much does it cost?
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: Well, how much does it cost? Yeah. We're close.
• 20:46
  Speaker 3: Number one.
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: Number two is? Yeah, close. Number two is that must
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: use a huge amount of fuel.
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: Just what's your miles per gallon?
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah, what's your miles per gallon or, you know, litres
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: per 100 kilometres? And to answer that question, we do about,
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: slightly depends on road surface, obviously, and how fast we drive,
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: but probably between 28 and 30 litres per 100 kilometres.
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: If we are off-road, obviously that's going to go up.
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: But when we're on-road, we try and, you know, we
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: drive quite conservatively. I don't go racing anyway, Jess. she
• 21:20
  Speaker 2: doesn't go racing particularly i mean she's speed limited to
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: 89 kilometers an hour so we're absolutely not.
• 21:25
  Speaker 3: Fast so that's quite that's quite.
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: So yeah that's that's our yeah that's our fuel consumption
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: which when you're back in europe that's quite expensive to
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: fill the truck up the further east you go you
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: know when we got to turkey we're like wow this
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: is pretty cheap and then we go to georgia wow
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: it's even cheaper And then we got to Kazakhstan and
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: we're like, this is ridiculous. Like Morocco was also cheap.
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: We are like filling up, filling up the truck in Kazakhstan,
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: for example. So we went back to England for six
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: months because we had some family stuff to sort out
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: over this Christmas just gone. So Christmas 25 to 26.
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: And we bought ourselves a BMW X5 secondhand. It had done,
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: you know, hundreds of thousands of miles. It was a
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: beat up old little tank, but big fuel tank, diesel,
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: obviously the whole, fuel prices shooting through the roof because
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: of geopolitical tensions meant fuel prices were really expensive and
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: filling up the bmw x5 in england was almost the
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: same cost as filling up the truck in kazakhstan.
• 22:28
  Speaker 3: And how big is our.
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: Fuel tank and our fuel tank here is 450 liters
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: yeah like.
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: Which i was gonna say you can choose where you
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: fill up at that point when your tank is that
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: big which is also very helpful But yeah, go ahead.
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: Sorry. I mean, yeah. Well, to your point, we did
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: that coming out of Morocco. We filled up our main tank.
• 22:47
  Speaker 2: We had a reserve tank built in Morocco, just like
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: a dumb tank sits under the side skirt. I think
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: it cost us about 200 pounds and it holds about
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: 100 liters and jerry cans. And then if you remember
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: the little side quest that Richard and I did in
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: Western Sahara when we all thought we were going to Mauritania. Yeah.
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: And we went off and we went and bought those,
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: you know, 25, 30 liter oil drums. Yes. And before
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: we left Western Sahara, where it was really cheap, we
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: filled them up. And then before we left Morocco, we
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: filled everything up again. And that got us from Morocco
• 23:24
  Speaker 2: through to Bosnia. I think it was Bosnia before we
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: had to put fuel in again. So, I mean, that's
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: kind of a fuel consumption thing, but to your point,
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: a big tank, and particularly with a few extra jerry
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: cans and whatever, you've got the opportunity to decide where
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: you're filling up. And that's not just, I'm going to
• 23:41
  Speaker 2: the next town. It could be, I'm going to the
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: next country.
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 23:45
  Speaker 3: And that's one of the things.
• 23:45
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 23:46
  Speaker 3: I'll just skip a few countries.
• 23:48
  Speaker 5: But that's also one of the things about having a
• 23:49
  Speaker 5: larger vehicle that is one of the pros in that
• 23:52
  Speaker 5: you have a large fuel tank, so you can go
• 23:53
  Speaker 5: longer distances. You have a larger water tank, so you
• 23:56
  Speaker 5: can stay remote for longer. You have more space to
• 24:00
  Speaker 5: put and weight capacity to put more food you.
• 24:03
  Speaker 3: Know dry storage whatever you can.
• 24:05
  Speaker 5: Carry more stuff to enable you to be a way
• 24:07
  Speaker 5: out into the wilds for longer which is what we
• 24:10
  Speaker 5: love you know whereas smaller vehicles you know will struggle
• 24:14
  Speaker 5: with the fuel the water you know the food garbage
• 24:17
  Speaker 5: whatever you know waste disposal so that's that's kind of
• 24:20
  Speaker 5: where having a bigger vehicle lends itself to you know
• 24:24
  Speaker 5: longer trips and further part like more remote kind of
• 24:27
  Speaker 5: spaces yeah.
• 24:28
  Speaker 2: I think it's easier when it's a couple once you
• 24:31
  Speaker 2: start adding a dog and a child obviously the things
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: you need to carry multiply and you know children are
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: not great at turning taps off so if you have
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: a hundred liter water tank your water is gone in
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: a heartbeat whereas you need.
• 24:46
  Speaker 5: More showers you need to drink more water you know
• 24:48
  Speaker 5: it's all those kind of things where you just have
• 24:50
  Speaker 5: to kind of you really just have to think ahead
• 24:52
  Speaker 5: and there's certain spaces or places that we've gone to
• 24:54
  Speaker 5: where we thought we'll fill up here in advance with
• 24:57
  Speaker 5: you know more of this kind of food that the
• 25:00
  Speaker 5: five-year-old will eat you know and because we know we're
• 25:03
  Speaker 5: going here or we need a bit more kind of
• 25:06
  Speaker 5: fuel because we're going there and like dog food you
• 25:08
  Speaker 5: need to find the dog food the dog eats and
• 25:10
  Speaker 5: you need to have enough of that to keep you
• 25:12
  Speaker 5: going so you know you don't have to go off
• 25:13
  Speaker 5: and locate dog food in countries that probably don't actually
• 25:16
  Speaker 5: really kind of like dogs a lot of them you know.
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: So there's we were supposed to be somewhere close to
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: you guys right now yeah in mongolia but sad face
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: obviously foot and mouth outbreak there meant that we couldn't
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: cross the border with otis they'd shut the border for
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: anyone with animals but we'd prepped for that so we'd
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: gone out and bought 45 kilos of dog food which
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: was going to last us to get all the way
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: back around to where we planned we were going to
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: park for a period of time where we could then
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: get back to that food and having the payload capacity
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: on the vehicle allows you to do that you know
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: if you If I said to you, Ash, you need
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: to put 50 kilos of stuff in your vehicle.
• 25:59
  Speaker 3: Chuck everything out.
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, okay, you've got payload capacity to a degree,
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: but 50 kilos is a reasonable percentage of it. Whereas
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: we weigh 15 tons and our maximum vehicle weight is
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: 18 tons. So we've still got three tons of payload
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: capacity if we needed it. 45, 50 kilos of that
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: is an infinitesimally small percentage of it. And that's one
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: of the things the bigger vehicle gives you, but then
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: the downsides of the access and the cities and... When
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: big trucks get stuck, they get really stuck.
• 26:32
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: I want to talk about getting stuck at some point.
• 26:36
  Speaker 2: But.
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: We'll go back to that.
• 26:39
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we'll go back to that.
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: You were talking about the FAQs, and I think we
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: had cost.
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: Cost of the truck. Fuel.
• 26:46
  Speaker 3: Fuel.
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: Fuel range and cost.
• 26:50
  Speaker 2: What else... Where do you, I'm going to try and
• 26:52
  Speaker 2: make this as polite as possible, where do you go
• 26:53
  Speaker 2: to the toilet? Yeah.
• 26:56
  Speaker 3: Common question.
• 26:57
  Speaker 2: That's a classic. Yeah. Do you poo in a box?
• 27:00
  Speaker 2: I mean, effectively. Kind of. Kind of do. Yeah. Yeah.
• 27:02
  Speaker 2: It kind of is, really. That must be really disgusting.
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: Not really. What else?
• 27:06
  Speaker 3: What else?
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: The funny thing is, actually, as we've come further east,
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: where you've got more of a language barrier, we still
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: get the fuel questions and we still get the cost questions. Arguably,
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: the cost question overtakes the fuel question now. But the
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: other question seems to have kind of fallen by the wayside.
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: Where are you going? Why are you doing this?
• 27:26
  Speaker 3: How do you afford it?
• 27:28
  Speaker 2: How do you afford it? Yeah. What do you do
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: for work?
• 27:30
  Speaker 3: How do you afford it?
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: How do you afford to do this? Well.
• 27:33
  Speaker 3: Well, we saved a lot.
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: We did.
• 27:36
  Speaker 3: We planned a lot.
• 27:37
  Speaker 5: We saved a lot beforehand, even though we kind of
• 27:40
  Speaker 5: spent a fair bit doing it.
• 27:41
  Speaker 2: But.
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: We then made sure we always have a buffer.
• 27:44
  Speaker 5: We say, say whatever, if there's like, you know, we
• 27:47
  Speaker 5: need to go home or heaven forbid something happens or whatever.
• 27:50
  Speaker 5: So we always have a kind of buffer for that.
• 27:51
  Speaker 5: So Dave is a professional photographer, videographer, and has clients
• 27:56
  Speaker 5: that he works for whereby he has to, has to,
• 27:59
  Speaker 5: does go away for one month at a time, kind of,
• 28:02
  Speaker 5: you know, throughout the year, normally about two times a
• 28:04
  Speaker 5: year and works solidly for the month. And then it
• 28:08
  Speaker 5: comes back and that then enables us to, you know.
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: Travel some more and pick and choose what you want
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: to do. Effectively, you know, one or two of those
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: trips a year gives us enough money to keep going
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: without dipping into our savings. So yeah, it's, it's probably
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: one or two months of work a year and then
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: 10 months of clear travel time.
• 28:26
  Speaker 5: And then I'm a full-time island. So I was, I
• 28:28
  Speaker 5: was working in the corporate world for 15 years beforehand.
• 28:32
  Speaker 5: And then, you know, when we decided we were going
• 28:33
  Speaker 5: to do this and then obviously have children and, and,
• 28:37
  Speaker 5: You know, it was like, well, I.
• 28:38
  Speaker 3: Was like, well, I'll stop at my job.
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 28:40
  Speaker 3: You know, I don't need to work in the corporate
• 28:42
  Speaker 3: world anymore. Thank you very much.
• 28:43
  Speaker 5: And we had to do that because it was always
• 28:44
  Speaker 5: going to be that your profession enables you to go,
• 28:48
  Speaker 5: you know, either here and do kind of, you know,
• 28:50
  Speaker 5: photography and whatever and work, but also then to go.
• 28:52
  Speaker 5: So when Dave does go away for the month, we normally,
• 28:55
  Speaker 5: you know, we plot up somewhere for the month that's
• 28:57
  Speaker 5: kind of stationary, either in the truck or, you know,
• 29:01
  Speaker 5: rent somewhere, rent a house or an Airbnb or whatever.
• 29:03
  Speaker 5: And then I'll kind of base myself there with Isla
• 29:05
  Speaker 5: and Otis. family members might come out and visit or
• 29:09
  Speaker 5: friends come and stay, you know, things like that. And
• 29:11
  Speaker 5: then Dave's able to therefore go away and work, you know,
• 29:14
  Speaker 5: knowing that we are kind of safe and plotted up
• 29:17
  Speaker 5: and then come back and then we continue, which is
• 29:19
  Speaker 5: a really, I mean, it is a luxury kind of
• 29:22
  Speaker 5: position to be in, but we've worked really hard in
• 29:25
  Speaker 5: the lead up to it to A, get that client,
• 29:28
  Speaker 5: you know, that situation to buy the truck number one
• 29:30
  Speaker 5: and to be able to be in a situation where
• 29:32
  Speaker 5: Dave's working incredibly hard to have those kind of, you know,
• 29:34
  Speaker 5: clients and work opportunities.
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think, you know, in essence, my job. I
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: could can be done for me I mean I take
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: pictures as we travel and you know those pictures I
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: sell you know I sell prints I have a print
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: fulfillment store that's available globally people can just go on
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: pick a picture and order it and a print turns
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: up that brings in a little bit of money But
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: so my job can be done from anywhere. I can
• 29:57
  Speaker 2: fly out from here to go and meet my clients
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: to take pictures. Whereas Jess's work was, although she was
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: working from home, it was kind of home office. She
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: couldn't do that from the shores of Lake Issaquil.
• 30:09
  Speaker 3: Well, there's a lot of travel as well.
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: There was travel and time zone changes, yada, yada, yada.
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: That just wouldn't work.
• 30:15
  Speaker 5: And after having Isla, I think, you know, I decided
• 30:18
  Speaker 5: or we decided that that wasn't what we wanted to do,
• 30:21
  Speaker 5: especially for me. Like we wanted to, to raise Isla
• 30:25
  Speaker 5: and spend as much time with her and I think
• 30:27
  Speaker 5: that if I was trying to do that job or
• 30:30
  Speaker 5: at you know this point in time anything similar it
• 30:33
  Speaker 5: would detract away from a our family and our lives
• 30:37
  Speaker 5: and also from you know the traveling that we're doing
• 30:39
  Speaker 5: and the places that we're going to and I just
• 30:42
  Speaker 5: think we both made that decision that that's not the
• 30:44
  Speaker 5: way we wanted to do it we wanted to you
• 30:46
  Speaker 5: know me to be able to us to be able
• 30:48
  Speaker 5: to focus on bringing up Isla and now we're talking
• 30:51
  Speaker 5: about evolving how we live. Homeschooling is coming into it now.
• 30:56
  Speaker 5: I mean, she's only five and a half, but we
• 30:58
  Speaker 5: are thinking forward already about how we are going to
• 31:01
  Speaker 5: homeschool Isla.
• 31:03
  Speaker 3: What does that mean? How does that mean? Will it
• 31:04
  Speaker 3: change how we travel? Will we have to slow down? Yes,
• 31:07
  Speaker 3: we will.
• 31:08
  Speaker 5: Allocate time, but also not make it so rigid that
• 31:12
  Speaker 5: we can't all of us enjoy what where we are
• 31:16
  Speaker 5: and how we do it you know and mix it
• 31:17
  Speaker 5: up and be like oh we're gonna go see some
• 31:18
  Speaker 5: petroglyphs today let's learn some history and geography or oh
• 31:21
  Speaker 5: we're gonna go to like you know the dinosaur museum
• 31:23
  Speaker 5: here or you know we're gonna go and we're just
• 31:26
  Speaker 5: gonna go for a walk and we're gonna identify different
• 31:28
  Speaker 5: species of you know shell and flowers and fauna along
• 31:31
  Speaker 5: the lake of you know the shores of lake issacol
• 31:33
  Speaker 5: you know so it's it's it's kind of it's evolving.
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah and it's a it's an evolving education process i
• 31:40
  Speaker 2: guess for all of us but i think maybe fundamentally
• 31:44
  Speaker 2: i don't know if we've ever actually said this but
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: i think we're both quite old-fashioned in certain ways so
• 31:49
  Speaker 2: for example like if you go back 50 100 years
• 31:52
  Speaker 2: the family unit was very strong and the parents were
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: involved in raising the children maybe 200 years like strongly
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: it was a very tight family unit and in the
• 32:01
  Speaker 2: last 50 60 70 years society has kind of fractured
• 32:06
  Speaker 2: open a little bit and now a lot a lot
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: of parents maybe don't take as much responsibility for their
• 32:12
  Speaker 2: child's education they just send them off to school and
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: away you go and thanks very much and they also
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: don't get to spend as much time with their children
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: and you know realistically what you get two two summers
• 32:24
  Speaker 2: with your child as a baby you get what 10
• 32:27
  Speaker 2: not enough 10 summers as a child and a few
• 32:32
  Speaker 2: summers as a.
• 32:32
  Speaker 3: Teenager they actually want to know you at that point.
• 32:34
  Speaker 2: And so you kind of want to maximize the amount
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: of time the amount of hours that you can spend
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: with them. And this is a way of doing that.
• 32:44
  Speaker 2: It means, you know, okay, this life is not super cheap,
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: but it is actually cheaper than living in a house
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: in England, without a doubt, guaranteed. And so that reduces
• 32:55
  Speaker 2: the income requirement, which means that therefore reduces the amount
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: of work we have to do, which then frees up
• 33:03
  Speaker 2: time to spend together as a family, to spend time
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: with Isla. to watch her grow up and be involved
• 33:09
  Speaker 2: in her growing up and her education at a really
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: micro level.
• 33:13
  Speaker 5: And I think also if we didn't do it now,
• 33:16
  Speaker 5: we were like, well, you know, we could work and
• 33:17
  Speaker 5: we could then save it for our retirement or whatever.
• 33:20
  Speaker 5: And that's not saying that it's wrong to do that.
• 33:23
  Speaker 5: But we thought if we just do this now, you know,
• 33:25
  Speaker 5: Isla's eight months old. She's not at school yet. We've
• 33:30
  Speaker 5: got somewhere we could go back to in England if
• 33:33
  Speaker 5: we needed to. Actually, we have less of that now.
• 33:35
  Speaker 5: But we just decided if we don't do this now,
• 33:37
  Speaker 5: we will get wrapped up in a better job, a
• 33:42
  Speaker 5: bigger house, a bigger car, schools, friendships. It's not to
• 33:46
  Speaker 5: say she doesn't have those, but doing it at this
• 33:49
  Speaker 5: age for both Isla and for.
• 33:51
  Speaker 3: Us, means that, you know, like, why not?
• 33:54
  Speaker 5: Like, you never know what's going to happen and why
• 33:56
  Speaker 5: wait till retirement? And yes, we're fortunate enough to be
• 33:59
  Speaker 5: able to have taken that leap. And it was a
• 34:01
  Speaker 5: big risk stepping out of my job, out of my career,
• 34:04
  Speaker 5: you know, and Dave, you know, saying goodbye to a
• 34:05
  Speaker 5: lot of his other clients because he wasn't physically present
• 34:07
  Speaker 5: enough in, you know, within the UK or Europe, or
• 34:10
  Speaker 5: we just chose that this is the way we wanted
• 34:12
  Speaker 5: to do it. It was a huge risk. And that's also,
• 34:15
  Speaker 5: I think, a bit of a misconception. People go, oh, well,
• 34:17
  Speaker 5: you know, you just like, you just went off and
• 34:19
  Speaker 5: did it. Like, well, like, no, it was, it was terrifying.
• 34:22
  Speaker 5: It was terrifying stepping out of the norm, you know,
• 34:25
  Speaker 5: what we were used to and, you know, with a
• 34:27
  Speaker 5: baby and a dog and, you know, aging parents and whatever,
• 34:32
  Speaker 5: you know, like into something that we had no idea about,
• 34:35
  Speaker 5: you know.
• 34:35
  Speaker 2: I'm actually going to frame that slightly different or phrase
• 34:39
  Speaker 2: it slightly differently. Everyone seems to think that when you
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: live this life, you just live on one permanent holiday.
• 34:48
  Speaker 3: Eternal sunsets and beautiful.
• 34:50
  Speaker 2: Places beautiful sunrises beautiful sunsets beautiful places yeah there's a
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: lot of.
• 34:54
  Speaker 3: That which is beautiful and lovely and amazing.
• 34:56
  Speaker 2: And because of that life must be incredible and so
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: easy and you just swan around the world having the
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: time of your life and the reality is it's hard
• 35:05
  Speaker 2: it is hard and it should.
• 35:08
  Speaker 3: Be hard right when you.
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: Change when you trade one life for another life's problems
• 35:13
  Speaker 2: don't disappear what you trade is one set of problems
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: that for a different set of problems or challenges or responsibilities,
• 35:22
  Speaker 2: for a different set of responsibilities. So instead of thinking, okay,
• 35:25
  Speaker 2: where's the next holiday going to be? How are we
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: going to afford it? How do we save for that?
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: Where's the next mortgage payment coming from? How are we
• 35:31
  Speaker 2: affording the electricity bills? What school is Isla going to
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: go to next? Is she being bullied? How's she getting
• 35:38
  Speaker 2: on at school? What can we do this weekend for
• 35:40
  Speaker 2: a soft play to entertain her in the few hours
• 35:43
  Speaker 2: that we have with her? So on and so forth.
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: Our responsibilities, our challenges, our problems are now, where are
• 35:50
  Speaker 2: we next getting water? But come back to previous, that's
• 35:53
  Speaker 2: like a two-week timeline. We can last for about two
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: weeks on our water.
• 35:57
  Speaker 3: Do we have enough solar?
• 35:58
  Speaker 2: Do we have enough power for cooking? Or can we
• 36:02
  Speaker 2: find some wood or charcoal we're going to barbecue outside,
• 36:04
  Speaker 2: which we're going to do later?
• 36:05
  Speaker 3: Can we fit down there?
• 36:07
  Speaker 2: Can we fit down that track? Where are we going
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: to park tonight? And, you know, that is such a misconception.
• 36:13
  Speaker 2: People are like, oh, you just pull up anywhere. There's
• 36:15
  Speaker 2: a lot of thought goes into this.
• 36:17
  Speaker 3: And respect for where you are and your environment.
• 36:19
  Speaker 2: Exactly. You don't want to trash the joint. You don't
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: want to upset anyone and go park on someone's private
• 36:25
  Speaker 2: land inadvertently, so on and so forth. And so there
• 36:28
  Speaker 2: are daily decisions and things that you've got to be
• 36:31
  Speaker 2: thinking about. They're just different to what you would have
• 36:34
  Speaker 2: if you were living in a house.
• 36:35
  Speaker 5: And then that then ties into, and this sounds like
• 36:38
  Speaker 5: a luxury problem, but decision fatigue is huge because that's
• 36:44
  Speaker 5: constantly like, okay, all of the things Dave said. And
• 36:47
  Speaker 5: then you have your daily dealing with a five-year-old, making
• 36:51
  Speaker 5: sure she's okay.
• 36:53
  Speaker 3: Is she entertained? Is she happy? Which is pretty easy
• 36:56
  Speaker 3: with her. She's pretty good going. Is the dog okay?
• 36:58
  Speaker 3: Are we okay?
• 36:59
  Speaker 5: You know, as a couple, are we okay as individuals? Because,
• 37:03
  Speaker 5: you know, yes, we live in a box. And, you know,
• 37:07
  Speaker 5: as you know, like, you know, being married is not
• 37:10
  Speaker 5: easy at times, as we all know. And then you
• 37:13
  Speaker 5: multiply that by living in a box effectively. And you
• 37:15
  Speaker 5: can't just go and shut the door sometimes because we
• 37:17
  Speaker 5: have one door. We never close it anyway.
• 37:20
  Speaker 2: You can't walk out the house, get in your car
• 37:22
  Speaker 2: and just go for an hour's drive to get some headspace.
• 37:25
  Speaker 5: Or go and have a coffee with your mates and download,
• 37:27
  Speaker 5: you know, like, or just go and, you know, just
• 37:29
  Speaker 5: do something that isn't about your truck and your husband
• 37:34
  Speaker 5: or wife or your child. Like there's no getting away
• 37:37
  Speaker 5: from one another sometimes.
• 37:38
  Speaker 3: And, that is a challenge.
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: That's of course amazing, right?
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: Also, it's fascinating from what, like my experience and your experience,
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: you're thinking daily, you're thinking weekly, you were thinking monthly
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: because when you're going into say another country, you kind
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: of have to know the next step after that. Because
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: you're looking into paperwork, you're looking into visas, you're looking,
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: are there pets allowed? What are the logistics behind it?
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: So like both of us, for example, planning this year's travels,
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: you're never just looking short term. You're always looking three
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: or four months down the road and like, how long
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: is the visa there, et cetera, et cetera.
• 38:23
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah. You're not, you're not living day to day.
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: You are living day to day, but at the same
• 38:29
  Speaker 2: time you're living, Month to month and quarter to quarter.
• 38:34
  Speaker 2: How long can we stay in this country? Or in
• 38:36
  Speaker 2: our case, where we had our plan to come through
• 38:38
  Speaker 2: to Mongolia just behind you guys. And suddenly, literally, we
• 38:43
  Speaker 2: collected our Russian transit visas. And two hours later, we
• 38:48
  Speaker 2: had the euphoria. Yeah, we got our transit visas. This
• 38:50
  Speaker 2: is awesome. Two hours later, we heard people got turned
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: away from the Tashanta border between Russia and Mongolia because
• 38:57
  Speaker 2: they had a dog with them. And then we heard
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: another report. And then we heard, suddenly, that plan is
• 39:02
  Speaker 2: completely out the window. Well, we built our whole year
• 39:05
  Speaker 2: plan around this, working our way through to Mongolia, coming out,
• 39:09
  Speaker 2: going into China, back through China, into Kyrgyzstan, back up
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: into Kazakhstan, then parking up for when I have to
• 39:15
  Speaker 2: go away for work. And suddenly, that's literally just been
• 39:18
  Speaker 2: torpedoed completely because there isn't enough time. Like the visa
• 39:24
  Speaker 2: days allowed in each of the countries doesn't work. so
• 39:28
  Speaker 2: we then had the mad scramble of what are we
• 39:32
  Speaker 2: going to do and and then.
• 39:34
  Speaker 5: I'm dealing with all the emotions of what of that
• 39:36
  Speaker 5: how that felt you know and like yes we're well
• 39:39
  Speaker 5: it's really great that we have our home with us
• 39:41
  Speaker 5: and we can just pivot and you know then kind
• 39:43
  Speaker 5: of okay what's plan b you know what plan c
• 39:46
  Speaker 5: but You know, it was really, really disappointing.
• 39:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, it's, for anyone that doesn't live in
• 39:52
  Speaker 2: a truck or doesn't actually overland, you're listening to this
• 39:55
  Speaker 2: because you're interested. This, I understand, sounds like a real
• 39:59
  Speaker 2: luxury first world problem. Okay. 100%. So don't get me wrong.
• 40:03
  Speaker 2: We understand entirely if you're sitting there going, Jesus, guys, like, really?
• 40:08
  Speaker 2: You're complaining about this? No, no. Yeah, boo-hoo, let me
• 40:13
  Speaker 2: get the tiny little violin out. It's microscopic.
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: The ambulance is coming.
• 40:19
  Speaker 2: Ambulance, I haven't heard that in a long time. When
• 40:22
  Speaker 2: your plan for the next six months has just been
• 40:26
  Speaker 2: completely torn up and set fire to, suddenly you have
• 40:30
  Speaker 2: to come up with something else. And the logistics of
• 40:33
  Speaker 2: trying to do that, whilst a clock is ticking, because
• 40:37
  Speaker 2: you're in a country that you can't stay indefinitely, so
• 40:40
  Speaker 2: you've got a ticking clock. you're still trying to get
• 40:43
  Speaker 2: the vehicle ready to get moving again, and suddenly it's
• 40:45
  Speaker 2: all gone up in smoke. There is a pressure to that,
• 40:48
  Speaker 2: and there's a challenge to that. And part of, I
• 40:53
  Speaker 2: would say, almost every overlander we've met, one common theme
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: is a flexibility and an ability to pivot. Like, you
• 41:02
  Speaker 2: have to be able to make a compromise, you have
• 41:04
  Speaker 2: to be able to make a decision and not dwell
• 41:07
  Speaker 2: on it, and you have to be able to pivot because...
• 41:11
  Speaker 2: Can I say shit? Shit goes wrong. We'll find out.
• 41:14
  Speaker 2: Is it before or after watershed? Who knows? Stuff goes sideways, right?
• 41:18
  Speaker 2: And you have to be able to roll with the
• 41:20
  Speaker 2: punches on an almost daily basis because nothing... You're in
• 41:25
  Speaker 2: a vehicle. It rolls. Things happen. Things go wrong in
• 41:30
  Speaker 2: a house. That's bricks and mortar not moving. Things go
• 41:34
  Speaker 2: wrong in the truck because... You're dragging your house over
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: bumpy-ass roads and washerboards and off-road and ruts and goodness
• 41:42
  Speaker 2: knows what. And you have to be able to deal
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: with that whilst dealing with the logistics and planning.
• 41:48
  Speaker 3: By no means.
• 41:49
  Speaker 5: I mean, from our backgrounds, as we've said, I worked
• 41:52
  Speaker 5: in the corporate world for 15 years. Before I met Dave,
• 41:56
  Speaker 5: if you'd have said to me, you're going to be
• 41:57
  Speaker 5: living in a 15-ton truck with a five-year-old and a
• 42:00
  Speaker 5: dog in the middle of Central Asia, I would have
• 42:03
  Speaker 5: been like, hello, are you mental?
• 42:05
  Speaker 2: Let me just get you committed to the asylum.
• 42:09
  Speaker 5: But we are, and I love it. And I absolutely
• 42:11
  Speaker 5: love it. And that makes it sound very much like
• 42:12
  Speaker 5: it was Dave's idea. Like it was our idea, but
• 42:15
  Speaker 5: I needed that time to just be like, okay, you know,
• 42:17
  Speaker 5: I can switch my thinking away around, you know, but
• 42:21
  Speaker 5: now it is. And I feel as the five years
• 42:24
  Speaker 5: have gone on that we've been in the truck, like,
• 42:25
  Speaker 5: you know, the most minor thing at the beginning, we'd
• 42:27
  Speaker 5: be like.
• 42:27
  Speaker 2: Oh my God, stop the truck. Something's rattling. Like, you know, something's.
• 42:31
  Speaker 3: Fallen off, you know, wherever.
• 42:32
  Speaker 5: And now we're like, do we have a do we
• 42:35
  Speaker 5: have like a cable tie or something you know like
• 42:38
  Speaker 5: or can we just like fashion this bracket because the
• 42:41
  Speaker 5: number plate was looking like it was going to fall
• 42:42
  Speaker 5: off you know or and and hats off to dave
• 42:45
  Speaker 5: like you know we are not trained mechanics we are
• 42:48
  Speaker 5: not trained you know carpenters welders you know plumbers electricians
• 42:53
  Speaker 5: and you know but we thank god for youtube you know.
• 42:57
  Speaker 2: Things like that like youtube chat and talking to.
• 42:59
  Speaker 5: Other overlanders and experience with like from friends of us
• 43:03
  Speaker 5: you've done it you know you guys other friends of
• 43:05
  Speaker 5: ours you know like you kind of oh have you
• 43:07
  Speaker 5: tried that one or you know there's such a community
• 43:09
  Speaker 5: whether that's in physical presence when you're with one another
• 43:12
  Speaker 5: or you know like you know social media whatsapp whatever
• 43:15
  Speaker 5: that you you know you never feel alone even if
• 43:18
  Speaker 5: you're in like the middle of Tajikistan and you put
• 43:21
  Speaker 5: yourself in a bog which we'll talk about in a.
• 43:24
  Speaker 2: Bit you know getting stuck or all of that you
• 43:26
  Speaker 2: know like.
• 43:27
  Speaker 5: There's always there's always help you know and if not
• 43:30
  Speaker 5: like you just you work it out you have to basically.
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: That is a good segue into.
• 43:37
  Speaker 5: Getting stuck getting stuck our favorite type of conversation.
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: And there's always help um you guys.
• 43:44
  Speaker 2: Always help This community is amazing in terms of always help.
• 43:49
  Speaker 3: Which one do you want to know about?
• 43:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah, which one? So, okay. So let's go with our
• 43:53
  Speaker 2: key stocks and then you can pick one or more
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: and we'll talk about them.
• 43:57
  Speaker 3: Short version.
• 43:57
  Speaker 2: Short version. So the first getting stuck was we got
• 44:01
  Speaker 2: on our shakedown trip to France. That was hilarious. We
• 44:05
  Speaker 2: were entirely unprepared. We drove into a muddy field. We
• 44:08
  Speaker 2: stopped to see how soft it was. We just went down.
• 44:13
  Speaker 3: Error number one.
• 44:14
  Speaker 2: Error number one was that error number two was the
• 44:16
  Speaker 2: fact that we didn't even have a shovel with us.
• 44:18
  Speaker 2: So terribly prepared. That was, we were terribly prepared. So
• 44:21
  Speaker 2: green at that point.
• 44:22
  Speaker 3: Oh my God.
• 44:23
  Speaker 2: So there's that one. Generator broken.
• 44:24
  Speaker 3: We had no heat for the generator. Power, nothing.
• 44:26
  Speaker 2: Power for the generator. Yeah, that was.
• 44:28
  Speaker 3: Anyway, so we got out.
• 44:29
  Speaker 2: That was fine.
• 44:29
  Speaker 3: We got out.
• 44:30
  Speaker 2: Then number two was we got stuck in a sand
• 44:35
  Speaker 2: dune in Morocco.
• 44:36
  Speaker 3: Which was interesting.
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: We, and we got stuck in the most stupid way
• 44:39
  Speaker 2: possible because actually we've been driving around and all have
• 44:42
  Speaker 2: been great. And then as we were coming away from Urg, Chicago,
• 44:45
  Speaker 2: we saw these beautiful dunes. And I'm like, oh, let's
• 44:47
  Speaker 2: just run a few dunes because it's so much fun.
• 44:50
  Speaker 2: And I just backed off the power for anyone that's
• 44:52
  Speaker 2: driven over sand dunes. You know, you come up with
• 44:53
  Speaker 2: more power and you back off at the top. So
• 44:55
  Speaker 2: you just crest and float down. And I backed off
• 44:58
  Speaker 2: slightly too early. And we just kind of belly flopped
• 45:01
  Speaker 2: onto the top of this dune. So there was that.
• 45:04
  Speaker 2: Then we got stuck in Greece out the back of Meteora.
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: Yep.
• 45:07
  Speaker 3: That was fun. Mud again.
• 45:08
  Speaker 2: That was mud. We hate mud.
• 45:09
  Speaker 3: Give me sand any day.
• 45:11
  Speaker 2: The Morocco was like 40 degrees when we got stuck.
• 45:13
  Speaker 2: That was challenging. Then we got stuck in Assi Plateau.
• 45:17
  Speaker 3: Kazakhstan.
• 45:18
  Speaker 2: Kazakhstan. And then we got stuck on the Pamir.
• 45:21
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 45:22
  Speaker 2: Just a little before we last saw you guys or
• 45:24
  Speaker 2: when we met you guys up there. So which one
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: do you want? Which story do you want?
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: What was the most memorable or like gained experience from,
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: I guess? or the longest or the hard the most
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: difficult mentally most.
• 45:38
  Speaker 2: Difficult was probably either kazakhstan or tajikistan.
• 45:43
  Speaker 3: It depends when you look at i mean like yeah in.
• 45:45
  Speaker 2: Both cases we were stuck at an angle now i
• 45:49
  Speaker 2: don't know about you guys but going up a hill
• 45:52
  Speaker 2: or going down a hill absolutely fine can be as
• 45:53
  Speaker 2: steep as it wants don't care when your vehicle is
• 45:57
  Speaker 2: lent sideways.
• 45:59
  Speaker 5: And you are the weight and height that we are
• 46:00
  Speaker 5: that's terrifying.
• 46:02
  Speaker 3: It's terrifying like ptsd inducing terrifying we still have.
• 46:06
  Speaker 2: Oh we the chart leans now a little bit like
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: 10 degrees and we're both like and yet she can
• 46:10
  Speaker 2: probably lean to about 25 degrees but it feels horrible
• 46:13
  Speaker 2: And it's also the knowledge that if she goes over,
• 46:15
  Speaker 2: it's going to be really, really, really hard to get
• 46:17
  Speaker 2: her back up again and require lots of vehicles. So
• 46:19
  Speaker 2: that's terrifying. I mean.
• 46:21
  Speaker 5: I think that I learned when we were in the
• 46:23
  Speaker 5: sand dunes how I can get myself underneath the truck
• 46:26
  Speaker 5: effectively and move sand with my legs.
• 46:27
  Speaker 2: That was key number one. We got some local Moroccans
• 46:30
  Speaker 2: who taught.
• 46:30
  Speaker 3: Us that one. That was really good. And then I
• 46:33
  Speaker 3: learned that, like, you know, tipping... Yes, there is always.
• 46:38
  Speaker 5: The chance that you can tip your truck like any vehicle, right?
• 46:40
  Speaker 5: And by God, by no means am I undoing it
• 46:43
  Speaker 5: down in any shape or form. It is terrifying when
• 46:45
  Speaker 5: you feel your truck is just going like that. But
• 46:49
  Speaker 5: it would take a hell of a lot to tip
• 46:53
  Speaker 5: a truck of our size. But when you are in
• 46:56
  Speaker 5: that moment and all you see is your truck potentially
• 46:58
  Speaker 5: tipping over down a hill, a significant hill or drop,
• 47:04
  Speaker 5: And there's nothing around you that you can tether your
• 47:06
  Speaker 5: truck to.
• 47:07
  Speaker 3: Nothing, basically. It is terrifying.
• 47:11
  Speaker 5: You don't even want to touch the truck for fear
• 47:12
  Speaker 5: that you might tip it over the edge.
• 47:14
  Speaker 2: Just overbalance it.
• 47:16
  Speaker 3: So I'd say tipping. But I think the thing, we
• 47:18
  Speaker 3: don't panic.
• 47:20
  Speaker 5: Even though your initial panic for like half an hour
• 47:22
  Speaker 5: and then you'd be like, right, how do we do this?
• 47:25
  Speaker 5: let the tire pressures down on the edge of which
• 47:27
  Speaker 5: is not tipping to try and reduce some of the
• 47:29
  Speaker 5: weight off the top of the truck. You know, you
• 47:31
  Speaker 5: dig a hole so that, you know, the tires can
• 47:33
  Speaker 5: come back down a fraction, anything basically to try and
• 47:36
  Speaker 5: take some weight off the top. If you can take
• 47:38
  Speaker 5: some stuff off the top of your truck, try and
• 47:40
  Speaker 5: get it off the truck, you know, to reduce some
• 47:42
  Speaker 5: of the weight. We couldn't do that as easily. And
• 47:45
  Speaker 5: we've learned our lessons from that about where we put
• 47:48
  Speaker 5: our recovery stuff, accessibility, You know, if you tip down sometimes,
• 47:53
  Speaker 5: of course, your recovery stuff is going to be in
• 47:55
  Speaker 5: the bloody locker that's tipped down in the mud that
• 47:57
  Speaker 5: you can't get to, right?
• 47:58
  Speaker 2: Of course.
• 47:59
  Speaker 5: And you're never going to know which side you tip
• 48:01
  Speaker 5: because you never want to tip again, right?
• 48:02
  Speaker 3: You'll get stuck again. So make your recovery.
• 48:05
  Speaker 2: Try and spread some key recovery stuff around so you
• 48:08
  Speaker 2: can get to it, whichever side it happens to be.
• 48:10
  Speaker 5: Have like, you know, a jacket in the truck with you,
• 48:12
  Speaker 5: you know, in the cab and some trousers or emergency
• 48:15
  Speaker 5: blankets or something.
• 48:15
  Speaker 2: Small fold of emergency blankets.
• 48:17
  Speaker 5: Because if you can't get in your cab and you've
• 48:18
  Speaker 5: got shorts and a t-shirt on, like you start the
• 48:20
  Speaker 5: rescue in and you end up in like minus flipping
• 48:22
  Speaker 5: whatever it was in Tajikistan and then it snowed the
• 48:25
  Speaker 5: following day.
• 48:25
  Speaker 3: Like you just be prepared. have some food, you know, with.
• 48:28
  Speaker 2: You, which water. We've always got food in the cab
• 48:31
  Speaker 2: because of Isla.
• 48:32
  Speaker 3: Exactly.
• 48:33
  Speaker 2: So that's fine. But yeah, like in Tajikistan, we were
• 48:36
  Speaker 2: driving along. It had been lovely and warm. We'd been
• 48:37
  Speaker 2: to some hot springs. It was amazing. We were coming
• 48:40
  Speaker 2: along a track and because we'd had this tipping experience
• 48:44
  Speaker 2: in Kazakhstan and the getting stuck, we saw a bit
• 48:47
  Speaker 2: of track that was quite leany that actually we would
• 48:49
  Speaker 2: have been perfectly fine to drive along. Wouldn't have caused
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: us a problem at all. But, we didn't want to
• 48:54
  Speaker 2: drive it we want to try and flatten it so
• 48:56
  Speaker 2: we kind of veered off to the left a little
• 48:58
  Speaker 2: bit just walked it first i went oh yeah that'll
• 48:59
  Speaker 2: be fine with the forgetting that we're a 15-ton truck
• 49:03
  Speaker 2: and the ground was not fine for us and so
• 49:06
  Speaker 2: as we went this way that was slightly flatter then
• 49:08
  Speaker 2: the left dug in bogged and bogged and we ended
• 49:11
  Speaker 2: up leaning more than we would have done if we
• 49:13
  Speaker 2: just stayed on the track so that was less than
• 49:16
  Speaker 2: ideal but talk about community and fortune and whatever within
• 49:21
  Speaker 2: 15 minutes of getting stuck we had friends with us
• 49:25
  Speaker 2: who were in a troopie but then seven more troopies
• 49:29
  Speaker 2: came over the hill in the opposite direction like.
• 49:30
  Speaker 5: The cavalry literally over the hill and the initial thought
• 49:34
  Speaker 5: was which i'm sure we've all felt god now i
• 49:37
  Speaker 5: have to explain this to seven different people.
• 49:39
  Speaker 2: About how god this is embarrassing this.
• 49:41
  Speaker 5: Is embarrassing like you know your initial like oh i'm
• 49:44
  Speaker 5: so stupid i've got myself into the situation how did
• 49:46
  Speaker 5: this happen like you know forgetting that this happens to
• 49:48
  Speaker 5: most overlanders you know at least some point in the
• 49:50
  Speaker 5: general one's been stuck yeah and then and then kind
• 49:53
  Speaker 5: of then i was like oh they're dutch amazing like
• 49:56
  Speaker 5: wow i can speak dutch like that's that's brilliant you
• 49:58
  Speaker 5: know And then they came over and then through, they
• 50:00
  Speaker 5: were like, hey, okay, so, you know, a bit of
• 50:02
  Speaker 5: a problem.
• 50:03
  Speaker 3: Are you okay?
• 50:04
  Speaker 5: And then, you know, through the course of, you know,
• 50:06
  Speaker 5: talking to them a bit more, the one of the
• 50:08
  Speaker 5: main guys was ex-Dutch military.
• 50:11
  Speaker 2: Ex-Dutch army. And he had been a truck recovery specialist.
• 50:16
  Speaker 3: I was like, are you kidding me?
• 50:17
  Speaker 2: And then he left the army and set up his
• 50:19
  Speaker 2: own truck recovery business as a private civilian.
• 50:23
  Speaker 3: You know.
• 50:23
  Speaker 2: Like the one person in the world.
• 50:26
  Speaker 3: In the middle of nowhere in Tajikistan.
• 50:27
  Speaker 2: Just a bit. Overland magic.
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: I'm telling you.
• 50:31
  Speaker 5: We manifested this without even realizing. And then basically, long
• 50:35
  Speaker 5: story short, it became this rescue operation of seven different
• 50:40
  Speaker 5: cars all backed up, winched in. BB had one up
• 50:43
  Speaker 5: the hill, one of the troopers up the hill with
• 50:45
  Speaker 5: a line.
• 50:46
  Speaker 2: Just to stop her tipping any further over.
• 50:49
  Speaker 3: Everyone was on the radios.
• 50:50
  Speaker 5: It was all like, okay, military precision, a little bit
• 50:53
  Speaker 5: more over, a little bit more winch, a little bit more. And,
• 50:56
  Speaker 5: you know, they pulled us out purely on their winches.
• 51:01
  Speaker 5: We did not turn the engines on, you know, because
• 51:02
  Speaker 5: we didn't want to dig the wheels in more and
• 51:04
  Speaker 5: sink in more and whatever and tip more potentially. And
• 51:07
  Speaker 5: we were out within four hours.
• 51:09
  Speaker 2: Four, four and a half hours.
• 51:10
  Speaker 3: Four and a half hours. By this point, it was
• 51:11
  Speaker 3: pitch black. It was freezing cold. Two of the people
• 51:14
  Speaker 3: in the group, the tour group.
• 51:15
  Speaker 2: Had altitude sickness. Because we were at like three and
• 51:17
  Speaker 2: a half thousand meters. Yeah.
• 51:19
  Speaker 3: And it was.
• 51:21
  Speaker 5: truly amazing like the sense of community and I was
• 51:23
  Speaker 5: a bit like no no it's okay guys like you
• 51:25
  Speaker 5: know you don't have to stay but please stay and
• 51:27
  Speaker 5: they were like no we don't leave you know we're
• 51:29
  Speaker 5: all in this together we're not leaving you we're going
• 51:31
  Speaker 5: to get you out it's fine and they did and amazing.
• 51:34
  Speaker 2: And all we had to give them was eternal gratitude
• 51:37
  Speaker 2: and a bottle of whiskey which they were very happy.
• 51:40
  Speaker 5: With yeah and that is one of the things that
• 51:42
  Speaker 5: you know we've we've learned although when you leave your
• 51:46
  Speaker 5: bricks and mortar and your friendship groups and your home
• 51:50
  Speaker 5: as you knew it right and the community that that
• 51:53
  Speaker 5: brings you find community in so many other amazing ways
• 51:58
  Speaker 5: whether that be from the local you know the local
• 52:00
  Speaker 5: communities where you are through to the overlanding community whether
• 52:04
  Speaker 5: they are with you or.
• 52:06
  Speaker 2: In yeah in spirit in spirit in the ether.
• 52:09
  Speaker 5: And that is that is one of the things that
• 52:11
  Speaker 5: just is truly truly special yeah.
• 52:14
  Speaker 2: It's funny actually we keep we keep saying over the
• 52:16
  Speaker 2: years like we meet people when we're traveling And after,
• 52:20
  Speaker 2: you know, after you meet people as a couple, you're
• 52:22
  Speaker 2: always like, oh, what did you think of them? And
• 52:24
  Speaker 2: we always go, they're really nice. Everyone we meet that's
• 52:27
  Speaker 2: another overlander, we're like, oh, they're really nice. They're our
• 52:29
  Speaker 2: kind of people. We go, Well, of course, they're really
• 52:31
  Speaker 2: nice and our kind of people because they're doing what
• 52:33
  Speaker 2: we're doing. So we obviously have similar thought processes, similar
• 52:39
  Speaker 2: ideas about how life should be lived. And we're all
• 52:42
  Speaker 2: kind of doing the same thing in slightly different ways.
• 52:44
  Speaker 2: But broadly speaking, this one overland idea. So, of course,
• 52:49
  Speaker 2: we're probably all going to get on. And yeah, OK,
• 52:51
  Speaker 2: you find some people where you're a bit like, well,
• 52:53
  Speaker 2: they're nice and they're OK, but I wouldn't want to
• 52:55
  Speaker 2: spend a lot of time with them.
• 52:56
  Speaker 3: That's like anywhere. That's like home.
• 52:58
  Speaker 2: But more often than not, you find people and you
• 53:00
  Speaker 2: end up hanging out with them for a while and
• 53:02
  Speaker 2: traveling with them.
• 53:02
  Speaker 3: Because they're good mates.
• 53:06
  Speaker 2: And they're from all parts of the world. Like, if
• 53:09
  Speaker 2: you want an anti-racism rap, this is just everyone, doesn't
• 53:12
  Speaker 2: matter where they're from, whatever country they're from, we're all
• 53:15
  Speaker 2: doing this thing together. And we're all one people living
• 53:19
  Speaker 2: in a similar sort of way.
• 53:21
  Speaker 3: So do we enjoy getting stuck? No, we do not
• 53:23
  Speaker 3: enjoy getting stuck.
• 53:24
  Speaker 2: I swear, I don't mind getting stuck on the flat.
• 53:26
  Speaker 2: I'll take it and stuck on the flat any day
• 53:27
  Speaker 2: of the week.
• 53:28
  Speaker 3: But it happens and it will happen again, probably.
• 53:31
  Speaker 2: As long as it doesn't happen on a lean.
• 53:33
  Speaker 3: No, not on a lean or in mud.
• 53:35
  Speaker 2: No tippy-tippies. No.
• 53:36
  Speaker 3: But, you know, you do it. You get through it.
• 53:38
  Speaker 2: It sucks.
• 53:39
  Speaker 5: And, you know, everyone can judge and everyone can look
• 53:42
  Speaker 5: at the social media and go, oh, well, I would
• 53:44
  Speaker 5: have done this differently or I would have put my
• 53:45
  Speaker 5: tire pressures down there. And, oh, you know, you shouldn't
• 53:48
  Speaker 5: have gone in there in the first place. yeah probably
• 53:50
  Speaker 5: all of that right you know but until you're in
• 53:53
  Speaker 5: it and you've done.
• 53:54
  Speaker 2: It were you there in that situation would you have
• 53:57
  Speaker 2: made different decisions maybe you would maybe you wouldn't but
• 54:01
  Speaker 2: you may have still ended up in the same situation
• 54:03
  Speaker 2: we're in and therefore that's what it is and you
• 54:06
  Speaker 2: just deal with it and It probably wraps back to
• 54:09
  Speaker 2: what we were talking about before, that ability to pivot
• 54:12
  Speaker 2: and roll with the punches because you have your nice
• 54:15
  Speaker 2: day plan. What are you going to do today? Today,
• 54:16
  Speaker 2: we're actually not going anywhere. We're sitting nice and still
• 54:18
  Speaker 2: by the lake and chilling out. But, you know, you
• 54:21
  Speaker 2: might come up with a plan like yesterday. We'll leave
• 54:24
  Speaker 2: our parking where we were parked up. We're going to
• 54:26
  Speaker 2: go to the hot springs. Then we're going to go
• 54:28
  Speaker 2: into the town and we're going to do some shopping.
• 54:31
  Speaker 2: And then we're going to drive on to where we're
• 54:33
  Speaker 2: parking up for the next two or three nights. And
• 54:35
  Speaker 2: that's the plan. But things go wrong within that. Like
• 54:38
  Speaker 2: you get into the town. Oh, suddenly there's an eight
• 54:40
  Speaker 2: ton limit and we can't go down here.
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 54:41
  Speaker 2: How do we pivot around this to be able to
• 54:43
  Speaker 2: get to where we need to be to do the shopping?
• 54:46
  Speaker 2: We've got a little bit of a water leak issue
• 54:48
  Speaker 2: going on. Well, maybe we can try and find some
• 54:50
  Speaker 2: spare parts here, but that's delayed our plan for the day.
• 54:53
  Speaker 2: It's never get up, say, well, we're going to drive
• 54:56
  Speaker 2: here today. And it happens perfectly smoothly because it doesn't. Something,
• 55:00
  Speaker 2: something comes up that, veers your path somewhere different.
• 55:05
  Speaker 3: That's what makes it fun.
• 55:06
  Speaker 2: That's exactly what makes it fun. And that can be
• 55:07
  Speaker 2: as simple as another overlander going, oh my God, you
• 55:12
  Speaker 2: totally need to go to this park up that I
• 55:14
  Speaker 2: went to because it was amazing, like it happened in Tajikistan.
• 55:17
  Speaker 2: Remember where we met you at Desert Rock Dream, where
• 55:19
  Speaker 2: you came for pancakes and Serena's birthday? That spot we
• 55:23
  Speaker 2: didn't know about. We hadn't seen it on iOverlander. And
• 55:27
  Speaker 2: we literally met an overlander, a Swiss guy, traveling on
• 55:31
  Speaker 2: his own in a small truck, coming the opposite way
• 55:34
  Speaker 2: on the Premier. And we pulled over to chat. And
• 55:36
  Speaker 2: he's like, I've just come from this park up, one
• 55:38
  Speaker 2: of the best park ups I've ever been to anywhere
• 55:40
  Speaker 2: in my life. I spent like a week up there.
• 55:42
  Speaker 2: It's incredible. Oh, where is it? And he told us, bam,
• 55:44
  Speaker 2: our plan of going over here today just became let's
• 55:47
  Speaker 2: go over there. And he was absolutely right. It was incredible.
• 55:50
  Speaker 2: And we went up there and spent a few days,
• 55:52
  Speaker 2: then went on. got stuck tipped and then went we
• 55:55
  Speaker 2: just need to chill so we went back to the
• 55:57
  Speaker 2: same spot to relax again and that's when you guys
• 55:59
  Speaker 2: showed up.
• 56:00
  Speaker 6: So yeah overland magic it's real the road is never
• 56:04
  Speaker 6: smooth that's the great advice really good advice and it's
• 56:09
  Speaker 6: so nice to hear about your experiences and sharing all
• 56:14
  Speaker 6: your knowledge and all of the misconceptions i guess or
• 56:18
  Speaker 6: assumptions about big truck life.
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: But yeah, thank you guys so much for chatting on
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: the podcast and joining us from Kyrgyzstan and all the best.
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: What's next for you?
• 56:29
  Speaker 2: Well, more of Kyrgyzstan. More of Kyrgyzstan. We told you
• 56:32
  Speaker 2: about our having to pivot away from Mongolia. So we're
• 56:35
  Speaker 2: going to do Kyrgyzstan, then a bit more Kazakhstan, then
• 56:39
  Speaker 2: into Uzbekistan for a little bit, pick up Russian transit visas,
• 56:42
  Speaker 2: hopefully in Tashkent, and then back through Kazakhstan into the
• 56:45
  Speaker 2: Mangostau region for a little bit. And then Russian crossing
• 56:51
  Speaker 2: to Georgia, and we will aim to overwinter in Georgia
• 56:54
  Speaker 2: and eastern Turkey. And then we'll head back east next year,
• 56:59
  Speaker 2: back through Russia, back through Kazakhstan, with the goal of
• 57:01
  Speaker 2: hitting Mongolia next year, hopefully without any foot and mouth
• 57:04
  Speaker 2: disease outbreak.
• 57:06
  Speaker 3: Hitting up for loads of places to go in Mongolia, guys.
• 57:08
  Speaker 2: On the upside, we get to spend more time out
• 57:11
  Speaker 2: here in Central Asia, and particularly Kyrgyzstan, which is really beautiful.
• 57:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, we'll have to have you guys back on the
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: podcast to talk all about that. There's so much to
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: dig into in Central Asia. And yeah, where can the
• 57:25
  Speaker 1: Overland Journal podcast listeners find you to follow on your....
• 57:30
  Speaker 2: Social media. We did do YouTube and then it stopped
• 57:33
  Speaker 2: when we left Morocco. So that's two years out of
• 57:35
  Speaker 2: date now. But Instagram is probably the best place. We
• 57:39
  Speaker 2: go through fits and starts. I think we were very
• 57:42
  Speaker 2: good last year. We did a lot. And then we
• 57:44
  Speaker 2: had the six-month break. And we've only just kind of,
• 57:47
  Speaker 2: we're about a month back into restarting. So we haven't
• 57:49
  Speaker 2: really restarted it again. But actually, we were talking about
• 57:52
  Speaker 2: it last night. It's probably going to restart today or tomorrow.
• 57:55
  Speaker 2: We'll start posting. So at Global Traces on Instagram.
• 57:59
  Speaker 3: And Facebook.
• 58:00
  Speaker 2: It will also go to Global Traces on Facebook. And
• 58:04
  Speaker 2: we kind of mostly post similar sort of stuff on
• 58:06
  Speaker 2: TikTok as well. So if you are TikTok fans. fans
• 58:09
  Speaker 2: instead you can probably find us there my photography can
• 58:12
  Speaker 2: be found on newtonphoto.art for anyone that ever wants to
• 58:16
  Speaker 2: buy prints please do that keeps us traveling yay please
• 58:19
  Speaker 2: sorry for the plug oh if you want yeah and
• 58:22
  Speaker 2: and that's that's probably about it really and hopefully find
• 58:24
  Speaker 2: us on the road yeah come find us on the
• 58:26
  Speaker 2: road we're a big blue truck we're hard.
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: To miss amazing well thank you guys for taking the
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: time best of luck on your journey looking forward to
• 58:34
  Speaker 1: hearing about the next pivot and i'm sure you'll navigate
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: it Amazingly.
• 58:39
  Speaker 2: Hopefully so. And hopefully we'll see you again before you
• 58:42
  Speaker 2: get your way back to Canada. Yay. Stay out here.
• 58:45
  Speaker 2: Stay out here and we'll see you again.
• 58:47
  Speaker 3: Thanks so much, guys. You take care.
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: Thank you. And shout out to the Overland Journal podcast
• 58:53
  Speaker 1: listeners for tuning into today's episode. We hope you enjoyed
• 58:56
  Speaker 1: it and we'll catch you next time.