Latest / The Overland Journal Podcast / Overland News January 2024: Events Roundup, Best Gear of 2023, and New Overland Products

Transcript

Overland News January 2024: Events Roundup, Best Gear of 2023, and New Overland Products · The Overland Journal Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to the Overland Journal Podcast. I'm recording
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: this introduction on a drizzly morning here in Marrakesh, Morocco,
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: about to spend some time testing out the new Dukati
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: Desert X. But for today's conversation, I'm joined by Brian
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: mcviickers and we're going to go into some of the
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Overland news for January, which is going to include a
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: deep dive into some of the overland events that we
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: can expect for this year for twenty twenty four, including
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: a very cool new music festival slash Overland event in Utah.
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: So please enjoy my conversation with Brian mcpickers. So, Brian,
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: thanks for coming back for another round of overland news
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: for the Overland Journal Podcast.
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: It's been trecking across Africa.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I have been flat out and it's been an
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: interesting exercise for me because I'm realizing that the things
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: that were I'm out in my life, the things that
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: I want to do, are bigger projects. So it's really
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: requiring me to triage the minor things in life so
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: that I can major in the majors. Yeah, and that's
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: been an interesting challenge because I'm looking for at first
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: what I did was I looked for as many ways
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: as I could be more productive as possible. So I
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: went on this tire rate of reading productivity books and
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: everything else like that, and I found that a couple
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: of things worked, most of them didn't work or they
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: weren't sustainable for me. And that's the challenge. It's the
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: same with dieting. It's so individual what actually helps to
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: drive changing your life.
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: I think the Best five Things to Do book isn't
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: necessarily for everybody.
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and there's so many different principles out there around productivity,
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: but the one thing that I did find was very
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: helpful is to identify what the next most important thing was.
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: This may not work for everyone because maybe they have
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: a boss or something like that, but for me, there's
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: like these bigger levers that I need to be able
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: to pull in order to get things done, the important
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: things finished. So there's this whole idea around listing in
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: the areas of your life that you have identified as
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: most important, what is the next most important step? And
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: I suspect because I know that this was true in
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: my life, but in a lot of people's lives, there's
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: these things that are really important that you think you
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: can put off for one more day, and then one
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: more day, and then you miss out on these really
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: big opportunities because you spend a bunch of time answering
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: emails or text messages or maybe even scrolling on social media.
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: It's easy to get wrapped it all in the minutia,
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: so then you never accomplishing anything significant that really moves
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: the ball forward down the field. So I found for me,
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: I have a list of the top three next and
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: next most important things that are related to my personal life,
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: which includes health, and that are related to my business.
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: So I know all the time what's the next most
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: important thing. And I wish that there was a way
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: for me to dangle a knee on sign around my
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: chest that just said I'm so sorry that I haven't
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: gotten back to you. But the reality is is that
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: if I got back to everyone who reached out to
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: me in as timely a fashion as possible, I would
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: never get anything done.
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: There's no productivity.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: You're stagnant, that's right, that's right. So and I realized
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: that like working more, I mean I already because I
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: love what I do. I work seven days a week already,
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: so like I have to have other balance in my life.
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: I have to be able to spend time with my girlfriend,
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: I have to be able to spend time with my family,
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: have to be able to spend time on my health.
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: And that means that if I want a major in
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: the majors and I want to get big things done
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: or do big trips or whatever else, I've got to
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: put a lot of that small stuff aside.
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: It's not easy to do ever, considered myself the big
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: be a big like New Year's resolution person because I
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: don't think that that has a long lasting effect.
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: They usually don't.
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: But I do appreciate the idea of there's a there's
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: a date on the calendar that kind of allows us
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: all to reset, right, And so probably the last two
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: months as the year has turned over, I've gone through
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: a lot of that as well, of like what can
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: you do better? How can you do better? What's what
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: are the barriers in the way and are they really
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: important barriers? Right? So is it something that you should
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: focus on and try to, you know, like smooth out
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: that barrier or do you just push it aside?
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: Right? What are you most proud of for what you
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: did in twenty twenty three?
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: Oh, you know, I tell you what for twenty twenty three,
• 4:53
  Speaker 2: twenty twenty three from the business world was not an
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: easy world.
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it was a hard year.
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: It was a hard year for a lot of a
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: lot of companies, a lot of a lot of consumers, right,
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: so it was difficult for a lot of consumers that
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: I think a lot.
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: Of families were struggling with inflation or everything else.
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: So I think everything that we've seen for the past
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: couple of years has finally caught up, right, I think
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: I remember at the end of twenty twenty two, you
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: kind of had a lot of people screaming, Hey, the
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: sky is falling, There's going to be this major recession.
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: We're all doomed. I don't know that we necessarily hit that,
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: you know, major catastrophe, but I do think that it
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: it kind of it that idea did impact twenty twenty
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: three in many ways.
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, by most standards, we had a fairly soft landing. Yeah,
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: and the interest the interest rate corrections are going to
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: help fuel some consumer demand because things will be less
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: expensive from a monthly payment perspective. But well, and also
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: like you know, just also as your friend, it's just
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: like I continue to be so impressed by you and
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: your kids. I mean, like an Amy, it's just like
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: the things you guys have done as a family, and
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: just how incredible your son and daughter have turned out.
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, they're both pretty amazing.
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: Because it's it's hard to do that, Brian. I mean, like, like,
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: it's very, very difficult to not only still be married.
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: How long have you guys been married?
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: Twenty three years?
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: Okay, to still be with your saying four years, to
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: be with your spouse, and to have healthy, happy kids
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: that are doing amazing things in the world and are
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: amazing to be around. Yeah, like that's got to be
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: the top one percent of one percent of outcomes for
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: most people.
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: They're just it's normal to me, I mean because that's thankfully,
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: Thankfully it's normal.
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: Thankfully it's normal for you.
• 6:44
  Speaker 2: But I mean, the more people we hang out with
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: and the more kids, the more kids I need the
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: same age as our kids. Everyone, I'm like, wow, our
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: kids are pretty pretty special. You know, our son Max,
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: he's just you know, he's.
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: Rock stars shining. So he just had a mountain bike
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: race this last weekend.
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: Three days ago on Saturday.
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: Those photos were so great.
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's cool. It's a first he races on the
• 7:07
  Speaker 2: high school team and then this is a it's called
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: MB DOUBLEA so it's uh, it's kind of the Arizona
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: Independent Racing Division, which is like an off season thing
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: from the high school season.
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: So it looked like he was kind of sponsored by
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: maybe one of the local bike shops or something.
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: With high gear bike shure.
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: That's so cool team.
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's incredible. Yeah, it's really neat No a sixteen
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: year old. Yeah, he's and he's doing great. He's got
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: a great bike. He's he's on a Niner rocket, you know,
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: and it's just when it's one of those you know,
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: twenty three twenty two pound carbon fiber race bikes. Wow,
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: and he makes that thing so fast. Yeah, and he's
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: really doing well this year.
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: So oh man.
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, he's placed in state and he did. He's on
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: the podium half of the year, so it was great.
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: Oh man, that's incredible. Yeah, you should be really proud
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: of that, Brian. So the next thing that we wanted
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: to kind of touch on is what, looking back on
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty three, what were some of the gadgets personal
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: purchases that you really found hit the mark for you.
• 8:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's funny when you look back at twelve months
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: and I to be kind of doing what we do.
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: How many different vehicles have we driven this year? And
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: how many different gadgets have come across our desk, you know,
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: and things that we've used, you know, from a productivity standpoint,
• 8:23
  Speaker 2: I'd say the biggest change from productivity standpoint of just
• 8:27
  Speaker 2: like work management is I went to that that iPad, yeah,
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: the iPad you Yeah, the one I got from you.
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, the iPad pro.
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: Right, And so the iPad pro because I had been
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: on I had been on Mac laptop, everything Mac, except
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: I was using like a like a PC Microsoft tablet
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: and it just didn't didn't fit. It was like the
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: odd thing out.
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah, once you're in the ecosystem, it kind of works. Yeah.
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: So going over to that being completely Apple across the board.
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: You know, whether you like Apple or not, it's just
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: that idea of being in have one cohesive operating system,
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: you know, whether it works all the time or not,
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: at least you're not trying to make you know, it's
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: not the square peg in a round hole. You know,
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: everything is working together. So that that has really helped
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: a lot because I do all my notes with that
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: little stylist. Sure, and so that that does a lot
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: and then you know, vehicle wise, I know we'll probably
• 9:25
  Speaker 2: dive deeper into it a lot more later. But I
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: think there were a couple of vehicles that really stood
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: out to me this year, and I drove I probably
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: drove more vehicles at product launches this year than any
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: other year.
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: Yeah, because I've been gone, Because you've been.
• 9:39
  Speaker 2: Gone, so you're welcome to stay away as long as
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: you're life. It's a lot of fun to go to
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: those vehicles.
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: It is fun and.
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: So I'm happy to do that. That's that's a that's
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: a great part of the job. But I would say
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: one that I was I mean to begin with you
• 9:53
  Speaker 2: start the year at least I kind of started the
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: year with with Easter Jeep and Moab, which was kind
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: of April timing right, And actually before that, we did
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: a range Rover thing up in Park City and that
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: was really cool. It snowed like twenty seven inches and
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: twelve hours.
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: Great environment for amazing Yeah. Yeah, they're really well suited to.
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: That and that and we got to see the debut
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: of the range Rover house and a lot of different
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: things there not a lot of driving with that event.
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: But then in Moab we got to do the you know,
• 10:27
  Speaker 2: every year Jeep does the five to seven kind of
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: mopar skunk Works.
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: Projects concept vehicles. Yeah, which one is your favorite of
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: all the concepts.
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: Of the concepts? I think I really liked that the
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: Magneto Magneto three, right, so it was fully electric. I
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: liked it as a proof of concept vehicle. Right, So
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: it was fully electric, nine hundred foot pounds of torque,
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: nine hundred horsepower. I think it was on forty four
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: inch tires.
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: As it should be. It had you know, at least
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: forties yet.
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: It was a zero degree approach and departure angle. I mean,
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: the thing was insane, wicked, and you know, when you
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: get into the details of it, yeah, it probably had
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: like a fifty mile range, but that didn't matter. No, Like,
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: it's a proof of concept. Sure, sure, And so a
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: lot of people would look at it and there was
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: a lot of chatter about like, oh, it's useless. It's
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: like no, thing's amazing, yeah, you know, and so that
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: was really neat to get to drive that.
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: And that's the thing about innovation is you have to
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: have version one point zero of anything you do and
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: if you Unfortunately, people are so critical that they don't
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: even they can't see the future because they all they
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: know is what they have now, and if.
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: It's different than what they have now, then somehow it's
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: got to be terrible. Yeah, exactly, So if you look
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: at from the innovative standpoint, I really thought that was
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: a neat concept vehicle.
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: And then you got to spend some time with that
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: Grand Wagoneer that we ended up getting to have here
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: at the office.
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the Grand Wagon Ear was a great truck. It
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: was a little big I think.
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: Just no, it's very big. It's a suburban big, it's
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: a suburban.
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and so it's a it's a big truck, you know, so,
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: like you said, the size of a suburban, and it's
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: not you know, it has a suspension that I think
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: lifts up a little bit.
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: Suspension. Yeah.
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah, So I really I really enjoyed driving that vehicle. Yeah,
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: but it was big. You had to. It's one of
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: those vehicles that every time you get in it, you
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: walk around it to remind you where the corners are.
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: It's a big, big, big truck. And they had that
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: the red tail overland tent on top yeah, and so
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: it was really.
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: Well, interesting, interesting proof of concept. I really liked how
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: they redid the fender flares that moved the belt line
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: up at the tires and they went with a much
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: larger diameter tire, and in my mind it completely changed
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: the look of the vehicle in a positive direction. I've
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: always felt like that the small wheel wells it. It
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: underclasses the car, like premium vehicles like that need to
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: have bigger wheel wells and bigger wheels are tired.
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: It really didn't look if you look at us like
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: a stock Wagoneer, it doesn't look like a Wagoneer.
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it looks. It was very cool, very very much
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: like they showed up with the Overland edition. It worked.
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: So yeah, pretty cool. Yeah.
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: And then from that same event, coming home, I drove
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: that it was the it was the Jeep Grand Cherokee
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: Trail Hawk four by E and that was a really
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: I really enjoyed driving that vehicle. I drove it from
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: Moab back to Prescott and there was at one point
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: I filled up, I filled up the fuel tank and
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: I had zero auxiliary battery left, right, you know, but
• 13:41
  Speaker 2: it does this self regenerating.
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's hybrid, so every time you put on
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: the brakes or modeling.
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and I drove that back from I filled up
• 13:50
  Speaker 2: in Flagstaff and I drove to Prescot, which was only
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: one hundred miles or so, but I I pulled into Prescott,
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: and you know, it says that your range I had
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: two miles. I gained two miles in range one hundred miles,
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: which was pretty neat. Yeah, the fuel gauge never never
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: really moved and the overall range increased in that one
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: hundred miles. So I think from a practicality standpoint as
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: a daily driver and venture vehicle, I really.
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: Liked that one. Well, that's so interesting that you say that,
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: because it for me, it was one of the standout
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: vehicles from twenty twenty three. For me, it like if
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: I didn't do this as a profession, Like if I
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: just like was sailing around, was sailing around the world
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: and I needed a car back in Arizona, that would
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: be the car I would buy, because I love the
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: fact that you have that plug in hybrid range. Like
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: where we live in Prescott. You know, anytime I'm driving
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: a four y e here, I charge it at the
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: office and it's the equivalent of fifty something cents a gallon,
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: which is much less than.
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: Just to drive around town back and forth commuting.
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: Correct in electricity. And I also never have to go
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: to a gas station. I just I don't have to
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: interrupt my day. Like I pull up to the office
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: and I plug it in. It takes no time at
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: all to plug it in, and then it's always got
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: a full fuel tank, so I never have to go
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: to the gas station, and I'm always ready to go
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: on a long trip.
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and you don't think twice about trying to plan
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: out recharging stations on a long trip.
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: And it's a pleasure to drive in all conditions, including
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: fairly technical terrain. And I even towed an Escapod tear
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: drop trailer with it off road and I was really, yeah,
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: very nice trailer. Like I mean, it's it's got to
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: be one of the most premium tear drops made period.
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: It's got I think that it's got the cleanest lines
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: out of anybody.
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: Yes, this injection injection molded. It's very quiet. I mean
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: it's it is ultra premium and it's also expensive. I
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: mean that's the with everything comes up comes a caveat.
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: But it is uh extra extremely well made, made in
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: the United States, made in Utah. But yeah, the four
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: by E Grand Cherokee. For those that are like that
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: need a daily driver, let's say your commute's around ten miles. Like,
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: it's like the perfect vehicle. It's just the perfect vew I.
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: Drove the I drove the Wrangler who was a Wrangler
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: Rubicon four by e.
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: Yep you did.
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: And I drove that up over I drove that from
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: Prescott up to Loveland and took it to the Overland
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: Expo and then I coming home, I went up over
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: Engineer Pass, which is personally it's one of my favorite
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: passes in Colorado to do. There's a couple of camp
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: sites up I'm not gonna say where because.
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: Is that the one where you drive by this like
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: remote cabin with a little stream and everything on the.
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: They're building more, they're building more properties up there now.
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: But there is a you kind of do this right
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: turn and you're gutting just up above tree line and
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: there's a little cabin that has a green it's like
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: a bridge. It's a bridge walkway, and so the house
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: the cabins built on like a rock spot.
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, and.
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: Then it's completely surrounded by just empty air.
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: It's beautiful.
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a really cool one. I stopped and took
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: a picture of that one. And then but what I
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: really enjoyed about the Wrangler four by e in that
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: environment is, you know, I think it's got maybe twenty
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: five miles of range, so I couldn't use it the
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: entire time. But so I filled up down in the
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: Lake City and then you know, I drove it in
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: gas mode up until I got to tree line, and
• 17:38
  Speaker 2: then when I got to the tree line, I switched
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: over to electron electric only.
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: And the other advantage of that is electric power is
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: not affected by altitude.
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, so you didn't feel you make.
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: The same power and altitude as you do at sea
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: level and the torque the electric in low range for sure.
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you just all those little ledges up above tree line. Yeah,
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: not a not an issue at all. And so I
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: drove it all the way up to the summit on
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: electric power and rolled down all the windows, turn the
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: radio off, and just.
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: Drove so cool.
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: And it was a completely different experience to be able
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: to do that and then have that that quietness and that.
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: The crunch of the tires all you get.
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: And it was So the key the trick that I
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: do is I get to I think it's Lake City
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: or City.
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: Of Lakes right there lay Lake.
• 18:31
  Speaker 2: City, and I get there about because he's usually in
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: the middle of the summer, right, so I'll get there
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: about six pm. Fill up with gas. They got like
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: one you know gas pump in the town. And then
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: all the side by side traffic is off the trail,
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: all the jeep traffic is off the trail. There's like
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: nobody up there. So then you can go from there
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: to the summit. And you get to the summit just
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: as the sun is setting. Wow, and there's nobody around.
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: Wow.
• 18:59
  Speaker 2: It's got to be one of my favorite little side
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: trips to do.
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: And then now everybody knows.
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: Now everybody knows, so just don't do it when I'm there.
• 19:07
  Speaker 2: And then you drop over the other side and you
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: go down and to tell your ide. Yeah, next morning
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: you grab a coffee and then you drive home.
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: So good man.
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so that was a lot of fun. That was
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: a good trip.
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: But yeah, I think for me, when I look back
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: on the year, I mean, there's been like a couple
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: I do continue to like reduce my kit but there
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: are some things that I've really leaned on. I really
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: have liked the Garment watch. I've always been an analog
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: watch guy, but for traveling, I'm finding it to be
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: very useful and I use it on a daily basis
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: for also tracking health metrics, primarily my sleep. So that's
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: been really useful. And I and I'm still wearing my
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: Aura ring and it's been interesting to kind of compare the.
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: Outcome track very similarly.
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: Some days they do and some days they don't. But also,
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: like the watch is on my right wrist and the
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: ring on my left hand, so if while I'm sleeping,
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: you know, I don't know, like maybe I'm laying on
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: my right side and my left might be moving, you know,
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: who knows. Yeah, yeah, that maybe is making a difference,
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: but it isn't. It isn't always exactly the same. But
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: they're both very actionable kind of But what I like
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: about the Garment is it's not constantly yelling at me
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: to do something like an Apple watch.
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: You can turn a lot of that off on the Garment,
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: and you might be able to on the Apple as well.
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: You probably can, but the you know, the Apple is
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: very much trying to keep you informed, whereas the garment
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: is trying to keep you accountable. I would say more
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: than anything.
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: Well, I've been using a Garment watch as well, and
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: it's aside from the you know, everything that you would
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: expect it to do. It does great. But I've been
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: a couple of weeks ago. I did a bit of
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: a dip deep dive into the apps. Yeah, and the
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: apps are endless. I think it's the IQ Store.
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: And you can just get so many different things onto
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: the watch. And so I've been I spent a good
• 21:02
  Speaker 2: couple of days using it to track skiing.
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: Oh cool, right, So it's got a ski app.
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: And I'll tell you you know how many runs you've done,
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: your altitude, speeds, heart rate. And then just the other
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: day I figured out how to actually store music onto it.
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: You can do that, yeah, And so like yesterday I
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: went for a run and I was able to play
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: music on my watch to my earbuds and just left
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: my phone behind, which is great. The only thing I
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: wish I think it'd be amazing if Garman came out
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: with a way to turn the watch into a.
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: Phone, which you can do on the Apple Watch.
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: The Apple Watch. And then I'm torn a little bit
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: because especially for travel and I and I've kind of
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: stopped using the Apple Watch and just use the Garment Watch,
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: even for trout. And the thing about it is got
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: the flashlight on it. I know it's game changes, but
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: I love having the flashlight.
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: At first, I thought, if this is going to be
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: the biggest gimmick of all time. And then and I
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: was talking to Gianni, and uh, Gianni di Natty, if
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: you're listening, thank you for the insights on. But he's
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: like he's like, no, no, no, dude. He's like he's like,
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: I'm telling you and this guy's pretty switched on. It's
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: pretty stylish, and he's like, no, no, dude. He's like,
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: the light's amazing, and it's amazing.
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: It's the reason like if I've got my I look
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: so glad you brought that up. Well, I look at
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: the Apple Watch. I really like it for travel because
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: it has a it's a phone. Yeah right, I have mine.
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: It's a cellular one hooked up, it's got its own
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: phone number everything. So it's a phone. And so if
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: I was to lose my phone, now I've got my watch,
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: right right. But in reality, like the Garment does so
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: much more. And it has the flashlight. Yeah that I've
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: been taking the garment.
• 22:44
  Speaker 3: More and I like the flashlight is I'll wear the
• 22:47
  Speaker 3: Apple Watch is like a daily something every once in
• 22:49
  Speaker 3: a while. The flashlight is brighter than the flashlight.
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: On an iPhone, oh by far.
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and it has four different levels plus a red
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: mode so if you want to if you don't want
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: to smoke your night vision, bam for those who are
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: watching on YouTube.
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: But it's pretty cool.
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's it's it's very very useful.
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: But if they if they figured out a way to
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: make you have cellular enter yeah, I.
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: Don't know, kind of gloud. I'm clinic, kind of glad
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: it doesn't.
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: It's nice to check out.
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: I'm clinic glad that it doesn't. Yeah, there's a lot
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: that I like about it. So that one's a pretty
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: cool one. And then coincidentally, I happen to be talking
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: about an Apple product too. But these new air tags
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: you've been out for a couple of years, and when
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: I started the Africa trip, I decided that, okay, I'm
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: going to use these things, and I got four of them. Okay,
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: so on each set of keys for the Grenadier, I
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: have an Apple air tag And there's these little carabineer
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: brackets that you can put on the keychain that keeps
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: the air tag with it, and then I put one
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: in my camera bag and then I put one in
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: my luggage. So like, right now I can monitor where
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: this truck is. It's being stored securely and with great
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: considering consideration and care I'm sure by the dealership in Nairobi.
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: But I can see if if this thing is driving around.
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: Right and I'll probably send you an alert if it moves.
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: Right it it Maybe it does that, but I have
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: not seen it do that. Maybe you have to set
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: that if it moves. But for me, where it's really
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: been useful is there's this there's this like frustration around
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: travel when you check your bags, Like am I ever
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: going to see my luggage again? And there's something about
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: being able to see the little blue dot going into
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: the plane. Yeah, that is so satisfying. It just it changes, Yeah,
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: it changes the nature of the next leg of the
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: journey because like if the thing doesn't make it on
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: the plane and it's still clearly then you know usually
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: have Wi Fi in a plane, you can start the
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: process of getting the thing sorted to the next location.
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: But if you see it go on to the plane
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: and it's like going with you down the taxiway, it's
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: so rewarding. So rewarding. Yeah, and then you know for
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: any of the other stuff that you're doing, you just
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: know where this luggage is going, Like you can see
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: it moving here or moving there. It's like I know
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: exactly where everything's at.
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: That's where would be really helpful. It's higher price stuff.
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's just really and it's such a small little item.
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: You just kind of stash it in the luggage and
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: you know, or in the car, and you kind of
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: know where things are going. So I really do like
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: that quite a bit.
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: Similar to that, I just started using a product called
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: it's called a Scout so it's made by nog Nog k.
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: And Og and it's never heard of it.
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: The product itself is called a scout okakay and it's
• 26:01
  Speaker 2: a little black box, right, and it mounts to you can.
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: It's got three m sticky back, so you could mount
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: it to say a set of skis, you know, your trailer,
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: or really anything that's kind of you know, more of
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: like a hard goods item that you would stick something
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: tore and then like I've got them on like the
• 26:25
  Speaker 2: race bikes, so we race mountain bikes. They're not, you know,
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: pretty nice.
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah, if they get yeah it's a problem.
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: You got you know, that would really be lousy. And
• 26:36
  Speaker 2: so I want to be able to keep.
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: Track of them because you're going to hunt those suckers down. Yeah,
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: it's gonna be like Liam Neeson.
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: You can hide them. And they do this with air
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: tags too. This is kind of a new one that's
• 26:46
  Speaker 2: like not a lot of people know about, so you
• 26:48
  Speaker 2: would know what it looks like, so you can hide
• 26:50
  Speaker 2: them on the bike. It uses the it uses the
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: same software as the Apple air tags, right, same technology,
• 27:00
  Speaker 2: and so on any iOS device you can it basically
• 27:03
  Speaker 2: gets tracked into that cloud network, right, And so it's
• 27:07
  Speaker 2: pretty cool. And if you you can set it so
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: that whether it's on a set of skis or a
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: bike or your motorcycle, they'd be great for motorcycles. If
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: somebody you can set it so that if it gets moved,
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: it'll like scream, it turns into like a car alarm,
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: and and that's kind of neat.
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: I love that too. I love that. And then I
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: think a couple other things that come to mind. I
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: you know, I just got this ether puffy and I think,
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: like a like a hooded puffy is such a like
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: grand staple of any clothing. And because I try when
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: I travel to never check bags, like like, I have
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: this like personal I feel like I've been a failure
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: as a traveler if I have to check a bag,
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: which on my next trip, I have to check a
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: bag because because I'm bringing I'm bringing motorcycle gear with me,
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: so I have to check a bag. So I'm going
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: to use a red Ox. They make these really lightweight, rollable,
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: but somehow impossibly endurable big bags that are just the
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: perfect size for a motorcycle deer.
• 28:14
  Speaker 2: So the one that you're taking is like the air
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: It's like it's aircraft something. It was kind of designed
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: for pilots to just put all their stuff in.
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and it works great. So I can fit boots, helmet,
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: full you know, gloves, full suit into the bag. But
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: you know this, for the most part, I always just
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: trying to check, you know, to do a carry on.
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: So like this puffy packs down to like a small burrito,
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: but it's weather resistant. It's you know, sufficiently insulated for
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: the fact I'm going to be going to Ethiopia and
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: at high elevation, and I need to be able to
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: I need to be able to have something perfect, something
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: something warn't down or synthetic, and we're also going to
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: be it is down, and then we're going to be
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: going up into the Atlas Mountains and the motorcycle. So
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: I need I can use this as a base layer.
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: So the other way to do it is I did
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: a fly and ride out to l A one time.
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: I wore I think I had a whatever the suit was.
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: I wore my suit on the airplane, so I wore it.
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: Not willing to do that.
• 29:20
  Speaker 2: I wore my pants and my boots and I carried
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: my jacket and my helmet and that's all I took
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: with me. I had like whatever, some snacks in my
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: pocket and my phone.
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: I remember that.
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: And it took me about a half hour to get
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: through security.
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: I bet they're like, what is happening.
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: On the other end of security. They they asked me
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: to never do that again because all the armor that
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: D three ozero doesn't go through the the.
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: Like it all shows up that you have like eight
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: pounds of it looks like it looks like plastic eight
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: pounds of C four on you. It was very with
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: a helmet.
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: I had to take it all off. They had to
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: expect it.
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it was bad. Yeah, Okay, there you go. Lesson
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: learned on the overl engine.
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: I would do it again because it's not illegal, really easy.
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: Oh man, well that's funny. So and then you know,
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: recently we covered the the radio chatter game on the podcast.
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: It's just a small, you know, family run business, and
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: we got a lot of great feedback on it for
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: people who liked it on on the show. So I'm
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: going to ask you a question here. This one's loaded
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: so set up. Yeah, well, I mean this one says,
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: what is the best advice you have ever received?
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: Oh?
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: Like, So, I don't know if you want to if
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: you want to touch that way, oh yeah, or we
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: can go to something more overlea.
• 30:42
  Speaker 2: There's there's so many things I think that I think
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: one of the things that one of the best little
• 30:48
  Speaker 2: things I always remember is like do, like, if you're
• 30:53
  Speaker 2: choosing a career or you know you're working or whatever
• 30:57
  Speaker 2: it is, do something that you enjoy doing, right, And
• 31:01
  Speaker 2: I think that.
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: That So why'd you come work for us?
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: I didn't say that I listened to the advice that
• 31:06
  Speaker 2: I get. I'm just saying, that's probably the best thing
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: I've ever heard. So yeah, that's I think that that's
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: one and I and that's one of the things. It's
• 31:14
  Speaker 2: like you can and you can find the balance. Like
• 31:17
  Speaker 2: even if you want to, you know, have whatever lifestyle, like,
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: that's fine. If you want to find the way to
• 31:23
  Speaker 2: get that lifestyle, do something that you enjoy doing. Because
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: I mean, how many people have you met, I would
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: kind of I don't for whatever reason, I don't consider
• 31:32
  Speaker 2: us to be the norm.
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: We're pretty lucky.
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah, very much so. And but you know, the general
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: person that you meet on the street and if they're
• 31:40
  Speaker 2: just kind of like miserable with their work, you know,
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: and it's like because they hate doing what they do,
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: and yet they spend that much of their life doing right,
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: And so yeah, even if it's you know, there might
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: be have other imperfections about it, but if you're doing
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: something that you love doing or you enjoy doing, it
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: makes it so much easier.
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: That's good advice. Thank you, Brian. Well, let's we're going
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: to pivot into talking about we want to kind of
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: focus on events for this Overland News because there's so
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: many events in the space, and of course the Overland
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: Expo is one that we just feel has done such
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: a good job of striking the balance between product and travel.
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: They still spend a lot of resources bringing in well
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: traveled individuals from around the world and providing training resources
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: that's difficult to find at other events. Other events do
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: provide that, but the Overland Expo provides it at kind
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: of a level that isn't really matched elsewhere in the industry.
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: We do, and we do or we're one of the
• 32:46
  Speaker 2: media sponsors or the media sponsor of the events, so
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: we do work really closely with them, but we've got
• 32:50
  Speaker 2: a long history with the event, so we do. You know,
• 32:54
  Speaker 2: we're probably a little bit biased on it, but I
• 32:56
  Speaker 2: will say that one of the things that I've enjoyed
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: watching them do is, you know, they've kind of got
• 33:02
  Speaker 2: the four events now, and they've had four events for
• 33:06
  Speaker 2: quite a few years, so it not it doesn't seem
• 33:09
  Speaker 2: like they're just trying to make as many more events
• 33:11
  Speaker 2: as they can. But what I do notice them doing
• 33:15
  Speaker 2: is they're enhancing the quality and enhancing the experience of.
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: Each of those events, refining it.
• 33:22
  Speaker 2: Maybe Yeah, so it's not necessarily I would say it's
• 33:24
  Speaker 2: a little bit more quality than it is quantity.
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: Going to take this jack, And so.
• 33:31
  Speaker 2: I'm impressed that you like the hood on a puffy.
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: Yeah I do. I do like the hood just because
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: it's one less thing that i'm and plus I have
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: no hair, so like I could my brain could freeze
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: very quickly because I have a small brain.
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: I like the I like the puffies without the hood
• 33:48
  Speaker 2: because I use them as an insulating layer under like
• 33:51
  Speaker 2: a shell. I see, and then I use a hooded shell.
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: I see. I wouldn't bring both, but oh, yeah.
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: You got to bring both. I've got to bring a shell.
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: I wouldn't.
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: Oh you have to bring a shell. We're gonna talk.
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: About I do actually have a shell with.
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah, puffy and a shell. Andy, you're done. And then
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: if you're going really really cold, you bring the exterior
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: puffy that's like a size larger than what you normally wear.
• 34:11
  Speaker 2: And then you put.
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: That and then you take it through security, you.
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: Put it over all of your stuff, and that one
• 34:15
  Speaker 2: has to have a and that way when you're like
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: you stop at the top of the mountain and you're
• 34:20
  Speaker 2: just kind of like taking a break, so you don't
• 34:21
  Speaker 2: like you must ski or something, so you don't freeze
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: and get into that like weird hypothermic thing. Right, you
• 34:28
  Speaker 2: put that puffy on the outside and it's just like
• 34:30
  Speaker 2: a big warm blanket. But that one's got to have
• 34:31
  Speaker 2: a hood, but it's got to be oversized. Okay, science
• 34:34
  Speaker 2: behind it all.
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: It sounds that makes sense, it's fun, it makes sense.
• 34:39
  Speaker 2: So there's an overland expos and then there's another one,
• 34:43
  Speaker 2: the music festival I was telling you about.
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, which is what the Fort Desolation Fest.
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: That's right. So the Fort Desolation Fest is I think
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: it's happening in June, and it is. It's a music
• 34:58
  Speaker 2: festival that is kind of focusing on the overland consumer,
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: so the overland audience, if you will. So it's a
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: it's not you know, it's kind of this overlandy atmosphere
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: as far as you know, lots of cool rigs, lots
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: of vans, lots of trailers, lots of you know, kind
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: of really neat overland and travelers, but it's not focusing
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: on hey, let's learn about overlanding and let's do clinics
• 35:24
  Speaker 2: and things like that. Yeah, it's just a three day
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: music fest. And then they have a couple of little activations.
• 35:30
  Speaker 2: Like last year they had their main stage. They powered
• 35:35
  Speaker 2: the entire main stage using Goal zero products that's cool
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: and solar, so they would charge all the batteries by
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: solar during the day and then at night they just
• 35:45
  Speaker 2: lit this center stage up for the for the main
• 35:48
  Speaker 2: acts at night and ran it all by you know,
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: Goal zero batteries.
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: That's amazing.
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it was. I mean I think it was quite
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: a feat for them to pull it off. Yeah, it
• 35:58
  Speaker 2: was a really neat way to showcase it. So they're
• 36:02
  Speaker 2: doing that again this year, and it's on a private
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: piece of property, kind of a private ranch that has
• 36:07
  Speaker 2: a few very kind of bespoke buildings on it, and
• 36:12
  Speaker 2: then just like a nice grounds. I mean they've got.
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: Grass and they've got sounds, very structure.
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: I think they even have a restaurant on site.
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: Huh.
• 36:20
  Speaker 2: So that's another good event that's coming into its second year.
• 36:25
  Speaker 2: In fact, Equipped Expedition Outfitters was the first sponsor to
• 36:31
  Speaker 2: sign up with.
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: Them, well, and Equipped is such a solid organization. Something
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: that they're behind seems worth keeping track of. And then
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: of course there's the overland rally that's done by Ray
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: Hyland and team, and they always do a good job.
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: Two or three of those now, I'm not sure how
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: many they have. I think they have one in Canada
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: and they also have one in the Pacific Northwest, so
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: they've always done a really good job of those. Those
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: are events that we founded many years ago and Ray
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: Runzo's now and then there's also Josiah and the Journey
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: of Lost Time, which is a journal of lost time. Yeah,
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: that's a publication. It's I think it is print, but
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: it's definitely digital, and it's just a really nicely done publication.
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: But Josiah also has a bunch of different events. There's
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: like the moon Lander, and there's one down in Baja,
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: and there's one up in the in the Oregon area.
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: And I went to the one in Oregon, and what
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: stood out to me at that event that was very
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: unique was that nobody talked about the gear or the vehicles,
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: which I thought was very unique. So there was some
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: very cool trucks there, yeah, like very thoughtfully prepared vehicles,
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: but there was such a wide range of makes and
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: models and like is it a van or this one's
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: a trailer or this one's a sacro. Nobody cared. Everybody
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: was talking about travel, and they were talking about craft beer,
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: and they were talking about how cool this area was,
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: or where they were going next, or maybe maybe challenges
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: around travel that they were working through with other travelers.
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: But it really was not another gear fest, which I
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: really liked. So and Josiah is a he's a very thoughtful,
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: like master of ceremonies, like he's a really he's a
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: cool dude. So because he's a cool dude, the events
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: are very cool, So i'd make sure that people are
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: taking a look at those.
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: I've had quite a few conversations with them this year
• 38:34
  Speaker 2: and last fall because we're sponsoring their events this year. Yeah,
• 38:38
  Speaker 2: and you know, they really are taking that focus of
• 38:43
  Speaker 2: they just want to get a bunch of people together
• 38:45
  Speaker 2: and have a really cool time.
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And it seems like that they take that really seriously.
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: So every event has like a different vibe to it,
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: which I think is really beneficial. And it's easy to
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: look at maybe the fact that one event skews one
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: way and use that as a criticism, but that's not
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: fair because there's so many different kinds of travelers that
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: people want a different experience. So I'm glad that there's different.
• 39:11
  Speaker 2: I guess four to six events is what they've got,
• 39:14
  Speaker 2: and they do. Everyone's a little bit different, has its own,
• 39:18
  Speaker 2: you know, kind of characteristic to it. And then what
• 39:21
  Speaker 2: I really like is that they've got the Baja one
• 39:23
  Speaker 2: because that is integrating some level of international travel and
• 39:30
  Speaker 2: Baja is that's pretty easy international travel. Oh yeah to
• 39:34
  Speaker 2: the first timer, it could be quite intimidating and challenge.
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: I remember I was terrified, but it was something I
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: wanted to be down there, and it's almost like, yeah,
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: it's safer than a lot of places in Arizona.
• 39:45
  Speaker 2: We can go down there for the weekend, that's right,
• 39:46
  Speaker 2: And so it's a it's a great first international trip
• 39:50
  Speaker 2: for people and be able to go and meet up
• 39:52
  Speaker 2: with a group of people that you know that you
• 39:55
  Speaker 2: kind of have a relationship with.
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: Or even traveling with them down there. You've got if
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: it's a first time across a border, to get.
• 40:03
  Speaker 2: A little bit of help the actual like the border
• 40:05
  Speaker 2: crossings in the travel that's not part of the event.
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah, but you could pair up with like somebody else
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: that is on their way if you got a little concern.
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: I'm sure there's way to pair up with other travelers
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: that are heading down there. Yeah, so that's an event
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: that's happening. And then across the industry events, we see
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: more and more penetration into the overland space. We see
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: more and more overland presence.
• 40:26
  Speaker 2: At the more you said more, the more overland.
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: There you go Expo.
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: I think that's in Minnesota.
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: There you go, and they've done really well. They've done
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: really well with that, And there's a whole bunch of
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: other events. If we have missed your event, it was
• 40:39
  Speaker 1: not intentional, there was no slight intended.
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: I did a list last year in twenty twenty three,
• 40:44
  Speaker 2: there were sixty four overland related events.
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and we've got to be up to one hundred
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: this year. We've got a really good article on Expedition
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: Portal that features those different events. So if you've got
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: a new event, or you don't think that we're frommiliar
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: with what you're doing, check that article on Expedition Portal
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: and see if you're on the list. If not, please
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: reach out. You can all give my information for contact
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: at the end of the show.
• 41:10
  Speaker 2: There was one other one that we mentioned earlier or before.
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: The Texas Overland Fest Texas.
• 41:15
  Speaker 2: Overland Festival that's new. They did their first one last year.
• 41:19
  Speaker 2: They're going to have another one this year.
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: Nice.
• 41:21
  Speaker 2: And then there's the Overland of America Expo. Okay, that's
• 41:26
  Speaker 2: another new one that is happening. I can't remember the dates,
• 41:32
  Speaker 2: but that's happening later in the summer, I believe. And
• 41:37
  Speaker 2: that's going to be at a property that is it's
• 41:41
  Speaker 2: a fully established property that is normally used for like
• 41:46
  Speaker 2: off road events, a lot of side by side events,
• 41:48
  Speaker 2: a lot of g events. Ok So I think they've
• 41:50
  Speaker 2: got fifteen to twenty miles of trails. Sounds cool on
• 41:54
  Speaker 2: the property. They've got restaurant, they've got a swimming pool,
• 41:58
  Speaker 2: they've got it's like a resort atmosphere on the property where.
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: He sounds amazing. Sounds amazing. So you don't even have
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: you don't even need a shower, Just jump in the pool.
• 42:08
  Speaker 2: That's the thing. They have full full showers.
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: Have all the things they do.
• 42:11
  Speaker 2: They've got dozens of showers in a big shower building.
• 42:15
  Speaker 2: It's pretty well appointed.
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so there's a bunch of new events. If you've
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: got an event you don't think we're aware of it,
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: please reach out because it'd be great to get an
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: update on that, because we're going to try to cover
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: events in this way about once a year and will
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: and if you and if you do reach out with
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: an event that's later in this year, we'll make sure
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: to cover it in a future episode of The Overland News.
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: There's a couple kind of key product developments that have
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: come out recently. Kuot now has these hard sides for
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: their rack system. This is one of the most impressive
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: products that I've seen come onto the market in recent years.
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: They are a sponsor of the podcast, which I'm grateful for,
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: but I'm also personally very impressed by the product. So
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: it's adjustable in height to two different heights. It's got
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: these molly style panels that don't look moley, they actually
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: look cooler, and then you can put outboard, mountain bike
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: mounts on it. Plus you can mount a roof ten
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: on the top whatever else. But they've just recently included
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: the option for these lifting upsides and a rear lift
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: gate that can be bolted onto the system. That basically
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: makes it like any other top or Yeah, so you
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: end up with a hard top, a hard front, hard sides,
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: and a hard back. So it's a very clever solution
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: that is now multifaceted in its approach, depending on the
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: time of year or what the intentions are with it.
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: So it's very clever to see Kuat, who makes some
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: of the best bike racks in the world, come out
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: with a product now that's going to be very well
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: suited to Overlanders, especially the overlanders that do want to
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: bring things like accessory kayaks and mountain bikes along, because
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: they make some of the best mountain bike racks in
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: the world.
• 44:09
  Speaker 2: So I spent a lot of time with that Ibex system,
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: so I put it on it. We had it on
• 44:13
  Speaker 2: a tundra and this is a neat thing about that rack.
• 44:17
  Speaker 2: We had it on a tundra. I took it off
• 44:19
  Speaker 2: of the tundra and put it onto the GMC that
• 44:22
  Speaker 2: that we had twenty five hd at four x AEVV.
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah that's right, so.
• 44:31
  Speaker 2: Acronym super but it's like it's a great truck, and
• 44:35
  Speaker 2: we took that. We took that Ibex off of the
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: tundra and just like it was a direct swap, we
• 44:40
  Speaker 2: put it onto the GMC. I think we had to
• 44:42
  Speaker 2: widen it about maybe three inches sure, but it was
• 44:47
  Speaker 2: under a couple of bolts it slides apart and you
• 44:49
  Speaker 2: tighten them down sweet and we had so we had that,
• 44:53
  Speaker 2: it had the molly panels on the side, so we
• 44:55
  Speaker 2: had a bike rack on both sides, and then we
• 44:59
  Speaker 2: had the I think we put the Intrepid rooftop tent
• 45:03
  Speaker 2: on top of the Ibex and we mounted it with
• 45:05
  Speaker 2: those new those new Van Ultra quick mounts.
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: Oh.
• 45:10
  Speaker 2: So van Ultra is a fairly new company that's making
• 45:12
  Speaker 2: a quick mount roof rack or a quick mount rooftop
• 45:17
  Speaker 2: tent bracket system clever. Yeah, so instead of the kind
• 45:21
  Speaker 2: of the four bolts actually eight bolts, so it reduces
• 45:25
  Speaker 2: it down to from eight bolts down to four bolts.
• 45:29
  Speaker 2: And it's the setup so that all you do is
• 45:31
  Speaker 2: you can quickly undo a knob and then the whole
• 45:35
  Speaker 2: bracket separates and now you're done.
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: The t's creating to take on and off. Oh that's
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: pretty clever.
• 45:40
  Speaker 2: So we you know, we put that through quite a
• 45:43
  Speaker 2: few miles of off road and the whole system worked
• 45:46
  Speaker 2: really well.
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that sounds and also it's just an impressive solution.
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: A couple of the things that have come out recently.
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: Winnebago has just announced an overland trailer called the Hike.
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: We're trying to get one end test, but it looks
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: very promising.
• 46:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a fairly compact package with a lot of
• 46:05
  Speaker 2: space on the inside.
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's kind of the sweet spot, is that
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: fourteen to sixteen foot box. Yeah. So I think that
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: we're seeing more and more trailers like that that are
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: going to be really well suited for longer term travel
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: because you've got the use of starlink now, so we're
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: seeing a lot more of those coming on the market.
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: And then Nitto has their new Ridge Grappler hybrid tire.
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: These hybrids are becoming more and more popular. So you're
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: looking at something that the center of the tread is
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: like an all terrain, the outside of the tread is
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: more like a mud terrain with a little bit tighter
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: lug spacing, but you have a lot of lug integrity,
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: you have some good self clearing of mud and other debris, snow, sand,
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: et cetera. But you end up with a fairly quiet
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: ride and better and better fuel economy. So these hybrid
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: tires are now coming out from more and more manifacts,
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: and they're a very well suited tire for most overland
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: travel because you know, crossing a continent, you can encounter
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: everything from mud to sand, highway miles, and everything else
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: in between. So these hybrids perform well, and they have
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: a little bit longer tread life than a typical mud terrain,
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: so a lot of times it can help you get
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: across the continent before you got to change out a set.
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: So I think that those new nittos are really nice.
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: Jack Rey just launched their new rooftop tent that has
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: solar built into the lid, but then also has these
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: wings of solar that kick out to the sides doubles.
• 47:36
  Speaker 2: Think about you know, for everybody listening, think about kind
• 47:40
  Speaker 2: of your wedge style tent. Yeah, so the roof is
• 47:43
  Speaker 2: about the size of the back of the truck yep,
• 47:46
  Speaker 2: and so you flip it open and now the solar
• 47:49
  Speaker 2: panels slide out to reveal more solar panels underneath, and
• 47:54
  Speaker 2: so you've got double the double the surface area and
• 47:59
  Speaker 2: it's all solar panels.
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's pretty clever, and it likely integrates with their Jackery,
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: you know, their little tower boxes. But then it's also
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: going to work I bet with a lot of other ones.
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: We haven't tested this yet, I'd be really curious to
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: see how it doesn't higher winds. I'm sure they've taken
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: that into consideration, but we want to get our hands
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: on one because it's a really innovative new product.
• 48:21
  Speaker 2: They had a now I'm realizing I didn't realize it
• 48:24
  Speaker 2: at the time, but I think at SEMA, I think
• 48:28
  Speaker 2: they had a bit of a prototype on display. Yeah,
• 48:31
  Speaker 2: but just didn't say anything. Yeah, And so there was
• 48:34
  Speaker 2: a They had a rooftop tent, a wedge I'm not
• 48:37
  Speaker 2: sure what brand it was, but it was kind of
• 48:38
  Speaker 2: the wedge style, opened towards the front of the truck,
• 48:42
  Speaker 2: and they had two solar panels on sliders. Oh cool,
• 48:47
  Speaker 2: that would slide out. They didn't have them deployed, right,
• 48:50
  Speaker 2: But I was I saw this new tent, and I
• 48:52
  Speaker 2: went back and I looked at my photos from SEMA,
• 48:54
  Speaker 2: and you can see the tracks. Oh clever where the
• 48:58
  Speaker 2: solar panels are mounted. So it looks like that prototype
• 49:01
  Speaker 2: they would slide out. They just didn't have it deployed.
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: Oh that's interesting.
• 49:04
  Speaker 2: And they never mentioned because I met with them, and
• 49:05
  Speaker 2: they never said anything about it.
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: And they do a good job. They've done really well
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: in some of our power supply tests.
• 49:12
  Speaker 2: So yeah, they make a I mean there's a lot
• 49:14
  Speaker 2: of battery boxes out on the market.
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and then you see to the other direction, you
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: see Goal zero that came out with their own fridge,
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: so there's been a lot of developments in the fridge space.
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: It got a battery built in, right, yes, it does,
• 49:28
  Speaker 1: and it integrates with all of their battery packs, and
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: you know, it just allows you to have that single ecosystem.
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: It likely pairs in with their Bluetooth and everything else.
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: So you get these, you know, kind of walled gardens
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: of technology that you can use across your electronics, which
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: I think is pretty worthwhile.
• 49:47
  Speaker 2: I am seeing. I think to the benefit of the
• 49:50
  Speaker 2: consumer is that if you're depending on your use case,
• 49:55
  Speaker 2: it used to be the only option was to have
• 49:57
  Speaker 2: a dual battery system. Yeah, and now I think that
• 50:00
  Speaker 2: dual battery system still very much has its place for
• 50:03
  Speaker 2: the right use case. But you would see everybody and
• 50:08
  Speaker 2: anybody doing a dual battery system, even though that they
• 50:10
  Speaker 2: would never really use it to full capacity and they
• 50:14
  Speaker 2: can be quite complicated to install and retain. So now
• 50:18
  Speaker 2: if you need a dual battery system, that technology with
• 50:22
  Speaker 2: with red Arc and a few other companies that continues
• 50:25
  Speaker 2: to advance. But then if you don't really need the
• 50:27
  Speaker 2: full capacity of a dual battery system, these battery boxes
• 50:32
  Speaker 2: and these standalone refrigerator freezers are kind of providing that
• 50:36
  Speaker 2: solution for the maybe the more recreational user.
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, or you know, like that's on the Africa trip.
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: That's all I'm using is a battery box in the
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: in the scouts. When you get a Scout delivered, it
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: just comes with the coal zero.
• 50:49
  Speaker 2: How simple. I mean with the with the Grenadier one wire,
• 50:52
  Speaker 2: you're not wanting to install a whole lot of aftermarket systems.
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: I just don't want that truck. And see what, although
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: I do use a lot of the red Arc equipment
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: on that truck. I have the red Arc, I have
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: a red Arc battery isolator, and I also have a
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: red Arc solar blanket that I put on the windshield
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: so when the vehicles parked for long periods of time,
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: I'm able to top off the little battery box.
• 51:15
  Speaker 2: That I've got and that's working pretty well.
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: It works flawless because my power requirements are pretty minimal.
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: Doing that twelve conversion to the starlink with the unique
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: componentry really drop my power consumption with the starlink and
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: their wiring uses the same plug as Demetic and ARB
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: and a couple others where it screws in so that
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: it just screws now. Yeah, it's really really good. Yeah,
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: it's really good. So then the the red Arc solar
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: panel system that I have on windscreen when I parked,
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: it's more than enough power to run the whole thing.
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: So run the fridge and the starlink. Some other news
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: is the Rebel Rally has come out with some training.
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: Let's talk about that.
• 52:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so most people listening would probably know of the
• 52:09
  Speaker 2: Rebel Rally. It's a you know, awesome women's only navigationally
• 52:13
  Speaker 2: focused kind of driving challenge event.
• 52:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, awesome event.
• 52:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it's not it's not a race.
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: It's a it's a it's a race. It's not a race.
• 52:23
  Speaker 1: It's race. It's not a race. It's race, Nina Barlow,
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: it's not a race.
• 52:26
  Speaker 2: It's race. It's a navigation challenge event.
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: It's not a race.
• 52:31
  Speaker 2: So they have they've the last few years they've done
• 52:35
  Speaker 2: this really impressive job at doing training for the people
• 52:40
  Speaker 2: who have entered in. Right, So you enter into the
• 52:42
  Speaker 2: Rebel Rally and then you get this this training that
• 52:45
  Speaker 2: you can enter into as well. And that I mean,
• 52:47
  Speaker 2: it's like six months of training if you want. Not
• 52:49
  Speaker 2: everybody has never You don't have to do it, but
• 52:52
  Speaker 2: a lot of people take advantage of it.
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: It really helps the outcomes.
• 52:55
  Speaker 2: From what I understand, and I hope I'm not wrong,
• 52:58
  Speaker 2: but from what I understand, they're now offering those training
• 53:01
  Speaker 2: classes to any You still have to be a woman,
• 53:08
  Speaker 2: but they're offering it to anybody who is. You don't
• 53:12
  Speaker 2: have to be entered into the Rebel Rally event.
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: But what a great thing though, because it allows people
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: to gain skills and determine if it's something that they
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: would like to do or not. So yeah, I'm just
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: that event just continues to impress me with how awesome
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: it is.
• 53:29
  Speaker 2: I kind of wish like if my daughter had more time,
• 53:31
  Speaker 2: I'd want her to go.
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: How rad would that be?
• 53:33
  Speaker 2: All that training?
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: Yeah? Incredible, that would be so good. And then a
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: couple other little pieces of news here. X Overland is
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: going to be launching their Africa series on their Overland
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: or their ex Overland network episodes. Right, that's right, that'll
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: be coming out, And we've got our own Africa series
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: that's coming out here with about the time that this
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: podcast drops, we'll have our first episode, so there'll be
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: lots of cool Africa content. Of course, X Overland does
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: an incredible job with theirs, and mine's a different kind
• 54:08
  Speaker 1: of story, but I think that they're both going to
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: be fun for people to watch. So X Overland did
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: a big loop through southern Africa, and some of the
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: footage that I've seen so.
• 54:19
  Speaker 3: Far is all world.
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: They just continue to advance their game in ways that
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: are unimaginable.
• 54:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah, they put out a trailer for the series.
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's so good. It was so good, captivating, so captivating, Yeah,
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: so much so. And then of course our series will
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: touch on our travels up the length of Africa from
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: Cape Town, most likely making a rite at Djibouti above
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: the Horn.
• 54:44
  Speaker 2: Just real quick, because I don't know how many times
• 54:47
  Speaker 2: you've talked about it and what people really understand of
• 54:50
  Speaker 2: what you're doing. So you know, So X Overland went
• 54:54
  Speaker 2: over they kind of picked a couple of areas of
• 54:56
  Speaker 2: the continent to go explore.
• 54:58
  Speaker 1: Some of the best, So they really focused on some
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: of the best of Africa.
• 55:01
  Speaker 2: And the footage is incredible. Now what you're doing is
• 55:05
  Speaker 2: quite different.
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: It is. So what we're focusing on is a long
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: axis crossing of the continent of Africa. We've done a
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: short axis crossing of the continent of Africa. I did
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: that in twenty fourteen or twenty thirteen actually, but we
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: wanted to do this long access crossing to complete our
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: crossings of all seven continents. So in technical terms, I've
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: crossed all seven continents. I think, first person in history
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: to do that by any measure we can find. But
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: this long access crossing will be a Guinness record, So
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: it's different. Yeah, it is. It is, it is, and
• 55:47
  Speaker 1: it's it's consistent with the kinds of things that are
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: important to us at Overland International, which is to push
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: the limits in all the ways that we can. We
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: did that with Expedition seven, and we do that with
• 55:59
  Speaker 1: our with or other travels to really understand how things
• 56:02
  Speaker 1: work so that way we can best support our audience.
• 56:05
  Speaker 2: Well, I had to put you on the spot and
• 56:07
  Speaker 2: call it out because you've put a lot of hard
• 56:08
  Speaker 2: work into that.
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I have. This has been four years in
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: the works and really grateful for the opportunity to also
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: test the Grenadier. We're not being compensated by Enios because
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: we wanted to be able to speak freely about the
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: use of the vehicle and the results that we have
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: and using it in such a long and arduous journey.
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: So we're over twenty thousand kilometers already on the Grenadier.
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: I've had no failures. I've not had to replace any components.
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: I've not had any faults that kept me from going anywhere.
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: So the vehicle has exceeded my expectations, particularly given that
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: it's a unit number three hundred and seventy something. So
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: it's very early in the manufacturing process, and I know
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: people in North America are starting to take delivery of them.
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: So if you follow Overland Journal on Instagram or Expedition
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: Portal on Instagram, or if you want a little bit
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: more of a personal granularity around it, you can follow
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: Scott dot a dot Brady on Instagram to see our
• 57:10
  Speaker 1: journeys across Africa. And I'm about ready to leave to
• 57:13
  Speaker 1: head back for the final segment of the Africa crossing,
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: so I'm going to be flying into Morocco. I'm going
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: to be dry riding the New Dukati Desert X rally
• 57:25
  Speaker 1: in Morocco, amazing and then so I'm going to try
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: to keep all of my limbs intact so that I
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: can finish the next part of my trans Africa journey.
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: So yeah, riding Dukatti. Yeah, it's an incredible motorcycle that
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: makes you feel like a hero. So it's one of
• 57:44
  Speaker 1: my favorite new motorcycles on the market period because it's
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: got range capability, just overall comfort and really lightweight. So
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: the Desert X is in a whole new class of
• 57:56
  Speaker 1: its own. I mean they're given KTM a full run
• 57:58
  Speaker 1: for their money on this thing. So yeah, we're gonna
• 58:01
  Speaker 1: go ride that in Marrakesh, and then I'll be flying
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: to South Africa doing some stuff with Paul May from
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: Equipped and Jess from easy On, going to do some traveling.
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: I'm going to go interview Kingsley Holgate, who those are listening.
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: This is an interview I've been trying to set up
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: for since the very beginning of the podcast.
• 58:19
  Speaker 2: That's going to be a treat to travel with Jess
• 58:22
  Speaker 2: in his own backyard.
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: Yeah he is quite Yeah, he is quite the traveler
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: in Africa. Incredible spotter of game, like he'll see a
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: leopard under a bush, like partly obscured by the carcass
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: of an impala and he's like, oh, there's a leopard
• 58:41
  Speaker 1: three hundred yards away, and I'm like, dude, i can
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: barely see the bush, you know, And he's like, and
• 58:46
  Speaker 1: then you zoom in on your lens and sure enough,
• 58:48
  Speaker 1: like there's the leopard. So he's really fun to travel
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: with and also very He's a thoughtful designer and easy
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: On makes really high, high quality components, So looking forward
• 58:59
  Speaker 1: to doing that. But I'm really looking forward to spending
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: time with Kingsley because he he's an overlander that in
• 59:06
  Speaker 1: every kilometer that he travels, he's given back. So he
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: will bring along trailers full of Mombasa nets to try
• 59:16
  Speaker 1: to protect children in Africa from malaria. And I'm selling
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: his accomplishments very short. This is some of the most
• 59:25
  Speaker 1: recent stuff that he's doing. But he's taking Modern Defenders
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: up the West coast of Africa, starting that in just
• 59:32
  Speaker 1: a few months. So Kingsley Holgate, for those that don't
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: know him, he is who I want to be when
• 59:38
  Speaker 1: I grow up. I know one this guy, Yeah, I'll
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: do that. He's got a way better he's got a
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: way better beard than I do, too. But yeah, so
• 59:49
  Speaker 1: lots of stuff happened in Africa, right now, what's next
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: for you, Brian?
• 59:54
  Speaker 2: Next is well, it's a most immediately headed a shot show.
• 59:59
  Speaker 1: That's right. So yeah, we'll have to touch base on
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 1: that because there's always some interesting stuff that comes from shot.
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: There is.
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 2: It's going to be quick, you know, I'm going to
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 2: go from Monday Tuesday and then so it's it's you know,
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 2: a day on the show floor and a day at
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 2: the range, so it's going to be a pretty quick
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 2: turnaround for thee.
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's so fun.
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 2: You have to go to media day at the range.
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: Oh, it's so fun. It's just so it's so ridiculously fun.
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 2: I kind of that's always on the calendar every day.
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah, no, as it should be super fun and oh
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: that'll be great.
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 2: A day, a day on the show floor. We've got
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 2: a few meetings schedule and and then a bit.
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 1: Of walking around to see and then you are going
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: to go drive the Lexus g.
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 2: X and that's the big thing for next week.
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: That is a big deal.
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 2: Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, go drive the new Lexus.
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and they've got the new over trail version and
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: I mean just this vehicle I could not be more
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 1: excited about Alexis than in ever. Yeah, like it's it's
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 1: going to be really really good.
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I got I got a chance to poke around
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 2: it a little bit at SEMA. Yeah. So I'm really
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 2: excited to get it out on the track.
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: I can't wait to hear your feedback on that. So
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: Paula and you will be heading down to Tucson and
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: capturing some content and then we'll be able to give
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: some feedback on that soon.
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I look forward to it.
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 1: Well, Brian, thanks for taking the time today.
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you bet.
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: And for those that are listening and have been following
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 1: the New Overland News series, please give us some feedback
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 1: on things that you'd like to hear more of or
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 1: less of, or how you like the format overall, things
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: that I need to do better, because of course, Brian
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 1: is the man.
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 2: So well, I tell you it's it's I only cover
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 2: about half of the stuff that I want.
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 1: It's impossible.
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 2: There's probably another five.
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 1: Trucks that I wanted, that's right, Yeah, that's right. So
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: I don't know, but we're at an hour, yeah, right,
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: at the.
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 2: Hour, I think we need to say, okay, we're only
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 2: going to talk about trucks. We're only going to talk
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 2: about events. We're all over the place.
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 1: I think we did good. I think we did good.
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 2: We did a really good job.
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: So awesome. Well, we thank you all for listening, and
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: we'll talk to you next time.