Latest / The Overland Journal Podcast / Choosing the Harder Path: Storytelling, Sacrifice, and the Road Ahead with Harrison Schoen

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Choosing the Harder Path: Storytelling, Sacrifice, and the Road Ahead with Harrison Schoen · The Overland Journal Podcast

0:05
Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to the Overlin Journal podcast. I'm your host,
0:09
Speaker 1: Matt Scott, and I'm here with my buddy Harrison Shown.
0:13
Speaker 1: You're an interesting guy. You're an interesting guy. So what
0:16
Speaker 1: we're going to be talking about today? His pitch to
0:19
Speaker 1: me was how to tell a story your grandchildren won't believe?
0:22
Speaker 1: And I thought that was a really good headline. So
0:25
Speaker 1: this episode centers around how do you build? Basically this
0:28
Speaker 1: question of like, how do you build a life worth retelling? Right?
0:31
Speaker 1: And for you, I guess some of that kind of
0:34
Speaker 1: revolves on the vehicles that you choose, and because right
0:37
Speaker 1: now you've got a unimogue that you're building. You're known
0:40
Speaker 1: for your escapades and Portie Cayennes that were lifted, you
0:44
Speaker 1: lived one for two years, and you've just done some
0:46
Speaker 1: crazy things. You turned down a million dollars on the
0:49
Speaker 1: Mister Beast Show, Yeah, which is I think a lot
0:51
Speaker 1: of this is also just like the character and the
0:53
Speaker 1: sacrifice that takes to travel. So I'm so glad to
0:57
Speaker 1: have you.
0:58
Speaker 2: Thank you, thank you for having me here.
1:00
Speaker 1: Yeah, So where should we start? I think my question
1:03
Speaker 1: for you is who is Harry shown?
1:07
Speaker 3: A special thanks to Hancook Dina pro Tires for supporting
1:09
Speaker 3: this week's podcast. Visit expedition portal dot com to see
1:13
Speaker 3: our content series in partnership with Hancook, where you learn
1:17
Speaker 3: about this year's Jeep Beach event in Daytona, Florida, get
1:20
Speaker 3: tips on exploring the O'calla National Forest, and take a
1:24
Speaker 3: tour of the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America at
1:26
Speaker 3: the Daytona International Speedway. We also take a close look
1:30
Speaker 3: at how to choose a mud terrain, all terrain or
1:33
Speaker 3: a hybrid rugged terrain tire using the Honkook Dina Pro
1:36
Speaker 3: tire lineup as examples.
1:39
Speaker 2: I think that I'm a little bit different from a
1:42
Speaker 2: lot of people. I think was he not crazy out
1:43
Speaker 2: there anything? I don't feel like I'm special. I grew
1:47
Speaker 2: up pretty poor in a mobile home. I lived in
1:49
Speaker 2: that for about seventeen years till my dad passed away
1:51
Speaker 2: with no life for alth insurance lost in mobile home,
1:53
Speaker 2: moved to my aunt, lived with five people in a
1:55
Speaker 2: two bedroomhouse, and then worked several jobs before I left
1:58
Speaker 2: for the Navy. Joined the Navy, spent four years there,
2:01
Speaker 2: got out. I tried to live an abnormal life since then.
2:04
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it's interesting. You always find out what the
2:08
Speaker 1: backstory of people is when you actually get to talk
2:10
Speaker 1: to and I guess I first became aware of you
2:14
Speaker 1: from the like driving a lifted Portia Cayenne around and
2:20
Speaker 1: there's always a story behind where people came from. Like
2:22
Speaker 1: how many times did you get the O your dad
2:24
Speaker 1: buy that car for you kind of thing?
2:25
Speaker 2: So many times? Dude, Like I'm at the age now
2:28
Speaker 2: where nobody says Daddy's money anymore. Oh yeah, with the
2:31
Speaker 2: first Cayennes, definitely, But then it's really funny when I'm like, no,
2:34
Speaker 2: the car was actually nine thousand dollars.
2:37
Speaker 1: What was the cool thing of where those cars were?
2:38
Speaker 1: You're still pretty affordable. The Cayennes are just they're not
2:43
Speaker 1: They're not that expensive. Like they depreciated, yeah, like absolutely crazy.
2:46
Speaker 2: And then goodness, like the heavy depreciation led to the
2:50
Speaker 2: off road capability and like people discovering what they were.
2:53
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, So you were in the Navy for four
2:55
Speaker 1: years you're talking about you served on a variety of
2:59
Speaker 1: are they called vessels or are they called ships either?
3:01
Speaker 2: One? Okay, you can call it a dinghy if you want. Yeah,
3:05
Speaker 2: I was on an LPD, which is an amphibious transport
3:07
Speaker 2: ship basically an uber for marines bring them to different places,
3:10
Speaker 2: drop off their vehicles. Even Yeah, and I was on
3:14
Speaker 2: an aircraft carrier CBN seventy went through to Roosevelt for
3:17
Speaker 2: like another two years.
3:18
Speaker 1: Was like being on an aircraft carry would be absolutely
3:22
Speaker 1: crazy as it's this optimized city and is there like
3:27
Speaker 1: a square footage of the total living space of an
3:29
Speaker 1: aircraft carrier A lot?
3:30
Speaker 2: Yeah, no clue, but like enough for five thousand people
3:33
Speaker 2: to comfortably live in full time for months on end.
3:38
Speaker 1: Yeah, how much of that experience of being on navy
3:41
Speaker 1: vessels and I went into this, but being very comfortable
3:45
Speaker 1: on these small like spaces, these vehicles that you're in, I.
3:48
Speaker 2: Think it was gonna first joined the Navy, like after
3:50
Speaker 2: boot camp, after training, I went to the fleet. I
3:53
Speaker 2: was in a holding unit basically while I met up
3:57
Speaker 2: with the ship on deployment. I was sat there in
3:59
Speaker 2: San Diego for about a and all my belongings fit
4:01
Speaker 2: into a seabag and a backpack. Yeah, Like I just
4:04
Speaker 2: enjoyed not owning anything. I didn't really have any stress,
4:07
Speaker 2: any troubles went to the ship and like after my
4:10
Speaker 2: four years in the Navy, I just wanted to get
4:11
Speaker 2: back to that.
4:12
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's interesting. I never served a lot of me
4:15
Speaker 1: wishes that I did. But there's also this there is
4:18
Speaker 1: this freedom of like you have a purpose, you have
4:20
Speaker 1: a mission, you have a thing that you're doing, but
4:24
Speaker 1: you also can have this minimalist life. I don't know.
4:29
Speaker 1: Sometimes I think in today's we're always connected, we're so hectic,
4:33
Speaker 1: everything's twenty four to seven kamin atcha. Like, I know
4:36
Speaker 1: that it's a lot of work, it's a lot of sacrifice,
4:38
Speaker 1: but there's almost something appealing to that.
4:42
Speaker 2: Definitely a cool experience and like I would do it
4:43
Speaker 2: again if I did it over, but I wouldn't join
4:46
Speaker 2: from now on. Yeah, I wouldn't do it now, but
4:49
Speaker 2: if I went back in time, I would do it
4:51
Speaker 2: again because it allowed me to do what I'm doing now.
4:54
Speaker 2: And I kind of played into becoming who I am
4:56
Speaker 2: because on the first ship, I was just a deck semen. Yeah,
5:00
Speaker 2: we would stand up on the watch. We'd stand up
5:02
Speaker 2: in the tower, steer the boat, and then we'd switch watch.
5:04
Speaker 2: It have to look out, so then we'd spend like
5:07
Speaker 2: hours at a time looking out of the ocean on
5:09
Speaker 2: the back of the ship, making sure no one fell
5:10
Speaker 2: overboard and if they did you pop a smoke float,
5:12
Speaker 2: you throw a life rang to him, Yeah, I make
5:14
Speaker 2: sure you don't lose that person. So I really spent
5:19
Speaker 2: a lot of hours staring at the ocean and like
5:21
Speaker 2: you're not allowed to. Yeah, you can't read a book,
5:24
Speaker 2: you can't do anything, you just stare at the ocean.
5:25
Speaker 1: But I guess you also have to say like a lurry,
5:27
Speaker 1: you can't just like totally zone app.
5:29
Speaker 2: And so it was a mixture of boredom and realizing
5:32
Speaker 2: that I'm in the middle of the ocean doing nothing
5:34
Speaker 2: while people are like out there on shore, like advancing
5:37
Speaker 2: their lives and doing the things they want to do.
5:39
Speaker 2: So I realized how much time I was wasting.
5:41
Speaker 1: Yeah that's the sacrifice, right, Yeah, So you get out
5:48
Speaker 1: of the Navy, and what's what comes next.
5:51
Speaker 2: I moved to Salt Lake with someone that I was dating,
5:53
Speaker 2: and I rented one of the rooms in the townhouse
5:55
Speaker 2: that I had there on Airbnb, and then when her
5:57
Speaker 2: and I broke up, I moved into the garage rented
6:00
Speaker 2: rooms on airbnbing like I was able to live there
6:01
Speaker 2: for free. Yeah.
6:02
Speaker 1: Because there's this photo of you with was an E
6:05
Speaker 1: thirty or an E thirty six to thirty six. Yeah, yeah,
6:07
Speaker 1: which I had one of those. I mean those things
6:10
Speaker 1: also used to be cheap. Like we were talking about,
6:13
Speaker 1: I had a ninety nine E thirty six M three
6:16
Speaker 1: it was Dakar yellow. When I was like in college,
6:20
Speaker 1: it was like six grand. Yeah, Like it was crazy
6:23
Speaker 1: how cheap it was. But here's the E thirty six
6:26
Speaker 1: in the garage. You've got your bed there, and I
6:29
Speaker 1: think that's really where things start to get interesting for you.
6:32
Speaker 1: Not that the Navy ism and that's super cool, but
6:35
Speaker 1: there's this common theme of I don't want to say
6:38
Speaker 1: like self sacrifice, but you're you're finding ways to live
6:43
Speaker 1: an adventurous life. And what I find so inspiring about
6:48
Speaker 1: that don't come for money. You're out of the Navy,
6:50
Speaker 1: you're out of finance, bro Like, you don't have unlimited cash,
6:53
Speaker 1: the realities that most travelers don't. But you're finding a
6:56
Speaker 1: way to make it happen. So what drove to start
7:00
Speaker 1: making these sacrifices so you could travel?
7:04
Speaker 2: I did the living in the garage for about a
7:08
Speaker 2: year year and a half. Imlize that I had accumulated
7:12
Speaker 2: more things. I owned all the furniture in the house
7:13
Speaker 2: and I just wanted to get back to just having
7:15
Speaker 2: a sea bag full of stuff. Yeah, So I knew
7:18
Speaker 2: that I either wanted to go backpack like Thailand or something,
7:20
Speaker 2: but it was mid COVID and travel hadn't opened up.
7:22
Speaker 2: So I chose to to modify the car that I
7:24
Speaker 2: had at the time, because I downsized from owning three
7:27
Speaker 2: cars too that I was renting out on Turo down
7:29
Speaker 2: to one ended up being a Porsche Cayenne and modified
7:33
Speaker 2: that to live in with two weeks of thinking about it.
7:35
Speaker 1: And was that the pink pig? Because you've had for
7:38
Speaker 1: the Cayenne folks, you've had like several a calum iconic
7:42
Speaker 1: lifted Cayennees.
7:43
Speaker 2: I've had ten, maybe eleven Cayennes total now, just over
7:47
Speaker 2: like three and a half years. But the first one
7:49
Speaker 2: was I call it p one. Yeah, just a silver
7:52
Speaker 2: Cayenne ass one hundred and twenty five thousand miles when
7:54
Speaker 2: I got it. By the one hundred and eighty five
7:56
Speaker 2: thousand miles i'd driven it to, it got so bores scored.
7:59
Speaker 2: I was feeding it court of oil every two hundred miles.
8:02
Speaker 1: Oh did those have like nick a sel line? Yeah, yeah, yeah,
8:05
Speaker 1: fascinating ten Cayennes. So then you had one what are
8:10
Speaker 1: the cayan you traveled in like two two and a
8:13
Speaker 1: half years P.
8:14
Speaker 2: One, okay, and then P three, So the pink pig
8:16
Speaker 2: was P two okay, And I bought that, had that
8:19
Speaker 2: in the background, kept it at friend's houses and stuff
8:21
Speaker 2: like that. Yeah. But I lived in the first one
8:23
Speaker 2: for about a year and a half. Then I switched
8:25
Speaker 2: to the third one, which was also silver. So nobody
8:27
Speaker 2: ever really noticed a difference when I switched over. They
8:29
Speaker 2: thought I just changed a couple of things about it. Yeah,
8:32
Speaker 2: but I actually lived in two Cayennes, like split it
8:34
Speaker 2: up the two and a half years I lived in them.
8:36
Speaker 1: So what I'd love to talk about is how you
8:39
Speaker 1: outfitted them for a living with fridges, sleeping platform that
8:43
Speaker 1: kind of thing. But where you took them, Yuh.
8:47
Speaker 2: I just made a wood platform. I drew up the
8:49
Speaker 2: design at two am one night, went to on depot
8:52
Speaker 2: the next morning, and kind of just bought enough wood.
8:55
Speaker 2: I just had to make sure that I had like
8:57
Speaker 2: a power bank that could run a fridge, and then
9:00
Speaker 2: a comfortable enough mattress and like long enough for me
9:03
Speaker 2: to sleep in because I'm pretty tall at six five. Yeah,
9:05
Speaker 2: and I would just put the Cayane seat forward, and
9:07
Speaker 2: I made this cool little thing where the rest of
9:09
Speaker 2: the bed would flip up once the passengers eats forward.
9:11
Speaker 2: And it was long enough for me to live in
9:12
Speaker 2: and comfortable enough for two and a half years.
9:15
Speaker 1: What did you do for a fridge? Did you have
9:16
Speaker 1: a fridge?
9:17
Speaker 2: I sided medic like CFX thirty five.
9:18
Speaker 1: Okay, sweet, Yeah, those little ones are good.
9:20
Speaker 2: Yeah, run off like it was first a goal zero
9:22
Speaker 2: one thousand, then I switched up to the three thousand
9:24
Speaker 2: after a year.
9:25
Speaker 1: Okay, So I think I'm trying to remember. I mean,
9:29
Speaker 1: I remember you. You kind of popped up, was it TikTok?
9:32
Speaker 1: That was the where the E thirty six and the
9:34
Speaker 1: garage kind of went a little viral?
9:36
Speaker 2: Yeah?
9:37
Speaker 1: Yeah. And then but I really started seeing you with
9:40
Speaker 1: the Cayenne when you did your big tuck tuk tuk trip.
9:43
Speaker 1: And I think that one. I think that'd be like
9:45
Speaker 1: a super fun car to do that. Their road's not
9:48
Speaker 1: like super technical, it's really shaley. It's like obviously like
9:51
Speaker 1: tire kind of shred. How long did you take to.
9:53
Speaker 2: Do it the whole trip or the dumpster just yeah,
9:57
Speaker 2: just gone all the way up to Tuck. It probably
9:59
Speaker 2: took about a month and a half total. That was
10:00
Speaker 2: a pretty crazy trip. We met Audi and BAMFF and
10:04
Speaker 2: they were doing a thing with all the RS generations
10:06
Speaker 2: of cars, and then drove up through BAMF Jasper my
10:11
Speaker 2: friends Audi RS six that he was living in at
10:13
Speaker 2: the time.
10:13
Speaker 1: Because didn't one of those go with you for a
10:15
Speaker 1: portion of it?
10:16
Speaker 2: The RS six of aunt he drove it up. He
10:18
Speaker 2: was planning and driving. He was driving from Florida all
10:20
Speaker 2: the way to the Arctic Ocean and his alternator failed
10:23
Speaker 2: halfway through Canada. He had to have it towed one
10:24
Speaker 2: thousand miles to Anchorage the nearest Audi dealer who eventually
10:28
Speaker 2: screwed him out of about thirty thousand dollars and he
10:30
Speaker 2: had to nearly sue them because the alternator was back
10:33
Speaker 2: ordered and he just couldn't get it. He had to
10:35
Speaker 2: sell the car to them. But we continued on. I
10:37
Speaker 2: ended up going on a first date in Dawson, which
10:40
Speaker 2: is crazy. I met a girl in Bumble. We went
10:42
Speaker 2: on a plane ride over at Tombstone National Park, drove
10:45
Speaker 2: the dumpster. Also did the shot the human the sour
10:48
Speaker 2: tow shot. Oh yeah, the sourtow shot was really interesting.
10:52
Speaker 2: I have aigtificate you Now, what.
10:54
Speaker 1: Time of year were you there? August August, so I went,
10:58
Speaker 1: I did my tuck tripping twenty two, so like things
11:01
Speaker 1: had just reopened from COVID.
11:03
Speaker 2: That's about when I did it. Yeah, yeah, twenty two.
11:05
Speaker 1: But I was there in June June July, and it
11:08
Speaker 1: was so hecking busy, and they were flying seven to
11:14
Speaker 1: three sevens of cruise ship passengers into Dawson. The place
11:18
Speaker 1: was a ghost town. Everything was booked. Okay, there's a
11:22
Speaker 1: lot of people there, but like they were all on
11:25
Speaker 1: tours during the day. But everything was constantly booked. But
11:29
Speaker 1: there was like a line of people out the door
11:30
Speaker 1: to do the toe shot.
11:32
Speaker 2: I don't know, we didn't have too much of a line.
11:34
Speaker 2: I think maybe by then they figured it out or
11:36
Speaker 2: they just had us like come back at a certain time. Okay,
11:38
Speaker 2: So we signed up and came back for it.
11:40
Speaker 1: What's the cold It's called something.
11:42
Speaker 2: It's like some club, right, Oh, I don't remember the name.
11:47
Speaker 1: Well, we're bad at that. What went wrong?
11:50
Speaker 4: So?
11:50
Speaker 2: Yeah, we spent five or six days total going up
11:53
Speaker 2: and down the dumpster. We really didn't spend very much
11:55
Speaker 2: time in talk at all because I saw it jumped
11:57
Speaker 2: in the ocean and cut it back and then it's
12:00
Speaker 2: a stinky ocean. Yeah. It was a little cold at
12:03
Speaker 2: the time, but not like arctic Arctic cold. Yeah, because
12:05
Speaker 2: it was basically summer. It was the last day of
12:07
Speaker 2: twenty four hours a daylight that we were up there
12:09
Speaker 2: and drove back and I never aired down for that
12:12
Speaker 2: whole road, so I was probably at about fifty PSI
12:15
Speaker 2: the entire time, and I had recently put on coil
12:18
Speaker 2: overs and was just letting them do all the work,
12:20
Speaker 2: which was a bad decision because the gravel eventually got
12:22
Speaker 2: to like the rattle of my car and unscrewed my
12:27
Speaker 2: passenger side tirod from the steering rack. And it doesn't
12:31
Speaker 2: secure with like a cotter.
12:32
Speaker 1: Pot or anything.
12:33
Speaker 2: I just like it.
12:33
Speaker 1: That's steering rack. It moves side to something.
12:36
Speaker 2: And it's just they it's really weird. I don't know
12:39
Speaker 2: what they expect, but there's no securing anything, Like you
12:41
Speaker 2: just tighten the bolt and then it's supposed to stay in,
12:43
Speaker 2: but it didn't.
12:45
Speaker 1: Man, So how did you get out of that?
12:48
Speaker 2: So that I noticed the steering was a little slow,
12:51
Speaker 2: and then I went off the side of the road
12:52
Speaker 2: to avoid a construction worker or something. And I was
12:55
Speaker 2: getting back on the road and I was having a
12:57
Speaker 2: hard time getting out of the sand because my right
12:59
Speaker 2: wheel was going straight and my left was turned in.
13:02
Speaker 2: And I popped back up onto the road shortly after
13:04
Speaker 2: I came to a stop, looked over everything, visually, didn't
13:07
Speaker 2: see anything wrong, got back in the car, tried driving.
13:09
Speaker 2: My passenger side wheeled dove in and I just started
13:12
Speaker 2: dragging it. Got out, checked it. I was like, I
13:15
Speaker 2: really don't want to work on that out here on
13:17
Speaker 2: the side of this highway or anything. And in my
13:20
Speaker 2: brain I was like, well, I was already driving with
13:21
Speaker 2: no tyrod because it didn't Yeah, so if I can
13:25
Speaker 2: get back up to speed and get the wheel straight,
13:27
Speaker 2: I can.
13:27
Speaker 1: Just I just do the shopping cart thing and it
13:29
Speaker 1: eventually would fall yes, follow along.
13:32
Speaker 2: So I would have to drive up till five or
13:34
Speaker 2: ten miles an hour while dragging that front right wheel
13:36
Speaker 2: and eventually it would like wiggle and then pop straight
13:39
Speaker 2: and it would stay straight.
13:40
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13:50
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13:54
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14:42
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15:04
Speaker 5: Warner team for your support of this week's podcast, and.
15:08
Speaker 2: I could go around turns and stuff too, and I
15:10
Speaker 2: eventually like there were two construction zones I had to
15:13
Speaker 2: drive through where they were like fixing the road and
15:15
Speaker 2: so you had to do like a follow car kind
15:17
Speaker 2: of thing. Those kind of those were the only nerve
15:20
Speaker 2: wracking parts. Yeah, and one of those is really funny,
15:25
Speaker 2: pretty long construction zone. But when we were starting the
15:28
Speaker 2: Dempster Highway, there was really like there was three miles
15:31
Speaker 2: of construction cones get ready for the construction zone coming up.
15:34
Speaker 2: So I'm speeding through those. Yeah, like I don't see anyone,
15:37
Speaker 2: like the very long straightaways in front of me. My
15:39
Speaker 2: car is loud, of course, so it seems like I'm
15:41
Speaker 2: going much faster than I am. I come up to
15:43
Speaker 2: this woman at the construction zone. She's very pissed off
15:46
Speaker 2: at me. She's like yelling at me, calling me all
15:48
Speaker 2: these names, and I'm like, I don't care, please shut up.
15:50
Speaker 2: I was going I was not endangering anyone. So then
15:53
Speaker 2: I continue through the construction zone. They're all yelling at
15:56
Speaker 2: me too because she radiate ahead. We continue on do
15:58
Speaker 2: the trip come back. I'm having the tyrode issue at
16:01
Speaker 2: that time, and so we come to a stop.
16:04
Speaker 1: So you're going fast through the construction zone because that's
16:06
Speaker 1: really your only option, otherwise your tire would just No.
16:10
Speaker 2: I couldn't go fast through there. Like I came to
16:12
Speaker 2: a stop and we were a couple of cars behind,
16:14
Speaker 2: like in the follow car leaping, and so the follow
16:17
Speaker 2: car is leading, we're behind, and the woman is there
16:21
Speaker 2: like in the construction zone, seeing me, and I have
16:24
Speaker 2: to go from a stop at the follow car to
16:27
Speaker 2: starting again, and so I know that she remembers the car.
16:29
Speaker 2: She's still pissed at me. Probably the wheel dives in
16:32
Speaker 2: and she sees me dragging the wheel until it eventually
16:34
Speaker 2: goes straight and then I take off. But I know
16:36
Speaker 2: the amount of satisfaction she got from that too.
16:40
Speaker 1: Oh oh, maybe a little carma Frey for speeding in
16:41
Speaker 1: a construction.
16:42
Speaker 2: Zone, definitely. And then yeah, I got back to the
16:45
Speaker 2: town of Dawson. I jacked up the car and reconnected
16:48
Speaker 2: the tyrod.
16:49
Speaker 1: Reconnect it.
16:49
Speaker 2: Yeah, the threads weren't messed up or anything.
16:52
Speaker 1: It's just literally man, that's fuscinating. Yeah, so let's move
16:59
Speaker 1: on because you're all going to drive down the pan Am.
17:01
Speaker 1: But we have to tackle this beast games, mister beast
17:05
Speaker 1: thing like, how did how do you how the hell
17:08
Speaker 1: do you even end up on Beast? I mean there's
17:10
Speaker 1: a lot of people on it, but kind of played
17:11
Speaker 1: like a he had a bit of a role in it.
17:14
Speaker 2: Yeah, mister Beast is like the largest creator on YouTube
17:16
Speaker 2: for those who unerware. He got a deal with Amazon
17:18
Speaker 2: to create a TV show. Wanted to make the largest
17:20
Speaker 2: game show ever, so he recruited about two thousand people
17:23
Speaker 2: to start. We spent the first part of it eliminating
17:25
Speaker 2: down from two thousand to one thousand. We slept in
17:28
Speaker 2: the Raiders stadium for three nights on the turf with
17:30
Speaker 2: a thirty dollars come and sleeping bag and no pillow.
17:32
Speaker 2: I eventually found a sandbag to use as a pillow.
17:34
Speaker 1: Oh that's really good.
17:35
Speaker 2: So I got myself comfortable and we played through four.
17:38
Speaker 1: The idea is that they're just trying to like, how
17:40
Speaker 1: bad do you want this? They're trying to like, yeah,
17:43
Speaker 1: and there's something where they would only feed you, like
17:45
Speaker 1: candy bars.
17:46
Speaker 2: We had unlimited candy bars basically, but as far as
17:49
Speaker 2: food intake, like maybe a thousand calories of broccoli, rice
17:53
Speaker 2: and chicken.
17:54
Speaker 1: So like the minimum of the Amazon lawyers would Yeah,
17:57
Speaker 1: allow you.
17:57
Speaker 2: And then we went on to film in Cannon, where
18:00
Speaker 2: we resumed in like hangar bays and went from a
18:03
Speaker 2: thousand people down.
18:04
Speaker 1: To eventually one per city or something.
18:05
Speaker 2: I saw, Yeah, there was a city up there that
18:07
Speaker 2: cost only fifteen million dollars. In the whole set for
18:09
Speaker 2: the first episode also cost the fifteen to twenty million
18:11
Speaker 2: dollars because all the trap doors they had to have
18:14
Speaker 2: for all thousand people were like all independently controlled actuated,
18:17
Speaker 2: so they had to build that set. And it was
18:19
Speaker 2: also like it was all scaffolding and we were actually
18:22
Speaker 2: like fifteen feet off the ground because everyone had to
18:24
Speaker 2: fall down into the phone pits. So just like the
18:27
Speaker 2: scale of if everything was way bigger.
18:29
Speaker 1: Than what it would just have to be crazy to
18:30
Speaker 1: see production that size. Like even I've only been around
18:34
Speaker 1: like small TV productions like Overland stuff or whatever, and
18:38
Speaker 1: even that's like pretty impressive to see it work, But
18:40
Speaker 1: to wrangle a thousand contestants has to be like interesting.
18:46
Speaker 1: But so did you like it?
18:52
Speaker 2: I really enjoyed the experience. The coolest part about it
18:55
Speaker 2: was getting like a thousand, two thousand adults together taking
18:58
Speaker 2: away their phones, taking away any articles of disparity, like
19:01
Speaker 2: no watches, no jewelry, no like expensive hats, like nothing
19:06
Speaker 2: to tell you kind.
19:06
Speaker 1: Of stripped of your like material ego.
19:09
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, And so you can walk up to anyone,
19:11
Speaker 2: someone could be a millionaire right next to you and
19:13
Speaker 2: just talk to them like a normal person. There's no
19:15
Speaker 2: like rank, there's nobody that's like higher better than you.
19:18
Speaker 1: I guess in some ways the military is like that,
19:20
Speaker 1: but I guess you can watch it, but then your rank.
19:22
Speaker 2: Rank really changes things. So just totally different than anything
19:26
Speaker 2: I've ever experienced, and I'm really glad for it. Like
19:28
Speaker 2: I got to connect with every How long was that?
19:30
Speaker 2: I was there for about three weeks total?
19:32
Speaker 1: Wow, So that's that's like a transformative amount of time.
19:35
Speaker 2: Yeah, And like I've done things similar to that. But
19:39
Speaker 2: imagine if you were just like from your hometown, had
19:42
Speaker 2: never really left it, and then you go for an
19:43
Speaker 2: experience that like that would really change your life.
19:45
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, that's crazy. You were offered a million dollars
19:48
Speaker 1: in the show and you turned it down.
19:51
Speaker 2: I was elected by my team of sixty people to
19:54
Speaker 2: stand up there and take it.
19:55
Speaker 1: So then they put you into teams kind of thing,
19:58
Speaker 1: like how many people were left at this one.
20:00
Speaker 2: Broke us down to we were at five hundred people
20:02
Speaker 2: at that point, and then we played through a tower
20:04
Speaker 2: of challenges. There were four different levels, and you played
20:06
Speaker 2: against a team the same size, so they eliminated another
20:08
Speaker 2: half down to two fifty. And at those two fifty,
20:11
Speaker 2: we each had like teams of sixty. Those sixty elected
20:15
Speaker 2: team leaders, and those four people of the remaining team
20:18
Speaker 2: stood up on the tower where we were offered an
20:20
Speaker 2: exponentially increasing amount of money that went up to a
20:22
Speaker 2: million dollars, and neither of the four people took it.
20:26
Speaker 2: That's pretty cool.
20:26
Speaker 1: That's kind of like a cool, like human thing, and
20:28
Speaker 1: maybe that speaks to that experience that you were talking
20:31
Speaker 1: about over three weeks of going through like this, it's
20:34
Speaker 1: just straight personality, straight character, and you're not really it's
20:39
Speaker 1: interesting because it's like almost like a social experiment.
20:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, very much a social experiment. And yeah, I was
20:45
Speaker 2: elected just off of like how everyone knew me within
20:47
Speaker 2: the games and nobody knew that I lived in a
20:50
Speaker 2: unimog or anything, because I was.
20:52
Speaker 1: Like you're saying, like I live in my Like I
20:54
Speaker 1: literally went a car. It's kind of to be fair,
20:56
Speaker 1: like you have a really nice unimog camper. That's like
20:58
Speaker 1: me saying I live in micro I mean an earth
21:00
Speaker 1: rowmmerun misleading, not misleading. That's the wrong way to I think.
21:05
Speaker 2: I think humility is like one of the most valuable
21:07
Speaker 2: human traits, and I just love love humility.
21:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, I could definitely. I think that most people could
21:14
Speaker 1: learn to be more humble. Right, So you turned down
21:18
Speaker 1: the million dollars, even though you're you know that you're
21:22
Speaker 1: gonna be building this unimog, you're traveling down to the
21:26
Speaker 1: pan am.
21:27
Speaker 2: I also with the million dollars, if I had taken it,
21:30
Speaker 2: I would have stayed in the game, the sixty people
21:32
Speaker 2: that elected me team leader would have been eliminated, and
21:34
Speaker 2: I would have possibly had the chance to win another
21:36
Speaker 2: five million dollars. So I said no to the million dollars,
21:39
Speaker 2: knowing if I actually wanted the five I could probably
21:41
Speaker 2: not continue on if I took it, because everyone would
21:43
Speaker 2: hate me, and I also really liked the other people
21:46
Speaker 2: around me. And if I won, if I took a
21:48
Speaker 2: million dollars, would I have done bought more trucks, buy
21:50
Speaker 2: rent property, like I don't have any crazy expenses. Other
21:53
Speaker 2: people are trying to win money to find.
21:55
Speaker 1: This is kind of part of your broader philosophy. They
21:57
Speaker 1: keep coming.
21:57
Speaker 2: I guess, yeah, And so I have enough money through
22:00
Speaker 2: the things that I do that a million dollars isn't
22:02
Speaker 2: really going to change things. It would accelerate my ability
22:05
Speaker 2: to do cool things in the future, but it's not
22:06
Speaker 2: going to change like the trajectory of my life. I'm
22:09
Speaker 2: going to do the things that I want to do regardless.
22:11
Speaker 2: A million dollars would just make that a little faster.
22:13
Speaker 2: But I'm fine waiting.
22:14
Speaker 1: I think that's a good way of looking at it.
22:16
Speaker 1: Money helps, but money isn't. Money isn't everything. Money often
22:19
Speaker 1: comes with like these.
22:20
Speaker 2: Leashes, right, more money will problems.
22:22
Speaker 1: More money, more problems. You end up with a bunch
22:24
Speaker 1: of stuff, and then the stuff ends up owning nerve
22:26
Speaker 1: or you have a really good job, and do you're comfortable.
22:28
Speaker 1: I talk to a lot of people, you know that.
22:30
Speaker 1: I always say, oh, I want to travel. They're tied down.
22:33
Speaker 1: They can afford the nice truck, and they can afford
22:35
Speaker 1: the nice thing, but there's like a time cost and
22:37
Speaker 1: the money cost, and the time is the likely really
22:41
Speaker 1: valuable thing.
22:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, but so.
22:45
Speaker 1: The unimogue, let's get into the nitty gritty of this.
22:48
Speaker 1: So what year eighty five and then that has a
22:52
Speaker 1: seven horse power but eight thousand gears or something.
22:56
Speaker 2: It's got. I recently upgraded the turbo at an intercooler
22:58
Speaker 2: and stuff, so it's got I would say two hundred
23:00
Speaker 2: and twenty horse power, maybe three upper three hundreds of torque.
23:04
Speaker 2: But it's got eight speed manual with an overdrive, so
23:07
Speaker 2: I can split every gear and I can click a
23:09
Speaker 2: reverse lever and use all sects.
23:10
Speaker 1: If you have like a really long climb or something,
23:12
Speaker 1: and this gear is a little too high, this gear
23:15
Speaker 1: is a little too low. You can it was just
23:17
Speaker 1: the eight.
23:17
Speaker 2: It would be a little tough going up some hills.
23:20
Speaker 1: That's not like forty threes, right, forty six is forty six?
23:23
Speaker 1: Is what's that tire?
23:24
Speaker 2: Size three eighty five, three ninety five eighty five to
23:28
Speaker 2: twenty And I.
23:30
Speaker 1: See that you're wearing the Continental hat, so you have mptes.
23:32
Speaker 2: I don't have mptes. Empts are great tires, but the
23:35
Speaker 2: forty three inch tires made my max speed it redline
23:40
Speaker 2: like sixty seven or sixty eight. Yeah, and with the
23:43
Speaker 2: michelin XLS it's around seventy four, and so I enjoy
23:47
Speaker 2: a little bit more top speed on the highway.
23:48
Speaker 1: Okay, sweet, because I saw your hat and I'm like,
23:50
Speaker 1: oh Jesus, this is guys I love or something. I
23:54
Speaker 1: I have this love hate relationship.
23:56
Speaker 2: With my im. They're coming out with the new tires, like.
23:57
Speaker 1: They've been saying there for like two years. Like the
24:00
Speaker 1: problem is that you can now get the michelin X
24:02
Speaker 1: force z exhbosition trucks. That's what earth Roamer is actually
24:06
Speaker 1: now like recommending, because like the mpts are fine, like
24:10
Speaker 1: as long as you stay within that speed range.
24:12
Speaker 2: But so.
24:16
Speaker 1: Do you like driving the cab over thing?
24:18
Speaker 2: It's not so much of a cab over. It still
24:20
Speaker 2: has a couple feet of hood and the engine is
24:23
Speaker 2: definitely in front of me. But it's comfortable. And so
24:26
Speaker 2: I bought the truck from an eighty two year old
24:28
Speaker 2: guy who bought it in two thousand and four and
24:29
Speaker 2: spent the next like ten years or so modified.
24:31
Speaker 1: I was a bring a trailer, you got it right, yeah, yeah.
24:34
Speaker 2: And so it was located in the center of Illinois.
24:36
Speaker 2: Roger great guy, but he just saw these trucks at expos,
24:42
Speaker 2: like he went over the nextpo West around the start
24:44
Speaker 2: of it. Yeah, and he was like, I just want
24:45
Speaker 2: to build one of those, so he did. He was
24:47
Speaker 2: like a hot rod builder before that.
24:48
Speaker 1: And he built the structure but didn't really finish the interior.
24:52
Speaker 2: It was fully outfitted. Okay, the interior was great and everything,
24:55
Speaker 2: but most of the build was finished about fifteen years ago,
24:57
Speaker 2: so everything was outdated. And he also went with like
24:59
Speaker 2: a a nineties early two thousands or the aesthetics in
25:03
Speaker 2: the middle or in the habitat.
25:04
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's just it was just different then, right.
25:06
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's like ribbons and like different sayings and stuff
25:09
Speaker 2: on the walls, and I had to get rid of
25:11
Speaker 2: that kind of.
25:12
Speaker 1: From my own stand of you have the early two
25:14
Speaker 1: thousands version of live Leaf Love on your wall kind
25:16
Speaker 1: of thing.
25:17
Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, oh man, it's those who wonder are not
25:23
Speaker 2: lost or something. So there's one of those. But I
25:25
Speaker 2: kept that even with the whole remodel and redoing the
25:28
Speaker 2: whole interior. I have that stuck on the wall.
25:30
Speaker 1: Yes, so you have this basically you buy it needs
25:34
Speaker 1: a remodel. It has a shell shells aluminium.
25:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, fully aluminum camper box.
25:39
Speaker 1: And did I say that you were doing like some
25:41
Speaker 1: insulation that you were adding.
25:43
Speaker 2: The truck has two engines, insulation all the way around. Oh,
25:45
Speaker 2: that didn't really have bad or anything.
25:47
Speaker 1: Okay.
25:48
Speaker 2: Yeah, and the truck has very low miles too, and
25:49
Speaker 2: Roger only drove it a thousand miles over those twenty years,
25:51
Speaker 2: so I also dealt with issues because of it being
25:53
Speaker 2: not used. Yeah, and I blew the engine in the
25:55
Speaker 2: first hour of ownership too.
25:57
Speaker 1: Oh dude, you're no no way you know if that
26:00
Speaker 1: happened to me with yes, yeah, you're talking to the
26:03
Speaker 1: only podcast ever with two guys who buy expedition trucks.
26:07
Speaker 1: And then mine was like two hours after, so made
26:10
Speaker 1: it a little bit further, but holy heck, that was
26:13
Speaker 1: not fun.
26:14
Speaker 2: Yeah. I was anticipating making it to Saint Louis that night.
26:17
Speaker 2: It was about a three hour drive, so I made
26:19
Speaker 2: it about an hour.
26:20
Speaker 1: I don't tell me you blew up in East Saint Louis.
26:24
Speaker 2: I yeah, blew up on the side of the highway
26:26
Speaker 2: like ten minutes from an exit. Cost seven hundred and
26:29
Speaker 2: fifty dollars to get to that exit on a toe
26:32
Speaker 2: and then it costs the first quotes I got from
26:34
Speaker 2: Illinois to Colorado to the one guy that basically works
26:37
Speaker 2: on them and is like fairly priced and stuff. It
26:39
Speaker 2: would have cost thirteen thousand dollars, was the first.
26:41
Speaker 1: Okay, would you have to do that?
26:42
Speaker 2: The low hellow boy and some of them thought I
26:44
Speaker 2: was gonna have to follow cars with an oversized load
26:46
Speaker 2: and like, oh tolerance eleven five.
26:49
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, no, you should be fine, but yeah, that's then.
26:54
Speaker 2: Luckily the guy that I was shipping the truck to
26:56
Speaker 2: had a vehicle going to Kentucky, so he grabbed mine
26:58
Speaker 2: on the way back for twenty five hundred dollars, which
27:01
Speaker 2: was a bargain when I heard the first number.
27:03
Speaker 1: Yeah, mine, mine, I'll be I should clarify the coolant
27:10
Speaker 1: hose that heat that hot water tank on my first
27:13
Speaker 1: going up Eisenhower Pass wasn't Earthromer's fault like it was
27:16
Speaker 1: a continent. Was a continental hose like it's the best
27:18
Speaker 1: rubber hose you can buy. It just was old. They
27:21
Speaker 1: now replace them. I ended up making it home after that,
27:24
Speaker 1: but the engine was like super hot, dumped all of
27:27
Speaker 1: its cool and it's spun a varying in Sedona, but
27:31
Speaker 1: mine was the same thing. Like I had to go
27:32
Speaker 1: from Sedona to Prescott to the Ford Dealer and it
27:34
Speaker 1: was like two grand or something that was. It was
27:38
Speaker 1: an absolutely crazy tow bill for what it was.
27:40
Speaker 2: Yeah, shipping these big trucks is a huge.
27:44
Speaker 4: I Scott here, I just wanted to take a minute
27:46
Speaker 4: to talk a little bit about expedition Portal dot com.
27:50
Speaker 4: Expedition Portal dot com is our website and it's also
27:54
Speaker 4: our community forum. We are celebrating twenty years of expedition
27:59
Speaker 4: portal dot com this year in twenty twenty five, and
28:02
Speaker 4: there are nearly three hundred thousand members on the community
28:06
Speaker 4: forum that talk about incredibly diverse topics all around the world,
28:11
Speaker 4: unique vehicles, things like land cruisers and land rovers, and
28:16
Speaker 4: what to do at the border with Ethiopia and Africa,
28:19
Speaker 4: all the way to some of the favorite campsites and
28:22
Speaker 4: adventure stories from the community. We also have the homepage,
28:26
Speaker 4: which is filled with nearly six thousand articles that are
28:30
Speaker 4: all available to you for free right there on expedition
28:34
Speaker 4: portal dot com. We have two to five articles per
28:38
Speaker 4: day that go up on the website that written by
28:42
Speaker 4: our very experienced staff, which includes global travelers like Bram
28:46
Speaker 4: Bell and Ashley Giordano. I have many articles on there,
28:50
Speaker 4: and many contributors like Dan Grek and others from around
28:54
Speaker 4: the world. So please take a minute and check out
28:57
Speaker 4: Expedition Portal dot com. It's a great way to support
29:00
Speaker 4: the podcast and to connect with the community.
29:03
Speaker 2: Expense if you break down or blow an engine in
29:05
Speaker 2: the middle of nowhere.
29:06
Speaker 1: And there's also an expense to driving them too. Like
29:09
Speaker 1: I'm gonna like flip the script a little bit, but
29:11
Speaker 1: I've had friends lately. Maybe they're like they're trying to
29:14
Speaker 1: get out their little time constrained. They have an earth
29:16
Speaker 1: Romer or Bliss Mobile or something. They'll actually low buoy
29:20
Speaker 1: them too somewhere because it's like that there's a delta
29:23
Speaker 1: between the cost per mile of the truck once you
29:26
Speaker 1: bit it out in Advan, you know it's not an
29:28
Speaker 1: emergency thing, and then there's a cost to there's a
29:31
Speaker 1: cost to the tires on these things, like per mile,
29:34
Speaker 1: there's a cost to everything. There's a cost of the appreciation.
29:36
Speaker 1: It's kind of a weird maybe way to look at it.
29:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, the unimog actually has very low operating expenses, Like
29:42
Speaker 2: I'm basically paying for fuel and oil changes five gallons
29:45
Speaker 2: of oil every like five thousand miles or so. But
29:48
Speaker 2: it does consume a lot of oil, so I'm constantly
29:50
Speaker 2: pouring you in there. Yeah, probably extend that if I
29:52
Speaker 2: wanted to, But the truck's also got thirty thousand miles
29:55
Speaker 2: on it, and vehicles with a two hundred thousand miles
29:57
Speaker 2: are still selling for two hundred grand or more or whatever.
30:00
Speaker 2: So I just want to add on as many miles
30:02
Speaker 2: as I can. So my only expenses are really fuel and.
30:04
Speaker 1: Just and you could in theory swap out of the
30:07
Speaker 1: camper as well, which is a really cool thing.
30:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, So.
30:13
Speaker 1: How fast can years go?
30:16
Speaker 2: Pre new turbo and stuff? I was cruising somewhere between
30:18
Speaker 2: fifty to fifty five typically on fly highways. Now with
30:21
Speaker 2: new turbo and things, I can go sixty to sixty five.
30:25
Speaker 1: That's you need to do as soon as you get south,
30:27
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter.
30:28
Speaker 2: Yeah, No, I'm really looking forward to not having to
30:30
Speaker 2: drive on American highways.
30:32
Speaker 1: So what modifications are you doing for your drive south?
30:37
Speaker 2: I've touched every bit of the truck. I've made more
30:39
Speaker 2: storage and every place that it possibly can. I went
30:41
Speaker 2: down to the Continental mpts, but then those were just
30:43
Speaker 2: on the original steel wheels. I went back up to
30:46
Speaker 2: Michelin's so that I could actually use Hutchinson double blocks
30:50
Speaker 2: for off road, which I think is going to be
30:51
Speaker 2: really necessary.
30:52
Speaker 1: I hate those those wheels. Man run the insert.
30:56
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, but not like fat big insert, just like
30:59
Speaker 2: the one that's the minim necessary.
31:00
Speaker 1: Yeah about the run flat Yeah yeah. I ended up
31:03
Speaker 1: taking mine now, And there's a couple other guys that
31:06
Speaker 1: run these wheels that have done the same. The problem
31:09
Speaker 1: is that when those things, when that insert gets hot
31:11
Speaker 1: after it ends up like warping. You can never balance
31:14
Speaker 1: the tires like it's Some people have good luck with it. Yeah,
31:19
Speaker 1: mine were like when mine came out, you could actually
31:21
Speaker 1: see just how you would never be able to balance
31:23
Speaker 1: it kind of thing.
31:24
Speaker 2: I've luckily not had that issue yet.
31:25
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, and I guess with your larger tire too,
31:28
Speaker 1: it's it's physically rotating the lack. So I wonder what
31:31
Speaker 1: your mileage will.
31:32
Speaker 2: Be supposed to take forty fifty miles out of the xcls,
31:36
Speaker 2: I think. And I bought the newest date code ones
31:39
Speaker 2: that I possibly could, yeah from I think it was
31:42
Speaker 2: like government tire GUV tire. Yeah yeah, end up being
31:46
Speaker 2: a tire for like twenty two twenty twenty three date codes.
31:49
Speaker 1: So that the x Force ZL they're xcls. Okay, so
31:54
Speaker 1: they're like the proper xCl.
31:56
Speaker 2: They have XL twos now though, I think, okay, but
31:59
Speaker 2: you have to buy those at MSRP probably.
32:01
Speaker 1: Yeah. Have you driven those type in the wet?
32:04
Speaker 2: Yes?
32:05
Speaker 1: How's that?
32:05
Speaker 2: I haven't had any issues? No, And I even drove
32:08
Speaker 2: up Big Cottonwood Canyon in a snowstorm before without change
32:12
Speaker 2: or anything that was nerve racking.
32:13
Speaker 1: I was in Scott's Defender one ten in the rain
32:17
Speaker 1: once and it was like the tires turned into the
32:21
Speaker 1: plastic ones on a power wheel. It had no grip.
32:25
Speaker 1: But obviously maybe the difference is that that's like a
32:27
Speaker 1: soft top aluminum Defender versus a big unimog.
32:31
Speaker 2: So I'm with both minorcycles front and rear and twenty pounds.
32:35
Speaker 1: What's your Do you know what your gross vehicle weighted?
32:37
Speaker 2: Like seventeen thousand pounds?
32:39
Speaker 1: So you're little, you're over, I'm over. Well, don't listen
32:42
Speaker 1: to our podcast.
32:43
Speaker 2: But it's fine. I had an exhaust break and I
32:45
Speaker 2: sprung the rear heavier.
32:46
Speaker 1: Oka. Is that the difference really on those for the
32:49
Speaker 1: chassis rating.
32:50
Speaker 2: Or hub bearings I've luckily had no issues, and I've
32:53
Speaker 2: driven my Unimog thirteen thousand miles since I purchased it,
32:56
Speaker 2: which is like more than almost anyone else does, especially
32:59
Speaker 2: in the first year and a half.
33:00
Speaker 1: It's interesting that people don't really talk about like wheel
33:04
Speaker 1: bearings on these trucks because they actually end up being
33:06
Speaker 1: a maintenance. People like, oh, it's a normal truck, like
33:09
Speaker 1: with mine, it looks like a pickup truck, but you
33:12
Speaker 1: have a DINA. I think I have aDNA S one
33:14
Speaker 1: thirty rear axle, and it's just every about every thirty
33:17
Speaker 1: thousand miles you have to replace those wheel bearings. You
33:20
Speaker 1: can go further than that. The wheel bearings and a
33:22
Speaker 1: commercial truck just have a life cycle, which is true.
33:25
Speaker 1: I'd to hop over to travel. We've talked about you,
33:27
Speaker 1: We've talked about the truck that you're taking, So what
33:30
Speaker 1: are you most excited about? Like why like why are
33:32
Speaker 1: you doing the PanAm?
33:35
Speaker 2: I'm doing the PanAm because after driving a touch tuck,
33:37
Speaker 2: I just want to drive as far south as possible. Yeah,
33:40
Speaker 2: and then being in the Navy took me to places
33:42
Speaker 2: like Sri Lanka, like Bali, and I want to get back.
33:45
Speaker 2: I know, seeing how other parts of the world live
33:47
Speaker 2: and really immersing myself in them. Are immersing myself in
33:50
Speaker 2: them without the government telling me what to do? Yeah yeah,
33:53
Speaker 2: you're not trying me to come home at ten pm
33:55
Speaker 2: every day?
33:55
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, Well there's a reason for that, because if
33:58
Speaker 1: the government didn't tell me, you know, I as a sailor,
34:00
Speaker 1: he'd be out like three or six and am So
34:04
Speaker 1: have you figured out your route? I mean you're just
34:07
Speaker 1: sticking strictly to the Panema.
34:08
Speaker 2: I really going to wing it. I'm gonna try and
34:10
Speaker 2: stay off the PanAm as much as possible because from
34:12
Speaker 2: what I understand, it's like just a paved road with
34:14
Speaker 2: gas stations lining it.
34:16
Speaker 1: Yeah, most of the stuff you're going to encounter down
34:18
Speaker 1: there has got to be paved for. There's obviously a
34:21
Speaker 1: lot of trail and things that you can do. Do
34:23
Speaker 1: you have a country, let's just talk about Central America.
34:25
Speaker 1: Let's go through Mexico. So are you gonna go down
34:27
Speaker 1: Baja first?
34:28
Speaker 2: Do you think down Baja? Ferry over and then get
34:31
Speaker 2: away from that part of mainland as quick as possible
34:34
Speaker 2: down to Mexico City and then continue south. And the
34:37
Speaker 2: goal is while shipping the truck around the dairy and
34:39
Speaker 2: gap because it's got to be rolling roll off.
34:41
Speaker 1: Yeah, with the batteries. Yeah, you have to ship those
34:44
Speaker 1: separate now, right, I.
34:46
Speaker 2: Had no idea.
34:47
Speaker 1: Yeah, like from Overland Embassy as a buddy of mine,
34:51
Speaker 1: and I was trying to get the update on on
34:53
Speaker 1: PanAm shipping because he's doing it for pretty much all
34:55
Speaker 1: the trucks on it now, so they'll actually you have
34:58
Speaker 1: to His work around is that the do row but
35:01
Speaker 1: your lithium camper batteries, they will ship those separately basically
35:07
Speaker 1: to Colombia and you have to reinstall them, which is yeah,
35:12
Speaker 1: likes me.
35:12
Speaker 2: That won't be too much.
35:13
Speaker 1: Otherwise you have to be a flat brack.
35:14
Speaker 2: Yeah. How much is that exponentially? My expensive?
35:17
Speaker 1: Over while it can be more yeah than row row
35:19
Speaker 1: for sure. This thing has this thing in theory could
35:22
Speaker 1: go row row, But the batteries on this are.
35:27
Speaker 2: Really in there or what there.
35:28
Speaker 1: It would be a pain to do. You have four
35:31
Speaker 1: three hundred em power batteries and there's a fairing and
35:34
Speaker 1: that kind of stuff. It was just they were real
35:36
Speaker 1: pain to get in and I just could not imagine
35:39
Speaker 1: doing that. Like I'm from Arizona and I don't have humidity.
35:43
Speaker 1: You know that if I'm in Colombia and I'm like
35:45
Speaker 1: trying to put ten pounds of stuff in a five
35:47
Speaker 1: pound bag, trying to get this battery, this clearance fitment,
35:50
Speaker 1: I'm just gonna lose my mom. So I would probably
35:52
Speaker 1: just have to end up doing a flat row.
35:54
Speaker 2: But while I ship the truck, the plan is to
35:56
Speaker 2: kayak the dairy and Gap, like kayak around on the
35:59
Speaker 2: ocean side.
36:00
Speaker 1: Oh cool if you like the San Blast Islands, Yeah, yeah,
36:03
Speaker 1: because there's really pretty there.
36:05
Speaker 2: There's a guy became friends with His name is b
36:07
Speaker 2: Moore Charles on Instagram, and he's gonna basically lead me
36:10
Speaker 2: and a couple other people to kayaker on the Daring Gap.
36:12
Speaker 1: That would be fun. That's an interesting one continuing the journey.
36:15
Speaker 1: Other than just most of you'll just go down a plane,
36:18
Speaker 1: there is like a couple of sailboats that you can
36:20
Speaker 1: do as well that do like tours and the herbo
36:23
Speaker 1: or Kartayana. Cool. Yeah, man, it's going to be so good.
36:28
Speaker 1: Have you figured out there's a like Honduras is an
36:30
Speaker 1: interesting one that I think a lot of people are
36:33
Speaker 1: very apprehensive about.
36:35
Speaker 2: Yeah, from what I understand, they can kill you there
36:38
Speaker 2: and get away with it, and then nobody's gonna bat
36:40
Speaker 2: an eye.
36:41
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's that bad, but I know
36:43
Speaker 1: that they do have a lot of gang violence. But
36:45
Speaker 1: I guess we kept a little bit too far ahead
36:47
Speaker 1: with Honduras. But like, what else are you excited about
36:51
Speaker 1: with Central America.
36:53
Speaker 2: I'm basically going in with no plan. Okay, speak very
36:56
Speaker 2: little Spanish, and I'm planning on learning one on the
36:58
Speaker 2: way too. Okay, I'm going to rely on either Google
37:01
Speaker 2: Translate or luckily, as an American, most people try to
37:05
Speaker 2: learn English as a second language, so we can usually
37:08
Speaker 2: find someone to communicate with.
37:11
Speaker 1: Let's bounce to South America then, So South America, I
37:14
Speaker 1: think is really where that off road stuff really starts
37:16
Speaker 1: to open. So have you looked at any of the
37:18
Speaker 1: kind of like the traditional overland roots like the Laguna's
37:21
Speaker 1: Rude or anything like that that you're considering?
37:23
Speaker 2: No plans, very little planning, Oh okay, carrying starlink, I'll
37:29
Speaker 2: carry my garment overlander with you.
37:31
Speaker 1: Just kind of just that your plan is to point
37:33
Speaker 1: south and figure it out. Okay, that's that's one way.
37:36
Speaker 2: To do for sure, or you know, plan as I go.
37:38
Speaker 2: I'm sure when I realize what I need to see
37:40
Speaker 2: or as people recommend things to me. But right now,
37:43
Speaker 2: like my plan is to ready the truck for anything
37:47
Speaker 2: more so than spending all the time planning.
37:49
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think what's good to have a mix of both. Course,
37:52
Speaker 1: the phrase it's like a military phrase. Prior planning prevents performance. Yeah,
37:58
Speaker 1: take that to heart, especially in the culture. So before then,
38:02
Speaker 1: I guess we're gonna start to wrap up. But you're
38:04
Speaker 1: gonna take a bike up to dead Horse because you
38:06
Speaker 1: did the Dempster, so now you're gonna do the Dalton.
38:10
Speaker 1: Are you gonna ride all the way up?
38:12
Speaker 2: Yeah? Over the last year, I've really gotten into motorcycles.
38:15
Speaker 2: It's a much cheaper way to get off road and
38:17
Speaker 2: to enjoy going fast, lower barrier entry, and I just
38:21
Speaker 2: really like doing that. And I picked up a sad
38:23
Speaker 2: like Moscow bags and I plan on riding all the
38:25
Speaker 2: way up to the art Coshion again.
38:28
Speaker 1: But what bike are you on?
38:29
Speaker 2: I'll ride a KTM eight ninety and my friend Adrian
38:32
Speaker 2: just picked up in Nordon nine oh one, so we'll
38:34
Speaker 2: kind of cool. Brother.
38:35
Speaker 1: They're kind of more bike right, Yeah, just got a
38:37
Speaker 1: little more faring yeah, yeah, that's interesting. I think that's
38:40
Speaker 1: a really good size bike. My the favorite adventure bike
38:44
Speaker 1: I have owned was a KTM nine fifty. I like
38:47
Speaker 1: tinkering with carburetors, and that bike was just rowdy and
38:50
Speaker 1: mad and like totally descended from all the Dakar stuff
38:54
Speaker 1: A good things. Yeah, yeah, I'm always looking for a
38:57
Speaker 1: nine fifty or a nine ninety that's in. Yeah, Like
39:01
Speaker 1: I just appreciate it as like a like an object,
39:04
Speaker 1: you know, like the best one in the world's still
39:05
Speaker 1: going to be a third of the price of a
39:07
Speaker 1: new BMWGS, but will it'd be cool. Motorcycling really seems
39:10
Speaker 1: to fit that simple, humble kind of ethos. Like I
39:17
Speaker 1: look at motorcycle touring and adventure riding is the backpacking
39:21
Speaker 1: of overlanding, Like it's the most hardcore, Like it's not easy,
39:24
Speaker 1: Like you're literally out there.
39:26
Speaker 2: Especially if you're going through rainstorms and like different weather
39:28
Speaker 2: and stuff, and like the most annoying part is probably
39:31
Speaker 2: just packing your stuff back up every night, like every
39:33
Speaker 2: morning back on the bike and just doing that thirty
39:36
Speaker 2: forty five days in a row for that ride up there.
39:39
Speaker 1: Where are you going to start from?
39:40
Speaker 2: Just Salt Lake? City.
39:41
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, I'm just.
39:42
Speaker 2: Gonna head up probably then go over to Alberta and
39:45
Speaker 2: then up through Calgary and.
39:47
Speaker 1: So do the Alaska Highway all the way.
39:49
Speaker 2: Up basically ALCN.
39:50
Speaker 1: Have you done, Cassie, are yet?
39:52
Speaker 2: I think so?
39:53
Speaker 1: That's the one that kind of it's more like it's
39:55
Speaker 1: in BC ty to get to some coastal BC towns,
39:58
Speaker 1: which is really cool. Then well, yeah, that one that
40:01
Speaker 1: would be really worth looking at. There's less traffic you'd
40:04
Speaker 1: go up through.
40:05
Speaker 2: I'm not going to be I took on the way
40:08
Speaker 2: back from Anchorage, I took down whatever the most direct
40:11
Speaker 2: route was, Yeah, to Washington.
40:14
Speaker 1: Yeah, that might have part of that might have been
40:16
Speaker 1: the Cassiar, but you have to go a little bit
40:18
Speaker 1: of the way. You might like that to be a
40:19
Speaker 1: fun motorcycle. Yeah, I guess we'll start to wrap up.
40:21
Speaker 1: So your thing was a story to tell your grandkids.
40:25
Speaker 1: So I guess my question for you is if your
40:28
Speaker 1: grandkids asked you why you chose to live this way,
40:31
Speaker 1: what would you say?
40:34
Speaker 2: I tried to fill my life with people that I
40:38
Speaker 2: care about and cool experiences and tried to see as
40:41
Speaker 2: much as this as possible.
40:42
Speaker 1: For death it comes for all of us. So where
40:46
Speaker 1: can how can people follow you?
40:48
Speaker 2: I'm Harrison shown or Harry shown on pretty much every
40:51
Speaker 2: social media.
40:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, so you have TikTok. I don't know if
40:55
Speaker 1: we've ever mentioned the word TikTok here, but I know
40:57
Speaker 1: that you do the TikTok. Well, that's great. I really
40:59
Speaker 1: appreciate you us. It's been really cool to learn a
41:01
Speaker 1: little bit more about you, your philosophy in life. I
41:04
Speaker 1: think the humble thing is important and something that I
41:08
Speaker 1: could certainly learn more from. Yeah, we all can. So well.
41:12
Speaker 1: I wish you the best on the pan Am and
41:15
Speaker 1: then this summer with Dead Horse and yeah, I can't
41:18
Speaker 1: wait to follow along.
41:19
Speaker 2: Thank you. Yeah, very new to bike packing.
41:22
Speaker 1: You're gonna be fine, man, be fine. Just get a
41:24
Speaker 1: hotel room once a while. All right, thanks for listening
41:27
Speaker 1: to the Overlain Journal podcast. We'll see you next time.