Tag Archives: overland

Anyone Can Do This

July 17, 2008 – 11:08 am

One of the main messages I think that we want to convey during and after the course of this expedition is that anyone can do what we are doing. Sure, we are all exceptionally intelligent, sociable and good looking here at TWBR, but honestly, all it takes is an idea or a dream and the conviction to follow through with it and you too can find yourself halfway around the world on a trip many people thought would never even happen. A lot of people that we meet say that we are doing this at the right time in our lives. We are young, we do not have many family commitments, (i.e. no children or spouses) and we can always go back to our jobs later on if we so choose. I guess this is a pretty good time to do something like this, but then again, I think you can always find time to chase your dreams, no matter what age you are.

Case in point, while we were stuck in the Congo trying to sort out our Angola visa problems, we met Stewart and Annaliese. Stewart and Annaliese hail from Cape Town, South Africa and are in the midst of driving their Land Rover around Africa. On the surface, that may not sound that interesting because there are a lot of people driving a lot of Land Rovers around here in Africa. What makes Stewart and Annaliese a bit of an exception is that they both left well paying professional jobs in Cape Town, sold their home and basically everything they own and put it all into a trip they had been contemplating for quite a while. They did have to wait for their son to go off to university, but it just goes to show you that you can always find the time in your life to do something like this. Just like us, Stewart and Annaliese’s friends thought they were totally out of their minds for giving up all of the things they had worked for in life, but as they point out and as we have experienced, a lot of the people who thought we were crazy are the ones checking out our respective websites and wishing they were in the car with us. It was nice bumping into the couple because we all shared an understanding of the rigors of overlanding but more importantly, what it feels like to take a big, potentially risky, yet rewarding step out of our comfort zones. You can follow Stewart and Annaliese’s adventures on their website: Roots in Africa.

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By Steve Bouey | Posted in Africa, Congo, Friends of TWBR, Interesting, Observations, South Africa, Trip Thoughts | Also tagged , , , , , , , | Comments (1)

Cape to Cape: Check

July 14, 2008 – 10:10 am

In the United States, you may not have heard about the driving the “Cape to Cape” run . I guess there may be some scenic drives or highways that go from Cape A to Cape B, but the Cape run I am talking about is the drive from North Cape, Norway to Cape Agulhas, South Africa. It is a drive that overlanders dream about and only a handful actually complete in their lifetimes. There are obviously more direct routes to drive from the northern most point in Europe to the southern most point in Africa, but for us, the journey covered roughly 17,000 miles, spanned about 110 degrees of latitude, took us through 29 countries and lasted approximately 6 months.

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Six months ago, we were in the far northern reaches of the Arctic

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As we made our way to Cape Agulhas, instead of reindeer, we were on the lookout for turtles

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Although chilly, it was a bit warmer at 34.5degrees South latitude

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The marker in Norway was nicer, but where else can you swim in two oceans at the same time!

We are not the first people to drive the Cape to Cape run, but it is definitely a small number of people, mainly Europeans… I can probably extrapolate a bit further, hedge a bet from our experiences and say that most of the members of the Cape to Cape overland family are either Dutch, Scandinavian or South African. Now add some nutty Americans to the group. I am fairly certain that we are the first Americans to complete the Cape to Cape run as part of our overall expedition. We received a lot of support and encouragement along the way. In fact, some South Africans we met in Angola shouted enthusiastically “finally, some Americans with some balls,” when we stopped on the side of the road to chat. The road was very tough at times, but we made it and looking back it was well worth it. We still have a good portion of the trip left, but this was a major segment of the expedition and one that we anticipated would be one of the toughest. I am sure South America will hold some surprises in store for us, but our experiences here in Africa will help us to prepare for what the next continent throws our way.


By Steve Bouey | Posted in Africa, History, Interesting, Norway, Road Conditions, South Africa, Trucks, Updates, World News | Also tagged , , , , , , , , | Comments (2)