This may take some time!

Aug 1

Posted by Rikki in Alex, Mongolia, Rikki | 7 Comments

August again and the team is all over the globe. Rikki in New Zealand, Anya in Siberia, and Alex in Mongolia.

We have a new plan, I say that like there was an old plan, and there was, well, sort of, and actually it’s not a new plan, it’s kind of the same as the old one, it’s just … well, our plan never had a time limit …

Due to unforeseeable and foreseeable reasons , including winter, build time under estimation, other exciting film production opportunities, theft of gear, visa denials, and family commitments, once again this mighty expedition is on the back burner until next Mongolian spring.

Alex after a exciting few months of documentary producing and filming is venturing back into the fields of Melons in Australia.

Rikki has been dealing with a few family matters and is returning to Mongolia, happily joined by his Dad, Sören for a two month Truck completion and testing misson, before heading to join the melon picking also.

So by the mid October, the truck will be completely finished, tested and ready to roll straight into action in early April 2011. We will both be in Australia earning the required cash to get us to South Africa.

This is not a disappointing announcement however, and we made it with relative ease, if anything the last few months have shown to us that we are more committed to this adventure than ever, lots of things had to be developed and learnt before we could feel like we were ready for this journey, and education is never free, we have now paid the cost in time, money and emotion and come April next year, a new phase of the Truck the World saga begins, probably.

Richy Rich

May 26

Posted by Alex in Alex, Mongolia, Rikki, Technical, Ulaan Baatar, Uncategorized | 5 Comments

The last time we wrote a little update, we were (as usual) a little ahead of ourselves thinking we’d be out for a little test drive on the weekend. It’s now a week later and we’re saying the same thing, we should be out in a few days. This has been the story of our journey thus far, everything takes a little longer, a little more effort, a few more parts, than we initially expected. It’s these extra yards, where we learn the most, about the truck, about ourselves, and about why we’re on this crazy merry-go-round adventure.

It has however, been an incredibly productive four or five days . Hammer and tongs, the saying goes, although we’ve also been using wrenches, soldering irons, and more rivets than I can count. We joke sometimes that our truck is held together with spit and hope, but that’s not true, it’s mainly rivets, lots and lots of rivets.

The internal and external lighting and ventilation is all wired and looking pro, we don’t even get out of bed now to turn the lights on and off – nice. Water pumps have been installed, the inflatable tank is full, and fairly shortly the clean, filtered H2O will be flowing into our kitchen and shower, double nice. Even our new chinese indicators are wired up, meaning we can indicate to other traffic which direction we’re going, as if we have any idea ourselves.

Last night, we had dinner with an incredible man called Micko, Liam’s dad (the guy we bought the motorbike off). He is 14 months into a travel from Rottnest to Rotterdam, (that’s Australia to Europe folks) in his landcruiser, with his lovely partner Liesbeth. They have just driven through China and Tibet, and had nothing but enthusiasm for us and our plan to get to africa.

For us, it was inspiring to see a couple of people, so totally happy on the road, telling us that we were on the right track. Long travels like theirs are not always easy, but for them, like us, it’s not about the destination, but soaking up as much of each place as they can. Hopefully we’ll get to spend some more time with them, and it’s likely too, because they have to wait for Russian visa’s, an unpredictable process that begins for us in a few weeks too.

So we’ll leave you, once again, in the hope that next time we update, we’ll have photos of sunshine, nature, and butterflies, instead of a slightly disturbing one of Rikki in a onsey.

(He says it’s not a onsey if they’re overalls, but he also confessed to me the other day his lifelong dream was to have boots attached to his onsey so in the morning he can get dressed with minimal effort sort of like richy rich? n.b Rikki’s birthday is december 3)

Touchdown. Mongolia.

May 17

Posted by Alex in Alex, Mongolia, Rikki, Ulaan Baatar | 4 Comments

When i arrived in Mongolia last february, it was overwhelming because I had no idea what to expect. This time, it was overwhelming because i knew exactly what to expect. It’s been so long between bouts, I was worried what may have gone wrong. Was Rikki’s visa going to work? Was the truck ok? Would we be able to get it ready in time? Fear and excitement are extremely close on the emotional spectrum, and no one ever tells you that realising your dreams, is a very daunting undertaking.

i needn’t have worried. now, four days after arriving, the fear is all rinsed out, and has been replaced by pure, unadulterated excitement. we’ve got visas til the end of July, the truck is very close to ready, and the moment I saw it, I fell in love with her all over again.

Rikki didn’t mess around when I left Mongolia last year, Gorki has come a long way. The solar panels are in, extractor fans, the kitchen is installed, new engine installed, (he broke the last one – ha-ha) there’s a new gas hatch at the back, brand new wheels on the beast … too many improvements to list here, but it’s looking really good. Seeing how far along the truck was, made me realise that this time, as opposed to a fantasy, this trip is a reality.

I’ve really got to take my hat off to Rikki. This is a massive job, and it’s not like a Weetbix ‘insert tab A into slot B’ sort of project, it’s a unique truck, built to his own specifications and desires. Being self employed, it’s hard to find motivation sometimes, and when there’s no salary, it’s even harder, but he’s slogged away, and the results are amazing. It’s the coolest truck I could conceive of travelling in, and I’ve been in the back of many a hippy bus. Compared to most, this will be like living on a super yacht.

I can’t wait to start living in it again, get on the road, pick up the translator, get out of the cities, and start covering some off road miles.

We think we’ll be hitting the road for another little test in a week or so. We have to sort out some electrical things in the cab (when I say we, what I really mean is … ), the water systems (which are designed just not installed), and hopefully a prototype of our tent too, before we head out of town.

I’ve been busy helping out where I can, building storage boxes, painting trailers, and spending money. I bought a motorbike off this nice Aussie kid called Liam, who’d just ridden it right across China on it, we’re gonna take it with us for, mini excursions. It’s the first time I’ve owned a motorbike, and yes, i feel like the Fonz. (Yes mum, I’m wearing my helmet, and that Swandri jacket you bought me is perfect for riding in)

All in all, very excited, feels like we’re on the verge of something magnificent, and I wish you could all be here with us. But until you save up enough for a ticket, you’re gonna have to make do with a few photo’s and listening to me tell you how cool our life is.

Come on – summer’s lovely here in Mongolia, drop your crappy nine to five, and come join me and Rik for a bit of Gobi galavanting!

It starts again

May 10

Posted by Alex in Alex, Mongolia, Rikki, Ulaan Baatar | 4 Comments

The day has come, now that it’s here I don’t know where to start … I’ve been living my alter ego life the last six months, feels weird to write about Truck the World life again.

Rikki and I parted ways back in Mongolia August last year with the agreement to meet back in Mongolia in May. It was a moving, man-tear moment that parting, hopes and dreams suddenly up in the air. As I write this, it’s seems to be time to rendezvous, put money where mouth is, ante up, get back on that horse, roll that shackle wagon out the ol’ store house, fire up the ol engines, or perhaps just drive around looking cool in our truck.

I wonder how the ol’ girl is, Gorki I mean, the GAZ66, I haven’t seen her since august, and Rikki is waveringly vague about the exact state of the truck. But the truth of the matter, is that I’ll find out in about 2 days, yup, that’s right … me and Rikki are meeting back in Mongolia on May 11, and this time, it’s for keeps. The real deal, for real, we really mean it this time, we’re gonna drive that old truck somewhere … anywhere is fine … but we’re shooting for Africa.

I’ve been in Aussie making bucket loads of cash the old skool way, throwing fruit, and those melons have replaced the stuff I got stolen in Mongolia, and have put a good sum back in the bank, which, by the time I get to mongolia, and the truck is rolling, will be slightly smaller (hard drives, tents etc) so we’ll see how far it will get us. For the record, I bloody love farm life in Australia, living in cities is for mugs.

I’m sure as this site develops in the next few months, a few other financial ideas will begin to emerge, but truth is, we forgot to go and get sponsors (or maybe we just aren’t that sure we can do this) and are doing it old skool. Work with what you got. I believe Rikki’s gonna sell some t shirts on the site, translators gonna tattoo for cash as we go, and I’m going to set up a gypsy type fortune tellers booth outside the truck when we pull over, happy ending guaranteed.

But in reality, money is the least of our concerns, the real pressure on Rikki and I, is from the big bad Mongolian government. I’d like to say we got in a little trouble for something awesome like smuggling gold, but it’s not, it’s just for overstaying, Rikki did this on his visa last time he was there (even though all the dudes he was bribing in immigration told him he’d be sweet). So Rikki has to be out of Mongolia in 30 days, it’s been his home for the last four years, and we were hoping to have longer, but those governments, they just don’t bend on some stuff, I reckon we might find out about that a bit more as we start crossing borders.

So ‘yay’ is what you’re thinking. ‘They’re finally doing it!’ ‘Holy-bouncing –catheter-bags’ is what we’re thinking, ‘are we really going to do this?’ We’ve been planning this almost three years, and it’s not as though life hasn’t moved on in that time, we’ve both probably asked ourselves many times in the last six months if we still want to do this. Now on top of that, lots of things are changing, like getting on the road very very fast, and not being able to go round Mongolia before we go start crossing borders and venturing wild.

Thinking a lot also about the website, content, and how to share this journey, how to record it in a beautiful way for a doco later. We’ve had so many different ideas for potential avenues, we’ll just have to see how it goes I think, but I am thinking that with the recent purchase of an iphone (my first mobile in five years) wherever we have 3g coverage, we should be putting up photos and blurgy stuff pretty often. We still wanna put out cool little movies and that, and were hoping to make some kind of audio podcast, but we’ll see how we go. But we think with something like this it’s cool to stay on top of it and put out even a little something every couple of days … even if it’s just a photo of the boring ol’ Kazakhstan mountains.

So thats the long and the short of it, I am on a plane out of Thailand tomorrow, and Rikki is in Korea, waiting for his flight to Mongolia.

Talk to you from the land of blue skies and Ghengis Khan, Mongolia, it’s the beginning!

Alex

Many Rivers to Cross

Jul 21

Posted by Rikki in Alex, Mongolia, Rikki, Videos | 14 Comments

After two long years of talk, tears, torque wrenches and tenacity, finally the tire meets tarmac. We are extremely proud to show off our maiden voyage.

However, it’s been interesting times here in the depths of Mongolia, highs and lows, lows and highs.

Some thought it was a staph infection from being tattooed in a warehouse by a small Russian … that’s right we know a little Russian, she’s called Anya. Some thought the famous Mongolian Death Worm had claimed its latest victims, it spits acid don’t you know?

The reality is that we have been coming to terms with the sledge hammer known as reality. It came crashing down on us in cruel blows in the last few weeks. A myriad of things have happened, but basically we are only a few short months away from winter with -30 temperatures, and a truck that is almost awesome, like a steak and cheese pie, that gives you three days of bowel issues -- thanks luke-warm pie warmer.

I could go into great detail, but so often happens, Alex has eloquently beaten me to the literary punch, in our weekly TV3 blog, below is the chronological blow by blow.

Anyways, enjoy the video, updates will continue to come, but come March 2010 the journey begins.

The beginning is the end is the beginning -- Alex Behan

About a week ago, just after we completed our first successful trip in the truck, Rikki sat me down for a chat. It’s not often Rikki takes dramatic steps like this, he had his serious face on, and so I knew what was coming was going to be difficult to swallow. I braced myself.

“I don’t think the truck is going to be ready in a month”

I let the words echo a little bit, I had expected something like this.

“You mean, you don’t think the truck will be ready, for a month” I said. Surely it would be ready after a month, what could take more than a month?

“No. Even in a month, I’m not completely confident that this truck will be ready, it needs more tests. And that means September, October … and that means winter, and I don’t really want to begin this journey in -40 centigrade … I think we should wait ’til next March.

Shit. I hadn’t expected that. I argued a little. I said that winter was as good a time as any to begin, that we would be hitting winter in some country at some point, it may as well be at the start. He countered that you don’t really want to be breaking down in the middle of Mongolia, Russia or Siberia and fixing issues at -40, the truck was untested in many ways. I felt like my dreams were unravelling. I took it as best as I could. I went to a bar, and asked the advice of a pint of beer.

I wasn’t convinced he was right. But he’s lived through three of these winters before, and he knows that truck bolt for bolt. I didn’t doubt his truthfulness, I didn’t doubt his passion to get on the road, but I thought he was being overly cautious. It’s part of the dynamic of our relationship, he’s sensible, wise, intelligent, and does things the right way, I, on the other hand am the enthusiasm, I’m the little ball of energy. Maybe he just needed a boost of confidence about how awesome the truck was.

We had another difficult conversation. I told him I thought the truck was closer than he thought, that our test run had been magnificent. He showed me his list of things yet to do, it was long, I couldn’t argue with that. I started thinking about options, I didn’t want to spend winter in Ulaan Bataar, I’d just be eating away at my savings, better to take a teaching job in Beijing or Seoul, do five months and come back in March.

I was thinking about these things, this time at an outdoor cafe, when my bag was stolen. Inside, my cameras, and my $4000 laptop. Gone. In five years of travelling it’s only the second thing I’ve had stolen. I felt like a fool, but surprisingly, I didn’t get angry, now I knew, I knew for sure, that I had to go work, to earn back the laptop etc. Setbacks were coming thick and fast.

Rikki and I had a heart to heart. We’ve been planning this trip for two years already, was it time to give up, or could we manage a five month delay? It was so hard to face, it’s not something either of us would ever have wanted, but it now seemed to be the only logical choice. There’s a lot of respect between Rikki and I, we’ve been friends a long time. It was time to seriously assess what we wanted, what we had already learned and what we wanted to change. There’s a lot of trust involved in saving and planning a journey like this when you live on the other side of the world.

Five months would give Rikki enough time to make the truck perfect, not just adequate, but everything we’ve ever dreamed it can be. It would give him time to do things better, not rush, or cut corners, but to make a truck he felt confident about in every way. And it would give me the time to head out country, (probably to Australia) and make back some money. Also, to design the trip more thoroughly, routes, places to visit, research. Hopefully seek out some sponsorship, some causes we would like to be involved with along the way, basically to improve the quality and reason for the journey. We’ve got the ball rolling now, we’re more confident about what we are capable of doing, so, as with any venture, it’s time to expand our ideas and goals.

We found the positive. You’re got to learn to roll with the punches in life, and life had just punched us in the guts. But we found the positive. We are going to leave next March. We have promised that to each other. Between now and then, we’ll be isolated, saving for a dream that has grown and changed over two years already, another five months of preparation, will mean the difference between the journey of a lifetime, and a journey on a timeline. We’re only going to do this once, best make it worth it.

For the next five months, I’m going to be living in tropical Queensland, making money the hardest way I know how -- picking watermelons. It’s tough, but I love it, sunshine, hard yakka, and you get paid by the tonne, which means every day I spend on the truck, is one I have earned, kilo for kilo. I could live without the flies though.

I’ll be happy to blog about that, as well as the progress on the research side of things, and Rikki can send us some updates from the warehouse in Mongolia. For now, we know the journey is delayed, this is the end of our practice run, the beginning of the real thing will be March 2010 -- weather permitting.

Tattoo the world

Jul 7

Posted by Rikki in Uncategorized | 3 Comments

So Truck the World has got some new tattoos, well not just tattoos, we now are basically a rolling tatto studio, thanks to “translator” formally known as Anya and our shiny new tattoo guns from China.

Sorry the update is a bit late, we have been out in the wilderness in the truck, videos of that will be up shortly!!

Roofers

Jun 22

Posted by Rikki in Alex, Mongolia, Rikki, Technical | 19 Comments

Wanna see the truck outside, in its natural environment, sure you do! Well the pop-up roof is installed and Gorki spent a sunny day outside in the fresh air.

A video of witty remarks, technical prowess and some slick shadow dancing. Don’t know what shadow dancing is, well watch the clip and find out.

Countryside test drives, tattoos and tension coming up soon, keep it locked as the truck the world adventures continue!!

Truck update June 2009

Jun 20

Posted by Rikki in Uncategorized | No Comments

Well its Sunday again, ah how time flies, this week a return to progress, see the truck update and a little bit of kit we have for sale.

We may act silly in the video re: the truck for sale, but we are serious, we have a spare diesel powered, Gaz 66, easily converted to an expedition truck, so come on join the madness, the truck is up for grabs. ( of course we are also serious when we say , “translator not included” she is ours!!!)

If you are into the truck , or wanna know about what you get exactly for $3500 USD hit us on facebook link is just there on the left.

Ok that’s it

Enjoy

Till next time

Truck the world !!

Masters of the interview

Jun 14

Posted by Rikki in Alex, Behind the scenes, Humour, Mongolia, Rikki, TV, Videos | 4 Comments

This week we thought with our cool little piece on Campbell Live in NZ, we would put together a little blooper reel just to show you how true professionals handle interviews, one take that’s all we need, honest.

A little side warning, some material in the blooper reel may offend and not be suitable for kids. You have been warned,

Mongolian Idol…….or is it?

Jun 11

Posted by Rikki in Ulaan Baatar, Videos | 7 Comments

This week, we thought we would show you a different side of Ulaan Bataar, this country loves music, its culture is filled with singing and instrument playing. We were invited to the equivalent of American Idol here in the city so we took the chance to enjoy a little display vocal decadence!! Towards the end of the clip, we also bring to you the Mongolian National Beatbox champ, he was kind enough to come down to our recording studio and hit us with some guttural beats.

Oh and by the way, Gorki may, I said “may”, leave the building this week, keep it locked for the next update where Alex will say,”Hey bro, I don’t think we have a fuel tank?”

Till next time
Keep on trucking.

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