Please Help with final planning of a round the world trip 6 to 8 weeks at a time

Ill try to make the story a short one and give as much info as possible but if you guys have questions Ill be glad to answer them

So I have been dreaming of this trip for almost five years and I want as much feed back as possible so I really thank you in advanced.

we are 29 and have 3 kids 5, 3, due 12/03/14 I have amazing in laws who will stay with them (kids will not travel with us) while we are gone hence the we can only leave 6 to 8 weeks at a time I also have a brother who works for an airline who is willing to let us use his family tickets to get back and forth from home to the vehicle. the Idea is to travel down the Americas tour Antarctica then ship over up Africa east from Europe thru asia and jump over to Australia and then finally back home we have no time restraints to how many years we take finishing and truly no economical restraints since we only need funds to travel 6 to 8 weeks at a time

I own a small business and are lucky enough to have my dad who works with me and can stay on top of things while we are gone but I also cant just leave and never come back so flying back home and working 3 to 5 months in between will help keep thing from getting out off hand

our vehicle is a 1997 40AE 80 series LC wich I have owned for over two years and it has the following aftermarket upgrades
Safari Snorkle
5 BFG AT 285s
OME 2 inch lift
Bajarack long rack with maxtrax, hilift, spare tire, dual jerry can mounts
EMS header back exhaust
also have the following accessories to be installed
3 sets of PIAA LP570
second battery full kit
twin ARB air compressor
cb radio with all accessories


other things I have acquired over the many years of lurking are
bath room tent with portable toilet
portable 12v shower
40l second row floor water tank
50l ARB fridge with straps
Partner steel stove with table
5gl LP bottle with mount


Things I would like to buy/install before we leave
Arb front bumper
winch with accesories
front and rear ARB lockers
long range fuel cell
awning with full wrap around walls for changing and cooking out of the rain etc
chain saw
maybe a rear bumper not sure if its needed

1st big decision
should we sleep inside the LC or buy a RTT??

here is my + - list
+
sleeping inside makes me a city boy feel a lot safer
being able to run the AC and heat If needed
faster set up from driving to sleep to back to driving then a RTT

-
loss of interior space
smaller bed
not as cool :)


second decision
where to leave the car???
we need to find countries where we can safely and legaly store the LC not to far away from an international airport

here is the list of countries we hope to go thru and please feel free to point out which we should avoid and why also what country we left out and why we shouldn't Keep in mind this trip may take over 5 years to finish
1-USA
2-Mexico
3-Belize
4-Honduras
5-El Salvador
6-Nicaragua
7-Costa Rica
8-Panama
9-Colombia
10-Ecuador
11-Peru
12-Bolivia
13-Paraguay
14-Brazil
15-Argentina
16-Chile
17-Antarctica
18-South Africa
19-Namibia
20-Botswana
21-Zimbabwe
22-Mizambique
23-Tanzania
24-Kenya
25-Ethiopia
26-Sudan
27-Egypt
28-Libya
29-Tunisia
30-Algeria
31-Morroco
32-Spain
33-Portugal
34-France
35-England
36-Belgium
37-Netherlands
38-Germany
39-Switzerland
40-Italy
41-Greece
42-Bulgaria
43-Romania
44-Ukraine
45-Russia
46-Georgia
47-Turkey
48-Syria
49-Lebanon
50-Israel
51-Jordan
52-Saudi Arabia
53-Qatar
54-UAE
55-Pakistan
56-India
57-Nepal
58-China
59-Bangladesh
60-Myanmar
61-Thailand
62-Laos
63-Vietnam
64-Cambodia
65-Malaysia
66-Australia
67-Canada

Keep in mind I only named each country once even when I will be in and out more then once

what equipment should I bring with me and which countries can it be easier to leave the car in??
we truly don't have time restraints so if it takes 4 trips to make it to Panama It is truly fine with us we want to SeeTheWorld enjoy nice beaches great food

so please leave your 2 cents
Thank You All

Instagram Seetheworld349
we plan on heading out next summer
 
Last edited:

gowalkabout

New member
Well with Australia you will be fine with your set up especially if you get all your add-ons. With your cooking you might want to look into a metho/alcohol stove as I think you will have problems with using an imported gas bottle or you will need to buy one here, not a big deal but something to consider. Australia is a big place and there is no way you would see it in 6-8 weeks. To give you an idea we live in Tasmania (that triangle island at the bottom) and we did a trip to the gulf (the big u shape bit at the top of the mainland) and although we did the return trip in 6 weeks we had already seen a lot of the area before and it was still a bit rushed. I would look at a minimum of 3 trips of 8 weeks a trip to get a good look at what's here. If you have any questions about Australia I will be happy to help you out. Keep in mind to that in summer you don't want to be anywhere near the middle of the country due to the heat.
Happy planning
 
Last edited:

Ozrockrat

Expedition Leader
I will be following this thread with interest as this is how we intend to do our travel as well.

From our investigations one of the difficulties will be storing the truck and leaving the country. Depending on the TVI (Temporary Vehicle Import) duration for each country you may need to put the vehicle into a "bonded" type storage which can rack up high costs. But there are some countries that are more flexible than others. Brazil & Paraguay I think (my research is out of date at them moment) are good candidates. Argentina can be done by getting the customs guys to put a seal on the vehicle and storing (they also take odometer readings). Chile is difficult. To leave my bike in Chile and fly out was a crap shoot. Twice I flew out without any issues and the next time I had some serious questioning as TVI is recorded in your passport.

Somewhere on Expo there is a link to a wiki of South America that has some good info on the TVI's. I will see if I can dig it up.

Also make sure you get the biggest passport they offer. Once you start popping countries with a vehicle it fills up quick.
 

haven

Expedition Leader
Australians Kym and Lyn Bolton are taking a similar approach to their world travels. Apart from one lengthy drive from Australia to England, their travels in Europe, North America, Central America and now South America have been in 6 to 8 week chunks of time. They leave their vehicle (the first EarthCruiser, designed by Kym in collaboration with All Terrain Warriors) with caretakers until they can return and continue the journey. At present, the Boltons are in the high Andes of Bolivia.

Read about the Boltons' travels, vehicle prep and other topics here http://goannatracks.com/Home/Welcome.html

The decision to sleep inside the vehicle is one of personal choice. The Expeditions 7 folks designed platforms inside their Land Cruisers to allow sleeping in the vehicles, but photos show them pitching tents, even in Antarctica! Read about this 'round the world trip here
http://www.expeditionportal.com/for...ears-Around-the-World-on-all-Seven-Continents

On the other hand, on trips longer than a couple of weeks, many people prefer the comfort, convenience, security and predictability of inside living. For a group of five in a Land Cruiser, that probably means a camping trailer or an extra-extra-large rooftop tent.
 

UK4X4

Expedition Leader
I'll highlight a few for you

25-Ethiopia-- volatile conditions
26-Sudan---volatile conditions
27-Egypt---volatile conditions pain in the ******** ferry trip
28-Libya----war zone
48-Syria-----war zone
50-Israel----war zone
52-Saudi Arabia----chance of overland transit visa...slim even a friend doing a motorcycle charity run from London to dubai had to fly over
53-Qatar-----its just a big sand dune 110km long by aprox 70 wide with ........nothing......
54-UAE.........dubai for shopping and a quick snow board or ski...the rest is sand
55-Pakistan.....volatile conditions

Have you actually really thought this through or did you just look at a map and doodle in a long line ?

Visas will be a nightmare, with your passports being away for long periods of time, you may need 2, in order to be able to apply for multiple visas at a time

There are many overland borders with towns in the No-mans land, vehicles are often left in these grey areas..........but grey areas often contain shady characters.

One persons on here left his truck in Peru to be shipped.......seemingly it travelled by its self up to colombia and was shipped from there back to the states..........


The other method would be for example- enter country a get a 3 month visa- enjoy the travel, see the country and then just before you leave pop across into no mans land - turn arround and come back in get a new 3 month visa and off to the airport you go, many traveller hostals campsites and hotels will probably help with parking.

It can be done but forethought and planning will help bigtime


Carnet, it would run out during the trip and be needed for many sections of the trip

Vehicle papers being kept up to date.........how do you pass this years smog when the trucks in the western sahara.

How many years do you estimate it will take...? as your toddler will be arround 10 by the time you finish looking at your country list :Wow1:
 
Last edited:

DiploStrat

Expedition Leader
Scholars Differ

but, having driven a lot of the roads you want to take over the last 40 years, I would:

-- Not bother with a winch

-- Not bother with front locker. (But I would have a rear locker or limited slip.)

-- Not bother with a chain saw.

-- Would try to achieve a fuel range of about 500 miles, but this is much less of an issue than it used to be.

-- Would go with a roof tent. (I like the idea of those with a plastic cover, but have not used them myself.)

-- Would arrange the back of my vehicle so that I could, if needed, sleep in it.

-- I would make sure that I had four sand ladders (I, too, have the Max Trax.) and a long, over sized two strap.

-- Leave the driving lights at home; you won't be driving at night in the third world and you can't use them on the road in the first world.

Make sure that you carry serious cold weather gear, including base layers, gloves, sleeping bags, etc. It is hard to understand how cold it gets on the Altiplano or the Sahara. I know from painful experience the agony of running into that cold when one is coming from the tropics.

You are describing an overland trip but kitting for a 4x4 trip. For what you are describing, I think you would be MUCH happier with a Tiger, Sportsmobile (small), XPCamper, Earthroamer, or similar. I have done a lot of what you describe (http://www.pbase.com/diplostrat) and would suggest that you look at these folks, who have hit 50 countries and are still counting. (http://www.travelin-tortuga.com/Travelin-Tortuga/index.html)

Interesting to note that the Boltons have just suspended their trip and are shipping back to Oz; truck too badly broken to continue.

In the end, there are lots of ways to do this. Have a great trip.
 
Last edited:

haven

Expedition Leader
A note about traveling with children: Outside USA, the kids will help you meet and interact with the local folks. People everywhere are family oriented and will be curious about, and welcoming of the children. Back in USA, you may face criticism and judgmental comments from relatives, and especially from people who don't know you well, about the possibility that you're putting the kids at risk. Here's a thread that covers that subject

http://www.expeditionportal.com/for...-in-a-Veggie-Powered-F250?p=969713#post969713

Oh dang, the www.discovershareinspire.com website seems to have a password requirement. You get a flavor of the criticism by reading ExPo members' comments about taking the family into Mexico, where there's plenty of drug-related violence in the news. The people making the criticism generally have not visited Mexico themselves, just read about the situation.
 

sg1

Adventurer
Hi,
we have been traveling for the last 4 years using a similar approach. We travel in winter for 4-5 months and then put the truck in storage until the next winter. With careful research it can be done. My advice is not to worry too much about your car. We have been travelling through Southern and Eastern Africa with a stock Ford Transit 4x4 (we even had the stock tires) for a total of 9 months and 35,000 km and had 2 flat tires, replaced 2 shocks and had to fix 1 abs-sensor. North and South America is even easier. Even with a stock LC you should not have a problem. West and Central African countries are often a visa nightmare and some are not safe (war or civil unrest). Syria, Egypt (Sinai) and Lybia are closed for international road traffic at the moment.
From what you wrote in your blog I suggest though that you do a lot more research into the political situation in the countries you want to travel to and where you can store your vehicle.
In Southern Africa (the South African Customs Union) you can leave your car for 12 months with a Carnet de Passage, after 12 months you have to leave the Customs Union and renew your Carnet. In Namibia ad South Africa there are a lot of places offering full service storage for Overlanders, in Tansania I know 2 places.
In Canada and USA you can temporarily import your car (and leave it there when you go home) legally for several months (you have to research the details) and in reality for years because it is not registered in your Passport. Since you do not have a RV you can leave your car in Mexico for only 180 days (as a RV 10 years). Bonded storage is quite easy and common in Costa Rica and Panama. In South America things are a little more difficult. Urugay is popular, it allows you to leave a car for 12 months. Peru supposedly has fairly flexible bonded storage rules but I have not researched it in detail because given the speed of our travel we wil not be there any time soon and rules may have changed by then. Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay are sometimes mentioned as places for storage but I do not know the details.
Given the size of your car I suggest a RT with the option to sleep inside if the weather is too bad or you are worried about security. We used this setup for years in Africa before we got our rather comfortable Camper (with old age you like your creature comforts).
Regards Stefan
 

DiploStrat

Expedition Leader
I would not try long overland trips with a child much below age five, simply because they are likely to be bored, but both of our kids spent a LOT of time in the bush. To be fair, now that they are grown, neither would consider an overland trip, but, by all means, take the kids. My daughter was born in Panama and my son in Liberia and both grew up in a half dozen countries.

All of the usual rules of traveling with kids apply - allow them to bring favorite toys, go slowly and allow for breaks, do things that THEY want to do. Consider, even, bringing a friend(s).
 

kpredator

Adventurer
rtw

x2 on what uk4x4 and diplostrat said.

use the search on the hubb
4x4 community.sa
hubb
wiki overland

africa overland stellenbosch za stores and helps ship vehicles

think carnet and visa's will be a challenge
you will need reservations in the game parks in southern africa,probably a year prior.
last time i looked ngoro crater was about 240.00 a day for self drive.
congratulations on your ambition.
good luck
kp
 
Well with Australia you will be fine with your set up especially if you get all your add-ons. With your cooking you might want to look into a metho/alcohol stove as I think you will have problems with using an imported gas bottle or you will need to buy one here, not a big deal but something to consider. Australia is a big place and there is no way you would see it in 6-8 weeks. To give you an idea we live in Tasmania (that triangle island at the bottom) and we did a trip to the gulf (the big u shape bit at the top of the mainland) and although we did the return trip in 6 weeks we had already seen a lot of the area before and it was still a bit rushed. I would look at a minimum of 3 trips of 8 weeks a trip to get a good look at what's here. If you have any questions about Australia I will be happy to help you out. Keep in mind to that in summer you don't want to be anywhere near the middle of the country due to the heat.
Happy planning

Thank you, yeah Australia its an amazing and huge country and we will try to stay as long as possible since its also towards the end of the trip.
 
I will be following this thread with interest as this is how we intend to do our travel as well.

From our investigations one of the difficulties will be storing the truck and leaving the country. Depending on the TVI (Temporary Vehicle Import) duration for each country you may need to put the vehicle into a "bonded" type storage which can rack up high costs. But there are some countries that are more flexible than others. Brazil & Paraguay I think (my research is out of date at them moment) are good candidates. Argentina can be done by getting the customs guys to put a seal on the vehicle and storing (they also take odometer readings). Chile is difficult. To leave my bike in Chile and fly out was a crap shoot. Twice I flew out without any issues and the next time I had some serious questioning as TVI is recorded in your passport.

Somewhere on Expo there is a link to a wiki of South America that has some good info on the TVI's. I will see if I can dig it up.

Also make sure you get the biggest passport they offer. Once you start popping countries with a vehicle it fills up quick.


great info thank you

does anyone know how I can use my double citizenship (US and Colombia) to my advantage both getting into countries and storing my vehicle.
 
Australians Kym and Lyn Bolton are taking a similar approach to their world travels. Apart from one lengthy drive from Australia to England, their travels in Europe, North America, Central America and now South America have been in 6 to 8 week chunks of time. They leave their vehicle (the first EarthCruiser, designed by Kym in collaboration with All Terrain Warriors) with caretakers until they can return and continue the journey. At present, the Boltons are in the high Andes of Bolivia.

Read about the Boltons' travels, vehicle prep and other topics here http://goannatracks.com/Home/Welcome.html

The decision to sleep inside the vehicle is one of personal choice. The Expeditions 7 folks designed platforms inside their Land Cruisers to allow sleeping in the vehicles, but photos show them pitching tents, even in Antarctica! Read about this 'round the world trip here
http://www.expeditionportal.com/for...ears-Around-the-World-on-all-Seven-Continents

On the other hand, on trips longer than a couple of weeks, many people prefer the comfort, convenience, security and predictability of inside living. For a group of five in a Land Cruiser, that probably means a camping trailer or an extra-extra-large rooftop tent.

great links Thank you
sorry about the confusion but my 3 kids will not be coming with us
it is just the wife and I, but I will bring a small pop up tent for those nights that require it
 
I'll highlight a few for you

25-Ethiopia-- volatile conditions
26-Sudan---volatile conditions
27-Egypt---volatile conditions pain in the ******** ferry trip
28-Libya----war zone
48-Syria-----war zone
50-Israel----war zone
52-Saudi Arabia----chance of overland transit visa...slim even a friend doing a motorcycle charity run from London to dubai had to fly over
53-Qatar-----its just a big sand dune 110km long by aprox 70 wide with ........nothing......
54-UAE.........dubai for shopping and a quick snow board or ski...the rest is sand
55-Pakistan.....volatile conditions

Have you actually really thought this through or did you just look at a map and doodle in a long line ?

Visas will be a nightmare, with your passports being away for long periods of time, you may need 2, in order to be able to apply for multiple visas at a time

There are many overland borders with towns in the No-mans land, vehicles are often left in these grey areas..........but grey areas often contain shady characters.

One persons on here left his truck in Peru to be shipped.......seemingly it travelled by its self up to colombia and was shipped from there back to the states..........


The other method would be for example- enter country a get a 3 month visa- enjoy the travel, see the country and then just before you leave pop across into no mans land - turn arround and come back in get a new 3 month visa and off to the airport you go, many traveller hostals campsites and hotels will probably help with parking.

It can be done but forethought and planning will help bigtime


Carnet, it would run out during the trip and be needed for many sections of the trip

Vehicle papers being kept up to date.........how do you pass this years smog when the trucks in the western sahara.

How many years do you estimate it will take...? as your toddler will be arround 10 by the time you finish looking at your country list :Wow1:


Thanks, I guess it could be easy two years before I get to 25-28 3 to 4 years 48-50 so I hope have changed by then ad if when the time comes its to high risk then I will try to re-rout around the war zones and 52 is good to know (I had no idea) 53 is more for the 2018 world cup :) and 55 how else do I get to India ;)
 

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