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Our trucks stick out. I have touched on the subject a few times before, but it is something that bears mentioning basically in every country we travel though. Driving the Tundra and the Sequoia seems to attract a lot of attention. In the planning phases of our expedition, people warned us not to drive new, fancy cars because they would do just that… attract a lot of attention, and invariably, some of that attention was bound to be negative. Many people suggested that we drive older model vehicles to better “blend in,” but there was one individual who completed a similar trip around the world in a car that was bound to stick out. Jim Rogers drove a modified Mercedes CLK on his Millennium Adventure and succeeded in attracting more curiosity than hostility on his three year trip while driving through some potentially volatile places.

Some people we meet while traveling, namely other travelers, attempt to give us a hard time, either willingly or unknowingly, because of our mode of transportation. “You guys are really missing out on local cultural experiences. You only meet interesting locals on public transportation. You must miss a lot by driving your own cars.” True, we do miss some things by not taking local transportation. We miss out on the pointless delays as a result of antiquated, bureaucratic transportation administration. We miss out on the unique smells that you experience on an overnight bus to Tashkent, although arguably, the smells coming out of our cars are quite competitive. On the other hand, we do not miss out on the countless other encounters that would not be possible without the Toyotas present.

Just a we are curious about the local transportation (foreground) so to are the locals curious of our trucks

Without our trucks, especially new, never-seen-before model Toyotas, we would have never met the General in Cambodia who gave us his mobile number in case we encountered any problems. We would not have met Edwina, a friendly Australian who helped us immensely in terms of researching and putting us into contact with potential sponsors. We would not have met Chinzorig and his Drive Mongolia company and been put into contact with a network of crazy overland drivers like us. Last, but certainly not least, we would not have met Nino, a Nino’s Tour Company who saw us filling up at the local petrol station, treated us to a Turkish feast, let us crash on his yacht in the Black Sea town of Fatsa and showed us probably one of the best times we have had on the trip thus far. The list goes on and on and yes, these are interesting people and coincidently they also happen to be locals.

We might miss out on nightlife at the local bus station, but if we want to take a break on the Black Sea, we can

If you think we are missing out on some cultural experiences, think again. Just a few days ago we crossed into Bulgaria and before we had even been stamped into the country, we were invited by a local customs official to share in celebrating St. Nicolas day with his family. St. Nicolas day is a big celebration here in Bulgaria and we were treated to a hearty traditional meal and lots of local hospitality. It might have helped that Vesko is a bit of an “adventure man” himself. He drove his Vesko’s Trip across the Syrian desert recently and is planning a trip next year through Central Asia. I do not to take anything away from anyone who takes the 36 hour train from town x to town y… I am sure you will have lots of interesting experiences of your own… just respect ours.

The trucks bring new adventures every day… like seeing if they will fit through the town gate at Khiva, Uzbekistan

We are now in Kunming.  We have Chinese license plates, driving permits, and all the papers we need to get through China.  This is a wonderful city full of cafes around a beautiful lake.  Apparently this is a sister city to my home in Denver, CO.  I can see why, it is cool just like Denver.  As per the usual here I am short on time, but have managed to catch up on photos from Cambodia.  Enjoy!

Phnom Penh to Ba Vet
http://www.theworldbyroad.com/photos/main.php?g2_itemId=7494

Kratie
http://www.theworldbyroad.com/photos/main.php?g2_itemId=7538

Stung Treng to Laos
http://www.theworldbyroad.com/photos/main.php?g2_itemId=7576

It has been a busy couple of weeks so we have fallen behind on Photo Galleries.  We are eagerly working to get them caught up.  Here are a couple while we get finished…

Sihanoukville

http://www.theworldbyroad.com/photos/gallery2embedded.php?g2_itemId=7407&

Ban Lung

http://www.theworldbyroad.com/photos/gallery2embedded.php?g2_itemId=7327&

Just a little notice for those of you that may not have seen on the homepage.

We have broken 10,000 miles!

Along with this we have now also visited 10 different countries. The miles should start to turn over more quickly in the coming months. Our exact entry date into China should be available to us in the next few days, but that date should be within the next 2 weeks.  From there our route is to Mongolia, and then continues on west to Kazakhstan.  As we make our way up into Siberia we will be getting even more remote so many segments will have hundreds of miles between towns with some weeks covering over 1,000 miles at a time.

Many of you may think, who are these sissies that can only drive 1,000 miles in one week? Keep in mind that some days our top speed may only be 20 miles per hour.  Road standards are a little different and sometimes hundreds of miles pass without seeing pavement.  Below are a few of the more recent photos of the roads the trucks have challenged and the things that make them slower.

Cambodian Border Checkpoint

Ahhh 10,000

The Road between the Laos and Cambodia Border

Okay, so do you think Thule will be upset if we take on this rack sponsor instead?

Some of the people pass give us some interesting looks

The rain makes the roads more exciting

There is never enough time to stop for muscle flexing photos, never enough

This is a statement we get from a lot of other travelers we meet on the road. The Toyotas stand out like a sore thumb anywhere we go and within minutes of parking them, whether it be at a guesthouse, a border crossing, a national park entrance or a popular attraction, we find ourselves deep in conversation explaining about what we are doing. Everyone we have meet thus far has been extremely excited about what we are doing, but from time, a few throw out a "you guys aren’t exactly roughing it" type comment.

True, we are by no means roughing it. If I wanted to get down and dirty, and really rough it, I would have done something like Rory Stewart and walk across Afghanistan shortly after the fall of the Taliban -  The Places In Between. In our case, we have the luxury of driving two nice big comfortable Toyota SUV’s and also have the comfort of packing a lot of what some people might think to be unnecessary gear in the ample space of the Tundra. We have SCUBA gear, climbing gear, camping gear, and yes a folding table and half a dozen camp chairs as well. So yes, we are not exactly roughing it… but at the same point, the Toyotas are my home for the next two years and most people generally want to have nice things in their homes. Furthermore, we set out on this trip not to see how tight a budget we could stick to or try to stay in the cheapest, dirtiest, grimmest guesthouse we could find in every city. We set out on this trip to drive around the world and with that, a whole Pandora’s Box of different challenges quickly presents itself.

When most people travel, they typically only have to find a means of getting themselves and a few pieces of luggage from point A to point B. When we travel, we not only have to figure out how to get to the next destination, but do so with two trucks and a lot more than a few bags. The other day, we set out early in the morning to cross the remote Laos/Cambodia border at Dong Krolor. This seemingly simple task proved to be quite an adventure and illustrated to some people traveling with us just what we are confronted with when you travel TWBR style.

According to the Canadian Automobile Association, in Laos, the "frontiers are closed to individual tourist vehicles." The CAA said the same thing about Cambodia, but we got in and we have been in contact with others who have not had any trouble getting into Laos with their own vehicles. However, after our experience at the Vietnamese border, you can’t really count on any of this information with absolute certainty, so driving out to this remote border was a gamble to a degree. We are also learning not to assume too much about what in most cases could be considered reliable information. At Stung Treng, people who had made it through from Laos said there was a bridge across the river, the map we purchased in Bangkok indicated there was a bridge across the river and Lonely Plant even mentioned the completion of such a bridge "sometime in 2007."

Once we did arrive in Stung Treng, we followed the newly constructed, Chinese built road right up to the entrance to a new bridge that looked as though 10’s of millions of dollars had been spent on its construction. At the entrance to the bridge, we were greeted by some official looking military type guys (official by Cambodia standards at least) who through the help of their 14 year old son/translator, informed us that the bridge was closed and would not open until the Prime Minister came next month to cut the ribbon and make it official. They were also waiting to finish the last few bits and pieces of the bridge until the PM could fit it into his schedule to officially open the bridge. If we did not have the trucks, we could simply hire out one of the many available boats like most other people do, but alas, we found ourselves scrambling to try and find out how to get 10,000 lbs. worth of Toyotas across a sizable, monsoon swollen river.

It took an extra day, but we were finally able to get some riverboat entrepreneurs to allow us to put the Toyotas on their ferry after negotiating a price through yet another interpreter. (We would soon find out that these guys wanted to renegotiate after we had made it across and even another 50 kilometers further to the border checkpoint.)  Once we made it out of Cambodia and into Laos, thankfully, the only problem caused by the vehicles and the Carnets was disturbing the Laotian customs officials from their lunch.

At this point, if we did not have our trucks, we could have jumped on a bus bound for towns such as Pakse, or Vientiane. Instead, we were trying to figure out where we were going to get gas for two trucks that did not have enough to make it to those destinations. After running the Tundra for 20 miles after the computer informed us that the fuel range was 0, we found a gas station. However, gas stations in this part of Laos are not your typical Shell stations. Again, we are confronted of trying to make a determination if the fuel in old rusted out 55 gallon barrels is actually fuel and if it going to help us get to the next big town or stop us dead in our tracks. Bottom line, I will be the first to admit that we have a pretty plush set-up. At the end of the day, we can sit in comfortable chairs, and watch a DVD on our oversized laptops, but after what we go through in a typical day, I think we deserve it… at least a little bit.