Enthusiast III
I'm new to OB but have been overlanding in one way or another for 40+ years. I was born on and grew up on an off-grid hippy compound (called The Land) in the high desert of northern Arizona.
The point of the long post below is that you can overland in the vehicle you have today. If you're willing to. If you spend some time learning to drive in a conscientious, thoughtful way, you won't do damage to your vehicle, and more importantly, you won't do damage to the trails.
You can get to almost any place worth getting to with one or a combination of these three transportation modes: feet, beast, or mechanical.
If you've got more money than time, spend that to do the overlanding you want and can afford to do. The key is to go do some overlanding.
If you've got more time than money, spend that to do the overlanding you want and can afford to do. The key is to go do some overlanding.
It doesn't matter if you spend ten hours building your camp kitchen and someone else spent $1200 of their paycheck buying a camp kitchen. You both can be proud of the work you did to get that kitchen.
It doesn't matter if you got your shelter from Goodwill, Walmart, or from Adventure Trailers or Into The Wild Overland. What matters is whether you are protected from the elements while you're out there overlanding.
You need six things to overland:
1) The desire.
2) The time.
3) Some food and water.
4) Some kind of transportation (feet, beast, or mechanical).
5) A place to go.
6) Some kind of shelter for when you get there.
So, the question is: What's keeping you from taking that overland trip from where you are to where you want to be?
A tiny piece of my overlanding story
****
The first vehicle I can remember was a horse-drawn wagon that we would take to Winslow for "provisions." We rode that 20 miles over desert. I guess you can call that "overlanding." It didn't cost a lot to equip: a couple of horses or mules and some tire repairs (it had a truck axle and tires). 0WD, but 4-8 HoofDrive, I suppose you could say.
We rode horses to do most of our exploring when I was young. Eventually we started buying and frankensteining motorcycles from junkyards. Those took us the same places as the horses, but faster, louder, and with more maintenance, breakage, and cost. They were a blast.
I learned to drive a non-motorcycle automobile in a 1966 Chevrolet C60 2-ton flatbed 2WD truck. Single speed rear differential. We could fit everything we wanted onto that thing. Very low first gear (50:1 crawl ratio); you usually started in second. We did contract work for the USFS. When school was out, we'd load up a teepee, six to ten sets of chainsaw gear, provisions for a month, six kids, several workers, and a couple of dogs into that and head out to the forests for a month or two. We went everywhere with The Big Truck, if we got stuck, the kids would do the recovery by pushing. The 42" tires made easy work of most obstacles, but those split rim wheels were terrifying. We only carried a hand pump, so when we got a flat we (the kids) took turns pumping the tires back up after the repair. We didn't carry a spare; my dad thought it built character to make his kids pump up a 42" tire to 110 PSI, and with 6 wheels, we could have two flats and still drive if necessary (and not loaded).
We had many different, traded or purchased for almost nothing vehicles. I remember a pair of Chevrolet Chevettes that we also overlanded in. With (by that time) eight kids, two adults: four kids and one adult in each Chevette and bottoming out at every bump. We went all over northern Arizona, across the Navajo Reservation, into Utah, New Mexico, wherever, almost always on dirt "roads" that some people in a pickup truck would avoid.
When I moved away for college, I got a Yamaha Virago motorcycle and took that everywhere: highways, offroad, whatever. I usually drank cold coffee and ate cold food when camping with it, but still loved being out and about. All I really needed was a sleeping bag.
About 20 years ago, my aunt gave me a 140,000 mile 1989 Toyota pickup Kingcab with a 22RE; 2WD. That went everywhere too, but this time with more gear. I bought a Coleman camp stove 2-burner from Goodwill that I'm still using today.
I loved that truck. But, there's no space for a carseat in a Kingcab. So when my kid came along, we sold it (yes, huge mistake, but we didn't have any money) and got a more practical vehicle: first a minivan, which we took everywhere, then a Subaru Outback, which we also took everywhere.
In 2007 I bought my first new vehicle: A Tacoma TRD Off Road with all the offroad bells and whistles: 4WD, locking rear diff, crawl control, etc. I loved that truck. And I started using it for field work.
But, my dad got sick and needed my help more and more on The Land.
So, in 2013 I sold the Taco and bought a Tundra so I could tow and haul more gear out there. I loved that truck too. My dad died in 2018 and I don't go out to The Land as much as I used to.
****
Last month I bought a 2019 TRD Off Road Taco because that's the size and capability of truck I feel best in.
I'll be kitting it out for field work. All kit is easily removable and only some goes on any given trip. Much of this is not necessary for overlanding; my truck is also sometimes my office.
Easily added (or removed):
* An easily-removable secondary power kit in a box:
** An auxiliary battery.
** A 1KW+ inverter.
** Some PV panels.
* Various tools in a kit.
* My camp kitchen and tables.
* A pop-up awning.
* Eventually a taller, skinnier set of tires.
* A spare fuel container, but only for trips that are further from a fuel source.
These are *MAYBES* (I have to do the trade-off consideration; none of these are easily removable and therefore change capability of the truck):
* Some rock sliders.
* A cap or walk-in topper.
* A camp shower.
These are No:
* No Hi-Lift.
* No winch.
* No new suspension until needed (10 or more years).
* No snorkel.
* No new bumper until needed (never?).
* No to a bunch of other things...
(I'm not casting aspersions on the people who have these, I drool over them when I see them. I don't need them for the kind of overlanding I do.)
The point of the long post below is that you can overland in the vehicle you have today. If you're willing to. If you spend some time learning to drive in a conscientious, thoughtful way, you won't do damage to your vehicle, and more importantly, you won't do damage to the trails.
You can get to almost any place worth getting to with one or a combination of these three transportation modes: feet, beast, or mechanical.
If you've got more money than time, spend that to do the overlanding you want and can afford to do. The key is to go do some overlanding.
If you've got more time than money, spend that to do the overlanding you want and can afford to do. The key is to go do some overlanding.
It doesn't matter if you spend ten hours building your camp kitchen and someone else spent $1200 of their paycheck buying a camp kitchen. You both can be proud of the work you did to get that kitchen.
It doesn't matter if you got your shelter from Goodwill, Walmart, or from Adventure Trailers or Into The Wild Overland. What matters is whether you are protected from the elements while you're out there overlanding.
You need six things to overland:
1) The desire.
2) The time.
3) Some food and water.
4) Some kind of transportation (feet, beast, or mechanical).
5) A place to go.
6) Some kind of shelter for when you get there.
So, the question is: What's keeping you from taking that overland trip from where you are to where you want to be?
A tiny piece of my overlanding story
****
The first vehicle I can remember was a horse-drawn wagon that we would take to Winslow for "provisions." We rode that 20 miles over desert. I guess you can call that "overlanding." It didn't cost a lot to equip: a couple of horses or mules and some tire repairs (it had a truck axle and tires). 0WD, but 4-8 HoofDrive, I suppose you could say.
We rode horses to do most of our exploring when I was young. Eventually we started buying and frankensteining motorcycles from junkyards. Those took us the same places as the horses, but faster, louder, and with more maintenance, breakage, and cost. They were a blast.
I learned to drive a non-motorcycle automobile in a 1966 Chevrolet C60 2-ton flatbed 2WD truck. Single speed rear differential. We could fit everything we wanted onto that thing. Very low first gear (50:1 crawl ratio); you usually started in second. We did contract work for the USFS. When school was out, we'd load up a teepee, six to ten sets of chainsaw gear, provisions for a month, six kids, several workers, and a couple of dogs into that and head out to the forests for a month or two. We went everywhere with The Big Truck, if we got stuck, the kids would do the recovery by pushing. The 42" tires made easy work of most obstacles, but those split rim wheels were terrifying. We only carried a hand pump, so when we got a flat we (the kids) took turns pumping the tires back up after the repair. We didn't carry a spare; my dad thought it built character to make his kids pump up a 42" tire to 110 PSI, and with 6 wheels, we could have two flats and still drive if necessary (and not loaded).
We had many different, traded or purchased for almost nothing vehicles. I remember a pair of Chevrolet Chevettes that we also overlanded in. With (by that time) eight kids, two adults: four kids and one adult in each Chevette and bottoming out at every bump. We went all over northern Arizona, across the Navajo Reservation, into Utah, New Mexico, wherever, almost always on dirt "roads" that some people in a pickup truck would avoid.
When I moved away for college, I got a Yamaha Virago motorcycle and took that everywhere: highways, offroad, whatever. I usually drank cold coffee and ate cold food when camping with it, but still loved being out and about. All I really needed was a sleeping bag.
About 20 years ago, my aunt gave me a 140,000 mile 1989 Toyota pickup Kingcab with a 22RE; 2WD. That went everywhere too, but this time with more gear. I bought a Coleman camp stove 2-burner from Goodwill that I'm still using today.
I loved that truck. But, there's no space for a carseat in a Kingcab. So when my kid came along, we sold it (yes, huge mistake, but we didn't have any money) and got a more practical vehicle: first a minivan, which we took everywhere, then a Subaru Outback, which we also took everywhere.
In 2007 I bought my first new vehicle: A Tacoma TRD Off Road with all the offroad bells and whistles: 4WD, locking rear diff, crawl control, etc. I loved that truck. And I started using it for field work.
But, my dad got sick and needed my help more and more on The Land.
So, in 2013 I sold the Taco and bought a Tundra so I could tow and haul more gear out there. I loved that truck too. My dad died in 2018 and I don't go out to The Land as much as I used to.
****
Last month I bought a 2019 TRD Off Road Taco because that's the size and capability of truck I feel best in.
I'll be kitting it out for field work. All kit is easily removable and only some goes on any given trip. Much of this is not necessary for overlanding; my truck is also sometimes my office.
Easily added (or removed):
* An easily-removable secondary power kit in a box:
** An auxiliary battery.
** A 1KW+ inverter.
** Some PV panels.
* Various tools in a kit.
* My camp kitchen and tables.
* A pop-up awning.
* Eventually a taller, skinnier set of tires.
* A spare fuel container, but only for trips that are further from a fuel source.
These are *MAYBES* (I have to do the trade-off consideration; none of these are easily removable and therefore change capability of the truck):
* Some rock sliders.
* A cap or walk-in topper.
* A camp shower.
These are No:
* No Hi-Lift.
* No winch.
* No new suspension until needed (10 or more years).
* No snorkel.
* No new bumper until needed (never?).
* No to a bunch of other things...
(I'm not casting aspersions on the people who have these, I drool over them when I see them. I don't need them for the kind of overlanding I do.)
