intro to blog

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Seeing that this is the first entry in my personal blog where thousands of people have been waiting for, I think it’s appropriate to start with an intro: where do I come from. I won’t go back into the misty past but refer to the number of times that
I declared to my wife and friends that I wasn’t going to retire in a townhouse: security at the gate, high walls, big TV screen, small garden and little dog.
With time progressing so did our plan, culminating in the first trip to Mozambique in a Toyota bakkie. It would have been a good car for our further developed plans if it has a diesel engine. We sold in favour of a Land Rover bakkie, on which we had a canopy built. With that in front of our house, I started the year long preparations to get it ready for the day my wife would stop work and I was ready to go.
We’ve been travelling almost 3 years since then, with no house to return to and the children, two grown boys, secure in their jobs and social circle.
We travelled through Africa, the Eastern route. I’ve got little to say about this because, although it took some seven months, I wanted to get out of Africa and see something I could identify with. The main highlights were the sands of Sudan and the unpleasantness of Egypt. No country has so much manpower tied up in security in such a inefficient way.
And Land Rover Cairo stole my gearbox. If you want to know more you’ll have to contact me.
Europe we reached via Tunis, Malta and Genoa. After a while we decided that the configuration we had was not suitable for the (over)populated towns and cities here. We bought a camper, parked the Landy in Spain and toured Europe for almost a year. It taught us, together with what we learned from others, that we needed a car with more road-clearance and stronger suspension. Back to our Landy but now with a “demountable” or truck-camper instead of the canopy with roof tent.
We were at Knossos, Olympus and many other places which I can only remember by watching our picture gallery, and finally got to Islamabad in Pakistan, where we are now.
Or rather, where the car is now. Because when “preparing for the Press-release” we are on a 4-week break in South Africa.
When in Quetta, after travelling through Turkey (lovely country, fantastic people), Georgia ( very bad roads, depressing) and Bulgaria (coming up from communism) my wife and I decided we would prefer to travel by ourselves for a while. She is back-packing and I drive the Landy. When back in Islamabad we will both proceed to India, I go North to Nepal and China (backpacking in China) and she goes South until it gets warmer.
In addition to this intro I’ll post my impressions of Pakistan after Quetta. My wife’s website is www.vrolijksontrek.com.
I did my best.
Cheerio.

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