A buddy of mine has been on an epic trip across Eurasia, and adventure he calls Off Silk Roadin’. His blog is a fairly long form recounting of his tales, but I recommend checking it out mixed in with browsing through his pictures on Flickr. He’s done some in depth touring in places that are often forgotten by travellers, and without saying it, gives a powerful recommendation for going to the Asian Steppes.

One of his best talents is starting conversations with strangers and thereby making friends and getting a much better place for where he is visiting. One quick tale for example:

I popped into a Photo studio for some visa pictures. The three guys who ran the shop were Armenian and eagerly recounted the histry of their families, which lived in what is now northeastern Turkey (where we had just come from) before the “Armenian Genocide” (something I have to learn more about having heard so many conflicting accounts. They sat around, solved crosswords, drank coffee, brewed us a tasty batch, and when they got wind of our journey, pulled out an old Soviet Atlas, pointed at things and recounted stories of their service in the Soviet Army that took them places where we were going to go. A sailor came in and introduced himself as a “semen” (seaman) and when I took a picture of him, suggested I not post it since he travels to the US frequently, and doesn’t want to be listed in the rolodex of the CIA (to which I was presumably contributing.) We encountered this kind of Soviet relic paranoia in several instances, particularly Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan so far.

And tales like that with some of these pictures, and I get that itch on my feet and can hear the open road whispering in my ear.

I love a good challenge, and the effort to transport about 6 cubic meters (a large van full) of stuff from Paris to Nice on short notice during a national holiday provided an exceptional series of challenges.

The first challenge was to transport the stuff 1.5 Km from Stade de France to my hotel at 3 AM. Thankfully, there were a load of crew hands around. After chatting with them for a bit and with the people managing them, I received some free assistance pushing all the the equipment (thankfully everything fit on 6 flight cases with wheels) to my hotel – picture of this effort above. About 45 minutes later I paid my cheerful helpers with beer, orange juice, and candy bars, and convince the hotel to let me stash all of the stuff in the hotel conference room until the following evening. One down.

The second challenge was to find a way to transport all of the kit down to Nice, 950 Km away. Something told me that 5 set of helping hands wouldn’t do the trick this time. First thing in the morning my colleague help ring around to various “man with a van” services while some co-workers in London tried to find a suitable rental van. After just a couple of calls we realized that there was no legit service that was willing to do the delivery the next day – Bastille Day, the biggest national holiday in France. A while later we found that there were no vans to be rented in all of Paris. When continued searching all day in vain.

At 4:30 in the afternoon a glimmer of hope appeared as we found the last van in Paris – it was far to large and very far away, but it was something. I hopped in a cab and raced over. Upon arrival at the supplied address however, my heart sank. It was Rue de Rivoli 93 – the Louvre, which, in case you have never been, isn’t a van rental agency. I went in anyway and much to my surprise found that two floors down where the tour buses park, there is indeed a van rental company. I grabbed my vehicle at the last possible moment, loaded up my kit, and went to bed for an early departure the next day.

The drive down to Nice was a bit wet in the morning, but pleasant enough cruising through France and surfing local radio. The truck was a bit unwieldy in the cities, but proved to be a capable beast out on the road. The rain cleared as I left Lyon and found myself driving through Provence on a perfect afternoon. But then 7 hours into my 9 hour drive, the next challenge arrived. With the fuel gauge still reading 1/4 of a tank, the van started to sputter and stall. I was lucky enough to be right next to an exit, and pulled off the road. I hopped out and opened up the fuel tank, which was empty as I had feared. Checking the dashboard again I saw that the fuel gauge now showed 1/8 of a tank. At least it was optimistic.

I was blocking the exit, so I hopped out and with adrenaline surging, pushed the van back 15 meters out of trouble – to the spot you see in the picture. Then I turned to the phones, and with a little help from friends with access to a French land line that could dial local toll-free numbers, managed to explain my situation to the rental agency and also contact emergency services to dispatch a crew that could give me some diesel. I have never been happier to have studied French. A couple hours later I was back on the road with Hertz covering the cost of the breakdown as the emergency services technician explained that there was indeed a fault with the fuel gauge.

It’s the type of trouble that I like to get in while I’m out on the road – challenging, but with no imminent threat to my health or well being. It was stressful, but sipping a beer that evening it didn’t seem like a half bad couple of days.

Road trips usually have good food along the way, and the road to Horní Bečva was no different. We ate out way through each stop, stuffing ourselves with local meats, pastries, and fried goodies. I put on a good 5 pounds on the trip, which makes sense since half of what we ate deserves to be on This is Why You’re Fat.

Some of the highlights were:

• Smažený sýr – fried cheese. I’m surprised that Americans haven’t come up with this. The meal consists of a giant lump of deep fried cheese and french fries. I’d roughly estimate that it’s 2000 calories of solid grease with starch on the side. It’s hard to get a sense of scale from the picture, but it’s a ton of cheese.
• Polish hot dogs – a hot dog in a crispy and chewy bun that’s basically a hot dog sleeping bag. You fill the sleeping bag with sauces before putting in the hot dog. The result is similar to a corn dog, but with sauce between the dog and dough.
• Grundle – ok, so the food is quite different than the link I provided would imply. It’s actually little fish. Fried up and well spiced they go very well with beer. They look like this.
• Winter jelly – it’s lard. Plain and simple lard. Just spread over bread, eaten as an appetizer or with beer. I can’t say I recommend it.

I’m headed off tomorrow for my next adventure: a road trip through Poland to Horní Bečva, a little town in the mountains of northeastern Czech Republic. My team mates will be my old friend Ilana from uni and flatmates Alina, Anemona, and Marcin. Anemona and Marcin are playing host on this trip as they are both Polish, and Marcin goes to art school part time in Horní Bečva. I’ll do my best to keep you updated with sights and tales along the way, but I’m not taking my laptop on this one, so no promises.

I’m really excited to get an insiders view of Central Europe, which seemed like a tough nut to really crack while I was there a few years back. Also, I giggle with excitement about the name Horní Bečva, which is pronounced, and I’m not making this up, Horny Bithchfu.

Map of our basic route:

One of the many uses of the duct tape: Holding together the windshield.

I’ve made no secret about my joy in roadtrips. What are the essential ingredients of every awesome roadtrip? Well, I’m glad you asked. Here are my top ten.

Honorable Mention: The Hookah – Okay, yes, I have to include this since I earlier dubbed the hookah as the secret weapon of the roadtrip. I’m not going to re-hash the many roadtrip virtues of the hookah here, but let’s just say that I’m holding to my previous claims.

10. Cheap Non-Perishable Food – Snack cravings are even more satisfying to fill when you are on the road. And, in the very likely case of mechanical problems, you are going to want at least some spare food. Make it a mix of some snack food and some more hearty alternatives.

9. Good Pair of Sunglasses – Some people are sunglasses people. Some aren’t. Well, the sunglasses for a roadtrip are not one of the accessories you want to gloss over. I’m not much of a sunglasses person myself, but I soon learned the error of my ways on the roadtrip. That sun can play some nasty tricks on your mental stability as it slowly ticks across the sky if you are driving into it all day long. But there is no need for that. We conquered the sun already.

8. Quality Road Reading – Spending those long hours on the road, you are going to want some to have soom good reading with you. Roll the windows down and let the air play through the edges of the pages (because, yes Kindle, I still do believe in books).

7. Tunes Tunes Tunes – Nothing beats a roadtrip playlist. A great song can really cause some car cohesion (think Wayne’s World, “Bohemain Rhapsody”). And a set of steady chill tunes as everyone is hitting their afternoon slump can add some real rhythm and soul to the wheels hitting the road. Sometimes you will desire just the relative silence of the passing road, but for the rest of the time, do yourself a favor and figure out what kind of audio system your vehicle has and plan accordingly.

6. Pocketknife and/or Set of Tools – Useful for daily tasks and life-savers in emergencies, don’t be an idiot – bring along some sort of tools with you. Even if you are not going to be out on the type of trip where you will be camping every night, you will still be out on the road and therefore to some degree out on your own. A roadtrip isn’t much of a roadtrip if there isn’t even the potential of anything ever going wrong.

5. Duct Tape – No brainer.

4. Working Mobile Phone – I have learned the hard way that just because one is traveling in the developing world and mobile providers change as quickly as the days on the calendar, that excuse will not be much of a consolance to you when your group runs into problems in the middle of nowhere and has no means of contacting the outside world. When your friend gets taken into custody by Zambian police or when your vehicle breaks down at 3 in the morning in an African game park, trust me, you will regret not having a working phone.

3. Vehicle with Character – It is a roadtrip. The type and overall character of the vehicle itself matters greatly. Personally, I prefer a vehicle that has some miles on it already. I prefer it to be dependable but to have its own ideosyncracies. Ideally, it will have offroading capabilities and will not be something on which a few scratches would be a big deal.

2. Chill Travel Buddies – In an adventure in which the journey matters more than the destination, the who you are traveling with matters as much or more than the whats or wheres of the trip. And when the trip is all done, the people and those memories are what will remain.

1. Open Plans – The roadtrip is more of an actionable traveling philosophy than a description of the chosen travel method. Don’t overplan your trip. Leave with a basic idea of dates and a detailed map with your planned route. However, the beauty of the roadtrip is its freedom. Stay somewhere a couple days longer than you planned. Take daytrip local excursions. Meet new people and jump into their lives for a bit. Be spontaneous.