Year 2

Still pretty firm but the edges are a little fluid!

 

TRIP 1: Oz to UK Overland (and over sea)!

January to April 2020.

 

The start of the second year will see us take on more of a logistical challenge than a physical one. We plan to fly to Australia and then travel back without using air transport. This plan developed from a throw away comment by Sarah, whilst sat on the sofa one evening. “Let’s see how easy it is to travel from Oz to the UK without getting in a plane”. Steve thought it would be easy. Make your way across Australia to Darwin, jump on a ferry to Indonesia and off you go! It wasn’t long before we found out the number of ferries to Indonesia is just about zero. What about crewing a yacht? Possible but we might have to wait several weeks for an opportunity to pop up. The next option was a cruise ship relocation. They turned out to be few and far between and at the wrong time of year for our plan. We were starting to lose hope when on one of our walks along the sea front close to where we live we saw a huge container ship passing by. We knew that a small percentage of these ships take a couple of passengers. After a little bit of research we found a company that facilitates this mode of travel, we have been in touch and it looks like it’s all systems go. We have the option of sailing from one of four Australian ports with a destination of Singapore after a short stop in Jakarta.

 

Having made several previous trips to South East Asia we know it is relatively easy to travel from Singapore to the north of Vietnam by train, bus, ferry and tuk tuk. There is even the option to cycle part in Vietnam. From there we will take a bit of a tourist route by train through China visiting Guilin, Shanghai, Xian and Beijing.  Our route will then take us on the trans Mongolian railway into Siberia and onto Moscow. We have a few option for the final leg of the journey. At the moment our favoured ones are either to take the train from Mosow to London or up to travel up to St Petersburg and then catch a ferry down the Baltic Sea to Rotterdam. Then back to the UK from there.

 

TRIP 2  Camping and other things in Northern Europe.

Mid May to Mid July 2020.

Back to Europe, back in the tent ! We are packing up the car and heading off to Scandinavia. This is an area we have never visited. Apparently camping is part of Scandanavian life so we thought it sounds good to us. We do not have a  definite route for this one other than we will visit Denmark, Norway and Sweden before ending up in Helsinki, Finland after about 6 weeks. From there we will catch a ferry to Tallin, Estonia and spend 2 or 3 weeks driving back through the Baltic nations before heading back to the UK.

 

TRIP 3  Overlanding as a group – Africa.

September to November 2020.

For the final trip of the year we are back to overlanding in a group. This time in Africa. Our preferred route will take us through Kenya and Tanzania taking in the Masai Mara and a side trip to Zanzibar. Then it will be down through Malawi, spending a few days by the lake before moving on to Mozambique and Zimbabwe where part of the journey is made by train into Victoria Falls. At this point we intend to include a short trip to Zambia and then onto the Okavango Delta in Botswana where we will hopefully see among other wildlife …HIPPO’s!  From Botswana we continue west into Namibia, across the Namibian desert where we will get the chance to do some wild camping. Once we hit the Atlantic Coast we will turn south towards South Africa and the final stop in Cape Town where our journey and travelling for year 2 will end.