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A Big Thank You to our YouTube Viewers
September 28th, 2009Desert Crossing video passes the 1000 view mark!
Over the past weekend Drive The Globe | Overland Adventures hit our first milestone on YouTube as our video entitled Desert Crossing passed the 1000 view mark. In addition, since the launch of our YouTube page in June we have nearly 4000 total video views and almost 800 unique visitors to our YouTube page. We would like to take this opportunity to thank all of you for your support. We look forward to posting some new content very shortly.
Please visit our YouTube page by CLICKING HERE
Overland Travel Site Of The Week- Sahara Nomads
September 21st, 2009
Sahara Nomads embraces the love of travel in Northern Africa.
A quick simple website with some great photos and nicely equipped Land Rovers. Our overland travel website of the week.
Visit saharanomads.com to see for yourself.
4B9 (Simsbury Airport) Fly In and Car Show
September 20th, 2009Gorgeous day for the annual fly-in in Simsbury Connecticut.
Sun, planes, cars- seems like a great excuse to hang out on a Sunday and enjoy probably one of the last summer like days of 2009. Hundreds of planes and cars turned out for the annual event. This year we attended with the Mog, the 1965 series IIA and Pat Macomber’s Defender 90.
Suggested Read – First Overland: London-Singapore by Land Rover
September 16th, 2009
First Overland: London-Singapore by Land Rover- by Tim Slessor.
Another fantastic novel for all of you interested in the origins of overland vehicle travel.
They had no money. They had no cars. They had a whole lot of tenacity. These six men convinced a publisher, film maker and enough sponsors to make this historic trip a reality. In late 1955, they set off from England. Six months, six days and 18,000 miles later, two very weary Land Rovers rolled into Singapore to flash-bulbs and champagne. Now, fifty years on, their bestselling book, First Overland, is republished with an introduction by Sir David Attenborough.
First Overland: London-Singapore by Land Rover
The Ugly Stick – A Newfoundland Musical Instrument
September 15th, 2009Just what in the world is an ugly stick?
The ugly stick is a traditional Newfoundland musical instrument fashioned out of household and tool shed items, typically a mop handle with bottle caps, tin cans, small bells and other noise makers. The instrument is played with a drum stick and has a distinctive sound.
The instrument’s main body is a mop or broom handle cut to approximately four feet. An old rubber boot was attached to the bottom and a cymbal attached at the very top. At strategic intervals along the length of the shaft, nails affixed with bottle caps, felt tins and other noise makers would be nailed into the shaft. The instrument would then be decorated with items of colour and fluff to the artist’s taste.
On our travels through Rocky Harbour we got a chance to catch the local Newfoundland band Anchors Aweigh play one night and demonstrate the fine art of uglistickness. They suggested dressing up your instrument in the likeness of someone who annoys you. Either way, on a recent getaway to Martha’s Vineyard we constructed our own stick. Now if we could only find someone that has rhythm enough to play it well!
Anchors Aweigh with ugly stick on left of photo.
Visit our video of a couple of ugly sticks in action on the Drive The Globe YouTube site.
Labrador & Newfoundland 2009- More Photos
September 12th, 2009
More photos from our summer trip 2009.
Thanks to Dennis and Maura White for posting more photos from Labrador, Newfoundland, PEI and Nova Scotia.
Click Below To View:
The Last Piece of The Mog Returns Home Via Montreal
August 22nd, 2009Spare tire left in Labrador returns home via Montreal and a midnight pickup.
Sometimes it seems like a trip never ends. After our “breakdown” in Labrador and the subsequent decision to leave the spare tire behind because of weight considerations we had to figure out a way to get a 275 pound large tire back home. As it turned out the easiest way was to have it shipped to Montreal and then pick it up- might as well make it a weekend getaway to Montreal in the process. Things never go quite as planned though and I expected it to be waiting for me at the Hilton when I arrived. No such luck though. So at 11:30pm on a Friday night we found ourselves on the outskirts of Montreal at a freight distribution center trying to make the midnight deadline (they close for the weekend) to pick up our much sought after spare tire.
Success! With only minutes to spare after a long drive from Connecticut the tire was loaded into our Jeep Rubicon by removing the rear roof and we were on our way for a weekend in Montreal.
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The Big Land – Newfoundland & Labrador – Photos Now Online
August 14th, 2009
Our photo gallery from the 2009 Labrador & Newfoundland trip is now online.
Please be patient- higher resolution photos will take longer to load.
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Suggested Read: The Day The World Came To Town – 9/11/2001
August 13th, 2009
The Day The World Came To Town - 9/11/2001 - Jim Defede
When thirty-eight jetliners bound for the United States were forced to land in Gander, Newfoundland, on September 11, 2001, due to the closing of United States airspace, the citizens of this small community were called upon to come to the aid of more than six thousand displaced travelers.
“For the better part of a week, nearly every man, woman, and child in Gander and the surrounding smaller towns stopped what they were doing so they could help. They placed their lives on hold for a group of strangers and asked for nothing in return. They affirmed the basic goodness of man at a time when it was easy to doubt such humanity still existed.”
This book is available at many locations, including, Amazon.Com
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Back To The Drawing Board – Some Redesign Needed On Unimog
August 12th, 2009Our Expedition Unimog completes its maiden voyage. A few changes are in store.
Every new expedition vehicle needs to start somewhere. No matter what you do there is always the first trip. Working out the kinks as they say. Most times I have found you come home with a number of changes that need to be made before the next adventure. Sometimes there are minor things, occasionally they are major.
Our last update on our expedition vehicle project showed a shiny new completed vehicle ready for her first such journey. Although I know that I owe everyone several articles accounting for some of our unique creations and modifications on the truck, I am going to skip forward for one post and cover the failures and the shortcomings of our project. Specifically, one major problem that nearly ended our trip only several days in.
Most importantly, I would like to begin by thanking the many people that jumped in to aid us in our time of need- and I mean need. As often is the case, we broke down at precisely the worst possible location- in the middle of nowhere, on a Sunday and with really no idea who to call for help. We were greeted by many people who pulled to the side of the road to offer a hand (in fact nearly everone driving by offered to assist). A big Thank You to all of you (you know who you are), and an extra special HUGE THANKS to Eugene and Connie Joy who simply were passing by. They stayed for hours, helped right the rear body, assisted in phoning the local authorities and checked in with us the following day to make sure that we got a “BIG LAND” welcome to Labrador.
So just what did happen? Well, after hours of bumping about on the rough gravel and pot holed road from Baie Comeau Quebec on the way to Labrador City my concentration toward the road ahead was broken by the CB radio. Dennis, with an urgency in his voice said, “Mike, you are loosing your back- pull over!” “Huh”, I thought. I looked in the rear view mirror and saw the rear body of the truck looking like a dump truck in full tilt mode. Uh, oh- I don’t have a dump truck!
Long story real short. I will take some negative credit for a bit of a design flaw. With the spare tire, weighing in at nearly 260 pounds, and a very overloaded truck there was too much weight- specifically too much weight too far toward the rear of the truck. The welds holding the rear body to the frame had let go. Later we found that none of the welds were related to any of the work we had done on the vehicle, in fact they were all factory welds and two of them were defective from new.
One of my revelations from the incident was this: In the States if I had a million dollars and 2 weeks I probably could not have gotten the truck fixed in time. In Labrador we managed to (with the help of many, and special thanks to GSC Crane Operation) get a tractor trailer tow back to the weld shop. Get a crane to lift the back body off. A welder to fix all of the weld points and strengthen the supports. Repair the wiring and exhaust damaged in the incident and lift the body back on. All of this in six hours- yes, six hours. Oh, and did I mention, on a Monday morning after getting towed in at 3am. Oh, and one more thing- without any electric power in the shop- in fact without any electric power in the whole town! Amazing.
An experience certainly, but one that we won’t forget because of all the great people that we met.
Thank you all from Mike, Karen, Dennis and Maura! - And now the photos. (Click To Enlarge)
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