Vanlife

Shortly before our vacation I discovered the «Magic Earth» app. Many may now think - "not another navigation app". But what is offered is really more than just exciting. Especially for us overlanders. Because the app combines what was previously necessary for several different apps. Here are the most important functionalities: satellite view Satellite view with elevation profile Open Street Maps good routing with elevation profile Offline capable (download per country) Online traffic management with traffic jam bypass Apple Carplay capable Integration with Apple Watch Hiking/biking - off-road navigation Import / maintain POI with backup In the meantime I've covered several thousand kilometers with Magic Earth - and I'm thrilled. Especially the 3D functionality is helpful when choosing a route and looking for a parking space, especially in regions with mountains and hills, the orientation with the 3D view helps enormously. Offline travel navigation with 3D maps, online

Legal camping in the nature - an alternative to a campsite

The principle is simple: a website allows landowners to offer an exclusive pitch in nature for a fee. The landowner has an opportunity to earn extra money. The landowner decides himself about the daily fee and what he wants to offer. Only a pitch, or also electricity and water, WC, shower, fireplace, firewood, Internet. A website operator provides a website, database, calendar function and credit card billing. He takes care of the maintenance of the data, takes care of reliable landowners, satisfied users. And he takes care of marketing, social media and gets a share of the fees. We travellers have a good website, can see what is available on our desired date and secure our pitch via credit card booking, which is then available to us alone. We travellers are often frugal and can be self-sufficient in nature. Beautiful pitches without any infrastructure are also nice. For us travellers in a bus / van / 4x4, this is a practical offer. We can comfortably search for a cosy pitch in nature

In the wrong place at the wrong time - pure adrenaline

In April/May 2022 we were on the road in Andalusia for 2.5 weeks. One of our more intense experiences occurred while wild camping - something that really got under our skin. In the last third of our journey, we reached Cabo De Gata, on the recommendation of our research queen and also on the recommendation of Juan, an employee of a hotel in Seville. The last kilometres of the journey were quite desolate, endless vegetable fields covered with fabric roofs, unusually littered roadsides - and then one of the most unadorned places "Cabo de Gata" did not really invite us to linger. But we stopped at the restaurant "Goleta Cabo de Gata" and had an extremely delicious lunch, I had mussels and then swordfish steaks on the table - both exceptionally tasty. On arrival, we had already marked a branching track in the sat nav, which, according to satellite image research, led directly to the beach, between Almeria and Cabo de Gata. After lunch, we ploughed about 1-2 km along

Mods I wouldn`t do again for overlanding or vanlife

After over 68350 miles of international overlanding (110`000km) with the rig showed above, done in the past 9 years it is definitively time for an analytic view. Which mod wouldnt we do again, which mod would we install on a newly buildup? Therefore I did several overlanding trips with rental cars in the US and Asia who was near stock, done by tent and icebox, I can too compare a bit. For shure the travel region makes severall mods more necessary and handy. My rig was done to cross africa and feels very fine for that purpose. Later on the Panamericana it feels partly a bit overdone. A lot of thos stuff is optional for many of us, like the reason why we are travelling extended. Therefore I will list each mod and write about where it was necessary, where not. I guess this way you can better decice if it is helpful for your own travel needs. Too the choosen vehicle makes a bit difference, if you look at the Land Cruiser 200, that is a very capable rig in the original configuration. An of

Offroad self recovery: Waffle board and recovery tracks comparison

The Overland Journal did test severall Waffleboards and Sandladders at 2009. On the Expeditionsportal the Article is offline today - but the Youtube Video is still there. 12 Years later are many new player on the market - and most Travelers did choose those waffle boards today. Maxtrax, Tred, Aldi - and a lot cheap clones are on the market. Here is the Video of some guys who try to abuse those recovery tracks and waffle boards. They Video gives a good idea about the quality of those recovery boards. We travellers usually dont abuse our material that strong. We just want some recovery help in deep sand or mud - where most of those devices would be helpful. The Video shows us, that the more expensive recovery boards are stronger and will serve us longer. Specially the Maxtrax, Maxtrax pro and Tred Pro did a fantastic job there. It is up to you what to choose! If you like some more offroad action during your travels, we would strongly suggest a set of Maxtrax or Tred Pro: You can fin