How big are the potholes on the Pamir Highway? Yes. To be clear, this is the highway. With trucks going back and forth. It is not an off road track. 🤯 Also, I’m 6’4”, if that helps give you a scale 🤣 #overlanding #pamirhighway #tajikistan

There’s an interior tour here… Interior tour! Finally you can take a look around inside our home on wheels, our MAN HX60 Bebe. https://youtu.be/YwTbIJQ_zrQ

(Don’t tell him he’s pretty, he’s up his own butt enough as it is 🤣)

He’s a Hungarian Vizsla!

We’re often asked how we cope with travelling with a dog and whether he’s happy. If he has space to run (chasing thrown stones), smells to sniff and the sofa to cuddle on, he’s happy. And if he has a river or lake to run through or swim in, then even more so! #photography #dogstr #overlandlife

Friends in the desert! One of the great joys of travelling is meeting other travellers. Each with their own stories and reasons for travelling. It took us a while to realise, but in the early days we kept meeting people…and getting on really well with them. Eventually we realised that people that travel all have similar mind sets, drives and desires, so it stands to reason we’d get on well. And continued meetings reaffirms this. The hardest part of meeting people? Saying goodbye to people you’ve only known briefly but have a connection with, knowing you may not see them again. #photography #overlanding #friendsontheroad

Last nights lunar eclipse blood moon, from 4300m up in Tajikistan. Just about 10mins before totality. The biggest downside? It was about -4degC so as soon as it hit totality, we all went to bed! #photography #eclipse #overlanding

It doesn’t happen very often, but today we’d decided to stay put with the friends we’ve been in convoy with for the last week or so. Then by chance we dropped a message to another couple who we knew were in Tajikistan and it turns out they were less than 100km away. So they came over to meet us! They’re Canadian and this is the 6th country we’ve met them in since early last year - Morocco, Italy, Greece, Turkey, Georgia and now Tajikistan. Quite amazing since we’ve taken totally different routes! Finally a Belgian guy on a bike came by and although he thought about continuing on, the spectre of fresh bread baking and a BBQ this evening proved too much of a draw. Also, he’s a baker by trade and since there’s a birthday in the group today, he’s baked a cake! So four overland vehicles at 4300m camped up on a high altitude plateau surrounded by mountains. Perfect. This is overlanding. The people you meet and stories you hear. #overlandlife #photography #tajikistan

Even with our gazillion lumens of light bars I’m not sure I’d like to drive this at night! 🫣

Not especially. I was baking in an Omnia Oven on our outdoor gas stove, so it’s a slow, low temp process anyway. But it was just about 50mins.

Tajikistan 🤯 Yesterday we had a bit of a moment. A slide slope nearly collected us as we slipped off the track, buried in the left hand side and got very close to rolling. Again. More on that later. But today was much better! Glorious scenery, great light and now parked up at a high altitude dried lake plateau at 4300m surrounded by towering peaks. Travel fact: Tajikistan is a mountainous, landlocked country of around 10million people. The average height of the country is 3186m with mountains covering a little over 90% of the land. #photography #overlanding #tajikistan

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Fresh baked bread at 4300m. With the birthday to celebrate yesterday for one of our travelling companions, I cracked out my (non-existent) baking skills and rustled up this Garlic and Rosemary bread for lunch. Certainly made for a unique setting for fresh bread. And yes, we then settled down for some lunar watching with the blood moon and eclipse giving us a great show… just a shame it was about -2 outside by the time it got to totality! #baking #overlandlife

It’s the first day of school for many in the UK, and since Isla is 4 she’d be going in to reception class. Just because she lives in a truck travelling the world doesn’t mean she should miss out on this milestone, so this is here “first day of school” pictures in front of her home, in the Pamir Mountains, Tajikistan. Lessons today have been… - paddling in a mountain stream (water safety) - a walk in the mountains (mountain safety/PE) - rock collecting (geology) - where we are in the world (geography) …and some phonics and numbers on Reading Eggs and Khan Academy. #overlandlife #worldschooling #overlandfamily #photography

We stopped by a river to fill up the water tanks this morning. Suddenly from having seen no-one for 48hrs we had three other overlanders and three different vehicle styles turn up! Which of these four rigs would you choose and why? #overlandlife #overlandfamily #overlanding

Hahaha we have an Avata 2 and she’s had a go on it back in Albania, but it’s back in the UK now as we didn’t want to lose it going through Russia. I do miss having it though - such a dynamic way of content creation beyond what’s possible with a normal drone.

Just a fun little edit of some delightful tracks recently. #overlanding #expeditiontruck #tajikistan

Since we were parked literally in the middle of nowhere (we didn’t see or hear anything or anyone for 48hrs) I decided it was time for Jess to have a drone flying lesson. I’m the drone pilot, but also the more extreme off road driver, so I want to get Jess flying the drone too, so it’s not all on me. 3minutes in to her first flight… “how the f*** do you do this while we’re bouncing down the road in a moving truck and still keep the moving truck in the frame? 🤯” I’ll take that as a compliment that it’s not as easy as it looks 🤣 Will have to get her more practice. #drone #photography #overlanding

Today was not short of views. We started at Lake Karakul, a 52km anechoic lake that’s said to have formed in an impact crater. At just about 3600m above sea level it’s a pretty spectacular spot - and is why it’s part of the Tajik National Park which was also inducted to the UNESCO world heritage list in 2013. This evening we’ve found a delightfully out of the way spot in the mountains. But the real highlight was the middle of the day - the Ak Baital pass. At 4655m above sea level, it’s the highest part of the M41 Pamir Highway. #photography #overlandlife #tajikistan

Wow! Thanks for following along all of you … we’ve just crossed 500 followers (sorry for missing whoever was the 500th!) Onwards to further growth of Nostr 🙌 This was us at Ak Baital pass, Tajikistan. #grownostr #overlanding

Postcards from Kyrgyzstan #6 The Barksoon Valley might be a name you’ve heard of… if you’re interested in the history of space travel. Why I hear you ask? Because after Yuri Gagarin launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in current-day Kazakhstan, he landed back to earth and then travelled to this valley in current-day Kyrgyzstan to recuperate. With the clear mountain air, glorious forests and huge waterfalls, not to Mention the views back over Issyk-Kul to the mountains that separate Kyrgyzstan from Kazakhstan you can see why you’d want to hang out there after being the first man in space. #travelfacts #kyrgyzstan #livefree

We sure did! All sorts of tall tales of adventure from the many countries we’ve visited between us!