Sometime after we met, we decided to go on a journey – an epic (at least by our standards) overland journey. As the years went by  we slowly continued planning for it but as life goes and responsibilities piled up and it got pushed the bottom shelf of our priority list many times over.

Then suddenly in mid 2013, through the grace of Allah, it jumped out the bottom shelf and placed itself on the desk for planning to begin.

Step 1 – Find a car! We needed the right vehicle to take us on this journey. So after long (and typical) Defender vs Cruiser research we agreed that the Cruiser was the right option. The search began… after much search and little looking this piece of brilliant Japanese machinery caught our eyes and our hearts.

We purchased and started researching options for overland preparation.

Enter Paul…

A colleague at Farhaan’s new job hears about our plans and mentions his friend from the UK who used to build expedition vehicles there! – Alhamdulillah!

So we meet Paul Marsh, have a few meetings and are on our way to putting down a list of requirements. He agrees to project manage the build of the vehicle due to his knowledge, experience and contacts in the industry. A few more meetings with Paul and we decide (due to Paul’s location) that we will send our car to him in Cape Town and do the build there.

January 2014 – Awning and Bullbar is installed

Feb 2014 – We took the Cruiser down to Cape Town and dropped it off with Paul.

Next Step – Paul takes the Cruiser to the “Land Cruiser Whisperer” Johan from JB Autos to do full mechanical look over due to it being second hand.

From there to Alucab to install our EeziAwn tent which was sent down from Joburg…

Now to conduct Test 1.0 – mechanical, Tent and Awning – in the next post…