You may have been asking yourself why we have chosen overlanding as our new way of traveling. Actually there is a simple answer, which I think everybody understands.

Because we love to be free!!!

Although this sentence describes it clearly, I would like to explain it in more detail with the help of our pics that we took on our second overlanding trip to the north shore of Fuerteventura.

First reason our lady dog “Nica” loves to be with us more and more. In the past we have been travelling at least once a year for a longer period of time. But since our little one is getting older, we don't want to leave her alone. We decided to enjoy as much time as possible we still have with her. Therefore we try to take her with us on our overloading trips as much as possible, which seems to benefit her. Traveling with us treats her like a rejuvenating therapy. At the same time it makes us very happy to see how she looks more awake, happier and younger again. We love her so much and it will be so hard for us when she is no longer at our side. That's why we allow her and ourselves a special kind of handling.

Second reason is the analog kinda way of life we gonna have when we are on our overloading-trips. From time to time it’s good not to have television and switch off the smartphones. Actually it wasn't even planned, but on this trip we have forgotten the power bank that’s why we could only do the most necessary things on our smart phones, since we will be without electricity from Friday to Sunday.

Very quickly we realized that life goes on very well without smart phones. In fact, it's much better because you can focus on the important things in life instead of spending hours on social media networks observing other people's lives. It’s much better to have your own life under control and having the possibility to enjoy it. Even with all the ups and downs, it’s worth loving the life you have.

In the evening we just sat down and watched the sunset. Every few minutes the colors of the environment changed. It was simply more beautiful and exciting than any TV shown or series.

Since you have very little outside influence, you have the possibility to be very close to yourself and to recognize many things about yourself. You start to re-create yourself because you realize what’s good for you and your loved ones.

On that night we talked about our future, the goals we have set for the next few years and where we would like to travel with Lenny. How we gonna managed it and what else we need to be able to do an overlanding trip for a longer period. Because our dream is to travel with the Lennie for maybe even 1 year. But we don't know if Nica will be able to do that with her 11 years. Therefore we first try to visit all 7 Canary Islands and stay for one week at most. If everything works out well we gonna visit the Spanish Peninsula and Portugal. There we would like to try to staying for 2-3 weeks. But only if Nica is doing well.

Third reason is the adventure. It always turns out different than you think. Actually, Dani and I were pretty stressed before this trip got started. We had been hard working all week and there was still the big dust issue we had from the construction of a big melon field in our immediate neighborhood. On the way to Las Palmas to the Fred Olson ferry, that we had booked for Friday evening, we already had a little fight because we noticed that we had forgotten some things.

But that was not all. At the harbor, we had to pay oversize, as Lenny grow up because of the roof tent. When we was at the desk where we paid the oversize, the lady behind the desk wanted to see my travel certification, which I have had to request on the website of the city council. I actually did it but I forgot to take the printed certification. That's why the lady didn't want to give me the Resident Travel Discount, which meant that I would have had to pay much more for the passage. So it would have been a really expensive trip only for that weekend. Besides it wasn’t possible to take the last ferry back on Sunday evening, as the ferry was already fully booked for oversized vehicles. Therefore we had to take the ferry earlier in the afternoon, which quite shortened our weekend trip. I almost was about to go back home. However, I really wanted to go on this trip, because I knew that we urgently needed some time to disconnect and unwind. That’s why in the really last minute I tried to request this certification again with my smartphone and luckily it works. Quickly I took a screen-shot and went back to the desk, so I could send the travel certification to the lady via email. It all took so long that we almost didn't make it. But the staff who loads the ferry were waiting for us, so we were the last ones who boarded on the ferry. After all this stress we told ourselves, that at least now we have to start to relax. So we tried to do it by thinking positive. As the benefit, that we were the last one to get on board is, that when we arrive on Fuerteventura, we'll be the first to get off the ferry. So, happy that we had managed the passage, we drove another 1.5 hours to the north coast of Fuerteventura.

Shortly before it got dark we found a perfect place directly at the shore and could enjoy the silence and nature with a cold beer. What have we learned from all this? It always turns out differently than you think. I had already given up this trip, but 3 hours later we were standing with Lenny at the beach and could enjoy the most beautiful sunset and the feeling of freedom, what no amount of money in the world can buy. This environment brought us immediately in vacation mood, the stress fell from us and finally we could relax. What we really needed.

Fourth reason is to produce less CO2 emission on our trips. We know that we produce CO2 emissions with our old Lenny and of course with the ferries we gonna use. But we hope it will be less than we fly to South Africa, New York or New Zealand as before. On our overloading trips we would like to leave only footprints or even better as little footprints as possible. So at the end of our trip we try to produce as less waste and to live as eco-friendly as possible.

Right now our Lenny is injured and in the garage, we will hopefully can realize another trip as soon as possible. For the next time we are planning another trip to the mountains of Gran Canaria. We found some new beautiful places we would like to visit befor Daniell is going to Fuerteventur to work on a german production.

I hope you had a relaxing and enjoyable weekend.

Love,

Katy

Pics by Daniell Bohnhof

Text by Look2 Ocean