ABOUT US
We are Felix, Indigo and Gaia, the dog.
This year we embark on our biggest adventure yet
– we will travel the world in our Land Rover Defender 110!
In 2018, shortly after we met, we shared our travel dreams with each other. Indigo had the dream of taking the trans-Siberian express to travel eastwards following the old silk road. Felix always dreamed of buying a 4×4 and driving south through the jungles and over the barren steppes of Africa. As in any fresh relationship, we managed to compromise. We decided on travelling East, following the Silk Road in a 4×4 vehicle.
The road towards our departure was long and bumpy. Buying a Defender in 2019 was the first and in hindsight easiest step. After this, the adventure began. With an ambitious departure goal in mind, we started working on the Defender to make it comfortable and livable for two people for the duration of a year. As we now know, and any Defender or Troopy owner in general knows, the car needed much more TLC than initially expected. Major setbacks like cutting off and welding on a big chunk of our rotten chassis were an everyday business for the coming months. We managed though.
At the start of 2020 the thing that shall not be named arrived. We still had hope of departing that year but as the months progressed the hope evaporated. Not that we were anywhere near a driving and livable Defender, but that was a side matter. As the year progressed and lockdowns came and went, we managed to get our Landy in a decent state.
By the end of 2020 we, like so many other lonely lockdown city kids, got ourselves a dog. Her name is Gaia and how cliche it might be, she turned out to be the love of our life. The first camping trip was a success but also showed us that we needed more space in our Landy. We figured a Defender Pop Top would solve our space issue, the only problem: The price tag on a ready-made one. So with the successful first phase of the build done, we figured building a pop-top can’t be rocket science and set out to build our own.
In order to produce a safe and working pop-top for our Defender, we had to learn how to use CAD software, how to weld aluminium, how to get 400gramm canvas through a non-commercial sewing machine. We pushed our physical limits of working around the clock and abandoned our social life. But we made it.
After years of long days and sleepless nights in our workshop, the time has come to finally embark on our journey. The Defender is almost ready*, we are ready and Gaia is done with it all. We are looking forward to what the upcoming year will throw at us and we are curious how it will be to travel the world overland with a dog in a Defender. If you are curious as well, please feel free to tag along on our adventures.
*Defenders are by definition never “done”, but we hope ours is up for the job