The 2 girls had been alone of their camper van within the wilderness once they observed a person strolling close by with a machete in hand.
As evening fell, the environment turned shrouded in darkness. With none electrical energy or Web connection in a nationwide park in Honduras, the ladies grew more and more paranoid and referred to as the park supervisor for assist.
However because it turned out, the person was a safety guard patrolling to make sure the ladies would have a peaceable evening.
That is simply one of many many tales Ms Noor Soeb, 54, and Ms Susie Chua, 59, have collected over their roughly 460-day overlanding journey by means of the Americas on the Pan-American Freeway.
Overlanding – the phrase utilized by fanatics – is a sort of journey masking huge distances and exploring comparatively distant areas over an extended time period.
Overlanding travellers, like Ms Soeb and Ms Chua, typically get round with giant leisure autos which double up as inexpensive long-term lodging.
“It was scary, however we knew we had been secure in our home, our little field,” Ms Soeb, who used to work in gross sales, stated of the travelling duo’s $47,890 truck camper.
The pair left Singapore on June 18, 2022, and returned on Sept 21, 2023.
The journey stemmed from Ms Chua’s need to see the historic Route 66, a well-known freeway stretching from Chicago to California that’s celebrated as a symbolic icon of the US in lots of movies, literature and songs.
It was their second overlanding journey, after a two-year sojourn in Europe beginning in September 2019.
The pair stated they’d learnt, from the primary journey, to be extra ready with paperwork when crossing borders and never rely an excessive amount of on the “highly effective” Singapore passport.
Providing visa-free entry to 192 locations, the Republic’s journey doc topped a rating of passports in latest months.
Ms Soeb added: “Nervousness is ineffective, we learnt to cease and re-strategise the journey plans. Be versatile and have a couple of backup plan, as there may be many surprises on the street.
“As an example, the parking you had been planning on for the evening didn’t exist, so an evening at a Walmart carpark must do.”
The duo first heard of overlanding in 2018 after chancing upon a truck from Switzerland whereas on vacation on the Borobudur temple in Yogyakarta, Indonesia.
Bewildered that the truck had coated such an excellent distance, Ms Soeb did some analysis and found “van life”, the place they may purchase a motorhome and journey the world over full-time.
Ms Chua crunched some numbers and located that overlanding was a cost-effective journey choice, particularly compared with the price of dwelling in Singapore.
After planning a price range and buying a 23-year-old motorhome for about $21,700, they set off on their first overlanding journey in Europe in September 2019.
They returned to Singapore solely in 2021 after promoting the motorhome.
Some highlights of their journey within the Americas embody swimming with sharks on the Belize barrier reef and spending the evening on the foot of the lively Masaya volcano in Nicaragua.
Whereas in Nicaragua, in addition they went canyoning on the Somoto canyon. Canyoning is an outside sport that mixes mountaineering, mountain climbing, swimming and rappelling.
One other spotlight for them was their month in Alaska.
Whereas Ms Chua was initially reluctant to go to the distant vacation spot, she relented on Ms Soeb’s insistence, and stated Alaska ended up exceeding all her expectations.
“It’s actually superb. Wow, it’s actually the final frontier,” she added.
The drive as much as the American state, recognized for its mountains and sea fjords, was not straightforward.
Ms Chua, a former company government, stated: “Typically you simply should drive for hours and hours. There’s no petrol station, so you actually should chart out and high up your petrol tank to be sure you don’t run out in the midst of nowhere.”
Hoards of humongous grizzly bears, moose and deers would additionally “leap out of nowhere” in entrance of their automobile whereas they had been on roads flanked by forests.
Recalling one specific shut name, Ms Soeb stated: “We virtually had an accident with a moose; the animal simply jumped in entrance of the truck.”
Breaking into laughter, the duo reminisced in regards to the chaos of Ms Soeb slamming on the brakes whereas Ms Chua screamed in shock.
Nonetheless, the 2 girls don’t have anything however awe for the majestic beasts they encountered on that drive.
“These are the animals that you just’d solely see in documentaries and books,” Ms Soeb stated.
They usually took their curiosity for these animals to the following degree once they had been gifted some meat from a black bear {that a} native hunter had shot down.
The Singaporeans cooked the meat in a pot of curry to fulfill their curious style buds, however felt the odor of the bear meat was too robust.
“I wouldn’t do it once more,” stated Ms Soeb.
They even discovered time to make YouTube movies of their journey, posting them onto their channel, 2TravellingAunties Norah & Susie.
The 2 girls have additionally encountered their fair proportion of emergencies.
Near midnight on the 394th evening of their journey, they acquired a warning of an earthquake and tsunami on their telephones whereas in Homer, Alaska.
They ignored it till the city siren sounded. They realised then that the scenario was severe.
The travellers had been not sure of what to do however drove in direction of larger floor to a lookout level on a hill together with a neighbouring camper. “I used to be shaking a lot from shock, however nonetheless needed to drive up the hill within the rain, chilly and darkness,” stated Ms Soeb.
The hill was congested, as many different campers had been driving in the identical route.
The pair then noticed a moose and its child heading up the hill and felt comforted that they had been getting into the suitable route.
Ms Soeb added: “There was a little bit of panic round, as vehicles had been busy leaving the seaside to move inland.”
They waited with the opposite autos for about an hour till an area girl knowledgeable them that the warning had been referred to as off.
Whereas most vehicles began to go away, the pair stayed on the hill till morning to be secure.
One other tough time for the pair was in Guatemala, when Ms Chua received phrase that her mom had fallen very sick again residence.
They ultimately determined to take a break, returning residence in September for Ms Chua to spend a number of months along with her mom earlier than persevering with on their journey of the Americas.
The pair will probably be hitting the street once more in February 2024, and so they plan to overland by means of South America, driving to nations comparable to Ecuador, Chile, Peru, Argentina and Brazil.
They stated they plan to journey for so long as they will.
“I don’t wish to sit behind a pc in some small field and work for the remainder of my life, I wish to see the world,” Ms Chua stated.
Supply: Her World
