The thing with going on an overland trip in a Bedford truck is speed. It doesn’t really go more than about 40 miles an hour and Chalfont St. Peter to Kenya is quite a long way.  A routine quickly set in. Up around 6.30am, bit of nosh then drive till lunchtime, bit of nosh, then park and camp and nosh around 6.30pm.

The set up in the back of the truck was two rows of facing benches. By about Day 3 it became like a very long tube journey facing the same people but with a (very) slowly changing backdrop.

Unfortunately by the time we’d reached Spain, three relationships had developed. Craig, a Kenyan laddy, fell for Beautiful Anna after ‘accidentally’ seeing her washing in a river. Linda from Reading, sobbed as she left her boyfriend in C.St P, but was snuggled up with Ozzy Oz by the time we were chuntering along the M25.  Then Brad, a wannabe actor guy from Los Angeles, who was openly gay,  hooked up with Bad Debbie (there was a Good Debbie too).  The tube journey got pretty irritating with the canoodling that started.  Brad kept signing Barbra Streisand songs across the passageway to Bad Debbie which was a real no no in my book of African Adventures.

To cut one of many, many, long stories to do with this trip short, Bad Debbie jumped off a bridge into the Spanish river that Anna was washing in and broke her ankle.  This created all sorts of dramas and loads more time to get anywhere. She then realised she was pregnant two months later when we reached Tamanrasset in the middle of the Sahara. Not by Brad.  Their relationship, it transpired, remained at a signing level. She hitched a ride back towards Algeria, with a group of tourists heading the other way, to fly home. Jeez.

Brad, after Debbie's departure, wearing his Wham gear.

Click here for first overland post.