Daily Routine

Of course travelling overland is a great way to see all the parts of the world you would miss by taking a flight to your destination, but naturally an overland truck does not stay clean by itself and the food does not magically come down the aisle with the cabin crew. So here is a small insight to the daily life of an overlander, it's not always the luxury that you might think!


Currently we are travelling as a group of 21 people, and that helpfully divides into groups of 3 very well. Each group will cook dinner, cook breakfast and clean the truck once per week, and those tasks are grouped closely together to get "your turn" out of the way as quick as possible.


Mornings:
5.30am - This is the time we get out of bed in the mornings if the truck is due to move that day. If your group happened to cook dinner last night, then it will be your turn to cook breakfast this morning. If you are cooking breakfast, you get cooking straight away as breakfast must be served by 6.00am. If you are not cooking, you can start to pack your tent away early.

Cooking using the gas supply from the truck

6.00am to 6.30am - Breakfast time. If you haven't eaten by 6.30am you won't be getting any breakfast as this is the time all of the breakfast equipment is packed away.


7.00am - This is the time that the truck sets off in the morning for the next destination, and o everything and everybody must be on the truck and ready to go by this time.


During the course of the day we can be travelling anywhere for up to 12-13 hours a day (once outside Europe where you are restricted to 9 hours a day), and so it is important to synchronise food and toilet stops well to maintain a steady progress. Don't forget a toilet stop does not mean there will actually be a toilet! You get what you get regardless of what you need!


5.00pm - On an average day this will be the time that the group cooking dinner will assemble to unpack and begin cooking. If you cooked breakfast that morning, that means it is your turn to clean the truck. Each day the truck is swept, mopped and disinfected, and if necessary a toilet hole is dug by the same group somewhere near where we have found to camp.


7.00pm - This is the time dinner is normally served (unless we have a very long driving day). If you cooked the dinner you must wait until everybody else is eating before you are allowed to serve yourself.


8.00pm - Washing up time. Those that cooked must now clean everything that was cooked with or eaten off of. Once this is done all of the equipment must be packed back onto the truck ready to cook breakfast in the morning. 


By 9.00pm you are normally finished with your duties, and you leave it as late as you dare before you go to bed to be up again at 5.30am to do it all over again! This is generally the time when I will look to see if I can blog or go on facebook, and so there is not often a lot of time left over to do anything else.


The good news is that once those tasks are out of the way, you get  5 days with a bit extra time before you do it all again! Tonight my group cooked, and so I will do breakfast and cleaning tomorrow. Vicky's group is one night behind me, and so she will be following the same pattern starting tomorrow.


On days where the truck does not move things are a little more relaxed, and breakfast will not normally be served until 7.00am.

The group cooking using a fire we have made near Istanbul. We cook on fire where possible, but it is mainly using gas at the moment.