Packing list

What do we have with us?

On such a trip you need all kinds of things, but have limited space in the car. Already with the composition of the clothes, a lot adds up: clothes for the summer, the winter, for Muslim countries and and and and... It continues with kitchen utensils, outdoor materials and leisure activities. But then there is our old car, which should be as reliable as possible and not let us down in remote nature. So what all has to come with us?

We have created a list with all our items and are happy to share it with you. So sorry that this one is in german onyl, we will translate it sooooon.

Now we want to go into detail on some items.

Spare parts for the Landrover

There is an eternal discussion among overlanders: How many spare parts do I take with me and which ones? To keep it short and sweet: We hardly take any spare parts with us. It is anyway the case that the part that breaks is the one you don't have with you.

Nevertheless, in our opinion, it makes sense to carry some spare parts and especially various repair utensils with us, so that we are not completely powerless in the event of a breakdown. We have in addition to tools, various tap's, cable ties, briden, different tubes, ropes, glue, fuses and other electrical stuff up to a large collection of screws and rivets with us. We also carry a tire repair kit, spare fan belts, some radiator hose, spare air, diesel, & oil filters, 1-2l of motor oil, and many different oils and greases. For regions where the spare part procurement should be still a larger challenge, we packed now additionally another set wheel bearings, a universal joint and various seals.

Tools

Regarding tools we had a golden rule:

"Everything that was regularly used during the Defender rebuild, we take with us on our journey".

This has absolutely proven itself. It doesn't even take much to do most of the repairs on the Land Rover. In the meantime we (or better put, Toby) are even able to do big repairs on our own and without a workshop, as soon as we have organized the spare part. For most of the repairs we have the necessary tools with us or we can use our repair tools in combination with Toby's creative solution finding to fix our problem (temporarily) and if necessary drive to the next workshop.

Thanks to our three-month stay in the Turkish workshop, we also gained a lot of knowledge and practical experience. So the accident actually had something good. ;)

Tip for Defender travelers: Take a 52mm nut for the nut of the wheel hubs with you! For many repairs the wheel hubs have to be disassembled, for which a suitable nut is needed. Unfortunately, however, according to our experience, this is not carried in many workshops. Alternatively, the wheel hub is then processed with a chisel and hammer.

Our toilet

... is multifunctional and practical. It consists of a shovel and a lighter.

Since we are 95% in the wilderness we just dig a hole, do our things and close it again. The toilet paper is burned and not thrown into the hole. In case of an urgent emergency in the city or in any other impossible situation, there is the possibility to relieve oneself in the car with a big garbage bag and a bucket or a folding chair. The waste bag afterwards should be disposed properly ;). Fortunately, we have never had to do so...

Kitchen system

Mainly we cook with our LPG bottle on a two-plate gas stove. The gas bottle holds 2.7kg or 6l. We can fill the bottle at any LPG station or anywhere they use a mixture of butane and propane (camping gas, GPL, LPG). The bottle has an automatic filling stop at 80%, so there is no safety risk when filling. So that we can fill the bottle in all the different countries, we have different adapters (direct fill, ACME, dish, bayonet adapters) with us.

We bought our gas bottle at www.gastankflasche.ch, a small company with fast and very good customer service.

In addition to this system, we have other cooking options. This is very important to us because we want to have alternatives if one system fails:

Jetboil: boils water in less than 2 minutes, we use it daily for tea and coffee.
Optimus Polaris: runs on everything: gasoline, diesel, petrol, kerosene.... and is very practical. It is our main backup in case we run out of gas and are not able to refill it immediately.
MSR stove: as a small add-on, we can screw the stove onto a gas bottle and cook that way. Simple, straightforward, fast, light and small.

We are very happy with this solution.

Leisure

We like to be out in nature a lot. Therefore, some outdoor utensils also had to go on the trip. We are fully equipped for mountain tours, climbing and kiting.

Please have a look at our detailed packing list and tell us what you think we didn't pack or packed too much. What should not be missing on your trip? And what is your opinion and experience about taking various spare parts with you?

If the packing list helped you, we would be happy about a small donation into our diesel-box.