Oxford’s heading home again
Patrick Cruywagen joins the first few days of the 10,000-mile Last Overland Expedition
The 10,000 mile Last Overland to London from Singapore Expedition most famous Oxford, the has begun, with in the ed) Land Rover photograph Editor (and now most journey home. the 100-day world, leading few days joins the first Cruywagen Patrick has captured adventure that of this crazy fans of Land Rover imagination the world around
Ihave often wondered why Football Premiership teams do pre-season tours to Asia. After spending the first four days on the Last Overland expedition as they made their way from Singapore’s F1 pit building to northern Malaysia’s city of Alor Satar, I now know why. The people of Singapore and Malaysia are extremely fanatical about Land Rovers (and football). Add into the mix the eight members of the Last Overland expedition who are trying to recreate in reverse the original 1955 trip done by the Oxford and Cambridge Far Eastern Expedition, then you have the ingredients for the mother of all road trips with thousands of supporters and Land Rovers to cheer your every move.
Wait. It gets better. At the front of the Last Overland threeLand Rover convoy is Oxford, one of the two Series I 86in station wagons that did the original Oxford and Cambridge Far Eastern Expedition. It’s as if David Beckham or Christiano Ronaldo has come to town. Or Singapore to be exact and I am right here in the middle of it all to witness it.
That original six-month trip 64 years ago was turned into a best-selling book ‘ The First Overland’ by expedition member Tim Slessor. Any Land Rover lover worth his salt will have a copy of that book and I know that it has inspired many a Landy adventure. It’s around 7.00 am when I take a cab from the plush Oasia Hotel Novena in downtown Singapore to the Formula One pit building. The cab’s air con protects me from the unbearable heat and humidity that awaits anyone who dares to venture outside. While I stare at the monstrosity they call the Marina Bay resort with its 2500-plus rooms, I think back to the cold and wet night I first met Tim about two years ago.
Tim, now 87, had driven from his home in Wimbledon to my office a 100 miles away. I will never forget the sparkle in his eyes when he talked about recreating the expedition. In an attempt to make it happen he had written to Land Rover several times but sadly declared that they were not interested. As Tim drove off into the darkness that night I remember thinking that a recreation of the First Overland expedition would probably remain but a dream for him.
The above all changed the same year when the missing Oxford was found on the remote mid-atlantic island of St Helena and then restored by the Landy-loving Yorkshireman Adam Bennett. Things progressed rather quickly from there. Adam then met British filmmaker and TV presenter Alex Bescoby during a Series One Club meet at Red Wharf Bay in Anglesey and the Last Overland expedition was born. They were going to turn Tim’s dream into a reality and now 18 months later, here we are in Singapore.
The pit lane is buzzing with activity. Land Rover fans have come from all over Asia for the historic flag-off ceremony. As I disembark from the taxi a chap called Mooks Yusuf from Bali stops to say hello. Every month without fail he sends me some Land Rover pics for LRM. Now we meet for the first time.
Tim and two other survivors from the original expedition, Nigel Newbery and Patrick Murphy, are in Singapore for the send-off. Tim is still recovering from a recent operation and won’t be joining the expedition for now. In fact, yesterday he took a tumble in his hotel room and is not well enough to come to the actual flag-off. It’s a bitter blow to his dream but
he is under no illusions that the show must go on and he has the following to say to the Alex and the rest of the team: “Don’t you dare postpone things. Get on with it and finish the job. Make sure you get Oxford and yourselves to London.”
Disappointment for one provides opportunity for another and the youngest member of the expedition is Nat George, Tim’s grandson and a recent economics graduate from Newcastle University. “The furthest I have ever driven is from London to Newcastle. Now we are about to drive 10,000 miles drive from Singapore to London. When I first found out that Granddad was ill I jokingly said to Mum I will go and here I am. It’s better than looking at job websites.” Ironically Nat is the same age as Tim was when he did the trip all those years ago.
Local Jerome Pang arrives in grand style. He is driving the oldest Land Rover in Singapore, a 1950 Series 80”. He also has a Forward Control IIB which is lined up with around 100 other Land Rovers. I take a quick snap of enthusiast Jackson Tan in front of Oxford. In his one hand he holds a signed limited first edition copy of the Last Overland book and in the other are models of Oxford and Cambridge. It’s time for the obligatory speeches and the British High Commissioner to the Republic of Singapore, Kara Owen, wishes Alex and his team well.
A reporter asks Patrick if he has any last-minute advice for the Last Overland crew? “When you hit corrugated roads speed up or else you will shake Oxford to bits.” Nigel is quick to add a quirky reply: “You probably won’t encounter any as it’s tar all the way to London now.” The time has come to start the engines.
The lights turn green and confetti shoots up into the air. Oxford hares off as if they want to complete the journey in ten days. Leaving the rest of us behind. I jump into Jerome’s air-conditioned new 110. The first modification people make here is to install the best air con on the market because without it the heat will boil you alive in your Land Rover.
The convoy regroups at the Malaysian border. Despite the fact that this can be one of the busiest border crossings in the world, it only takes us a few minutes to cross into the southern Malaysian state of Johor. This is thanks to the wonderful local Land Rover communities and police who have helped smooth the roads ahead.
Within a mile or two the Southern Land Rover Malaysia group hijack us and take us to the Johor Bahru City Square for another flag-off event and a traditional lunch. We have barely done 20 miles but it’s a welcoming and friendly stop.
Plus travelling on a grumbling tummy is no fun. There must be about 50 Land Rovers parked up at the square. The reception we get both humbles and overwhelms us. Dr. Ahmad Saifuddin Abdullah, the vice-chairman of the Southern Land Rover Malaysia, wishes the Last Overland team well, T-shirts and stickers are exchanged and photographs taken. Oxford mania is sweeping across Asia.
At lunch I sit next to Jerry Tay, a Southern Land Rover Malaysia committee member. He is the owner of six Defenders and Series Land Rovers and fondly remembers the 50th anniversary event of First Overland in 2006. “I was driving a Classic Range Rover at the time and had Tim Slessor as my passenger as we drove from Kuala Lumpur to Singapore. We were met by about 30 Defenders near the city of Singapore. Tim remarked that it must be more of a jungle here than in Malaysia because there were certainly more Defenders. It was such an honour to have him in my Range Rover.”
After the flag-off we push on, Kuala Lumpur is still many miles away. We have a police escort for a short while and it helps with the traffic. Local club members stay in the convoy. When we stop for fuel I count about 25 Land Rovers in our convoy.
I jump into Oxford for a catch-up with Alex. I ask him how this crazy adventure came about. “When I read the book I fell in love with the story and just had to chat to one of the survivors. At the time I did not know that Tim was planning his own return trip and he actually invited me on it!” Alex and his team will produce a documentary on their trip. Despite his passion for Land Rovers, he is not what I would describe as the typical LRM reader. He confesses: “This 220 mile stretch from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur is the longest drive I have ever done in a Land Rover.” It’s dark and rather late by the time we reach Kuala Lumpur.
Day 2 of the expedition starts very much like the first day. There is a breakfast event to attend with some local journalists. Several local Land Rover owners turn up in their classic Land Rovers. We are hosted by Amay Tingare, the Brand Director of Jaguar Land Rover Asia Pacific and we
take up the next leg of our journey with another flag-off.
Today is all about crossing the touristy and impressive Cameron Highlands. I jump into Vigneswaran Kartyhigesu’s Defender 110. Like everyone else I just call him Vicky, he is one of the founding members of a group called the Rovernuts and he will be assisting Last Overland with their route over the next day or two. He is a bit of a local Land Rover legend.
I am happy to get off the toll roads and highways and we take a narrow Aussie-built road into the heart of the Cameron Highlands. The highlands are Malaysia’s Land Rover mecca and I will be doing a separate feature on the area in a future issue.
The Cameron Highlands Land Rover Club carries us across the hilly, green landscape. They control the traffic, ferry camera crews ahead and the more we climb the longer the convoy of Land Rovers behind us.
The highlight of the day is when Nat gets behind the wheel of Oxford for the first time. There is a slight crunching of gears but he soon gets the hang of it. I have never seen anyone with a bigger smile on his face. When we stop at one of the tea houses I chat to him about the experience. “No power steering and you can’t slap the gear stick about. Definitely the purest driving experience of my life. I should have the gear changing sorted by the time we get to London.”
The Landy-loving people of the highlands constantly stop the convoy for interviews, photos with Oxford and to hand over gifts. It’s dark by the time we reach our guest house in Tanah Rata.
Our third day is a 259 km (161 miles) drive to the island of Penang, which is known for its culinary delights. This excites expedition foodie Larry Leong whose 2007 Defender 90 Td5 is one of the three Land Rovers going all the way to London. Singaporean Larry is the first guy you would pick for this kind of trip. Although he has several decades of experience in Business and IT, he drove this very same Defender from Solihull to Singapore in 2007. Then in 2015 he did it again with his wife and daughter. As we pile on the asphalt miles I catch up with Larry. He has some wise words to say about what lies ahead. “At some stage of the expedition, members will tire and question what they are doing here. 10,000 miles in 100 days is not easy. If we pull together during the tough times then we will be okay. I like to think that we are a highlyadaptable team. I am more concerned about Oxford.”
We pass cactus shops, honey and butterfly farms as we slowly drop out of the highlands and head coastwards. After another fuel stop we are met by Malaysia’s Northern Landy Lover group. After the obligatory snaps with Oxford they guide us into Penang, as the traffic can be tricky.
As this is the food capital of Malaysia we head out for dinner with our hosts. I sit next to Dr Silverius Purba, the Indonesian doctor who is the most popular member of the Last Overland expedition in these parts. I think that half of the folk at our Singapore send-off were from his neck of the woods. Sil is always smiling and has the perfect CV for what lies ahead. “I once worked with the BBC on a 35-day assignment in central Borneo. I have also trained with the Indonesian Special Forces and we had to treat and evacuate patients in extreme situations. Hopefully that won’t happen on Last Overland.” He laughs. While he tells me about his first Land Rover, a 1976 Series III, I order some Penang Char Koay Teow, the number one dish here. It consists of white flat rice noodles which have been stir-fried with chives, eggs, crunchy bean sprouts and prawns. It is the best thing I have eaten on this trip.
Sil owns nine Land Rovers. So while the expedition will call on his medical skills from time to time I have no doubt that his mechanical skills will also come in handy.
My final day with Last Overland is a 136 km (85 miles) push to Alor Satar. The morning is filled with a photoshoot and a final opportunity to enjoy the incredible food on offer. We came to the island on a bridge; we leave via a ferry to the mainland.
I spend my final kms with Last Overland in the expedition 110, it was one of the last off the production line and like Oxford it too belongs to Adam Bennett. Without him this expedition would definitely not have been possible. As we head north on Puma power I catch up with the expedition route and security manager Marcus Allender. I ask for his thoughts on the first few days. “I did not expect the scale and
intensity of the enthusiasm that we have encountered so far. We have only visited two of the 20 countries. Heaven knows what it will be like in the others.” I too am blown away by the Land Rover owners and enthusiasts in these parts.
I have to ask Marcus about his biggest concerns over the next 96 days. “The whole Land Rover world wants Oxford and the two support Defenders to succeed. Adam has packed all the spares for Oxford and he did 10,000 miles in it prior to the trip. He has supreme confidence in Oxford. My one big concern is the altitude. How will it handle 5000 metres in Tibet? We have a tow rope. My other concern is poor fuel but we have additives to deal with that.”
As we reach the outskirts of Alor Setor we are met by a police escort to take us into the city. Some lads on classic motorbikes lead the way. I jump into a Series III pick-up which is on media duties. That way I am able to capture the craziness.
We are staying in the same hotel as the Rovernuts group who have shifted their annual Land Rover fest to coincide with the Last Overland passing through town. What a night we have with them. Land Rover war stories are exchanged well into the early hours of the morning.
My time with Last Overland is done for now. It’s as if we were rovering on another planet. After spending time with all eight of the expedition members I have no doubt that I will see them in London before Christmas. And if things do go wrong and they can’t sort it out then I am sure the amazing Land Rover community will help them on their way. Tim’s dream lives on through them.