AULRO Book Club: 'On the Road'

[VladTepes]

I thought I'd start a thread specifically for Road Trip Books.


I really enjoyed a book called "Around Australia the Hard Way in 1929". It's about 2 blokes who travelled this country in the years of the great Depression. They had little money, not even a watch or compass, though they were sponsored by Harley Davidson (to the tune of a free jumper each!) The bike they had purchased themselves, and it was old at the time.

It's a real adventure and a fascinating story - it's more about this great land and its numerous characters than it is about a motorbike.

Here's a link to where you can get it, though I;m sure it's available more generally.

http://www.whitehorsepress.com/product_info.php?products_id=4712


Another great read is:

"The Motorcycle Diaries: A journey around South America" by Ernesto Guevara de la Serna (later to be known as Che Guevara).

It tells of a young man and his friends adventureous trip around a continent. Coming from a privileged middle class background this trip opened ZErnesto's eyes to the world around him and the plight of the generally poor and exploited South American people. It shaped the man he was to become, a leader of the Cuban Revolution. This journey, however, is full of adventures and larrickanism, poignant moments and moments of ridiculous absurdity.

It's a great read and you certainly don't need to share his later political ideology to enjoy this great yarn.

A full review and details of the book are here:

http://www.curledup.com/cycledia.htm

- Vlad

[numpty]

Just got hold of a copy (1968 edition) of the Leyland Brothers book about their East/West crossing of Australia in 1966. They used a SWB Series 2A (I think) and a LWB Series1 Stn Wgn.

They claimed to be the first to make a vehicular crossing of the Simpson Desert on this trip, but this had been achieved by Reg Sprigg and family a few years previously in an early Nissan Patrol.

Wife is reading it at the moment, but should be an interesting read, as they were quite adventurous for their time, despite any other misgivings people have about them.

[abaddonxi]

Jerome K. Jerome's Three men in a boat (to say nothing of the dog). 1899

Full text here (http://www.forgottenfutures.com/game/boat/boat.htm)

Well worth it.

Cheers
Simon.

[JDNSW]

Just got hold of a copy (1968 edition) of the Leyland Brothers book about their East/West crossing of Australia in 1966. They used a SWB Series 2A (I think) and a LWB Series1 Stn Wgn.

They claimed to be the first to make a vehicular crossing of the Simpson Desert on this trip, but this had been achieved by Reg Sprigg and family a few years previously in an early Nissan Patrol.

Wife is reading it at the moment, but should be an interesting read, as they were quite adventurous for their time, despite any other misgivings people have about them.

I make a cameo appearance in this book, together with my twin brother - see if you can spot it!
John

[Michael2]

Another good read is "First Overland" about a group of Oxford & Cambridge boys who managed to get sponsored a couple of Series 1's circa 1950 and drove from London to Singapore (and back). Though the book only covers the trip across. In Burma there were no roads through the jungle, in Syria they came across a lone archelologist excavating Cyrus' summer palace.

[numpty]

Another good read is "First Overland" about a group of Oxford & Cambridge boys who managed to get sponsored a couple of Series 1's circa 1950 and drove from London to Singapore (and back). Though the book only covers the trip across. In Burma there were no roads through the jungle, in Syria they came across a lone archelologist excavating Cyrus' summer palace.

That's a great read. Am trying to get a copy of it, there seems to be a few around. Amazing where they went and with so little trouble.

[Bushie]

Read "the story of Tom Kruse - Mailman of the Birdsville track" a while ago not a bad read, about to start on a book I borrowed from Numpty "Crossing the Dead Heart - Cecil T Madigan" of course then theres Len Beadells books (which every self respecting Landie owner should have read).


Martyn

[Michael2]

I lost my copy of "First Overland" by lending it to a mate 15 years ago. I bought another copy on ebay this year. When I looked there were a few copies going for very reasonable (cheap) prices.

I even found Toyota & Nissan drivers at work reading it!

[JDNSW]

Cape Cold to Cape Hot, Richard Pape.

From North Cape (Norway) to the Cape of Good hope in 1955 in an Austin A90



Overlanding with Annabel - Stuart Gore.

Driving all over the Western and Central parts of Australia in the early fifties on a shoestring in a 1929 Chrysler.

John

[wovenrovings]

A good read it the story of Francis Birtles trip from London to Australia in 1927 by car. Can't remember the name of the book right now but his route was the one followed by the fella's in Landrovers in 1955.

[wovenrovings]

Its called Grit: an epic journey across the world.

[JDNSW]

Crossing the Dead Heart, C.T. Madigan, 1946,1948, 1974, possibly since then as well.

Account of the first crossing of the Simpson, probably should be compulsory reading for anyone planning a crossing (together with "Where Dead men Lie").
Since the crossing was in 1939, it did not use a Landrover - in fact it did not use any sort of car - they used camels.

John

[JDNSW]

John,

Picked up on your cameo appearance in the book.

And...

you were wrong weren't you? :p ;)

They DID make it :D

yes, stopped at our camp halfway across and made extensive use of our workshop facilities!

[JDNSW]

yes, stopped at our camp halfway across and made extensive use of our workshop facilities!

That was supposed to have a picture! Try again.

Still didn't work! I give up!

[JDNSW]

OK, fourth try! Actually I have realised what the problem was - the file had no suffix - Unix does not worry about this, but AULRO obviously does!

John

[EchiDna]

That's a great read. Am trying to get a copy of it, there seems to be a few around. Amazing where they went and with so little trouble.

http://www.firstoverland.com/index.html

you can buy a copy of it through the first overland webpage... and I met the 5 surviving fellows when they revisited Singapore to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the feat :)

[Michael2]

John,
After reading "where dead men lie" plus "first overland" and all of Len Beadells books, I wonder if the leylands were ratbag drivers or just pure and simply had incredible bad luck to do the number of diffs that they did...
I reckon the problem with the Leylands was that they had the LWB Land Rover heavily overloaded, and they were towing a heavily overloaded trailer off road. It was the LWB that broke all the diffs.

For six people they should have had 3 LWB utes, not a LWB, a SWB and a massive trailer. Very poor judgement IMHO.

[JDNSW]

John,
After reading "where dead men lie" plus "first overland" and all of Len Beadells books, I wonder if the leylands were ratbag drivers or just pure and simply had incredible bad luck to do the number of diffs that they did.

BTW...have now seen the pic...and I do understand why you thought they would not make it. Was that track north you suggested to them the Colson Track?

As Michael2 says, their problem was they were overloaded. Grossly!

I don't know which track is the Colson track - I have not been back there since any of them had names.

John

[JDNSW]

The Way of the Chariots

Barbara Toy , London 1964

From the Niger River to Libya via the Sahara in a Series 1 in about 1960, driven by a woman alone. Also any of her other books (this is the only one I have found) "A fool on Wheels", "A fool in the Desert", "A fool Strikes Oil", Columbus was right!", "In search of Sheba".

John

[Jamo]

After reading this thread. I splurged on a 50th anniversary copy of 'First Overland'. Great book. It came with an audio cd of the book with the story told by Tim Slessor.

[JDNSW]

After reading this thread. I splurged on a 50th anniversary copy of 'First Overland'. Great book. It came with an audio cd of the book with the story told by Tim Slessor.

I feel old - I got (new) not the first edition but the Readers Book Club edition for Christmas in 1957!

John

[Jamo]

:D I was only minus 9 in 1957:eek:

[JDNSW]

"Round the world on a wheel"
"Being the narrative of a bicycle ride of nineteen thousand two hundred and thirty-seven miles through seventeen countries and across three continents by five young Englishmen"

"with one hundred illustrations"

J.F. Fraser, London, 1899

One of the fascinating aspects of this book was the almost total lack of roads away from towns (outside of Europe anyway). At the end of the nineteenth century, if you travelled long distance, you went by train. Their trip started in London, then went across Europe and Russia into Persia, to India and through Burma to China, across to Shanghai, boat to Japan, across Japan, boat to the USA, then across the US, and finally boat back to the UK.

John

[JDNSW]

After reading this thread. I splurged on a 50th anniversary copy of 'First Overland'. Great book. It came with an audio cd of the book with the story told by Tim Slessor.

Found this in the USENET group alt.fan.landrover :-

Something of a blatant plug, I'm afraid, but I'll justify it by saying
it's a public service to those who (like me) were inspired into
Land-Rover ownership by Tim Slessor's book (now republished by Signal
Books) of the 1955 Oxford & Cambridge Far Eastern Expedition from
London to Singapore.

The Expedition's financial viability was only assured when David
Attenborough commissioned Antony Barrington-Brown ('BB') to make 3
films for the BBC's Travel and Exploration Unit. *With the BBC on
board, they could get the big-name sponsorship that meant the
expedition could go ahead. *Unfortunately, with no home video recorders
available in the late 50s, the film (once broadcast) was lost from
view. *Now BB has allowed me to re-master it for DVD viewing, with him
and Tim providing a commentary, and interviews with Nigel Newbery, Pat
Murphy, Adrian Cowell and Sir David Attenborough.

PAL versions are now available through www.teeafit.co.uk/firstoverland,
and I'll try to get them out to you for Christmas. *An NTSC version
(for North America, Japan and the Carribean) is also in production, but
there's been a holdup which will delay them until after Christmas, I'm
afraid.

GRAEME ALDOUS
Teeafit Sound & Vision, Yorkshire

[Michael2]

I think I'll be ordering a copy. But who's interested in having a quick show of interest on how many members are interested, and then seeing if we can get a discount for a bulk order (still to be indevidually shipped). Another option would be for www.aulro to enter an arrangement whereby the site becomes a reseller, we pay the retail price, but the Dave gets a cut to continue funding the site.

I'll post this in General chat too and see what response we get.

- Michael2

[WedWon]

Not trying a hijack here but can we start compiling a list of Land Rover specific (or related) reading.

My suggestions (some of which I have already acquired):
First Overland - Tim Slessor
Where Dead Men Lie - The Leylands
Red Rover - Mike Steel
Four Wheel Drive Swagman - Jeff Carter
A Fool on Wheels - Barbar Toy
A Fool in the Desert - Barbara Toy
A Fool Strikes Oil - Barbara Toy
Columbus was right - Barbara Toy
In Search of Sheba - Barbara Toy
The Way of the Chariots - Barbara Toy
The Highway of the three Kings - Barbara Toy
Rendezvous in Cyprus - Barbara Toy
The Hundred days of Darien - Russell Braddon
10,000 Miles in a Land Rover (also titled Nine in a Land Rover) MAry McComb Orr

C'mon guys add to the list

Cheers
Jason