The Road Chose Me: Driving a Jeep from Alaska to Argentina

[adidas]

Came across this cool story and figured id share with everyone.

Dan is on a trip of a lifetime, hes driving from the furthest northern tip to the most southern tip where a car can go. All in all, around 50,000km. The best thing is he lived in Calgary for 2 years before trekking on such an adventure.

I will try an get him to post on here.

http://dangrec.com/an-adventure-begins

[ekguy]

pretty sweet. I've been browsing on there for a little bit here and he's seen some really amazing spots.

[Grecy]

Hey Everyone,

I'm Dan, driving my Jeep TJ from Alaska to Tierra Del Fuego.

I'm currently in Colombia, having driven about 33 000kms in nine and a half months, with about 20 000kms to go which I think will be about 7 - 10 more months.

If you guys have any specific questions, I'll do my best to answer them.
If there is enough interest here I'll post updates regularly.

-Dan

[rage2]

That is awesome. How are the roads so far? How's the jeep holding up?

[kaput]

.

[darthVWader]

AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[rage2]

You can tell this is a car forum when all we care about is the Jeep and gas...

[kaput]

.

[rinny]

How did you get over the darien gap? Ship or fly your jeep over??

[corsvette]

Awesome adventure,please keep us updated!

[ryanallan]

Why are you avoiding California?
The PCH would have been the best part of your trip.

[adidas]

Originally posted by ryanallan
Why are you avoiding California?
The PCH would have been the best part of your trip.

Not sure how you could say so unless you have done the entire trip yourself. Im pretty sure there is better parts in the world then the PCH.

And someone asked about the jeep, i believe he had it shipped and that it took a week.

[barmanjay]

Originally posted by Grecy
.... having driven about 33 000kms in nine and a half months,....

Hey Dan

If you find yourself in any kind of major city with a chrysler/dodge/jeep dealership,.. I would highly reccomend you have your transfercase oils changed and your front and rear diff oils changed.

Wouldn't hurt to change your tranny oils aswell.

They are supposed to be done every 35k. It would be devastating if your trip was cut short because your t-case exploded or a diff blew out.


Good Luck!

Sounds like a great adventure.

If I was single, no-kids, and looking for adventure,.. this would definitely be in the top 5 of my list. - I envy

[Grecy]

Hey everyone,

Thanks for the great words of encouragement - it really helps

I'll try to answer all those questions as best I can:

Roads & Jeep:
The pan-am highway is sealed the whole way, so except for major pot holes and speed bumps its not bad at all.
As soon as I venture offroad things just get worse and worse, though nothing the Jeep can't handle. Usually just very rutted/pot holed gravel.
The Jeep is holding up amazingly, with nothing of note going wrong.

Gas:
Average price is pretty close to $1/liter or $3.80/gal.
I plan to drive 50,000kms at I get around 13.5 l/100 kms

Money:
I saved for 2 years for the trip, and will probably live on my credit card at the end (worth it). I don't like to talk too much about money, but I'm sure I'll do a detailed post on my budget and costs when the trip is over.

Darien Gap:
I shipped the Jeep around for $770. Read about it here : http://dangrec.com/shipping-across-the-darien-gap-pt-1

California:
I lived in CA for about a year a while back and have seen most of it many times. I wanted to go somewhere new and really love hot springs and hiking, so Idaho and Utah were perfect.

Oils:
Yep, I changed them all before I set out and am carrying oils on board to do it myself sooner or later.

I'm happy to answer any more questions anyone has.

-Dan

[Grecy]

The whole episode of shipping the Jeep from Panama to Colombia around the Darien Gap has come to an end.
Final price was $770.



http://dangrec.com/shipping-across-the-darien-gap-pt-1
http://dangrec.com/shipping-across-the-darien-gap-pt-2
http://dangrec.com/shipping-across-the-darien-gap-pt-3
http://dangrec.com/shipping-across-the-darien-gap-pt-4

I'm happy to answer any questions you might have about the whole process.

-Dan

[Cody D]

Have you talked to anyone from Dodge about this? Maybe their PR department? I wonder if they would sponsor you in any way, this makes me want to buy a Jeep TJ, haha.

[Grecy]

Originally posted by Cody D
Have you talked to anyone from Dodge about this? Maybe their PR department? I wonder if they would sponsor you in any way, this makes me want to buy a Jeep TJ, haha.

I haven't, no.
I intentionally didn't want sponsors for this journey, to show people that a regular guy can make it happen if he so wishes.

Next time will be different

-Dan

[barmanjay]

Keep the pics coming

I'll life my alter-no-kids life through your pics

[msommers]

Very VERY cool Dan, I'm envious. Please update as often as you have time for! God such a cool trip!

[thrasher22]

This is incredibly rad. How have you felt security wise through so far? Or am I acting like an old housewife after watching 60 minutes and shouldn't be so concerned.