John McCombe
For John McCombe the cheapest way out of Australia in 1972 was a $180 one-way fare from Fremantle to Singapore on the small Russian cruise ship, the MV Khabarosvk. That was the start of a love of low-budget international travel over four decades and five continents, and a curiosity to observe and learn from their people and cultures. Not surprisingly, he didn’t hesitate for a nanosecond when invited to join this eccentric convoy from Australia to Finland, through twelve countries and over 20,000 kilometres.
From a NSW north coast dairy farm where he grew up, John’s working life has included farm work, teaching Mathematics, union advocacy, working in the mining and finance industries, with brief stints as a builders’ labourer, a camping tour driver, a ship’s cattleman, sessional university lecturer and management consultant in between real jobs.
John is married to Marie Sellstrom and lives in the Victorian High Country.
John McCombe
Two antique cars, a few old mates and the journey of a lifetime.
Take a couple of vintage cars and their owners’ determination to drive them on a pilgrimage from Australia to Finland and you have a fascinating story told through photos and the distillation of blogs and diary entries by some foolhardy, adventurous blokes.
Starting out from Thailand, their travels took them through Laos, China, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Armenia, Russia and Finland – a six-month journey spread over two legs in successive years.
Told in an engaging, self-deprecating and personal style, the reader enters the journey, every step of the way: following the ancient Silk Road route into the mountains of south-west and western China and the Tibetan Plateau where Muslim and Buddhist communities have lived for centuries, through the ‘-stans’, and beyond.
Many an adventure, impossibly sticky situations, near misses and regular mechanical breakdowns were inevitably resolved with the support and civility towards this motley group of travellers in their ancient cars, by locals renowned for their hospitality. Nothing was ever too much trouble.
They had no sponsor, no professional photographer or filmmaker, no journalist to publish the story, no ‘name’ to add fame and celebrity, no contract in the pocket for a coffee table book with quality photos and deep, or informed historical and cultural insights, and no travelling mechanical workshop. There was just a determination to get each of these old cars to Helsinki in one piece and smell the roses along the way.