“We’re fighting to make the world less boring. Our planet used to slap us about the face-cheeks with iron fists of adventure every day.  Maps had edges to walk off. Whole continents lay undiscovered. But now, the entire surface of the Earth has been scanned by satellites and shoveled into your mobile phone, tagged with twattery about which restaurant serves the best mocha-latte-frappeshite. 

We live to find ways to make the world a bit more difficult. To bring chaos into our over-sanitized lives.  To create adventures where you don’t know what will happen tomorrow or if you’ll even make it. Because we think there’s no greater moment than those seconds as you leap into an abyss of uncertainty and disaster.”

• Tom Morgan, The Adventurists 

This is how a group called The Adventurists describe themselves, and today we’re speaking with one of their founders about the trip that inspired it all. It’s called the Mongol Rally, and the premise is to drive from London to Mongolia, in a car that costs not much more than a cup of tea, with no plan and no back up. 

In this day and age, with the technology we have in our pocket, there’s a tendency to plan things out to the nth degree. The Adventurists offer an important counterpoint to that. Maybe adventure should have an element of risk?  Maybe embracing the unknown is an essential part of exploration? What if we’re denying ourselves something important in our over-sanitized lives? 

Today’s guests Jenny Hunter talks about this and lots more, as she takes us 10,000 miles from a bar in Shoreditch to Ulaanbaatar. 

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Believe it or not, you can actually do the Mongol Rally yourself, as well as a bunch of other mad cap adventures. Check out theadventurists.com to find out more.

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Armchair Explorer is produced by Armchair Productions. Aaron Millar writes and presents the show, Charles Tyrie does the audio editing and sound design, and Jason Paton is lead producer. Our theme music is by the artist Sweet Chap. Episode cover photo by Tom Archer.

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