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Travelogic

OFF ROAD TRAVEL'S MIXED SIGNALS

Some TV commercials are tapping into the thrill of adventure travel these days. One underscores the glamour with humor; another, the possibilities with technology. Both mentioned here suggest that you can drive anywhere you want, and you probably can. Of course, reality gets in the way from time-to-time.

First, the Land Rover commercial, Scene I: An aerial view of sand dunes — mountainous sand dunes -- stretching into forever. The camera zooms in on what appears to be miles of footprints in the sand, then onto two men making those tracks in the sand as they stagger over the dune and disappear into the desert. They look like they've been walking for days.

Cut to: A Land Rover with a beautiful couple laughing without a care in the world. Their Land Rover is parked in the sand with towering sand dunes rising around them.

Scene II: The two men walk past the couple in the Land Rover, neither pair noticing the other, and one of the fellows hoofing it says, "A Land Rover. And a smashing woman giving caviar to that chap...Look, I see an igloo ahead."

Clever play on the notion of mirages and being lost in the desert certainly gets your attention. And one of Jeep's commercials is equally impressive. Scene I: A shiny red Jeep coming straight at the camera through a splashing river or creek bed. A voice over informs the viewer of all the neat features included with a Jeep. Then the voice asks: "With all this new technology, where do you go from here?"

Scene II: An aerial camera pans a spectacular canyon, maybe the Grand Canyon, and presumably, the river at the bottom that the Jeep just ran through. Then the camera zooms in on what appears to be the same Jeep, racing to the brink of a clouded cliff.

Voice over just before the Jeep launches into the canyon: "Anywhere you want!"

Truth is; you really can go anywhere you want. Trouble is; the effort to get there is more in keeping with the guys walking in the desert than the couple snacking on hors d'oeuvres there.

The United States and Europe are the only two countries with lots of land that's fully connected with pavement, which makes road travel comfortable for all but the most serious naturalists who truly enjoy pitching tents. Jeeping or Land Roving off into, say, the Alaskan bush — even onto a US desert -- is highly impractical. With all the asphault veins, you don't need to cut across country to get from here to there. And if you do, it's almost guaranteed to get a traveler into trouble with someone.

Out West, cattle ranchers and cowboys on horseback are going to war with the US Department of Interior because their cows can't roam freely where the buffaloes used to. So tell me: How realistic is luxury Jeeping? Land Roving Bush Yuppies in Nevada's deserts or canyons would be lucky to meet a ticket-swinging US Forest Ranger instead of the bulldozer Nye County rancher, Dick Carver, used to spearhead the rebellion shaping up in that state.

Even in undeveloped countries where Jeeps and Land Rovers come in handy, off road travel usually takes place on washboard roads and pot holed trails that serve up mouths’ full of red clay dust more readily than caviar. Horseback riding in Belize's Maya Mountains didn't give me as many aches and pains as bumping and banging by Jeep across that country's rutted-out Hummingbird Highway.

Of course, the Land Rover I rented in Ecuador came equipped with a jump seat on the roof, which was an exceptional way to view the 20,000-foot high Andean volcanoes. It was nothing less than panorama-in-the-round, without the need for head-spinning exorcism. But, hey, in just one hour I froze my buns off and that was the end of topside travel in a swinging lawn chair of sorts.

Travel writer, Susan Hack, shares her experience with an elephant back safari in Conde Nast Traveler's December 1995 issue. During the trip through the Okavango Delta in Botswana, Africa, Hack likens these four-footed land rovers to Land Rovers with wheels, and concludes that elephants are the best all-terrain vehicles. (Elephant safari How To's are listed on page 105.)

But whether it's adventure travel by natural or manmade carrier, it seems that mixed signals have ruled the day even before TV got hold of what's trendy: According to Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary, an adventurer is "one that adventures; as a: Soldier of Fortune." An adventuress is "a female adventurer; esp: a woman who seeks position or livelihood by questionable means." Ouch. That hurts more than butt-blisters from elephants, or stiff necks from Jeeps.