I once drove from the Kruger to Johannesburg in a tiny Suzuki – yes, the one with no room for a pool, sauna or pony. The roads were long and the sky huge – in my small tin can, I felt like the proverbial straw riding piggyback on a camel (that’s a farmyard, not a sentence). Except that the camel’s back didn’t break.

And if my car broke down, I would be robbed of all my valuables, my wife would be taken as a slave, and I would have my throat cut on the side of the road. So said the road signs. Well, not word for word, but I was warned against stopping for any reason.

So I persevered and was in Johannesburg by nightfall, seven hours and eight minutes after my spinning wheels-attempt departure. I hugged my GPS and took it out for a drink.

I also drove from Kochi to Kerala in an ancient Ambassador. Well, just for a couple of miles. Then, when the rain started to fall and the roads turned to rivers of mud, I stopped on the side of the road and turned on the GPS on my phone.

Actually, it could have been the middle of the road – I couldn’t see a thing and the wipers had died. But I followed the little red dot on the screen and arrived in a safe village where I had the best bhajis the subcontinent could offer. Well, they might not have been that good – it was my relief that made them extra delicious.

Map-making had never been a precise art- Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures

Driving overland is a doddle. No river too wide, no mountain too high – I just key in the postcode of my destination and drive off. Simple. Except for when the GPS doesn’t work.

Some years back, I was making my way from Salerno to Naples along a secondary road. The fields were fat with colour, the sky ruggedly beautiful and the wheels were pattering the tarmac like the hand on an old friend’s back. The whole universe was conspiring to make my drive as fairy tale as possible – in fact, I half expected Toad from Wind in the Willows to overtake me.

Then suddenly, the GPS went blank, I took a wrong turning, and I found myself in the middle of what looked like Buġibba, but a thousand times worse. So I did what any wise driver would do and joined a lane of slow-moving traffic.

“Isn’t there anyone directing the traffic?” my wife asked.

Yes there was – a girl and her friend in their underwear. So I pulled out of the kerb-crawling track and, with my GPS still dead, arrived in Naples two days later.

GPS has turned the world into one small village. But there are still areas which, for some reason, aren’t mapped – you hit them and, like black holes, they swallow you in, car and all. Try finding a pub for lunch in the English countryside – a little place with homemade brews and eggs from the chickens in the backyard.

Ignore John Cleese’s voice prompting you to turn around, now, at your peril. Because you will not find your pub. And you will get lost. True, the English countryside can be as handsome as Heathcliff – but at three in the afternoon, it’s like being caught in a still from The Returned.

Is there a moral at the end of this overland story? Not really. Just consider getting lost as part of the adventure.

And while we’re on the line, how familiar are you with the village of Bouchemaine? I’ve been stuck here for two hours, trying to find the exit.

techeditor@timesofmalta.com

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