A NOTE FROM THE EDITOR:

This weekend we are featuring a guest post by fellow author Jacqueline Lambert. Our paths crossed recently in the world of travel writing and we were delighted to read her book More Manchester Than Mongolia: An Unexpected Road Trip Through Back Road Britain, which is due to be released on December 5, 2025! Jackie and her husband Mark have had some incredible adventures, to say the least. We are pleased to read and share some of Jackie’s experiences, through her warm and buoyant descriptions. Take a look:

THE BEAST, THE BALKANS & THE KINDNESS OF STRANGERS

How a 24.5-tonne Ex-Military Truck Taught Us the Real Reason We Roam

by Jacqueline Lambert

Buying The Beast (No Sensible Adult Would Have Done This)

On Friday the 13th of December 2019, our lives changed forever.

For three glorious years, my husband, Mark, and I had been full-time nomads accompanied by The Fab Four – our quartet of fluffy Cavapoos (Cavalier/poodle cross). In summer, we roamed Europe in Caravan Kismet, hauled along by our van and surf bus, Big Blue. In winter, we warmed our bones by skiing down mountains, and sipping vin brülé.

Then the Friday-the-13th nightmare happened. The UK electorate handed Boris Johnson ultimate power. 

That meant only one thing – Brexit – and the shrivelling of our unlimited freedom to tour Europe down to a measly 90 days in every 180. 

It was arrivederci Alps, adios Spain – and au revoir to lazy, year-long road trips.

In a fit of melodrama and clarity, I uttered a life-changing sentence to my beloved, 

“I’ve had enough of Britain. Let’s go to Mongolia.”

There. I’d said it out loud. 

So it stuck. 

If you’re set on driving to Mongolia – a country three times the size of France with only three paved roads – you really shouldn’t be towing a caravan. Which is why we began researching ‘expedition vehicles’ with all the expertise of persons unable to distinguish a torque wrench from a toast rack.

We knew we needed something rugged, fixable, four-wheel-drive – and preferably not so military-looking that we’d be shot at. After flirting with a fire engine and an ex-army ambulance, whose interiors didn’t set us alight, we plumped for the idea of building our own. 

We trusted in the Haynes Build Your Own Overland Camper manual, Mark’s talent for spatial wizardry, and our own senseless, unfounded optimism.

Online, we spotted a batch of 1990, 6×4-wheel-drive, bull-nosed Volvo N10s being retired by the Belgian Army. 

Huge. Indestructible. And completely inappropriate.

We were smitten!

The specs claimed the N10s could climb ridiculous gradients, forge through deep rivers, and – according to a video sent by our Dutch friend Casper – navigate the Amazon accompanied by bikini-clad dancers draped with anacondas. 

One already had a cargo box fitted. That alone could save a year of engineering headaches. And the price was good. The engine was pre-electronics (fixable by any mechanic with a hammer) – and because she was 14-tonnes heavier than the overlanding ‘sweet spot’, 33ft (10 m) long, and towered nearly 13 ft (4 m) high, I’d named her:

The Beast.

But buying an enormous ex-military truck, sight unseen, off the internet, when you have zero experience is… bold. Some might say deranged.

An uncharacteristic attack of common sense hit us. 

She wasn’t right. 

She was far too big and far too heavy. 

On the 13th of January – exactly one month after declaring our intent to reach Mongolia – we put down a deposit.

Mark grinned at me and delivered the second life-altering sentence.

“She may be too big and too heavy, but she’ll be fun…”

Life With The Beast (Or: Why Do Strangers Keep Running Toward Us?)

Of course, saying, “It will be fun…” is very different from actually converting a twenty-four-and-a-half-tonne gross ex-military truck into a rolling off-grid home for two humans and a furry family of four.

It involved many instances of wanting to curl up into the foetal position and sob uncontrollably. But after months of sawdust, swearing, and the creeping realisation that if we didn’t finish her on time, we’d be homeless – because we’d sold our house to fund the project – we somehow produced something miraculous: a functioning overland camper.

And once she rumbled into the world with all her bull-nosed charm and the aerodynamics of a NATO-green shipping container, we discovered the Haynes manual had omitted one crucial detail.

A vehicle like The Beast turns everyday life into a travelling street performance.

We’d expected breakdowns. We’d expected questions. We did not expect the sheer, unfiltered enthusiasm she inspires.

Every day, people wave, grin, cheer, and sneak photos of her from behind a coffee or their steering wheel. Children beg us to blast the horn, and adults hope we might.

And she’s sparked a few fairly ‘interesting’ encounters.

As we crawled through a town in Montenegro, a dark Mercedes saloon slewed menacingly across a zebra crossing ahead of The Beast to block her progress. Mark’s emergency stop hurled me forwards.  

The doors on either side of the Mercedes flew open. Two men leapt out and rushed towards us, like in a gangster movie. The driver remained inside with the engine running, ready for a quick getaway.

Wide-eyed, I squeaked to Mark, “Is this a heist?”

Before he could answer, the pair positioned themselves in front of The Beast’s radiator grille and gave a thumbs-up to their driver, who snapped their photo on his phone. They turned to shoot us a naughty-boy grin, raced back, jumped into their car, and drove off.

No robbery – just mobile paparazzi.

In another Balkan town, while I waited for Mark to get cash from an ATM, a man vaulted a hedge from a café on the far side of a square, sprinted over, and swung straight into the driver’s seat next to me. His camera-wielding mate captured a triumphant smirk – before he sauntered casually back to his coffee.

Some interactions are gentler. 

On show in our UK hometown of Bournemouth, we had no such guerilla tactics. Visitors formed a long and orderly queue to be granted a peek inside The Beast. As the crowds filed in and out, I noticed friends outside, waiting patiently for an audience with us. I left Mark hosting and rescued them from the line. After coffee away from the mayhem, my foot had barely touched our bottom step when an indignant woman at the front pronounced, “Excuse me. EXCUSE ME! There is a queue, you know.” 

“This is MY truck!” I replied.

She didn’t miss a beat. 

“Oh well. That’s alright then.” She gestured for me to proceed, granting me leave to enter my own home!

But my favourite moment happened in Gaeta, the impossibly scenic Italian coastal town halfway between Rome and Naples. At a campsite facing the Tyrrhenian Sea, all the residents spilled out to photograph The Beast as she arrived. One man, Giampietro, sported a grin wide enough to split his face and said, “I’ve been following you all the way down Italy!”

He’d seen a photo of The Beast online – then another, then another – and had tracked our progress south with the diligence of Mission Control monitoring a lunar landing. He greeted us as if we were A-list celebrities, rather than two Brits, four dogs, and a huge green truck that accelerates with all the urgency of a tectonic plate. 

To Giampietro, meeting The Beast in person was akin to the culmination of a pilgrimage. He insisted on a photo. 

He posted it online and within hours, it had gathered 176 comments.

“I saw this in Saturnia!” 

“We passed that on the autostrada!”

The Beast isn’t just noticed. She is celebrated. Cheered on. And shared like a moving myth. She doesn’t merely attract people – she beckons them in, makes them bold, and awakens their curiosity. 

And that brings me to the truth we never saw coming.

The Real Reason We Roam

When we first hit the road, we set out in search of epic views, dramatic mountain passes, and spectacular sunsets that bleed into the seascapes of foreign shores. It was all about seeing sights that drain you of words – then send you scrambling for your camera.

But The Beast has taught us something far more profound.

Landscapes are lovely… but it’s the people who make a journey unforgettable.

Like the Bosnian campsite owner – now a cherished friend – who nicknamed us ‘Mad Max’ and whisked us off to see hidden treasures: the seats of kings, a trout lake where we caught our dinner, and the ruins of an Illyrian city some believe to be Troy.

Or the Bulgarian man who hopped wordlessly onto his scooter to guide The Beast through a maze of narrow village streets when a road closure stranded us.

Or the hundreds of people who wander over to The Beast simply to talk, smile, share a joke, or place a hand on her wheel arch and sigh with childlike delight.

These events aren’t planned. They’re not written in guidebooks. And you can’t programme them into your satnav. They happen because The Beast has a peculiar superpower: she dissolves barriers between strangers and creates moments.

And those moments are exactly what make travelling with her feel magical.

Yes, The Fab Four have always melted hearts – but The Beast amplifies that magic, forging connections in the most unexpected places – on mountain passes, in city traffic, or sometimes, just visiting an ATM.

Travel is about connection.

It turns out we didn’t build a mere camper; we built a catalyst.

A great, lumbering, utterly ridiculous and charming machine that reminds us daily that the world is far kinder than the headlines suggest, and that most strangers are simply friends we haven’t met yet.

When Mark said, “Yes, but it will be fun,” we had no idea what kind of fun.

The real adventure is not the miles beneath our wheels, but the hearts we meet along the way, and through these experiences we’ve learned that human connection isn’t incidental to travel. 

It is travel.

Everything else – the landscapes, the landmarks – and even the sunsets – is mere decoration. 

And as long as The Beast keeps rolling, we’ll keep collecting these moments – funny, chaotic, touching – because they are the richest souvenirs any traveller could hope to find.

Author Bio

Jacqueline Lambert writes award-winning comic travelogues fuelled by curiosity, chaos, and the company of canines. She has penned eight bestselling books about life since she quit work to become a full-time nomad, including six in her Adventure Travel / Adventure Caravanning With Dogs series, and two charting progress with her Wayward Truck. 

Building The Beast: A funny true story of van life, DIY disasters, and one very big truck and her new release, More Manchester Than Mongolia: An Unexpected Road Trip Through Back Road Britain, chronicle her initial steps into Lorry Life. 

Her stories blend humour, mishap, and heartfelt observation as she and the crew explore Europe on six wheels. Jacqueline is currently working on her next trucking adventure, an overlanding odyssey through the Balkans, due for publication in 2026.

Keep in Touch

If you want to follow her adventures or be the first to know when Jacqueline releases new books, here are a few ways to connect:

Author Website: https://jacquelinelambert.co.uk Travel Blog: https://www.WorldWideWalkies.comAmazon: https://author.to/JLambert Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/18672478.Jacqueline_Lambert Bookbub: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/jacqueline-lambertFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/JacquelineLambertAuthor If you enjoyed Jackie’s post about adventure caravanning, you might also enjoy this travel memoir by author V M Karren: The Tales of a Fly-by-Night and Other Stories I never Told My Mother.

Click on the book to read a sample.