Felix, Mogli, Rudi and the school bus they turned into a home
The headaches just started leave his impressive loft in Berlin to catch the plane to the US: the heavy luggage, made up of cameras and drones , was not allowed on the plane. It was their first trouble, and they saved it with flying colours.
Once in North America, they began working on building your new mobile home, and they found, of course, that the bus was more dilapidated than expected : leaks, leaks, holes and other difficulties they put them to the test , but again, they all came out with flying colors. Even when he did so cold the paint didn't even stick to the wall managed to complete the task.
"We had no idea what we were doing!" , Mogli tells us from his car that has now become a home. " We were finding out as we went with the help of good tools and Youtube tutorials. To me I was good from the start , and woodworking was so much fun! Felix, however, realized that it was not for him, so he carried out tasks such as painting the bus. In the end - when we hardly had time left - he got over himself and did all plumbing and electrical installation while I put the tiles in the bathroom", explains the artist.
Mogli refers to when time was pressing - his 90-day visa expired in a week - and suffered one of the worst blows of his expedition: the carpenter they were working with he abandoned them and he made them leave his garden, where they fixed the caravan, still No insurance or registration. The young people had to leave in a hurry, and besides, with a failure in the heater that almost ruined the engine. They were even stopped by a policeman, who, unexpectedly, he took pity on his luck and turned a blind eye.
Thereafter, They crossed the border into Canada. Everything seemed to be going well, they greatly enjoyed the natural wonders of the country and provided encouragement and supplies to each cyclist they found, as Felix had recently gone ** around the world on a bicycle ** (traveling 18,000 kilometers and 22 countries in 365 days) and he felt very sympathetic to the cause.
The best thing was that Rudi, his cub, could roam freely through nature, and for a couple who had left everything they knew for him, that was very important. It turns out that when they adopted the puppy, they realized that, due to a defect in his breed, he couldn't climb stairs often ...and they lived in a third without an elevator. After crossing all of Berlin looking for a new place to live, they wondered almost jokingly, while they ate a pizza, what really tied them to that place . So, they decided to go on this journey. That's where the idea of the bus came in.
" We have never seen a caravan with style At least not the style we like. We knew we were going to be on that bus for a long time, so it was important that we could design it based on our needs and our taste, to feel like home," Mogli tells us. "However, it has some downsides: it's super loud, and does not take well to bumpy roads. Also, is not isolated the way a caravan is, and since it has so many windows, heats up like a metal box when the weather is nice, which is very hard on our dog.
It was also very hard when, before leaving Canada, they discovered that the puppy had to have surgery on the bones of the legs. After the intervention, he was crying and convalescing for some time, and the sadness of seeing him suffer was added a fight over a visa to enter the US which lasted two full days. During them, the couple tried by all means to convince the immigration employees that they in no way wanted to stay in the United States, that they were just passing through. After much insistence and practically presenting a biography of their lives, they succeeded.
But was that the worst thing that happened to these two adventurers? Nope. The worst was yet to arrive meters before the border. There, they deposited Rudi, still recovering, in a metal box, in the sun . They left him there alone for hours, despite the prayers and the pain of Mogli and Felix. When they finally got it back, he was in poor shape.
"Sometimes it's hard to stay happy and enjoy when so many things go wrong, but we have each other and especially our puppy, who it makes us very happy. When we have a bad day, one of us reminds the other how good he is compared to other people in the world ", explains the artist.
Is refreshing travel perspective, that shows not only the happy moments, but also the sad ones, not only the perfect shots, but also the pajamas and the breakfast face , is being unevenly received by the Internet community. " The tone of your vlogs is too sad in my opinion if you are in an expedition called "happiness", comment, for example, one of the Youtube users. Others refer to the delicate musical themes that accompany the images, which they brand as "melancholy" and that they are largely performed by Mogli herself (here you can listen to her latest single).
However, the many followers they gather (on Facebook alone there are more than 67,000) seem enjoy this realistic perspective, and, empathize so much with the protagonists who suffer with the state of the dog. " My dogs are everything to me too. I am super upset with your experience crossing the border and horrified at the way Rudi was treated ", comments another user in her latest video to date. In fact, the messages of support for the furry are so many that the only words that are commented in this last vlog are thanks to those who have shown affection for the dog.
"Rudi is still recovering from his surgery, but he is already much better. However, he doesn't do very well to endure so much heat, so we don't make plans until it occurs to us a way that he can be happy on the road. Anyway, we never make too many plans, we take things as they come. We don't have a destination or a time limit, so we will continue until life on the road stops liking us ".
Maybe that's why one of his last video blogs, the one that takes place when they cross the Alaskan border, is titled " Is the end? " And it is that, with so many setbacks, it is inevitable to ask them, as well as to analyze what could have been done differently: "For example, we bought the bus online and we did not give importance to the height. We fit, but sometimes we are a bit tight and on many occasions, n our visitors are too tall to be able to stand inside. However, we do not spend too much time contemplating the past. There will always be something that goes wrong but we try to concentrate on the present and s you are happy "explains the couple.
That is precisely why they should be called 'Expedition Happiness'. Not because they are always happy (who is?), but because, like the best of travellers, they know how to look for the good side of everything and they try to spend as little time as possible thinking about the negatives. For example, parking such a vehicle could destroy anyone's morale, but not yours: "Finding parking in a big city can be impossible , so we try to avoid them and stay in nature As much as we can. You can't always have everything in one trip. so we don't feel like we're restricting ourselves," analyzes Mogli, always positive.
And she adds: "We have seen beautiful places, like the Banff National Park, Denali, the glaciers or the Grand Canyon, that took our breath away. What we like most about our trip is camping in the middle of nowhere, enjoy nature without distractions and spend time with our little family. It's a feeling of pure happiness and freedom. Also, one cool thing about our bus and our solar power system is that even at those times , I can make a cake or a lasagna ", recalls the singer, focusing again on the best part of the trip, the one that keeps us going no matter what. Because, after all, Isn't that the true essence of making a path?