What do rising fuel prices mean for overlanding?

What do rising fuel prices mean for overlanding?

Fuel prices continue to rise, the crisis that has been born from the Russian invasion of Ukrain has taken hold in numerous ways with one of the most painfull being at the pump. So what do rising fuel prices mean for overlanding? For those of us overlanding on a budget [or not even] it will probably mean cancelled trips and shorter journeys.

Spain is in crisis with more than just prices at the pump, at the time of writing what started as a small strike and a few demonstrations from a couple of unknown trucker organisations has now grown into something much, much bigger – supermarket shelves are becoming empty again as deliveries are not getting through, the trouble of course is over sky high fuel prices even though the price of gas has come down.

Couple this with rising cases of the latest Covid 19 variant and Easter just around the corner and it looks like the next few weeks or even months may be on the rough side [one reason why we started prepping]

Overlanding is a recreational activity, something we believe is increasingly more important to balance into your life, with all the threats of a potential WW3, nuclear defences, North Korea testing long range weapons and all the rest of what I don’t really need to mention here, putting a smile on your face and having something to look forward too is pretty much essential to help you motivated and even sane in world which is becoming more dangerous by the day.

Fuel Price Difference – Fact

The Shogun Sport has a 75ltr tank, to fill from empty at the beginning of this year would have cost me €95,00 euros, as of March 2002 that figure is now €140,00

Okay, so what about real life? In reality no-one fills up from completely empty so the hard core noticable difference at the pump for us is around €30,00 every time we fill up. That is a hard hit no matter which way you look at it.

Get an App

Spanish filling stations have rather erratic pricing at the best of times, getting an app helps identify which filling stations are offering the best prices on fuel in a certain area. For us the difference between two local filling stations can be as high as 20c per liter.

Shorter Overland Trips

We’ve put a road trip to Asturias and Galicia on hold for the foreseeable, the simple fact is that fuel is going to be the killer, having planned the costs and mileage as near as we could the trip would now cost us an additional €240,00+ euros in diesel costs.

Staying closer to home and investigating more in our own back yard is going to be the name of the game for the Summer of 2022 unless the volatility calms down and fuel prices fall to an acceptable level.

Economy

If you’re into overlanding then you’ll know this already but it’s still worth mentioning here:

• Shop around for fuel
• Use a less heavy left foot!
• Don’t carry weight you don’t need
• Does the RTT need to be on?
• Unnecessary gear on the roof rack?
• Kill all unnecessary journeys
• Overland shorter routes
• Don’t let engine idle when stationary
• etc etc

Overland Buddy

Teaming up with an overland buddy can be a great way to still get out there while keeping the costs down. Yeah, I know we all like to take our own rig but for a longer planned trip/camping just taking one vehicle or sharing as part of a team with others can reduce the costs of your [and their] weekend considerably.

Looking ahead, lets hope that things get sorted out especially between Russia and Ukrain, as for fuel prices I can see them remaining higher than they were quite considerably even if prices at the pump do drop.

Things are changing in the world.