These 3 Strangers Are Moving Into Van For A 100-Day Trip Around India

Caravaning is a relatively unknown concept in India, with most travellers in the country choosing to travel the length of our subcontinent on bike or road trips. But three ambitious young travellers aim to bring about a change in this area by doing an extensive caravan trip across India.

The Brains Behind The Wheel

Rohith Subramanian and Ankita Kumar, two well-known Indian travellers are joining William Meara, an Irish entrepreneur and investigative traveller, to break out of the mould that India has set for travel.

This will be the first ever documented caravan trip in India. But before we go into what the trio hope to achieve from all this, here’s what caravanning means.

Each of these travellers is very different from one another with completely different travel styles and dreams entirely. The only thing the three of them have in common is that they have no homes to go call their own.

Ankita is a solo woman traveller who recently got back from a 4-month trip to South America. Rohith is a biker who gave up his job and company to travel to 35 countries in 2 years. William is an investigative traveller who has gone hitch-hiking across the Middle East, Pakistan and even North Korea!

The Plan

The trip began on 4th March and will continue for 100 days up until July. The trio plan on covering six states, starting in Bangalore and then hopefully ending in Jaipur.

The six states to be covered are Kerala, Maharashtra, Goa, Rajasthan, Karnataka, and Gujarat. They hope to also visit lesser known villages and towns to get the rawest experience India can give them.

The Van

One question people must be dying to know the answer to is “what about the van?”. Normally if a traveller wants to go on a caravan trip in India, he/she will have to import a caravan into the country, which is really expensive. This wasn’t a pocket-friendly option for Ankit, Rohith and William. So they decided to take it one step further and pimp their ride.

They stripped the interiors of a 1990 Force Matador and remodelled it to fit in a bed, sink and anything else they’d need on the trip. They’re also decorating the interiors to make it a trendy urban home on wheels. To top it all off, they lovingly named their van Kiro. By revamping an Indian vehicle, they hope to encourage more travellers from the country to choose caravanning in the future.

Activities For The Road

100 Days on the road is quite a long time, so the trio has come up with a number of interesting activities to make their journey more interesting. For one, they hope to associate and mix with a number of conservation groups on the road.

A few great groups are Wild Otters a group to promote conservation of wild otters in Goa, Barefoot College in Tiloniya that hope to better rural life with sustainable resources, and Ten Degrees Off in Bandipur that deals with the conservation of wildlife and the environment. Apart from this, four programs will be organised on the road to get to know the locals better.

Food Truck: A local chef will be picked up along the way to convert the van into a food truck for a day

Live Gig: The trio will put up a small gig outside their van with a local musician

Pop Up: A local artisan or designer will be picked up and the van will be converted to a small boutique selling clothing, art, and accessories for a day

Storytelling Session: Find some local kids and put up an interesting story-telling session for them

Say Hi

Ankita, Rohith and William don’t have a specific itinerary for this trip but are documenting every step of their journey on social media. If you’re hoping that they’d land in your city, keep tabs on “Droom Caravan Chronicles” on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. You can always send them a message and say hi!