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It was during the four years from 1999 to 2003 that Tanja and Denis Katzer were caught in the spotlight on the adventurer and explorer stage, when they embarked upon their world record walk across Australia. A 7,000 km trek from South to North; West to East.
Tanja and Denis filmed their caravan of camels in the desert and sent the material to a Perth-based TV channel (three episodes of which were actually broadcast). As Denis put it, “that was pretty cool.” Before their departure the producer threw a small leaving party during which she (the producer) took Denis to one side and asked why he thought their story was so important. “Because not many people choose to walk across this huge continent of yours,” he replied.
Her response was less than heartwarming: “I’ll give you that, only a few people have tried. But that’s not the real reason. We don’t expect you to survive. And that’s what we want. Don’t misunderstand me, we don’t want you to die, but we’re pretty sure that’s going to happen anyway and it will make the headlines. And you are our story.”
“This wasn’t good. I couldn’t believe my ears. They wanted to profit from our failure, our death. And to cap it all, she chose this farewell party as her moment to share this disappointing snippet of journalistic anticipation with me. Right there and then, I made a vow to myself: I’ll show you. I’m not going to die.”
Needless to say, Tanja and Denis completed what they set out to achieve and published their experience as Karawane durchs Outback, a 140-page book abundant with images and anecdotes. But more importantly, their story was broadcast by National Geographic in 60 languages to an audience of no less than 250 million people worldwide. Tanja and Denis were now in the limelight and their career took an impressive turn for the better. A career that began in the 1980s when Denis was still travelling on his own.
To discuss his mammoth Mother Earth project, the longest continued documentary of our planet, I joined Denis at his parent’s house which now serves as a museum and archive for the treasures, films and photographs which bear witness to more than three decades of relentless exploration.
When I implied that Denis had become a popular figure amongst the German cycling community, he cut me short: “I don’t want to be classified as a cyclist. I am an adventurer, and my prime objective is to document the planet on which we live. That includes bike riding, horse riding, camel riding…and the planet…to discover things and to share them with people who cannot travel…to wake them up.”
And so began our two-part interview.
If you were to caption this interview, what would your message unveil?
I want to prevent suffering. I have seen so much suffering. I want our children to see the trees, hear the birds twitter, and be able to roam freely without a mask to clarify the polluted air. I want them to be able to fell their own decisions without being under the watchful eye of the authorities or marionettes of a few wealth-driven megalomaniacs. That is my motivation: to ensure life is worth living.
We live on a planet. But in my eyes, this planet, Mother Earth, is a living organism. Not like Mars.
At the core of our planet is magma which expands and contracts (over hundreds of thousands of years) like a heartbeat. The planet is alive and humanity is not treating her well. If we hurt the planet, then she will eventually hurt us back.
I want to be component in restoring harmony between us and the platform upon which we live. This has been the driving force behind all of our expeditions to date, and will continue to be so for the future.
In summary, I have documented everything we have seen and experienced. From tribes that have been eradicated or deprived of their culture, to the toll greed and irresponsibility have taken upon wildlife. I see it as my vocation to record from whence we came; to document our history and ensure we don’t lose the ties with our past and the events and actions that have ultimately shaped our society as we know it today.
I try to be as factual as possible when I write—without criticism or judgement, regardless of the outcome. Someone else can decide what is good or bad. Is it good or bad if someone dies when a volcano erupts? In the bigger picture, it happens and everyone has the right to their own opinion.
I have had the good fortune to travel in time. Really. I have travelled through time. We all have. It won’t be possible to see what I have seen or experience what I have experienced, ever again. I have visited tribes that were still in the stone age, tribes that ran around with penis-sheaths; seen people who killed each other because of tribal rights and rituals…and I was in the middle of it all.
I documented everything. Now, those tribes have been extinguished, and the few that still remain will most likely disappear in the next 20 or 30 years. They’ll dress like us, maybe study at university, or drive a taxi. It’ll be like the natives of North America: They attempt to uphold their culture and pay tribute to their forefathers—but when they’ve performed a ceremonial dance around a fire (or whatever else they do), they jump in their Jeep and drive back to their home in the suburbs. That’s not representative of their heritage. It’s not the same as going hunting with members of your tribe in fear of being hit by a poisoned dart from a rival.
During my career, I have searched for adventure. Not the amusement park thrill where people are pseudo-scared by plastic crocodiles and ghost trains. An authentic adventure is being somewhere, where a real crocodile can leap out and tear your arm off. The opportunity to be that close to reality is what drives me. But one mustn’t take things too far, or else the arm might be gone.
Denis, tell me about yourself before you became a full-time traveller.
At school, I suffered from a bad case of exam nerves. I never really got over it. By recommendation I then ended up becoming an office equipment engineer at, what was then an international player with 30,000 employees worldwide, Olympia—due to my communicative nature and social skills. I mean, come on, we’re talking about repairing typewriters and such. This may have been regarded an achievement, but I would be lying if I said I was ecstatic.
Soon enough, it was time for my national service. At this point, I decided to take this seriously and signed up for the special forces. After all, I was pretty good at all sports…well, not bad…certainly better than average. I ended up as a paratrooper in the special forces and went on to be one of the best. This was amazing. All of a sudden I was in my element, jumping out of low flying helicopters in the pitch of night. I was fearless. I had weapons training, learned everything there was to know about navigation, and became a team leader.
I worked my way up through the ranks and became a trainer at one the best camps for elite soldiers. The Green Berets, SAS, they all came to us for special training. Ironically, I could never tell my parents what I did because my father was an avid pacifist—that would have been a disaster.
One day, I asked my troops, “who would like to support the British in the Falklands war?” (I should point out that these guys generally had a pretty high IQ.) Anyway, 80% of these soldiers raised their hands and said they were prepared to go.
Now, for those who are unaware, after the second world war, the schools in Germany taught that never again could there be a war like that. We all had a terrible conscience for the atrocities, and I carried this guilt around with me for many, many years, even during my first trips abroad. I hadn’t had anything to do with it, but I still felt guilty when I visited foreign countries.
So, when all these men raised their hands, I asked, “why?” Their answer was simply that they had been trained to shoot at cardboard figures and kill. Now they wanted to put their training into practice, for real. I explained to them that the reality they sought was when a bullet hits their companion in the head and they scrape blood and gore from their tunic.
I had trained these men so well, they were now killers. I was shocked at myself for what I had done. I resigned. Even though I felt very much at home here and was good at what I did, I made the first really big decision in my life and turned my back on a career I excelled at.
Suddenly, I was wearing my grey coat, standing at a bench, repairing office machines again.
One day, a trainee called over to me, “hey, Katzer, throw me a screwdriver!” I span around and said, “the least you can do is say please!” I had grown accustomed to being a highly skilled officer in the special forces commanding 30 or 40 men. Now there was a young upstart telling me to throw him a screwdriver. No respect. This was the reality and a tough pill to swallow. It dawned upon me that I was being sucked into society and would likely be stuck here for the rest of my life.
Around the same time, and against the advice of my friends, I followed an invitation to play American football for the Nürnberg Rams (at the time, the Nürnberg Rams played in the first division games). My military training led me to believe I was indestructible—no fear, no pain. Nine months later I was a wreck. My knee had been twisted so badly (it still gives me problems even today), my football career came to an abrupt halt. I was frustrated and at a loss what to do next.
A friend of mine, who owned several travel agencies, suggested a change of scenery: Asia. Why Asia, I asked. Well, I wanted to surf, dive, paraglide, skydive, and drive a jeep with fat tyres—all the things young men brimming with testosterone enjoy. I wasn’t an idiot, but it seemed like a good idea and we took off in 1982.
When we landed in Thailand, the cabin door opened and the tropical heat poured in. I had never felt anything like it before. The smiling people at immigration…everything was fascinating.
I explored the region in northern Thailand known as the Golden Triangle, where opium was cultivated, began climbing active volcanoes, and did all sorts of crazy stuff including riding a motorcycle into the jungle. It was at this point that I realised my technical and military training was beginning to pay off.
And then you added purpose to your wanderlust…
I mentioned before that my father was a pacifist. When we watched cowboys and Indians on TV, he sided with the natives every time. In those days, the American movie makers portrayed the Indians as the bad guys and my father always tried to explain to me who the real culprits, responsible for the suffering, were. And it stuck with me.
In 1987, I went to the Galapagos Islands with another friend of mine. We arrived during the most ferocious storm, and the boat we were on nearly sank. One second you saw the sea, the next the angry skies above. All the hatches had blown open and, as if by coincidence (which I don’t believe in) a newspaper washed up against my feet. The headline: four engineers savaged by Auca Indians.
Status review: On the one hand, I recalled my father’s explanation about who really brought suffering upon others and, on the other, here was a newspaper headline claiming a savage tribe was responsible for the deaths of some engineers. I turned to our translator and asked if there were really Indians in the jungle. “Of course,” he said. That was it, I had to go and find them. He put me in touch with a friend of his who was half Auca, half Ecuadorian, and spoke both languages.
Leaving the islands, we forged our way into the depths of the jungle and first stayed with a ruthless band of cocaine smugglers. This was my first, albeit impromptu, expedition. I actually got to see the tree where the engineers had been put to death. This really was a very dangerous situation: We were in Auca territory and nobody knew who their next victim was going to be.
While I was there, I couldn’t overlook some huge oil tanks along the river banks that had been built by one of the industry leaders. The tanks were leaking their content into the river which then carried it downstream to the tribal villages. The natives hadn’t a clue what was going on. The river had always been their source of drinking water. Now it was poisoned and they were dying. There was no other way to describe it: They were being murdered and nobody gave a damn. I was shocked.
With time, the tribe accepted me and allowed me to participate in their daily rituals. It seems the employment agency was right, I had a gift to blend in with almost anyone, anywhere. To all intents and purposes, I too ran around naked.
On one occasion, a tribesman took me to the settlement of gold diggers and smugglers. They were the epitome of low-life gangsters and criminals and, because he was just a native Indian, they treated him with as much disrespect as they could muster. In their eyes, he wasn’t worth the dirt he walked upon.
This was his first contact with so-called civilised people, he wanted to sell them a monkey. I couldn’t believe what I was witnessing and took it upon myself to start professionally documenting the plight of the Auca.
At the time, I was still working for Olympia and pretty good at what I did. Not only repairing, but also selling equipment. In fact, at the end of the month, the commission I earned exceeded my technician’s salary and the workshop manager started to take notice. Eventually, he offered me a job which, after some lengthy negotiations, included special terms allowing me to take six weeks off at the end of each year and six weeks at the beginning of the next. I now had the freedom to travel and still keep my paid job.
Later, as sales manager, I was in a position to self-finance my expensive travels. Having to return to the grindstone after an expedition was not easy, so I started to toy with the idea of leaving altogether. Almost as if on cue, the boss called me at home and offered me a job as his right-hand man, with a vastly improved salary, Mercedes-Benz car, and all the perks. He gave me 24 hours to make a decision.
Tanja and I were in the throes of figuring out how to leave our jobs and prepare for a three-year timeout: “The Three-Year Expedition.” As we discussed this amazing job offer, my eyes wandered over to my back pack and thermal mat in the corner of the room. Even though I had been granted a lot of freedom, the time just wasn’t enough to become fully immersed in a different country and culture. However, this offer was so good, it could eventually make me a millionaire. I suggested to Tanja that I stick with it for two more years. I could save the half million I stood to earn, bank it, resign, and then we could use the 10% interest to travel.
Tanja gave me the best piece of advice I have ever received: She said that if I stayed on for another two years, I ran the risk of becoming so addicted to the money and power that I might not be able to tear myself away and would ultimately lose sight of my dream.
The following day, my boss called. I asked if he was sitting down before thanking him for this wonderful opportunity—and then went on to inform him I was about to hand in my notice.
This was the turning point in your lives. What were your next steps?
It was 1991, and Tanja and I embarked on our first journey to Italy, Egypt and Turkey—after which Tanja had to return to Germany to finish her apprenticeship. So we agreed to meet up again in India the following year.
Meanwhile, I continued through East Anatolia, Iran, and on to Pakistan, where a Swedish guy (who I had met along the way) and I travelled on the roofs of trains. From up here I had an unhindered view of the goings-on as we travelled the country. To my surprise, whenever the rail tracks crossed a road I didn’t see cars queuing at the barrier, but camels. Sitting on the camel was invariably a macho, dressed in colourful attire, oozing raw manliness. I thought to myself: I want to do that too. And the next expedition was born.
Nobody had tried to cross Pakistan with camels before. But who was to tell me it couldn’t be done, unless they had tried. And even if they had failed, that still didn’t make it impossible.
Tanja joined me in India as planned, and we explored the country on a motorbike before returning to Germany to plan the camel expedition through Pakistan. One thing led to another, the three years passed, but we still hadn’t seen the world. To be honest, you can’t see the world in three years unless you jet from one place to the next. Even then, you still won’t really experience everything. So, we extended our three-year expedition and dubbed it “The Five-Year Expedition”. Before we knew it, the five years had also passed.
We were back in Germany at the time working on a TV series called The Ten-Year Expedition, so we renamed our own expedition accordingly. The show was a hit even though, and I’m being honest here, I hadn’t a clue what I was doing. The first time I was in the cutting room, I sat next to the cutter in front of a massive pult surrounded by loads of screens. I watched the blank screens waiting for the cutter to do something, and he sat waiting for me to give him instructions. Eventually, he broke the silence by asking what he should do. I said, “but you’re the professional…”—“No, I’m the cutter.”
Fortunately, the producer had given me some space in her office and told me to pull together the show so that it could be published. I was as prepared as an amateur could be, and the cutter and I literally went through each image one by one and strung them together. This was the first live show of its kind—Tanja and I were live in front of an audience and commented on the film we had made.
You once told me that Tanja saved your life. What happened?
Tanja has saved my life on more than one occasion.
If you are travelling with a partner and one of you gets into a life-threatening predicament, the other has only got fractions of a second to react. There is no time to think. You have to immediately take the initiative and potentially put your own life on the line. There aren’t many people who will go to such lengths to save someone else. Tanja is one of the few and the only reason I am still alive.
One example was when we were in Pakistan buying camels at the market. Take into consideration that we were absolute novices without the faintest idea what to look out for and, something most people miss, camels are amongst the most dangerous animals in the world. Sure, they look cute enough, despite their tendency to dribble. In reality, they are conniving beasts that can be quite deadly if they haven’t been trained properly. In the Arabian world, most of them are broken in. In other words, they aren’t coaxed into something with love and affection, they are tortured into following commands. This form of education has its pros and cons: Pro, the animal becomes a useful form of transportation, which is good. Con, the creature learns to hate humans, incessantly. Not only that, but they have long memories and might wait anything up to ten or fifteen years before attacking someone who had hurt them.
Anyway, we bought two camels. My camel was called Heera, but what I was completely unaware of was that Heera had already killed people. The dealer had knowingly sold me a killer…the bastard! No matter where you are on this planet, animal dealers never sell their best specimens unless you really know what you are talking about.
Before purchasing our camels, we had been given a lot of advice by doctors and vets warning us of the threat a camel can pose. Doctors in Pakistan always have vivid pictures to hand, showing either half a skull or an amputated leg. Both the result of a camel bite. A camel will bite you in the head and either rip it off or scalp you—and by that I don’t mean just tear the skin, they literally crack your skull like a coconut. Deadly. We were always being warned about our animals. You can probably guess where this is going.
At one point, we were in the Indus Valley (the father of all rivers), following its course. We stopped and instructed the camels to kneel down. Tanja’s camel was a young adolescent male and at an age where he could best be compared to a primed hand grenade. When they’re like this, you have to continually demonstrate who’s boss and they need to respond. Vocal commands need to be strong. As Tanja attempted to get her camel to kneel, her voice wasn’t firm enough and he wasn’t interested; so I went over, took the reign and gave him the command. Tanja stepped to one side, but what I didn’t realise (and this is a typical novice’s error), I hadn’t grasped the reign directly under his chin, but gave him a good 20 cm of slack. Enough for him to throw back his head before sinking his teeth into my arm. He had my whole hand in his mouth which, as we had learned from the doctors, would certainly result in its amputation.
I yelled out and grabbed the camel’s top lip and, just as he prepared to snatch his head upward (which would have meant the end of my hand), Tanja burst in from the side and clung to his bottom lip with all her might. No longer able to lift his head, the camel increased his grip and started to walk. I screamed out in pain—until it suddenly subsided and I was convinced I had lost my hand. With all the movement going on, the camel started to lose his grip and briefly opened his mouth, preparing to chomp down again, just long enough for me to pull my arm out. I collapsed to the ground.
Shock is the worst consequence that can follow this kind of trauma. People often die of the ensuing shock rather from the injury they have sustained. But Tanja and I had trained for moments like this and she took control. Fortunately, my hand was still in place and Tanja went to great lengths to explain to me that, even though I couldn’t feel it, it was indeed still there. She removed my glove and there was one gaping hole where a long incisor had penetrated and damaged a nerve canal. The reason he hadn’t succeeded in chewing all the way through was my indestructible watch.
If Tanja hadn’t reacted in the way she did, the camel would have thrown me up, torn off my hand or lower arm, and I would most certainly not have survived the attack. Tanja has been there for me on a number of occasions and there is no-one I trust more in the world.
After completion of your camel trek across Australia in 2003, your repertoire evolved to include bicycles, horses in Mongolia, and an elephant in India. Where do your ideas come from, and what strategy do you use to turn them into a reality?
More often than not, new ideas and destinations occur to me when we are travelling. It’s a gut feeling.
We were roughly two years into our Australian expedition when a local TV channel flew out to meet us on a farm in the desert. We filmed an interview and, just as they were leaving, one of the crew said the film was due to air on a certain date. Consequently, we knew, if we wanted to watch it, we had to reach another station by that date—which we did.
Along with our contribution, there was another short film about an Australian couple who were cycling from Europe to China. My immediate reaction was “Wow!” I wasn’t sure why I felt the way I did because I didn’t consider them to be explorers like ourselves. After all, a lot of people circumnavigate the globe on bicycles. Nevertheless, I was moved—even though I felt our approach was more unique and spectacular for an audience. A bit like climbing an 8,000 m mountain for the first time.
A few days later, I cautiously broached the subject to Tanja as we walked through the desert with the thermometer reading around 50°C in the shade: “Once we’ve got Australia behind us, how would you feel about organising some bicycles and riding to Asia?” She looked at me, utterly bewildered. “Are you out of your mind? Here we are, walking through the desert with seven camels, struggling to survive under a relentless sun, no shade in sight, and all you can think about is cycling through Siberia! -30 or -40°C? No way!”
Well, it was a start. From that less than enthusiastic retort, I still had another two years of marching across the sand in unbearable heat to gently drip feed her this wonderful idea of mine.
Once back in Germany and with Tanja’s consent, I mulled over some expedition concepts to promote to a bicycle manufacturer. Eventually, I was in a meeting with Riese & Müller and suggested travelling as ecologically as possible from one expedition to another. My idea was to cycle from Germany to Mongolia, where we would embark on a new expedition and, once completed, cycle to the next. Instead of flying from one destination to the other, we would pedal.
The idea was accepted, hands shaken, and the seed sown for a long-standing relationship. We were cyclists.
The ride to Mongolia secured our spot in the cycling community, and the experience we gained along the way was second to none. People were writing to me with questions about our bikes and equipment. Once you’ve repaired a broken component on a pass 3,000 m up a mountain, and your hands are going numb because the temperature has dropped to -15 or -20°C, people begin to take you seriously and listen to your advice.
At the time, there was a lot of change happening on the political map and we were amongst the first western Europeans to enter Mongolia. By using our network, and with a good portion of luck, we were granted twelve-month visas—unheard of at the time.
We bought some horses, made some carts, and rode across some of the most awe inspiring terrain in the world. The typical form of nomadic transport at the time was a yak and cart with wooden wheels. Can you believe it, wooden wheels! All that has changed now, of course.
Whilst we were there, we learned of a tribe close to the Siberian border who reared and lived with reindeer. As you might expect, I had to go and find them.
The elephant story began in my head when I was a child and evolved into a three part TV series.
When I was very young, I dreamt of having an elephant as a friend. Just as other kids aspired to becoming astronauts, I yearned for an elephant. So, when we planned our expedition to India, I reached out to the local authorities who proved very helpful in helping me find my new friend.
This changed the character of the expedition entirely. In India, Ganesh is the elephant-headed Lord of Good Fortune. So, every village we rode into looked upon us as riding on God—not maybe, we were definitely riding on God. You can’t imagine the implications for us. Entering the village, all the kids would come running out the schools and the villagers would line the streets. This is great if you want to mingle with the locals and experience their life at eye-level, but as far as the elephant is concerned, the hundreds of people wanting to touch him was pure stress.
Similarly to our killer camel, our elephant came with an equally blemished criminal record: three murders. He too had become a psychopath as the result of painful training and breaking. So, we had a really dangerous animal (again), which ultimately led to the premature end of our expedition—because he tried to kill me and our interpreter on several occasions. The biggest problem was his intelligence—they are cunning creatures and devise their attacks quite intricately before executing them. The situation became too dangerous for us to continue because we could never anticipate who or when he would strike next. Every time we let our guard down, even for the briefest of moments, there he was trying to kill us again.
You recently purchased a bimobil EX412 expedition truck. This is significant change to your previous choices of transportation. What are your plans?
This chapter of our story begins with a test e-bike expedition through Asia, which was actually a bid to find another elephant before continuing the previously interrupted expedition. We had already cycled though part of Siberia, Mongolia, the Gobi desert, a lot of China, Vietnam, and Cambodia before ending the journey in Thailand. In Vietnam, we stayed for a year whilst searching for the replacement elephant. We had chosen a lodge because of its close proximity to an elephant park. The idea being to borrow or rent a suitable animal for as long as was necessary to cross Asia. I built a close relationship with the hotel owner which would, at a later date, play a significant role in our our plans.
Unfortunately, I crashed my bike on a bamboo bridge at night, went over the side-rail and fell several metres onto the rocks below. Thankfully, I was wearing my helmet so my injuries were limited to my neck and a bone protruding from my shoulder. The Vietnam tour came to an abrupt halt.
Unsure of what to do, I called my physiotherapist, Hans-Peter Maier, who said this was a typical ice-hockey or cycling injury and I would be back in the saddle in a couple of months. So we stayed for three months amongst the rice terraces, and experienced the sowing and reaping of the crop, which provided us access and inclusion into the community. We were no longer looked upon as guests.
Anyway, following my accident, I landed in a small local hospital not far from our lodge—where three gentlemen visited me: Vietnam’s minister of finance, a famous architect, and a high-ranking police officer who was also responsible for the Vietnamese police TV channel. These three men were planning to open a new chain of hotels (which would also include the lodge). All of a sudden my network grew to include some of the most important people in the Vietnamese government. Coincidence? Maybe, but I still don’t believe in that sort of thing.
We spoke often and, together, they produced a film about Tanja, myself, and our Mother Earth project which was subsequently broadcast on national television. In the course of our conversation, I explained our elephant project and they introduced me to the tourism board who agreed to put forward the idea to the president as long as I provided a written proposal.
Whilst researching my presentation, I discovered that the international hub of illegal ivory trade was in Hanoi. This could develop into a potential threat to Tanja and myself if we were to travel through the area with an elephant and inadvertently publish stories with possibly sensitive content on our website. If this were to be considered a threat by the ivory mafia, then it could justify a retaliatory response. According to the policeman, our chances of survival were close to nil.
Tanja had another, even more valid, opinion. Conservation parks had been established throughout the region to protect the elephants against cruelty and misuse. This also includes preventing them being used as a tourist attraction and paid rides. Quite rightly, Tanja pointed out that if we were riding around on an elephant, regardless of our intentions, we would be sending the wrong signal and undermining everything the conservationists had set out to achieve. She had a point.
As we speak, the planned expedition to Cambodia, Thailand, Myanmar, and Laos is yet to be finalised. But, as opposed to travelling with an elephant, we have chosen to use our e-bikes for exploration in each country and stay in the conservation resorts where we can work with the teams and spend time with the animals.
The roundtrip to and from Asia will cover approximately 60,000 km, with stages on and off pavement. Considering all the equipment we will need to take along, including e-bikes, trailers, extra batteries, and all the other gear long-term travellers require, we began looking for a suitable expedition vehicle that would transport everything and provide a home for the three years we estimate the expedition will endure. After much consultation and consideration, we chose the bimobil EX412 which has since been slightly modified to accommodate our needs.
Can you explain the purpose behind your slogan “Mother Earth is Alive”?
Mother Earth is Alive is more than just a slogan. It defines who we are, as a couple, and what we want to achieve. Today, many, many companies want to wash themselves green because that is the message they want to send to the general public. But is this a marketing ploy, or do they really mean it?
Before the green hype, when we started using Mother Earth is Alive as our signature, people were sceptical about the esoteric touch. Everything I had done previously, and all the books and films Tanja and I have produced, were interpreted as though we were in this because of the adventure. Don’t misunderstand me, we love the adventure, the excitement and the adrenalin rush, but that isn’t the reason behind what we do. There is a purpose behind our expeditions which goes much deeper.
Ever since 1987, when I first visited the Auca Indians in Ecuador, I’ve invested a considerable portion of my life, and Tanja’s too, studying indigenous groups. And you know what? They possess the same negative traits of someone living in Vienna or New York. The bad part is, they are people. They are rapacious, jealous, irascible, and so much more. Their lack of empathy takes everything to the next level—I’ve seen them torture animals in a way you can’t even imagine. And with that, in my eyes at least, they’ve lost their status of being a so-called holy tribe. They are by no means holy, or noble savages. But that doesn’t give us the right to wipe them out. They represent our roots; where we came from.
Originally, I wanted to help prevent suffering amongst indigenous groups by acting as a go-between and thereby protect them. The idea was to visit all the different tribes worldwide. However, after a while I realised that they weren’t the only ones who needed protecting—we all do. That was the moment when I redirected our focus toward an expedition around the world and began telling the story of Mother Earth. Our journey was no longer confined to jungles, but spread to every region and country on the planet.
Jimmy Nelson, a remarkable British photographer and author of the book Before They Pass Away, is also on a quest to preserve culture. As was my focus to begin with, he concentrates on indigenous groups, whereas Tanja and I have since broadened the scope of our attention and, without wanting to sound derogatory, we want to tell our story with more than images alone.
Images capture a moment and conjure an emotion. Our ongoing documentary employs photographs to visualise the chapters that accompany them. They say beauty is in the eye of the beholder. In other words, the audience will look at our pictures and interpret them according to their own personal perception. Our story, on the other hand, allows us to create the mood and setting whilst explaining the consequences involved, thereby enhancing the relevance of each image.
I have one last question as we draw this first part of the interview to a close. Your trek across Australia’s remotest landscapes took four years to complete. Was it difficult to re-integrate upon your return?
Six weeks after arriving in Germany, I suffered a sudden loss of hearing. After four years in the desert, alone with Tanja and the camels, the stress involved in trying to fit in the with society was simply too much to cope with.
Picture yourself standing on the edge of the platform as an express train thunders through the station. And now imagine trying to board that train. It would tear you apart. That is how I felt. The journey had slowed my mind to such an extent, I couldn’t keep up.
The consequence we drew from this experience was to not travel for more than two years at a stretch. Admittedly, our forthcoming expedition to Asia is planned to last three years, so we’ll see how the pans out.
Fortunately, technology has come a long way since our first expedition. Digital photography has taken away the painstaking and time consuming effort of developing and labelling thousands of slides upon our return. Photographs can be sorted and captioned on the same day.
Communication is so advanced today that, even when we are away, we are not out of reach. Long gone are the days when letters had to be sent months in advance to a pre-determined location. Not to mention the hand-written responses and updates we needed to send our partners at home. Even our books are now written and produced during our trips.
The only challenge that remains is the psychological adjustment upon our return. We’ll see.
This article first appeared in the Winter 2020/21 edition of Overland Journal.
