About us
Married for over 30 years, British couple Marianne and Chris swapped the hamster wheel of life for full-time travel and meaningful adventure.
After working in high-pressure roles, they decided that over 30 years of working to pay their mortgage off, it was time for their life to change. So they sold all of their belongings and rented their house out - moving into their 2005 Fiat Ducato with a dream to travel around Europe and use the house rental money to fund their early retirement and adventures. This was a huge dream and an idea that came about after losing friends too early and after Marianne became a living kidney donor to her friend kate.
With absolutely no experience in video editing, Chris took the decision to learn how to film and edit videos as a way to be able to share the adventures with family and friends, It was a long way from his previous career in the hotel industry running the Special Visits Department at The Dorchester Hotel in London, managing a pub in Shropshire before spending over a decade working in the NHS.
Marianne (now 59) and Chris (now 56) decided that With the kids grown up and on their own path, and with the mortgage finally paid off, decided that they could not be sure that they Would even make it to retirement! So the decision was made....
they took the leap of faith in spring 2018, left behind the conventional path and hit the road. What started as a bold idea to spend more time together, has since become an extraordinary global journey.
TREAD the Globe was born from an idea by their eldest son to document their adventures for family and friends - they now share their story to inspire others to live boldly, travel meaningfully, and embrace whatever adventure comes next.
Our Vehicles
Trudy
Trudy is a 2005 2.3 Fiat Ducato Adria Twin Campervan - 15" tyres and we chose her as Marianne's Dad recommended it for Europe - we had no idea we would be driving her around the world!!
Upgrades included: Autoterm Diesel Heater, extra solar, LPG tank, lifesaver jerrycan, Wifi booster, new extra suspension.
Trevor
Trevor is a 2018 Single cab 2.4 Hilux. He is from Malaysia and therefore only has air con in the cab (But he doesn’t have any heating in the cab, to save money in 2018 all of the plantation vehicles came standard without heating to save money as you don’t need it in hot countries - we didn’t know this at the time).
But we have heating and aircon in the habitation area. He has now gained the name of the Leaky Legend or more affectionaly our ‘Problem Child’ !!
Some folk have suggested we sell or dump him - but as we haven’t won the lottery…
Trevor is going to be sticking with us until he falls apart (we truly hope he doesn’t but have decided that anything is possible!). We are on the road and have started leg one of this challenge - Driving from New Zealand to the UK.
