It’s that time of year where I’m investigating possibilities for my yearly big adventure, MALLE MOTO style for 2024 with my trusty KTM 500 
This thread will serve as a brainstorm and random thoughts platform around the planning for my trip, much of it might be disjointed, but that's ok - I love planning but I'm terrible at documenting on a forum! Let's see how this goes...
So far I've done Malle Moto Kaokoland early 2022, then Malle Moto Mozambique end of 2022, took a break from all the planning, stress, packing and admin and joined Hardy’s Specialised Adventures in Kaokoland in May this year (2023) - Seems I’m overdue for another Malle Moto adventure in 2024. For those wondering what's with the "MALLE MOTO" thing, that's what I call my self sufficient motorcycle adventures and it usually involves camping, like an obscene amount of unpacking and packing everything you carry with you, EVERYDAY. And most importantly, lots of epic riding in remote places one your own (or rather, alone with your riding buddy's)!
Now I'm actually not a big camper, in fact I hate camping. BUT, when it's part of an adventure my inner woodsman comes out and LOVE the camping/wild camping/making food over a fire/Jetboil vibes! Yes, it's a lot of effort but most awesome things in life require high effort input.
The dates I’ve identified are between middle MAY 2024 and 7 JUNE 2024 for 14 DAYS of riding (excluding trailering there and back time etc).
These dates open up possibilities for doing one or a combination of these countries: (None of these I've done an adventure in by the way) - Considering rainfall and temperatures
Zimbabwe
Botswana
Zambia
My country considerations are:
1. Do I do one of these countries properly and spend my entire time in one alone (This would make sense if the chosen Country is so epic that it needs a dedicated trip)
2. Do I do two of these countries and try get the best of what each has to offer, should it geographically make sense - No use I spend half my time just gunning for km's just to get to the good part of the next country
3. Which country/'s should I consider for Point 1 and Point 2
Now what do I like? Unspoiled (as far as possible) nature, animals, tough riding, remoteness, off the beaten path, challenging conditions and a little bit of danger (usually associated with the amount of wild animals or some terrorist activities (less ideal)) mixed with some wild camping. Not all nights have to be spent camping and not all camping nights have to be wild, some "luxury" of running water and ablutions are welcome, but not a deal breaker.
Resource considerations:
The route, and ultimately our gear, will be determined by:
1. Acces to water
2. Acces to fuel
Most of the food we need we can carry with us, so that's not really an issue.
Gear considerations:
We're able to comfortably carry the following with us at any time - This will ultimately dictate how remote we can go and where we can go:
1. 25 litres of fuel per person
2. 8 litres of water per person
3. I've done this kind of trip a couple of times so spares and redundancy I've got figured out and I've got gear for days for a self sufficient trip, so one less thing to worry about
In Mozambique, whenever we camped, which was about 11 out of the 14 nights, we hammock camped. It worked out really well and is just the lightest and easiest way to camp, and it's just good fun! For the countries I have in mind, hammocks probably won't work on account of animals. There are unfortunately almost no wild animals left in Mozambique so it made sense for there.
Needless to say, a tent will be used for camping this time around.
Safety considerations:
Then there are safety considerations - I obviously don't want to die! But I want an adventure in the bush, with mates and our bikes, where we can experience something amazing. Once you've tasted that feeling of truly being alone and vulnerable on an epic adventure with your bike, you NEED it! Having read that sentence, it sounded very Brokeback Moving along...
1. Political unrest
2. Probability of wild animals killing us
3. Plan when something goes wrong - What are the options
The above will also dictate the country we select, the routes as well as the camping possibilities (IN which case we'll need to find accommodation of some sort)
To this effect, the following I'll have to get:
1. Satellite phone
2. A contact or two in the selected country that can at least just try and help organise some assistance if something terrible goes wrong
3. Some animal deterrent devices - Bear spray and/or those compact electric fence jobbies if we're going to commit to camping in game-dense areas
Route considerations:
All off the above considerations will ultimately shape the tracks we'll be doing. At this point, I know NOTHING about each of these countries in so far as planning a MALLE MOTO adventure there...
Hopefully some guru's would be willing to help me with some of the above considerations
That's it for now, I'll post as I go along, cover some of my gear, routes and decisions that need to be made etc.
This thread will serve as a brainstorm and random thoughts platform around the planning for my trip, much of it might be disjointed, but that's ok - I love planning but I'm terrible at documenting on a forum! Let's see how this goes...
So far I've done Malle Moto Kaokoland early 2022, then Malle Moto Mozambique end of 2022, took a break from all the planning, stress, packing and admin and joined Hardy’s Specialised Adventures in Kaokoland in May this year (2023) - Seems I’m overdue for another Malle Moto adventure in 2024. For those wondering what's with the "MALLE MOTO" thing, that's what I call my self sufficient motorcycle adventures and it usually involves camping, like an obscene amount of unpacking and packing everything you carry with you, EVERYDAY. And most importantly, lots of epic riding in remote places one your own (or rather, alone with your riding buddy's)!
Now I'm actually not a big camper, in fact I hate camping. BUT, when it's part of an adventure my inner woodsman comes out and LOVE the camping/wild camping/making food over a fire/Jetboil vibes! Yes, it's a lot of effort but most awesome things in life require high effort input.
The dates I’ve identified are between middle MAY 2024 and 7 JUNE 2024 for 14 DAYS of riding (excluding trailering there and back time etc).
These dates open up possibilities for doing one or a combination of these countries: (None of these I've done an adventure in by the way) - Considering rainfall and temperatures
Zimbabwe
Botswana
Zambia
My country considerations are:
1. Do I do one of these countries properly and spend my entire time in one alone (This would make sense if the chosen Country is so epic that it needs a dedicated trip)
2. Do I do two of these countries and try get the best of what each has to offer, should it geographically make sense - No use I spend half my time just gunning for km's just to get to the good part of the next country
3. Which country/'s should I consider for Point 1 and Point 2
Now what do I like? Unspoiled (as far as possible) nature, animals, tough riding, remoteness, off the beaten path, challenging conditions and a little bit of danger (usually associated with the amount of wild animals or some terrorist activities (less ideal)) mixed with some wild camping. Not all nights have to be spent camping and not all camping nights have to be wild, some "luxury" of running water and ablutions are welcome, but not a deal breaker.
Resource considerations:
The route, and ultimately our gear, will be determined by:
1. Acces to water
2. Acces to fuel
Most of the food we need we can carry with us, so that's not really an issue.
Gear considerations:
We're able to comfortably carry the following with us at any time - This will ultimately dictate how remote we can go and where we can go:
1. 25 litres of fuel per person
2. 8 litres of water per person
3. I've done this kind of trip a couple of times so spares and redundancy I've got figured out and I've got gear for days for a self sufficient trip, so one less thing to worry about
In Mozambique, whenever we camped, which was about 11 out of the 14 nights, we hammock camped. It worked out really well and is just the lightest and easiest way to camp, and it's just good fun! For the countries I have in mind, hammocks probably won't work on account of animals. There are unfortunately almost no wild animals left in Mozambique so it made sense for there.
Needless to say, a tent will be used for camping this time around.
Safety considerations:
Then there are safety considerations - I obviously don't want to die! But I want an adventure in the bush, with mates and our bikes, where we can experience something amazing. Once you've tasted that feeling of truly being alone and vulnerable on an epic adventure with your bike, you NEED it! Having read that sentence, it sounded very Brokeback
Moving along...1. Political unrest
2. Probability of wild animals killing us
3. Plan when something goes wrong - What are the options
The above will also dictate the country we select, the routes as well as the camping possibilities (IN which case we'll need to find accommodation of some sort)
To this effect, the following I'll have to get:
1. Satellite phone
2. A contact or two in the selected country that can at least just try and help organise some assistance if something terrible goes wrong
3. Some animal deterrent devices - Bear spray and/or those compact electric fence jobbies if we're going to commit to camping in game-dense areas
Route considerations:
All off the above considerations will ultimately shape the tracks we'll be doing. At this point, I know NOTHING about each of these countries in so far as planning a MALLE MOTO adventure there...
Hopefully some guru's would be willing to help me with some of the above considerations
That's it for now, I'll post as I go along, cover some of my gear, routes and decisions that need to be made etc.
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