by George Dyke…..
On a last minute business trip to Las Vegas this week, I managed a chance encounter with 2CV world travellers Chang Luo, his wife Jie Ding , and Yuding Luo their adorable 4-year-old daughter. They were exactly one-year to the day into their two-year trek around the globe that started in England.
Chang Luo (38), his Jie Ding (38) and Yuding Luo (4-1/2).
The meeting came about through my friends Richard and Lynn Bonfond, who I have been Citroën acquaintances with for some time. They now live in Las Vegas and I contacted them thinking we could get together and go out for dinner. They wrote back saying; “Thanks for the invitation but how about if you come over here on Thursday evening for dinner as we have other house guests, the Chinese couple, Chan and Jie and their daughter who are travelling around the world in their 2CV are staying with us. They will be leaving us Friday morning but we will be here of course!
I had read about their adventure (in fact, we ran an article about them in the arctic here) but I had the feeling that having the opportunity to see Richard and Lynn again and meet Chang, Jie and Yuding was really going to be something special. And it was…
– left to right; Me, Richard, Jie, Yuding, and Chan (photo by Lynn).
Jie treated us to Chinese dinner that she prepared with Lynn’s assistance. I got to take a close look at their 2CV that was in remarkably good shape considering the miles heaped upon it and a good many of them being on unpaved roads as they travelled through Mongolia. They forged rivers and climbed mountains – all with apparent ease, though Chan recently discovered that one of the support studs of a front shock absorber had given way and that the parts were on the way. (Not enough to stop them from driving. That was going be addressed in Los Angeles on the weekend.)
The 2CV had a left front fender ding from a bird hit in on the arctic highway in Canada, and the corrosion of a Canadian winter had settled in nicely on the front bumper.
Fender ding repaired from the bird hit.
Canadian corrosion to the bumper.
It turned out to be a fascinating evening with Chang telling us all about his global trip so far and showing us pictures of Mongolia, the frozen north of Canada and Russia and Finland. He has a drone with him and showed us movies taken with it where it looks like he had helicopter film crew along for the trip. You can read about their adventures and see some of the amazing photos and videos that they have taken on their Facebook page: https://fb.me/luoboding2CV.
What struck me when Chang showed the map of their travels is that they are not doing great distances every day. It’s all about seeing the world along the way. It just so happens that they are doing so in a 2CV which draws immense attention and admiration wherever they go and tends to draw out informative dialogue with local people.
Their daughter Yuding has had the experience of a lifetime seeing the world at her age. She is learning an astonishing amount being exposed to so much diversity and variety of cultures along the way. She is certainly one informed four-year-old and she makes no hesitation to let you know it! Super energetic, nothing seems to slips by her notice. She can recount many aspects of the trip and has become quite the artist drawing images about it!
All too soon it was time to let them get some sleep and I departed feeling very fortunate to be there for their one-year voyage celebration. In the morning they were heading off to Los Angeles and then on to Mexico and South America. They think they may take a year to see just that. Wow, what an experience!
I hosted the Luo family on their way through Kingston (Ontario) a few weeks back. This is a wonderful family doing an extraordinary trip.