Riding pillion on a vintage Vespa from Sydney to Italy was never going to be easy.
But doing so amid a war in the Middle East, global oil shocks and shuttered borders? That was something Mario Gabrieli, 54, and his 11-year-old son, Leonardo, never planned for.
Their aim was – and still is – to complete a coming-of-age pilgrimage from their home down under to Gabrieli’s birthplace of Trieste almost entirely on the back of their 1976 blue Vespa, bar a few necessary water crossings.
Almost three months in, they’ve already dealt with fuel restrictions, petrol station closures, extremely sore bums and a complete engine failure. But they’ve taken it all in their stride. It’s the journey, not the destination, after all.
Sitting at a bamboo bus stop about 150km north of Songkhla, a city in southern Thailand near the Malaysian border, Gabrieli says it has always been his “dream” to complete a journey across the world on a Vespa. He’d driven a Vespa for a month at a time through parts of Europe and Asia.
But it wasn’t until Leonardo reached year six, and their apartment was getting knocked down, that it felt like the right time to take him out of class and complete home schooling before he reaches high school.
“It was the perfect timing for me in my life,” he says. “I thought ‘maybe this dream can come true’. The main reason [to do this] for me is really to pass on my sense of adventure to Leonardo.”
They tested the waters on a two-week moped trip around northern Thailand, and Leonardo adapted easily. In early January, they got ready to ship their Vespa on a container to Bali – and then, a week out from their trip, there was a complete engine failure.
“It was a classic moment,” Gabrieli says. “We had to take the engine down, open it and rebuild it.”
With the help of a mechanic friend, they sourced the rare parts, fixed it up and shipped the Vespa off to Bali. Since then, they’ve travelled throughout Indonesia via Surabaya, Java and Sumatra, hopped over the ocean to Malaysia and crossed into the south of Thailand.
From there, they will journey through Laos and China before traversing the epic, 1,200km Pamir Highway through the Stans and over the Caspian Sea to Azerbaijan, which borders Iran.
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Border restrictions mean this will be the toughest part, but if all goes well they’ll make it to Georgia, Turkey and Greece, winding up on the Adriatic Coast to Italy.
Their backup, if they can’t make it to Azerbaijan, is detouring via Russia, almost circling Ukraine – but that also may be impacted by visa restrictions.
They expect the whole journey will take about 10 months.
‘Send the chopper’
So far, the pair have been “blessed” to have been welcomed into countless Vespa communities dotted throughout Asia, who have opened their homes as a place to board and supported them on the road.
“We’re trying to do two days riding, one day stop whenever possible,” Gabrieli says. Their off days give them time to stretch the legs and complete Leonardo’s home schooling – they’ve been able to access the internet with local sim cards.
“Sometimes it’s a bit harder because you might have to cover a bigger distance and there is not much on the road to stop. There’s tiny, tiny villages.
“But people welcome you because you’re on a Vespa. It becomes almost like a passport because it’s such an iconic vehicle. The areas that we’re in now is Vespa country because it [was] manufactured here in the 70s, all through south-east Asia.”
Gabrieli knows of Vespa communities in China, Kazakhstan and Turkey.
“The section of the Pamir Highway, we don’t know [anyone there], but apparently there is a lot of travellers in those areas,” he says. “It has lots of mountainous areas and [will] probably be the toughest moment, where you’re going to get maybe a slightly different version of us.
“We’ll be like ‘ah, I can’t do this any more. Send the chopper. Pick us up.’”
That’s not to say it’s been easy so far. The global fuel crisis has been somewhat of a curveball. Gabrieli says once they entered Thailand, they faced fuel restrictions preventing anyone from purchasing more than 10 litres of petrol – if you could get it at all. He says about 70% of the petrol stations are closed.
“The tricky part of that is, for us on the Vespa, we have a 150km range with the tank. But you don’t know if you’re going to find a petrol station that is open. So you just have to guess.”
He pauses, as if reflecting on this for the first time.
“At the moment, I’m not thinking too much. I’m just going. And it’s incredible that you can always find a way. There is always a way.”
As for the higher petrol prices?
“I haven’t looked at the budget really,” Gabrieli muses. “I think we’ll be fine. I think don’t get caught up in the day-to-day. A lot is on the fly … No plan … Because I think that is the essence of the travel.”
‘Three stages of pain’
The hardest days have been when they’re on a deadline and need to get somewhere fast – which means about 10 hours nonstop on the moped, slamming over potholes and swirling through traffic.
Leonardo describes it as “three stages of pain”.
“One, the flaming butt. Two, the numb butt. And three, the steam butt,” he says.
Gabrieli says there’s also a fourth stage: “The prayer. The prayer to make it stop.”
It helps, though, that they’ve become minor celebrities as they amass followers on their journey. Leonardo has been coined “Indonesia’s Justin Bieber”, thanks to their newly surging social media presence.
The pair are documenting their journey on Instagram and Facebook, which has also allowed them to reach out for assistance if their Vespa breaks down or they’re in need of advice.
Leonardo says he’s been picking up new friends wherever he goes.
“In Indonesia, there’s these big families and if you know one of them, they all come out and say, ‘what’s your name? Where are you from,’” he says excitedly.
“And then all the places are all so new … And you’re like, ‘wow’! And you feel the adventure.”
He recalls one moment, in Sakra, East Lombok, when it started to rain and everyone ran undercover.
“But then a funny guy went inside, got his swimmers and started dancing around in the rain,” he laughs. “In five minutes, everyone’s dancing around in the rain. And we did that until the rain stopped.”
If they do arrive in Europe, Gabrieli says they’ll reunite with his partner and Leonardo’s mother, Jocelyn, and spend two months in Trieste doing “normal things” before flying back to high school for Leonardo.
“It will be almost like a full circle, [growing up in] Trieste, always on the Vespa,” he says. “Come back to Trieste with the Vespa, with Leonardo. It will be an entrance. It will be such a huge moment.”
Though it would be great to finish the trip, Gabrieli says at the same time, “it’s not that important”.
“I think Leonardo has started enjoying the road and started to see the beauty of [things] changing every day,” he says.
“I started with the mentality that to take Leonardo on a journey with no planning and be open to what happens on the road really is the point. Everything else is like a bonus.”
Leonardo’s friends at home are excited for him, but he doesn’t think they’ll ever understand the significance of what he’s experienced.
“They’ll think, ‘oh, he’s travelling the world, how cool’,” he says. But I don’t think they’ll know how much meaning it actually has.”
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