The most travelled Jetta?

RobinPhillips

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Joined
Apr 9, 2001
Location
Switzerland (formerly Lethbridge, AB, Canada and b
TDI
2000 Jetta (drove it off the dealer's lot new in Nov 2000)
A celebration of my Jetta's 16th birthday and having just passed the 500,000 km mark, I collected together all the pictures I could find of the places that it has been. I then realized this is probably the world's "most travelled" Jetta? (Or does someone have a counter example?)

Unlike many people here, I never set out to keep this car for so long. But there has just never been a reason to replace it. If it were to get crushed by a truck or something I really don't know what I would replace it with. It is fully depreciated, just the right size for my needs, uses minimal amounts of fuel, costs very little to maintain and continues to be a reliable daily driver - what more could one want from a car?!

I've put together all the pictures with some text here:
http://www.robinphillips.net/Robin/Jetta/

If you just want the highlights, I think these are the best few pictures of some of the most interesting locations:

On the summit of Mauna Kea (Hawaii):


On the Dempster Highway:








The Everglades in Florida:


Key West:


Badlands National Park:


Ontario:


The Port of Halifax:
 
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RobinPhillips

Veteran Member
Joined
Apr 9, 2001
Location
Switzerland (formerly Lethbridge, AB, Canada and b
TDI
2000 Jetta (drove it off the dealer's lot new in Nov 2000)
Lake Lucerne (Vierwaldstattersee):


The old banked track at Monza:


In Sofia (Bulgaria):


Romania, on the Black Sea coast:


At the Finnish/Russian border:



At the Nordkapp in Norway:


212m below sea level:


North of the Arctic Circle in Finland:


and the 500,000 km mark:

With hopefully, lots more to come in future years!
 

TDIGAZ

Veteran Member
Joined
Jan 15, 2008
Location
Eastern Ontario, Canada
TDI
Current: 2003 Jetta GLS Grey 5 spd. Previous: 2003 Jetta GLS Silver 5 spd (lost in a collision)
Simply Awesome.
I also went through the pics in your link... Wow, you and your Jetta have been to some amazing places. It's great to see the Jetta "staged" in the pics. Did you start out doing this, or did it happen by chance a couple of times, and thought " that's cool, I'm going to keep doing that.".
Either way, very impressive.

Now to other members, let's see more pics of TDI's in famous/unusual places.
 

RobinPhillips

Veteran Member
Joined
Apr 9, 2001
Location
Switzerland (formerly Lethbridge, AB, Canada and b
TDI
2000 Jetta (drove it off the dealer's lot new in Nov 2000)
TDIGAZ: It was more the latter - that's why there are very few pictures of the Jetta in Hawaii. At the time it was just our "new car" (to replace the less than entirely reliable Corrado...). I took some pictures of it ontop of Mauna Kea just to prove to friends that you can drive up there in a "normal" car - and don't need an SUV. I obviously took lots of pictures of it on the Dempster because part of the fun thing there was the driving. For our diagonally cross-continental drive to Florida I took the pictures infront of various National Park signs, more for the photo collection to show people where we had been (and it just made sense to have the car in the picture so it wasn't just a picture of the sign). It was only really when we moved to Europe that I started thinking I need to take pictures of the Jetta in various unusual places. Now of course I actively do it all the time!

I'd of course love to see other people's pictures of their cars in unusual places!
 

whitedog

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Joined
Jul 12, 2004
Location
Bend, Oregon
TDI
2004 Jetta that I fill by myself
Great story. The only competition that I can think of would be an ALH stuffed in a Vanagon.
 

romad

Top Post Dawg
Joined
May 27, 2011
Location
Prescott, AZ
TDI
2005 Jetta GLS Wagon "Cranberry"
Re: NordKapp (North Cape, northernmost point of European continent)

In May 1981 we bought our first Jetta while stationed in northern Germany. 1 month later we started on a 30 day tour of Scandinavia. It was while driving north from Rovaniemi Finland we saw southbound vehicles with "NordKapp" on them. After determining it would only add about 600 miles to our planned route, we detoured and went there. What an adventure! We had to go through a bare rock tunnel with water dripping down from the ceiling, a line of weak incandescent bulbs spaced 100 meters apart hanging from the middle of the ceiling, rock road bed. Once we got through there we had to wait for the ferry (NordKapp is actually on an island, not the European mainland). While waiting, we saw coming off the ferry a big Winnebago RV with California plates! Took the ferry across, drove up to the cape, and stayed awake to watch the Sun NOT set! Headed back to the ferry terminal to catch the early one back. We then continued our trip down the length of Norway.

That tunnel picture, is it the one that replaced the ferry?
 
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AndyBees

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Joined
May 27, 2003
Location
Southeast Kentucky
TDI
Silver 2003 Jetta TDI, Silver 2000 Jetta TDI (sold), '84 Vanagon with '02 ALH engine
Great story. The only competition that I can think of would be an ALH stuffed in a Vanagon.

My ALH 84 Vanagon has been to Alaska a couple of times.. to the Arctic Circle in the Yukon. And, we drove it to Nova Scotia once....
 

Mike in Anchorage

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Joined
Jan 4, 2009
Location
Anchorage, AK
TDI
2016 Touareg Lux, 2015 Golf Sportwagen SE, new 4 Sept 2017;2009 VW Jetta TDI Sportwagen (Ruby) sold to VW on 22 SEP 2017
Robin, I think you'll win any contest in this regard. Are you planning a trip across Siberia, through Africa, or to the mid-East as a next adventure? It will cement your place really well.
 

RobinPhillips

Veteran Member
Joined
Apr 9, 2001
Location
Switzerland (formerly Lethbridge, AB, Canada and b
TDI
2000 Jetta (drove it off the dealer's lot new in Nov 2000)
Some answers to the various questions above:

Yuri: :)

Romad: The tunnel picture ie this one:

is indeed the tunnel you pass through on the way from the mainland to the island that the Nordkapp is on (Wikipedia has a page on it (of course:)). It used to be a toll tunnel, but is now free as the Norwegians only impose tolls until the cost of the tunnel (or birdge) has been recouped. I'll claim this as the lowest a North American Jetta has ever been until someone shows me a picture of one either next to the Dead Sea or in one of the handful of deeper Norwegian tunnels!

Mike in Anchorage: (So where are you from?:)). Yes, I have a couple more destinations in mind. Although I enjoyed skiing in Finland the last two years I thought I'd try something different in 2017. So I'm going first to Bulgaria, then onto Turkey and finishing up in the Caucasus Mountains in Georgia. That one is definite (as long as the political situation in Turkey doesn't deteriorate between now and February). I had been playing with the idea of participating in the Budapest to Bamako rally but didn't quite have the nerve in 2016. Maybe in the future... I'm also toying with the idea of taking a long 7 weeks break in late summer 2018 and driving to Vladivostok with my son. It is paved all the way and politically safe at the moment. It would certainly be the trip of a lifetime - there are a couple of websites describing part of the route - just look at these mad examples.
 
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Mike in Anchorage

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Joined
Jan 4, 2009
Location
Anchorage, AK
TDI
2016 Touareg Lux, 2015 Golf Sportwagen SE, new 4 Sept 2017;2009 VW Jetta TDI Sportwagen (Ruby) sold to VW on 22 SEP 2017
Some answers to the various questions above:

Mike in Anchorage: (So where are you from?:)). Yes, I have a couple more destinations in mind. Although I enjoyed skiing in Finland the last two years I thought I'd try something different in 2017. So I'm going first to Bulgaria, then onto Turkey and finishing up in the Caucasus Mountains in Georgia. That one is definite (as long as the political situation in Turkey doesn't deteriorate between now and February). I had been playing with the idea of participating in the Budapest to Bamako rally but didn't quite have the nerve in 2016. Maybe in the future... I'm also toying with the idea of taking a long 7 weeks break in late summer 2018 and driving to Vladivostok with my son. It is paved all the way and politically safe at the moment. It would certainly be the trip of a lifetime - there are a couple of websites describing part of the route - just look at these mad examples.
Though I've been living in Anchorage for over 35 years, I'm FROM Ohio. The drive to Vlad sounds like a blast. Wonder if I can get a car there and do the drive as well. I also have driving experience in Arctic and sub-Arctic conditions. At one point, I had intended to join a friend for a bicycle trip around Lake Baikal. Turns out that some streams do not have bridges and we didn't feel like building a raft at each one, so we bagged. So many good adventures to be had. The links you posted are not working, but I know how to research, so I'll continue to look at the sites. Thanks.
 

millere5815

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Joined
Jul 2, 2014
Location
Holgate, Oh
TDI
2002 Jetta
Very nice. My Jetta has been with me in 45 of 50 states, and will hit 48 of 50 this year. Currently at 307k miles.

How did you get yours to Hawaii, and how much did it cost?
 

ZB657

Member
Joined
Jul 6, 2015
Location
Chicago
TDI
2012 VW Jetta TDI
This is simply amazing. I'm trying to get there with my TDI. Right now, it's at 80k and I plan on making a lot of road trips with my car because it's simply amazing....especially when you have good MPGs. I love it. Nice pics and absolutely great trips!!
 

RobinPhillips

Veteran Member
Joined
Apr 9, 2001
Location
Switzerland (formerly Lethbridge, AB, Canada and b
TDI
2000 Jetta (drove it off the dealer's lot new in Nov 2000)
Trip to Georgia

I thought it was about time I posted an update to this thread. The trip to Georgia (the country, not the state) that I mentioned as being planned in an earlier post, took place last year. We covered 8235km in the 16 days that we were gone (including a mammoth 1969km in order to get back from Turkey to Switzerland in one day (easier to do now that my son is old enough to help drive!). Here are a couple of highlight pictures, the rest are available via an update to the link that I gave in the original post in this thread (ie http://www.robinphillips.net/Robin/Jetta/ ).



Turkey:


Crossing the Bosporus into Asia:



Made it to Georgia:


The roads in Georgia are in pretty bad condition, but they certainly go to interesting places:



My new favorite "Jetta with road sign" picture:


It was a pretty amazing trip, we did lots of good skiing (especially in Georgia where Russian money has enabled a modern ski resort to be built up in Gudauri).

The also drove the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgian_Military_Road which was quite an experience
 

RobinPhillips

Veteran Member
Joined
Apr 9, 2001
Location
Switzerland (formerly Lethbridge, AB, Canada and b
TDI
2000 Jetta (drove it off the dealer's lot new in Nov 2000)
For year's I've been entering the trips we do into google maps, but had never spent the time to figure out how to merge them all together. Well, I finally sat down and did it, the result is this map of all the places my Jetta has been:



The link to the google version (which you can zoom into) is here:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1boaw49YaHpFdT0v1_Aw3TuSlqYQ&usp=sharing
 

romad

Top Post Dawg
Joined
May 27, 2011
Location
Prescott, AZ
TDI
2005 Jetta GLS Wagon "Cranberry"
Wow!

In 1981 when stationed in Germany, we bought our first Jetta, picking it up in Luxembourg on the US Memorial Day weekend (Luxembourg has it as a holiday also). One month later we took a 30 day trip around Scandinavia and did a detour to Nord Kapp. At that time you had to take a ferry to the island and the road to the ferry went through a rough unfinished tunnel with water dripping down from the top. About every 25 meters was a dim light bulb hanging from the top, and the roadbed was made of potholes. While waiting to board our ferry, we saw a Winnebago RV come off the ferry and as it drove by, we saw it had CALIFORNIA license plates!

BTW, have you been getting the news about Kilauea? They say the biggest threat now is to the Lower Puna area.
 

jackbombay

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Joined
Mar 12, 2002
Location
Diesel knows best
TDI
A4 Jetta
Good stuff man!

You should try to travel through the fjordlands of western Norway if you have a chance, some of the best car sightseeing on the planet around there :)
 

RobinPhillips

Veteran Member
Joined
Apr 9, 2001
Location
Switzerland (formerly Lethbridge, AB, Canada and b
TDI
2000 Jetta (drove it off the dealer's lot new in Nov 2000)
Romad: In order to not go completely off topic whilst answering your question, here's a picture of the Jetta when it was just a couple of days old (hasn't even got the permanent registration plates yet) located in Puna:


We were living in Puna (Paradise Park) at the time and as I measure it on google maps, the house is only 11.5km (=7 miles) from Leilani estates where the fissures are currently opening up. Even better, the Corrado I actually bought from a guy living in Leilani Estates - it was parked just a few hundred meters away from where the closest fissures would be today.

But despite the press coverage of all the lava coming out, I think the bigger risk at the moment might be the summit area. I only spent ~1 year in Puna before moving to the Volcano Golf Course area, which is where this picture is taken (wow, doesn't the paint work still look new :) ):


Measuring this on google maps shows our house was just ~4km from Halemaumau crater:


There is a good chance that we are going to see some very large explosions from the crater in the next few weeks - due to the lava dropping below the water table inside the mountain - see this USGS page for a good explanation.

There is also a good summary of the current uncertainties here

The events of the last few weeks have certainly made me think about my ability to assess risk. I've been following closely as I still have friends living close to the affected areas - one person is down slope of the current eruption areas so will definitely be affected if the volume of lava increases. We all tend to watch the footage of people's homes being destroyed and think to ourselves, "well, they knew the risk, they chose to live on top of an active volcano". But you really don't see the danger when you are there. I moved to the Big Island for work and moved to the Puna district because colleagues recommended it and because it was cheap. That;s about as far as I thought and I think most other people who move there don't think any more than that either. We then moved to Volcano a year later to get away from the mosquitoes and because the climate is nicer. I knew the house we were renting was built on material blasted out of the summit caldera in the 1790 explosions, but that just seems like a long long time ago and very unlikely to re-occur. Well, it's still unlikely (currently we're only talking about mid sized steam driven explosions that would at worst throw pebble sized stones or ash on our old house) but the chance of something really disruptive has definitely gone up in likelihood... and then I'd be the one having to evacuate and possibly loose my house (I think it is quite possible that we'll see these "mandatory evacuations" being extended to the areas around the summit caldera if steam driven explosions get going in the next few weeks - search for "Kilauea May 1924" to see some pictures).

One thing I've noticed going back through my old pictures is how few photos of the Jetta on Hawaii I have. It just didn't seem very special at the time... We actually had it on most areas of the island though. I have a lot more of the Corrado which was my daily driver for 5 years. In retrospect I really wish I hadn't sold it when I moved to Europe!
 

Enabled

Veteran Member
Joined
Apr 23, 2013
Location
Houston, TX
TDI
2003 Jetta TDI Manual, BMW 328d SW
Take it to Antarctica and then I'll be impressed..






ha, jk. this is awesome. Maybe I'll be impressed with you outdoing yourself!

Been wanting to drive up to the Arctic Ocean for a while.
 
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