Interview: How a Hungarian humanitarian group explores Africa with a Trabant

Zsolt Vadász, the founding member of the Geonauta Friendship Society, talks about the group’s purpose, their adventures in Africa, and what they are trying to achieve with everything they do, no matter how strange it might seem to others.

Daily News Hungary wrote about Zsolt Vadász and his expeditions before. He is known for travelling around the world with a 30-year-old Trabant, raising awareness of environmental protection and sustainability.

Crazy idea: Hungarian guys to cross the desert with a Trabant

What it is all about

Zsolt Vadász is a founding member of the Geonauta Friendship Society, which is basically a group of friends who, at first, went hiking and rock climbing together, and they slowly formed into this amazing humanitarian group, aiming to raise awareness of the harmful ways of today’s consumer society and emphasize the importance of protecting our environment. They organise hiking tours and regular trash pick-ups, and they even build artificial nests for endangered birds and ring them if necessary.

A few years ago the group decided to show the world that they do not need an expensive new car to reach any, and I mean literally any point of the world. They proved that a 30-year-old, very simple car with low fuel consumption could take you anywhere you want to go. What is this magical car? The Trabant.

“We do not believe in the “buy it, throw it away, buy a new one” philosophy of today’s consumer society. We use our 30-year-old Trabant which needs to be repaired constantly and requires a lot of work. And yet, we managed to visit, among others, the Aurora Borealis (the Northern Lights) or the North Pole, and we attended the Budapest-Bamako rally three times.”

At the Budapest-Bamako rally, Zsolt’s team won the special prize for Team with the lowest budget two times. Apart from the Budapest-Bamako rally, Zsolt and his group visited Africa many times during their own organised tours to Tunisia and Caucasus.

Adventures in Western Africa

January this year, Zsolt and his friends decided to conquer West-Africa to explore the ways of nomad living in the Sahara Desert. In this expedition, Zsolt was accompanied by Nikolett Mitala, who later in February, gave a presentation about the Trabant expedition and the nomad ways of living in the West Sahara at Travel Expo Budapest.

As to why they decided to go West-Africa, Zsolt said:

„One of the most important parts of our expeditions is to provide humanitarian aid. All the equipment we buy for an expedition together (e.g. tents, polyfoams, etc.) usually gets donated after each tour.”