Back on the road with Defender X, this latest leg took me from Istanbul through Georgia and on to Baku. But like so many journeys, it became about much more than the route itself.

I left for Istanbul only days after the end of a three-year relationship. It ended well, I think, or as well as these things ever can. But endings are endings, and I arrived bruised, tired, overfed, and badly in need of perspective. To be met there by this strange, loyal, funny, exhausting and generous road family felt exactly right.

From Istanbul we drove east. Across Turkey, down to the Black Sea, into Georgia, through Batumi and Tbilisi, and eventually on to Baku. Along the way the journey became a reflection on friendship, aging, borders, old Soviet shadows, and the strange relief that can come from being trapped in a car long enough for your own thoughts to catch up with you.

Georgia fascinated me immediately. The shift from polished Turkey into the messier, noisier, more familiar rhythm of the Caucasus was instant. Batumi felt half Dubai, half Soviet. Tbilisi opened up in a different way, especially once I got away from the group for a while and started meeting people on my own. In Baku, the beauty and the control sat side by side. Everything shone. Cameras were everywhere. It was impressive, unsettling, and unforgettable.

This piece is not really about cars, even if Defender X began there. It is about what the road still gives when the world feels harder, more controlled, and more unstable than before. It is about older bodies, old friends, private bruises, the war always somewhere in the background, and the feeling that movement still matters.

Because in the end, the road does not give answers. It gives perspective. It gives motion. And sometimes that is enough.

Read the full piece here: https://explorermikaelstrandberg.substack.com/p/defender-x-back-on-the-road