All Foreign Driving

1. If you’re driving on the opposite side of road for the first time in a few months, it REALLY helps to have a second person in the car to help remind you when you’re driving on the wrong side of the road (something all four of us have done at one point or another).
2. Carry a bag of zipties, they’ve been a lifesaver at keeping dangling car parts from falling off the car.
3. Depending on the country you’re in, fill up your gas tank as frequently as possible. We found in Namibia that its quite normal that you could drive 250 miles without ever seeing a gas station.

That's Our Toyota Yaris!

Foreign Car Rentals

1. In addition to checking the car for dents and scratches, ALWAYS check the inner and outer tread on ALL the tires. Our need to replace two tires in Namibia could have been completely avoiding had we looked carefully at our back tires before leaving and realized what poor condition they were in. Also, don’t forget to double check your spare tire.
2. If you will be driving ANYWHERE that doesn’t have well-kept tarred roads, get the best insurance coverage possible. It didn’t cost us more than US$2-3/day to have a $0 deductible and I assure you it was worth it…
3. Make sure you read the insurance coverage very thoroughly AND make a copy of it for your records. I’m currently writing this from the middle of Namibia where we know that we’ve banged up our Toyota Yaris quite a bit, but don’t have the paperwork to know if it’s going to actually cost us anything when we return the car.