''Overland'' or ''Overland World Truck Expedition'' is a documentary series about expeditions promoted and organized by Beppe Tenti. The documentaries are broadcast from 1996 on

RAI 1 Rai 1 () is an Italian free-to-air television channel owned and operated by state-owned public broadcaster RAI – Radiotelevisione italiana. It is the company's Flagship (broadcasting), flagship television channel and is known for broadcasting ...

, for a total of more than 150 episodes (replicated on several occasions). From the thirteenth season Overland is also broadcast in high definition on RAI HD. The centerpiece of these expeditions is the re-discovery of the journey by land, combined with the aim of obtaining a snapshot of the planet and its culture in the late 20th century and early 21st century.

Solidarity

Overland has always been a beneficial, active and contributory objective: It has been at the forefront of

UNICEF UNICEF ( ), originally the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund, officially United Nations Children's Fund since 1953, is an agency of the United Nations responsible for providing Humanitarianism, humanitarian and Development a ...

in many of the countries crossed using, whenever possible, medical care to assist populations. It also supported the Italian Association for Cancer Research (''Associazione Italiana per la Ricerca sul Cancro, AIRC''). Since 2005, on a proposal by Lionello Grossi, supports the association Overland for Smile which provides dentistry care to children living in orphanages in Eastern Europe. In 2010, with the twelfth edition of Overland, thanks to agreements with the Italian Development Cooperation, CUCI (University of Parma) and other organizations, has set up a medical vehicle equipped with specialized personnel with the task of surveying the health situation in some of the areas crossed by the expedition, as well as to distribute informational materials, so as to identify possible future interventions of ad hoc cooperation. In the same shipment is the CinemArena project, a traveling cinema that uses one of the historic 330.30 ANW as support for the projection screen. The aim of the project is to inform the people of the small villages about the risks and prevention of different diseases, all using the documentary tools.

Expeditions

The project Overland was founded in 1995 with the ambitious aim of tracing a portrait of our planet, exploring the far corners and creating an exceptional diary broadcast on Rai. The numbers of Overland, already today, are impressive: 13 expeditions in 16 years, more than 421,000 km of total mileage (approximately 8 times the circumference of the Earth), covered in over 1460 days travel through 372 borders of countries belonging to the disparate geographical areas and climatic zones of the planet. Overland is part of a larger project to Beppe Tenti for the "rediscovery" of the over-land trip. With Overland 1, the crossing from

Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...

was completed in 1996, the focus has shifted to the New World, Overland 2 (New York–

Tierra del Fuego Tierra del Fuego (, ; Spanish for "Land of Fire", rarely also Fireland in English) is an archipelago off the southernmost tip of the South America, South American mainland, across the Strait of Magellan. The archipelago consists of the main is ...

–

São Paulo São Paulo (; ; Portuguese for 'Paul the Apostle, Saint Paul') is the capital of the São Paulo (state), state of São Paulo, as well as the List of cities in Brazil by population, most populous city in Brazil, the List of largest cities in the ...

) crossed from one end to the other of the Americas in 1997. The third expedition, Overland 3, held in 1998, saw the caravan traveling along Africa, the

Arabian Peninsula The Arabian Peninsula (, , or , , ) or Arabia, is a peninsula in West Asia, situated north-east of Africa on the Arabian plate. At , comparable in size to India, the Arabian Peninsula is the largest peninsula in the world. Geographically, the ...

and Europe from the most southerly point of Africa,

Cape of Good Hope The Cape of Good Hope ( ) is a rocky headland on the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic coast of the Cape Peninsula in South Africa. A List of common misconceptions#Geography, common misconception is that the Cape of Good Hope is the southern tip of Afri ...

, to the further north in Europe, the North Cape. But the adventure continues and in 1999 with Overland 4 and 5 with the four trucks traveling by Asia. In 2002, Overland 6 runs through the

Mediterranean The Mediterranean Sea ( ) is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the east by the Levant in West Asia, on the north by Anatolia in West Asia and Southern ...

and the

Sahara The Sahara (, ) is a desert spanning across North Africa. With an area of , it is the largest hot desert in the world and the list of deserts by area, third-largest desert overall, smaller only than the deserts of Antarctica and the northern Ar ...

. Later were broadcast in 2004 Overland 7 - Back in Siberia (extended footage of Overland 1), in 2005 Overland 8 - The rediscovery of the Americas (extended footage of Overland 2), and in 2006 Overland 9 - Three Continents (extended footage of Overland 3). Meanwhile, in 2005 Overland 10 discovers a new flavor changing means: traveling by bicycle from

Como Como (, ; , or ; ) is a city and (municipality) in Lombardy, Italy. It is the administrative capital of the Province of Como. Nestled at the southwestern branch of the picturesque Lake Como, the city is a renowned tourist destination, ce ...

Beijing Beijing, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's List of national capitals by population, most populous national capital city as well as ...

. Two years later, the expedition gets the centennial Itala, winner of the first raid in history in 1907 from Beijing to

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

. This car was taken of the old museum and kept it together in Overland 11 retraces his steps back a hundred years later, returning to Beijing where he was playing in the company (among other means) of a Fiat 500, which also makes his return to Italy with 500 Overland. A small break of a few years and 2010 sees the fulfillment of two expeditions, Overland 12 and 13. Overland 12 calls into track two of the four historic "Musoni" alongside four new Iveco vehicles (a Trakker 6x6, two 4x4 and a Daily Massif 4x4), to return to the African continent traveling completing the perimeter, from

Morocco Morocco, officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It has coastlines on the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to Algeria–Morocc ...

to the Cape of Good Hope and then up in

Cairo Cairo ( ; , ) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Egypt and the Cairo Governorate, being home to more than 10 million people. It is also part of the List of urban agglomerations in Africa, largest urban agglomeration in Africa, L ...

: one of the most extreme and difficult expeditions carried out to date, according to the expedition leader Beppe Tenti. In Overland 13 adventure is especially technology, which aims to showcase the best of Italian research in the field of mobility: the protagonists of this unprecedented challenge are 4 Piaggio Porter electric-powered and equipped with a system of autonomous driving, traveling 15,000 km to

Expo 2010 Expo 2010, officially the Expo 2010 Shanghai China, was held on both banks of the Huangpu River in Shanghai, China, from 1 May to 31 October 2010. It was a major World Expo registered by the Bureau International des Expositions (BIE), in the ...

from Milan to Shanghai. An adventure in a futuristic technology that recalls the legendary Peking-Paris of 1907, the first continental crossing of motor vehicles, past and present protagonists are the Italians and their ingenuity, Technical and Organizational. The suggestive itinerary is played between the folds of history and maybe, for once, has less frenetic pace than the average of previous expeditions. Overland 14, the first edition with the car as the only mode of transport, was placed in Caucasus: Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia and Caucasus countries of the Russian Federation as Chechnya, Ossetia and Ingushetia.

Overview of the expeditions

* Overland 1: Rome–New York, 1995-1996 * Overland 2: New York–Tierra del Fuego–São Paulo, 1997 * Overland 3: Cape Town–North Cape, 1998 * Overland 4: Lisbon–Beijing, 1999 * Overland 5: Beijing–Rome, 1999 * Overland 6: Genoa–Sahara–Turin, 2002 * Overland 7: Extended footage of Overland 1 * Overland 8: Extended footage of Overland 2 * Overland 9: Extended footage of Overland 3 * Overland 10: Como–Beijing (Cycling marathon), 2005 * Overland 11: Paris–Beijing (100 years of rally Beijing–Paris), 2007 * Overland 500: Nanjing–Bologna (Bologna Motor Show) 2007 * Overland 12: Turin–Cape Town–Rome, 2010 * Overland 13: Milan–Shanghai (

Expo An expo is a trade exposition. It may also refer to: Events and venues * World's fair, a large international public exposition * Singapore Expo, convention and exposition venue ** Expo Axis, one of the world's largest membrane roofs, construc ...

), 2010 * Overland 14: Caucasus, 2013 * Overland 15: from terracotta warriors to the Taklamakan dunes, 2014 * Overland 16: Bolivia and Peru, 2015 * Overland 17: Southeast of Asia: Thailand, Malaysia, Cambodia and Myanmar, 2016 * Overland 18: Islamic streets, Central Asia and Middle East, 2017 * Overland 19: India, 2018 * Overland 20: From Italy to Guinea, 2019 * Overland 21:

Nordic countries The Nordic countries (also known as the Nordics or ''Norden''; ) are a geographical and cultural region in Northern Europe, as well as the Arctic Ocean, Arctic and Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic oceans. It includes the sovereign states of Denm ...

, 2020

References

External links

*
Official YouTube channel
{{Authority control Italian television series