This has been my second year at the Toyota Jamboree event, and oh boy, this one felt very different personally for me. In 2025, when I first visited this event, I was pretty much alone, exploring by myself. I had never been to anything like this before, though one thing I knew for sure was that it had everything I love: adventure, camping, offroading, and a community that shares the same vision as me.
Last year my experience was mostly limited to the guided tours and event activities. It was fun, but pretty calm overall. Most of my time I spent camping at the Maybe Camp. I truly love that camp by the way. I prefer less traffic, less dust when I camp, and no music.
But something happened there. I met my first true offroad friend, Keith Musaeus. I got my front passenger wheel debeaded, and he helped me change the tire. Then, after basically saving the day, we discovered my never used Hi-Lift jack had jammed and we could not bring the car back down :) Haha, I still laugh about it because it was honestly so much fun. So here’s a quick tip for you, which might sound obvious, but I’m still going to leave it here: maintain and clean your jack :D Or pay the price later. Also, just get yourself a nice hydraulic jack from ARB or a good dolly jack. Don’t be me… unless you want to make new friends by breaking down in the middle of a green trail and blocking everyone behind you.
Since that day, we’ve stayed good friends and have gone to as many events together as possible. This event triggered a huge wave for me in the offroading and overlanding world, and in photography in general. I started taking pictures not just for myself anymore, but for others too.
Back to 2026, this time the Jamboree was completely different. I already had way more friends, and way more duties since I was a media volunteer this year. Quiet camping, guided tours, and relaxing camp time became more of a luxury!
I stayed in the same camp and almost with the same people too. Next time though, I might have to stay a bit closer. And no, it’s not because Henry’s crowd was loud until 2 AM every night hahaha, just kidding. It’s simply because it takes too much time driving back and forth when you have multiple tasks to do. Or in my case, when you have terrible memory and constantly leave something at camp, then have to rush back to grab it. A quick 15–20 minute drive one way adds up fast.
Also, I am terribly sorry if I was speeding a little going back and forth.
This year, Jambo happened to be the 20th anniversary, and a huge number of people showed up even though it rained for almost two days straight. Perfect weather in my opinion, way better than the melting Texas heat! A lot of people I know were there, and I finally realized what you really need for a successful Jambo event: a lot of friends coming from different places to spend a few days together and have fun.
After checking in with the Media Monkeys, I started getting some nice shots of the early vendors and people arriving at the gate around 10 AM on Thursday.
Later, we caught up with Keith and went on our first guided tour. It was the easy Green Line, supposedly a chill ride to warm up before some more serious trails. We ran with some nice people as usual, and Keith broke his driver’s CV axle haha yes, you read that right, on the Green trail :D To give Keith some credit, he was trying to go over a very nasty ditch that looked doable from the side but turned out to be impossible. So here, in my opinion, is where the fun begins: recovery time! We had to use a winch to pull him out, and that’s exactly when it snapped. I truly believe Keith was one of the first people to break something serious this year!
Here are some photos from the recovery:
Fun fact: the Tacoma that Keith is riding is also pulling around a 2,000–3,000 lb trailer, so a broken CV axle is not a very nice thing to have happen when you still need to get the trailer back to Houston. Well, this is where experience comes in, and something I personally need to work on more—car mechanic skills. Keith fixed it in about 2–3 hours and already had a spare CV axle ready. Again, it was a great learning moment. If you’ve never done something like this, find Keith and ride with him—he will definitely break something again next time :D But in all seriousness, learning how to do this is a real skill. Even though we have so many YouTube videos showing how to change CV axles, seeing it and helping do it in real life is an absolutely different story.
Moving forward through the day, I participated in multiple events as media, and the one I personally enjoyed the most was the Blind Man Bluff. This is where a team in one rig has to complete a short obstacle trail as fast as possible, while the driver is blindfolded. Yes, the driver literally cannot see anything, so the co-pilot has to guide them through the course like a navigator. I was positioned close to the first turn, where almost every team came in hot trying to go fast, and honestly, it was pretty scary. Probably the most intense moment of my photography career so far, but at the same time, it was a lot of fun.
Being media at an event like this gives you access to some of the most insane shots. By the way, last year someone hit a tree and ripped the entire wheel and suspension out.
Here are some shots I got:
Later we had a rock garden competition, racing, some local community rides like GXOR, raffle time, campfire hangouts, and more. It is very hard to express all the feelings sometimes, but I can say one thing: this year I truly understood the most important piece of the Jamboree - people.
Get out there, you won’t regret it. Also, if you see me out there, please don’t be shy and ask me to take a picture for you!
