Photography by Villiers Van Der Merwe
Vill Van Der Merwe was born in South Africa, where he and his family lived in a small town in the middle of the Kalahari Desert. The way he remembers it, they would use Toyota Land Cruisers for overland travel either on the red dunes or along the coastlines, and they favoured these Land Cruisers for all sorts of vehicle-based adventure.
“That’s what I grew up with and that’s what I learned at a very young age, until I moved to Canada when I was 11 years old,” Van Der Merwe recalls. “At that point, that all stopped. We didn’t do a whole lot of that anymore.”
Fast forward to 2015, when he bought his own Toyota Tacoma. It was at that point he decided, “Well, I’m going to start using this thing for the things that I love.” And as an Alberta-based geologist by training, not to mention someone born into the magnificent natural wonders of the African continent, what he loved was the outdoors. So much so that outdoor lifestyle and landscape photography had become a serious hobby. A serious hobby that he quickly realized was more of a serious talent. A very serious talent.
Being back behind the wheel of a rugged 4×4 vehicle, it all began to click. He instantly understood that certain things had been missing in his life, like the intrepid exploration of natural environments or the invigorating thrill off-roading.
Van Der Merwe soon met a gentleman by the name of Kyle George at a local dealership, who inspired him to start building up his Tacoma. And then, two years later, George and his business partner, Ryan Quiring, decided to open a shop called KRave Automotive. A Toyota-specific automotive shop, the vision behind KRave was to help customers and people like Van Der Merwe himself build their dream vehicles for overlanding, four-wheel driving and the like.
“I spent a lot of time and effort building with this shop. It’s at the point where we’re doing more maintenance, more upgrading on actual vehicle components,” he shares. “For instance, I just replaced my rear axle. We put gussets on it and we welded it so that it’s stronger, because the old axle was starting to bend on me.”
Now, here’s where things take an exciting twist:
Three years after KRave’s launch and three years since he got to work on his Tacoma, earlier this autumn, Van Der Merwe decided to leave his job as a geologist and become KRave’s full-time sales and marketing manager. And along the way, he launched an Instagram page to document both his Tacoma’s progress and his return to off-roading — @geoscoutadventures — which currently tallies over 25,000 engaged followers.
“It’s come full circle now,” he beams. “This desire to get back into something that I grew up with has now become my passion, my job and, hopefully, my future.”
How exactly does one make the leap from project geologist and area geologist for Canadian Natural Resources Limited, to sales and marketing manager for an independent auto specialty shop in cosmopolitan Calgary? There isn’t exactly a ton of obvious crossover between the two, as Van Der Merwe acknowledges. But he uncovered enough of one to make the transition not only work, but feel quite organic.
“Geology defined is very exact and so forth,” he explains, “but what I had to realize was that my job as a petroleum geologist wasn’t just to find oil and drill wells. It was also to project manage, and to look at the fine details. Furthermore, a lot of my training in university was to pick up on really, really microscopic details and so forth. And because I’m so detail oriented, I’m able to help these guys to a level where they didn’t have that kind of support before.”
In his new role at KRave Automotive, Van Der Merwe can observe things that need refinement, or that the team needs to look at. He’s further able to look at a big picture, but then also bring it to a very small level and actually pick out details. And then there’s his photography. His sweeping, oft-majestic photography. X factors rarely come more pronounced. Or jaw-dropping.
“It’s really easy for a person to place a vehicle in the middle of a photo,” he says. “I usually try to look for things that can draw your attention away from the vehicle and more towards the landscape or the background, as well. And I think that’s where a lot of people connect with my photos. Because they get to see not just the vehicle, but also the beautiful places that we like to take them.”
Perhaps most importantly, from his KRave colleagues to his KRave clients, Van Der Merwe has also been able to pay his unique journey forward a bit.
“I love to talk to people and get them excited about their own adventures. How I can inspire them to not just copy my vehicle, but also think about what it is that they want to do,” he declares.
Van Der Merwe always tells people, whatever they do, do it with purpose, and don’t forget to enjoy the process. Because, as far as he’s concerned, too many of them don’t know why they’re doing what they’re doing, and don’t think about what that process actually involves and why they actually enjoy that process. So, those are things that he usually tries to inspire in people. To not just try to copy his vehicle or his decisions, but to make them for themselves.
And to help them down that path — be it with their vehicle, or their own personal and/or professional odyssey — there are three lessons he frequently tends to pass on.
The first? Align yourself with good people. Whether it’s your family or good friends. For his part, Van Der Merwe considers himself very lucky to be able to take his wife and child out off-roading with him. His son’s first trip was when he was just eight weeks old.
“He’s been off-roading since right from the start. My wife also off-roaded with me previously,” he elaborates. “We were actually out the day before she went into labour. She was helping me with a photo shoot that I was doing for Toyota Canada, and she was gunning the truck through puddles and so forth.”
Aligning yourself with good people is particularly important with a hobby like off-roading, Van Der Merwe stresses. Because as much as off-roading can be considered a solo pursuit, there are inherent dangers involved.”
“We do a lot of snow or winter wheeling out here. Where, obviously if you get stuck in an ice cold river or in the snow, and you’re not able to recover yourself, you’re going to be in a world of hurt without a good buddy system.”
The second lesson? Find the platform that you love and want to dedicate your time and obviously your capital — into. For Van De Merwe, that’s Toyota. For KRave Automotive, that’s Toyota. “We’re a Toyota specific shop,” he reminds us. “Getting yourself a solid platform like that is a key step.”
And the third? Do your damn research.
“Understand what your final build might look like. Understand what it is that you want to do with this vehicle not just today, but in two or five years from now,” he clarifies. “And building your rig. It obviously makes sense for a lot of people to do their builds in steps, and that’s encouraged. But understand what the end goal is. Don’t just do something now and then do it over a month later. Or do something different.”
Whatever you do, Van Der Merwe deems it crucial to understand that end goal.
“That’s how you’re going to have success. That’s how you’re going to have some fun. And that’s how you’re going to turn your passion into your profession.