We Secured the “Dino Car” and Are Preparing It for Ukraine
A Personal Milestone
It’s been one year and ten days since my first trip to Ukraine—the moment when the idea of helping beyond just financial donations was born.
Now feels like the right time to reflect. I expected this would be a long journey, but I also hoped for stronger donor support. That said, we've learned a great deal, new ideas keep coming, hardworking volunteers continue to step in, and we're slowly but surely making a difference—within our means.
Failures haven’t broken us. We carry on.
The Vehicle: A Mitsubishi L200 – Meet “Trix”
On Friday, we met the previous owner of the L200. The vehicle has a solid frame, the engine recently had a timing belt replacement and other maintenance, and it passed technical inspection.
It had minor issues with the brakes and a leaky gearbox, and it was missing the front hub for 4WD engagement.
The previous owner had only been using rear-wheel drive, and one front hub was missing bolts—which we’ll replace.
On Saturday, my brother Martin and I picked up the vehicle.
On Sunday, Martin got the paint and spray gun, and the car was repainted.
Rapid Progress
On Monday, the previous owner arranged:
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An official color change (to khaki)
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Export license plates
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Export paperwork (processed in Liberec)
Everything went smoothly—thank you to everyone involved!
And now, we’ve also confirmed that we can:
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Spray-paint a vehicle ourselves in the Czech Republic
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Officially register the new color—a useful skill for the future!
All that remained was to arrange:
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Insurance
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Toll stickers
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And the vehicle was ready to go!
Meet “Trix”
We’ve named the car Trix, after the dinosaur decals the previous owner had placed on it—including a dinosaur figurine on the dashboard.
Trix is named after a real dinosaur discovered in the US in 2013 and later brought to the Netherlands, where it was named after Queen Beatrix.
We’ll keep you posted on the next steps and Trix’s journey to Ukraine.
СЛАВА УКРАЇНІ! ГЕРОЯМ СЛАВА!
Glory to Ukraine! Glory to the heroes!
