I feel I have to finally admit it: I inspired Ewan and Charley. They read my stories in Motorcycle Sport and Leisure and said to themselves: "If that stupid tawt Bright can manhandle a wholey unsuitable overloaded bag of sh!t BMW around the world, then so can we. All we really need is Russ Malkin to film us: He's the best..."


Errr, sorry, just woke up. T'was just a dream. My inspirations were Ted's "JT", Helge Pedersen's "10 years on 2 wheels" and Robert Fulton's "One Man Caravan". Another excellent book I read after I came home from my trip was Jonny Bealby's "Running with the Moon".

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Brighty's website: TheBrightStuffDotCom

CURRENT RR WITH REGULAR UPDATES: The Wife Takes on Chlamydia: A South American Retrospective

I have some friends who off roaded to Alaska and raced the outlaw Baja 1000 every year. They dragged me to a slideshow by this dude named Helge Pedersen. I saw that big bike in a tiny canoe and was hooked!

That was probably 15 years before LWR.

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, ±1974.

E&C introduced me to the concept of travelling on a motorbike and then I came up with the idea of an USA tour. But it was the travellers at the HU meet in 2010 that inspired me to be a bit more adventurous. It was Walter Colebatch in particular though that inspired me to ride to Mongolia & Siberia, I never really gave any serious thought to these places before. Revisiting the USA plan again now but it keeps getting sidetracked: Central Asia is beckoning me. Other travel tales keep me going, providing me with a fix until my next adventure. Being currently unemployed though after my return is very frustrating and retarding my progress not to mention not being able to save.

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www.AdventureVagabond.com Mongolia & Siberia 2012: Adventure Moto Madness

It was LWR that led me to the BMW GS as my primary bike. But going around the world like they did seemed the stuff of rich movie stars (um, movie star and buddy). Especially when they made such a production around the planning stage - carnets, fixers, survival training, deals with motorcycle and gear companies, support vehicles, etc. If this was what RTW travel was all about, then it wasn't for us. We'd just stick to our 2-3 week moto-vacation in 1st world countries, then fly back home to earn money for next year's trip.

On one of our vacations through Europe (4 whole weeks!), we were at the cargo warehouse at Munich airport, prepping our motorcycles for shipment back to Canada when we ran into a guy unpacking his F650GS Dakar, fresh off the plane from Vancouver. It was just a 5-minute conversation, but he told us how he was 9 months into his trip, having completed an Argentina-to-Alaska run and was now doing the European continent. 9 months! And we thought we were really loosening the leash at 1 month away from home...

I know the exact date that happened, because we blogged about it over 5 years ago:

"As we waved goodbye to our motorcycles, our minds were abuzz with the logistics of doing such a trip ourselves.

The train ride back to Munich had us discussing what it would take to do a motorcycle tour for over year, possibly two, that would take us around Europe (properly this time), Eastern-Europe, Africa and Asia, and even back to the Americas (south and central). It probably won't happen for a few years, but I think we're both committed to this idea. Last year, after riding to California and back, the seeds were planted for this Europe trip. Now, at the end of this trip, we've got to up the stakes again. "Ride The World", indeed!"

Today marks the 5 month anniversary since we left on our own RTW trip. Haven't made it out of NA yet, but we're in no rush, having sold everything to wander around aimlessly on two wheels. I never got the name of the guy we met at the cargo warehouse in Munich airport, but he was far more of an inspiration to us than Obi Wan and his sidekick.

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Gene - http://www.RideDOT.com

I remember reading Jupiters travels in the late 70s after which I started to plan a route to Tehran where my father was working at the time. I had just rebuilt my already 25 year old BSA which I thought would be ideal for the trip. Probably fortunately the trip never came off for budget/girlfriend reasons.

When we did set off in the early 90s our only inspiration was the promise of a long holiday in the sun!

Just to reiterate (is that the right word ? It just came to me and I don't even know what it means)

Well, they inspired me to do my first trip so I did it.

After that trip I decided they were a bunch of whining, overly self important drama queens..

We haven't a good old E&C thread for ages. I'll put a fresh pot of coffee on and put my feet up

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Did some trips.
Rode some bikes.
Fix them for a living.
Can't say anymore.

The most dangerous part of any RTW trip has to be getting through the Mersey tunnel at 7 in the morning , never saw E&C TRY THAT

zebb
www.motoloco.eu

Try it at 8.30am... You will usually see me on the back wheel with my UZI, popping caps into white-van-mans ass...

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Did some trips.
Rode some bikes.
Fix them for a living.
Can't say anymore.

AH white van man could be a whole new thread (rant) on its own ,
i think you have the best solution Ted , Andy and Maya from adventure sidecar will be trying the delights of the tunnel tomorrow, they are on there way to mine before they set off to Africa on Saturday , asking them what they think of E&C is quite funny

Happy days... Send them my regards. I'll be in Twelve Quays college all day learning how to weld.

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Did some trips.
Rode some bikes.
Fix them for a living.
Can't say anymore.

I think for me it's always just been in my blood. I've been a bicycle traveller for a long time and I somehow just thought that it would be cool to drive a car from Canada to Argentina. So, at the library, I found a book by two blokes who drove a car from Ushuaia to Dead Horse, Alaska in 28 days in the 80's to set a record. I was obviously already interested in doing this but reading their book really awoke the travel bug again.

Then I realized that motorcycles are much more fun and I bought a bike for the express purpose of making it to Ushuaia from Victoria, BC, Canada. I found Ewan and Charlie's book and thoroughly enjoyed it. Then I read Lois on The Loose and really got hooked. Compared to Charlie and Ewan, she's more my adventurer type.

I finally made it as far as Yaviza, Panama and back. South America is on hold while I make some more money and I continue to be inspired by the great riders I meet at the HU events in Nakusp.


...Michelle

For me, Jupiter's Travels was definitely the first and lasting inspiration. Don't know when I read it, not long after it was published I think. I'd been a bike traveller (Europe only) since 1965 but that book certainly extended my horizons.
I read it a couple of times at least. Then when I decided on London-Cape Town, I read that bit yet again.
The thing that really caught my interest was the slowness of the journey. The long stays in different places. Made me want to go slowly as well.

So having become a student of Ted Simon, when Charley and Ewan came along, as far as I was concerned they were actors making a TV programme for the mass market, and nothing more. Apart from the charity angle. I found it a bit of a turn-off really, finding I really didn't want to be associated with that type of money-no-object fully-supported undertaking. And that's the word I'd use to describe what they did - an undertaking. Not a journey nor a trip nor a ride.
And here's a thought, when my son and daughter were old enough to ride pillion on my bike - my daughter loved it, my son hated it. He had not an ounce of motorcyclist in him. (Nevermind!) And when C & E's book came out, guess who bought me it for Christmas? Not my daughter....

My other big influence was Lois Pryce's books which convinced me what bike to use. Her journeys, being fairly quick in comparison with Jupiter's Travels, convinced me that slow was the way I wanted to go.

I'll also mention Anne Mustoe, who wrote a few books about cycling around the world and other travels. Her books are in the same league as J Travels as far as I'm concerned. And about as far as it is possible to get from C & E, in every aspect. And triggered my bicycle ride from Canada to Mexico back in 2001, and other shorter ones. I'd recommend her books even if you're strictly motorbikes only.

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TTR250 - London to Cape Town

I agree, especially the LWD - I found watching them and their entourage visiting familiar places was devaluing my own experiences, not that the places were off the beaten path or hard to get to but they certainly didn't benefit from the C&E caravan rolling through.

for me the influence was Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance in the late seventy's , i got fed up with all the philosophy by the 3rd chapter , and went for a ride to Berlin instead, a very scary ride in 1978 ,
another big influence was Gertrude bell look her up,, what a girl