Motorcycle Diaries:
Chrome Won’t Get You Home
A borrowed Harley Sportster from Vail to San Francisco and back the long way. One of those days set my personal one-day mileage record on a motorcycle, 778 miles.
Vintage on Vintage
A guy born in 1935 climbs on a Czech Jawa 350 motorcycle, made in 1957 and the two of them, both vintage editions, adventure their way up and over the Alps into Italy…and back… almost!
A Probability of Rain
Everybody who cycles seriously rides in the rain, but not like this, almost never like this, Misha and me on our Honda Nighthawk from Prague to Florence and back.
Italy by Motorcycle
Prague To Sicily And Back, Misha and me exercising our first big bike, our Yamaha Virago 1100.
Traveling by other means, mostly by car – road trips:
Sarajevo, 1997, Just as the Fighting Stopped
We’re having a minor argument about the route, whether or not the bridge is blown, if the scribbled directions are actually correct. The road is narrow, but not the described narrow and we’re backed up behind a farm tractor, its rear end sagging under the load of a huge wire-caged pig. The pig’s head is down, swaying from side to side in the knowledge its throat will soon be cut, aware that time is running the wrong direction for pigs and it’s a sobering metaphor for our entry into Bosnia.
Sarajevo a Year Later
Too much was unchanged for another description of wrecked towns and bewilderment. Actually, the bewilderment seems to have slowly settled into that next stage of the war-torn, the ‘what are you going to do for me now’ stage that brings a gleam of ‘get it before it’s gone’ to the eyes.
Thailand, Christmas, 1996
Once delivered to Bangkok airport, Misha and I debate—a day of rest in a good Bangkok hotel, hot shower and needed sleep, or push on to Koh Samui and island rest? Island rest wins, probably a good choice. The streets outside the airport are choked with drive-on-the-right British style traffic and swarms of scooters and light motorcycles.
U.S.A., the Whole Enchilada in Three Months
This is a really long “trip note” that takes in three months, thirty-four states,27,000 miles and sixteen National Parks. No one should be expected to wade through that, but we did it and it was more of a look at America for Misha than probably any other Czech has had. Most Americans as well. You might want to scroll it, see if there’s a stopping point along our way that interests you.
