Accidental Adventurer, Saskia Caspari and 2025/26 ADV Cannonball Updates

Send us a text

Saskia Caspari @habiadventures rode her G650GS to Dakar and just kept going. Join us for a conversation with this inspiring and intrepid adventure rider. 

Music by Austin Vice 

Support the show

Winner of the Dot Comm 2025 Gold Podcasting Award

Support us directly on Patreon HERE

Buy us a Coffee HERE

The Motorcycle Book and Film Clubs.

The Living List Document GOOGLE DOC

Contact the Podcast [e-mail]

Contact Aaron for ADV Rally Inquiries [e-mail]

ADV Cannonball Podcast Home

ADV Cannonball Rally Home

GPS Checkpoint Rally & Event App Home

ADV Cannonball Rally on Facebook

ADV Cannonball Rally on Instagram

ADV Cannonball on ...

Episode Transcript

SPEAKER_04 (00:02):
Welcome to the ADV Cannonball Podcast, where we
discuss all things on twowheels, the adventure bike
cannonball, and othermotorcycle-related nonsense.

SPEAKER_08 (00:25):
Season three, episode 10.
Welcome to Adventure CannonballPodcast.
I am your host, Taylor Lawson.
And today I am joined by oncehovercraft pilot, Captain Aaron
Pufall.
What's up, Taylor?
Thanks for having me on theshow.
Absolutely.
Aaron, where are you, kind sir?
And what are you drinking?

SPEAKER_05 (00:44):
Well, oh yeah, I am drinking a Top Cutter IPA, the
Bale IPA.
Breaker, and I am in Seattle,Washington.
And where are you, sir?

SPEAKER_08 (00:55):
I am in sunny Stockholm, Sweden.
Actually, it's a little rainytoday, a little muggy, but it's
been sunny and nice here.
We're expecting like mid-80sthis week, pretty warm.
And I'm drinking a peachybulldog pale ale from Gotland's
Brewery in Gotland.

(01:16):
Yeah, man.
Nice.
Here we go.
Let's see if I can pop thiswithout making a mess.
Nope.

SPEAKER_05 (01:24):
Nope, that was not successful.
That's life, buddy.
You got to break a few eggssometimes.
You know what I mean?
Sometimes it happens.
Here we go.

SPEAKER_08 (01:32):
Yes, sir.
All right.
So I had some field notes thisweekend, which we can roll.
And I just want to say that theend of the story is that the
first thing that anybody shouldreally do is assess, A, whether
their bike is under warrantybefore they attempt anything.
And then with that, we will rollthe Field Notes.

SPEAKER_04 (01:55):
It's time for Field Notes.
A collection of voice notesrecorded on location while we're
on wildly exciting motorcycleadventures packed together for
your amusement and our publicshaming.

SPEAKER_08 (02:09):
July 13th.
The rain just cleared.
It is...
Zero wind outside.
And I'm going to take my T7 overto my buddy Sven's place.
Sven, who, correction, doesn'thave four motorcycles in his
garage, but has five.
He also has a really great toolset up.
So we're going to go see if wecan figure out why my fuel gauge

(02:32):
is flashing.
Well, it's faulty.
We're going to see if we cantroubleshoot it and get it so
that actually tells me how muchfuel I have in there.
How great would that be?
All right.
So I have ridden across thenorthern side of Stockholm and I
am now in Sven's garage where,yes, I did on the previous
podcast, I have to do somecleanup.
There are six motorcycles inhere.

(02:53):
So Sven, thanks very much forhaving me at your garage.
What are we up to?

SPEAKER_02 (02:56):
Let's see what we can find about your fuel gauge.
And to be honest, I have no cluewhat I'm doing, but we'll figure
it out some way.

SPEAKER_08 (03:09):
All right.
Well, there's a good start.
We'll check back in and see howwe end up.
All right.
So, Sven, how did we make outtoday and what did we learn?
Well,

SPEAKER_02 (03:21):
about fuck all, but...
No, but at least we found outthat it's not in the fuel
sander.
We swapped tanks with mines andstill the problem is there.
So it's somewhere in thesoftware or in the loom or
something like that.
I tried to clean up theconnectors but it didn't help.
So I need to do a bit moreresearch on that.

SPEAKER_08 (03:43):
I just want to say it was fun hanging out here.
I learned all the things thatthis bike needs to have.
And I just want to say that thereason that we intro this bit
laughing is because you gave methe comment that I had really
gone out of my way to make thisTenere 700 look as much like my
friend's GS as possible.
And I think it started with aconversation about removing the

(04:05):
crash bars.
So anyway, thanks very much foryour time and for all the tips.
It's been a fun afternoon.

SPEAKER_02 (04:12):
Yeah, it's been great.
You're always welcome.

SPEAKER_08 (04:15):
And with that, Field Notes out.
Yeah, so I have to say that wegave it our best shot.
I want to say thanks to you,Sven, for, uh, for taking the
time.
It was fun to hang out and talkmotorcycles and just, um, yeah,
just to hang out and be in, bein a garage and, and, uh, and,

(04:36):
and turn wrenches for a littlewhile.
So that was fun.

SPEAKER_05 (04:38):
Yeah.
But you, you've, you'vediagnosed most of the problems.
So you, you're pretty sure thatthe problem is not in the tank.
So that's, that's half thebattle right there.

SPEAKER_08 (04:46):
Yeah.
I thought that was so cool.
Like he's got, you know, a bunchof bikes in the garage and I was
like, how are we going totrouble to shoot this?
He goes, Oh, but just take thepieces off of your bike, but
take mine and put them on andsee what's broken.
I was like, okay.
So we totally cannibalize hismachine and put them on mine.
And they were like, no, that'sa, that's not the problem.
It's not the tank.
So anyway, Sven, thanks fortaking the, thanks for taking
the time, man.

(05:07):
It was really cool of you to dothat.

SPEAKER_05 (05:08):
No.
And you know what?
I think it's a good lesson foreveryone.
I bet you, you learned a lotabout your bike.
You learn how to take it apart.
And there are too many guys outthere that are like, It's
broken.
Take it back to the dealershipand hope for the best.
And when something goes wrong,when you're in the middle of
nowhere, at least you're moreprepared now how to take the
bike apart and how to put itback together.

(05:29):
And we all know that there areless spare parts the more times
you put something back together.

SPEAKER_08 (05:34):
Yeah, and I have to say that Sven's clearly more
experienced than I am becausethere was only spare parts on my
side of the bike when we put itback together.

SPEAKER_05 (05:41):
Listen, we all know these things are overbuilt.
You know what I mean?

UNKNOWN (05:45):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_08 (05:46):
But we took it.
I only had to go one layer backin to to get it right.
But we got it right anyway.
But

SPEAKER_05 (05:52):
the next time you're not going to have those spare
parts.
You know, if you watch the videoof like Lyndon Poskett building
his his Basel bike season one,episode one of Race to Places,
you know.
you're like, wow, this guy knowshow to build a bike.
You know what I mean?
So that's what happens when youdo things over and over and over
again.
And don't be afraid to take yourbike apart.
It's not that complicated.

(06:12):
Just be patient and you're goingto learn something every single
time.
So Maya, hats off to you forgiving it a shot.
Thank you, sir.

SPEAKER_08 (06:20):
All right, so I had a really fun interview with
Saskia.
So she was really inspirational.
And one of the things, my bigtakeaway in having an
opportunity to chat with her isthat it just goes to show you
that you don't need to haveamazing skills as a mechanic.
You don't need to spend yearsmodifying your bike, buying the

(06:42):
perfect bike, or have tons ofmoney.
You just need one thing.
And what is that thing, Aaron?
Don't be a weenie and just go.
You got to go.
That's it.
You just got to swing your legover the bike and point it

SPEAKER_05 (06:55):
in one direction.
But you do need a new what?
Well, we always give peopleadvice if they're going to do a
cannonball with us is just makesure you have a fresh service
and a fresh set of tires.
And these bikes are pretty muchbulletproof these days.
And, you know, the likelihood ofyou having a catastrophic
failure on a cannonball or anybig route is really, really
rare.

(07:15):
You think about how many timesyou've ridden across countries
and done all these things.
It's very rare to have acatastrophic failure.
And she points out that, youknow, the skills that she's
found along the way wasincredible.
chain tensioning and fixing flattires with tubeless tires and
you know this falls into in linewith me saying why the gs is

(07:37):
such a great bike is they havetubeless tires they have shaft
drive and they're justbulletproof

SPEAKER_08 (07:41):
you know as soon as when i was done with the
interview with her i went andresearched can i get tubeless
tires on my tender race 700 andwhat was the answer yeah
everything is just like yachtingeverything is just a function of
money that's right input moneyget out toys.
Exactly.
Exactly.

(08:02):
Anyway, with that, let's rollthe interview.

SPEAKER_00 (08:05):
Registration is now open to the public for the next
ADV Cannonball Rally.
All riders on any motorcycle arewelcome to join the adventure.
Whether you're looking for anexciting and highly organized
coast-to-coast ride with a groupof like-minded riders or a
friendly competition forcannonball glory, it doesn't

(08:25):
matter.
Everyone can participate.
Head over to Welcome to

SPEAKER_08 (08:37):
Adventure Cannonball Podcast.
Today, we are joined by ourinspiring guest, world traveler,
motorcycle adventurer, andvisual storyteller, Saskia
Kaspari, known on Instagram asat hobbyadventures,
H-A-B-I-A-D-V-E-N-T-U-R-E-S.
Saskia's journey spansconsonants, cultures, and
countless dusty roads.

(08:58):
We're diving into her life ontwo wheels, the stories behind
the photos, her philosophy onthe positivity of people.
Saskia, welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_09 (09:06):
Hi, Taylor.
Thank you so much for having me.
I'm really excited to be here.

SPEAKER_08 (09:10):
Fantastic.
We're really happy to have youhere as well.
In transparency, you and I met acouple of weekends ago at the
Skoog event.

SPEAKER_09 (09:18):
Yeah, it was in Skoog, up there in Sweden, on a
nice motorcycle event, a fewdays of camping, riding.
I think we all enjoyed that

SPEAKER_08 (09:28):
very much.
When I, when I mentioned topeople, like I was talking to
someone the other day and Isaid, they said, what'd you do?
And I said, well, it was kindof, you know, it's a bit cold
and I wasn't prepared properlywith the right, you know, the
right equipment.
And so it was like, I didn'tsleep well.
And they were like, and, andthen I mentioned that we had a,
you know, an actual chefpreparing food for us.
And they went, you know what,all of a sudden the violin went

(09:52):
away and I do not feel sorry foryou anymore.

SPEAKER_09 (09:55):
Yeah, it sounds so remote in a forest in Sweden and
was to some extent, but alsothere was great, I mean, it was
great facilities.
The food was amazing.
Everything was good.
But to be fair to us, it waspretty cold.
And I think no one was trulyprepared for the cold.
Maybe only the people who comefrom the north, the Swedes, the

(10:18):
actual Swedes and theNorwegians.
with the woolen layers, but Iwas very cold.
I don't know about you.

SPEAKER_08 (10:26):
Yeah, no, I was super cool.
I, you know, when I, when Ipacked, I had pretty much packed
and I had actually borrowed abag from a friend of mine who,
you know, when I asked him aboutthis, he's like, it was 15
degrees.
And then I borrowed theequipment.
And then as we progressed to,you know, as the days ticked
away towards Coog, thetemperature just continued to go
down.

SPEAKER_09 (10:45):
We made it.

SPEAKER_08 (10:46):
We made it.
We survived.
And then you had the, and thenyou rode the bike from the
Netherlands and then back to theNetherlands.
So that's, that's impressive.
So So that's just, you know, inthis game of things, that's
really nothing compared to whatwe want to talk about today in
terms of your travels.
So I'd like to talk a bit aboutthe origins and the motivations.
So let's start at the beginning.
So what was your firstexperience with motorcycles,
which made you think, I likethis, I've got to have more of

(11:08):
this?
And what was the introductioninto adventure motorcycling for
you?

SPEAKER_09 (11:12):
Yeah, that's a good question, because, I mean, you
would expect some story, oh,this experience happened to me,
and then I dove into adventuremotorcycling, but it was a bit
more smooth than that.
So in my family, so my dad andmy uncle ride motorcycle.
So when I grew up, we had like alittle, like my dad had a
motorcycle in the garage.

(11:33):
It was a, like not an adventuremotorcycle, but a more Kawasaki
something.
I don't really know the model,to be honest.
It was more cruiser, like onewhere you sit and have your arms
a bit more high.
So I remember when I was like,when I was a child, I was just,
I was weirdly spending manyhours just sitting on this
motorcycle in the garage.
I dropped it once as well, justpretending I'm riding.

(11:54):
I don't know where that camefrom.
Like I also went on the back afew times on a ride, but not too
often.
So I don't know why I wasweirdly fascinated by it.
So I just spent sometimes hoursjust sitting in the garage on
this motorcycle, pretending I'mriding.
Yeah.
And then When I grew up, yeah, Ididn't think about it that much.

(12:16):
It just wasn't a theme.
And then somehow when I was,yeah, about 20, 21, I can't
even, like, I cannot tell you, Icannot even remember how it came
about.
So it just, yeah, I was decidingto get my license and I got a
motorcycle and I went.
I think my main motivation backthen was more that I wanted to

(12:38):
travel.
So it was more, okay, what modeof transport could I use for
travel?
Car was an option then.
So I just thought, why not amotorcycle?

SPEAKER_08 (12:48):
So when you got your, how old were you when you
got your motorcycle license?

SPEAKER_09 (12:52):
I was, I just said 2021.
I think I was 23.
I was 23, actually.
I just miscalculated.

SPEAKER_08 (12:59):
So as I understand it, and I got this information
in chatting with people when wewere actually at Scoob.
So you didn't plan to set out tobe gone for two years.
Is that a fair statement?

SPEAKER_09 (13:11):
That is an absolutely fair statement.
It just kind of happened.

SPEAKER_08 (13:15):
So talk to us about the sort of, it grew organically
and then it morphed into thisjourney, which took, was it like
two years, at least two years,right?

SPEAKER_09 (13:24):
Yeah, it was about two years now, actually.
So now it's June.
So exactly two years ago, Ileft.
Oh, cool.
And I just came back.

SPEAKER_08 (13:33):
How did it morph from, I'm going to go for a trip
to, I'm going to continuetraveling?

SPEAKER_09 (13:38):
Back when I was, so when I was 23 and I got my
license, I already did a fewmotorcycle trips.
First thing I did is, I don'tknow, I just wanted to.
I went to Croatia and back and Iwent on a trip to Central Asia.
So I did a few trips back then,but at some point my motorcycle
from back then, I didn't reallyhave funds and it was like a
very old, very, yeah, it wasjust done, the motorcycle.

(14:01):
So I had to, well, I chose tosell it because I didn't know
how to repair it.
It was an old Honda Dominator.
I loved it.
so much, but at some point itjust didn't work anymore.
It didn't work when it wasslightly damp.
Uh, it ate as much oil as it atefuel and I just didn't know how
to fix it.
And at some point I just said,okay, I can't like it doesn't go
anymore.

(14:22):
So I sold it.
And then for many years, Ididn't really have a motorcycle
also in life.
I just focused on other thingsand was just a bit more in the
background.
And then a few years ago, um, Ijust got the itch again.
I can't even tell you why.
I just got the itch again and Idecided to buy like a new
motorcycle.
And that was like a BMW G650 GS.

(14:45):
So I bought it, yeah, fromsomeone used because I just
wanted to try out riding again.
If I find the old sparkenthusiasm and...
And now I'm laughing at that Iever doubted that because then I
was just out with it all thetime.
Every weekend I went somewhere,like I went everywhere with a
motorcycle.

SPEAKER_07 (15:03):
And

SPEAKER_09 (15:03):
then I started to spend every holiday also just
going somewhere.
So, hey, I have a week off work.
I go to Spain.
I have two weeks of work.
I went to Scotland on a tour.
So I went like all sorts ofEurope trips.
At some point I thought, okay, Iwould like to do something more
adventurous again.
I was like many years back, Idid the Central Asia trip and

(15:24):
that was just itching again.
I wanted to do something.
So I thought, okay, maybe fornext time, the next holiday from
work, I go to Morocco.
So because I've never been toMorocco, I mean, it's obviously
has a very good reputation amongmotorcyclists to being a
beautiful place.
country to motorcycle.
And I couldn't confirm that Iwould like, I can't wait to go

(15:47):
back one day.
Um, yeah, but that was actuallythe plan to go to Morocco.
But then like when I was lookingat Morocco, I also have this, I
had this idea, okay, I want togo as far as possible, like as
far south as possible, but Iwasn't really sure like how far
you can go.
And, um, then I like, I just,yeah.

(16:09):
read a little bit on theinternet and then i found like a
little like a um not a littlelike a blog from um someone who
has crossed all of africa withthis buddy um okay so like i
thought okay i will just ask uhso so i don't know we like we
just start chatting um his nameis uh Gordon, and we started

(16:33):
chatting about this.
I just asked, is it possible togo more south?
From Morocco, how far can yougo?
Because at some point the desertstarts and there are all sorts
of unknowns.
I was like, yeah, I think youcan do that.
It's totally possible.
We just chatted a little bitabout this and it was really
encouraging.

(16:53):
Yeah, sure, you can go moresouth.
You can go as far as you want.
And Yeah, first I was reallylike, what?
Nah, I can't believe you can gothat far south and I'm not sure.
But at some point, like I did abit more research, I read a
little bit and I thought, okay,maybe it's possible.
So then I had this grand plan ofriding.

(17:16):
So taking my, it's still aholiday from work, taking a
holiday, riding all the way toDakar because yeah, that's just,
I think everyone wants to dothat who rides a

SPEAKER_07 (17:26):
motorcycle.

SPEAKER_09 (17:27):
I didn't even have any deeper motivation.
I just wanted to, wanted to goto Dakar.
And then my plan was to park thebike there.
So just leave the bike becauseyeah, holidays.
It's not in every country.
It's a bit different, but in theNetherlands, they're quite where
I live.
I'm German, but I live in theNetherlands and they're quite

(17:48):
generous with vacation days,number of vacation days.
So it's no problem to get likeThree and a half weeks, maybe
four off.
But that's already quite astretch.
So my plan was to go to Dakar,park the bike, fly back.
And then the next holiday I gotfrom work, I would fly back to
Dakar and ride the bike back.

(18:09):
So that was a bit the originalidea.

SPEAKER_08 (18:11):
Okay.

SPEAKER_09 (18:12):
And that's also what I did.
So I rode down there in myholiday.

UNKNOWN (18:19):
Okay.

SPEAKER_09 (18:19):
So it was, of course, relatively fast because
I just, I didn't have that muchtime.
I just rode to Dakar and then Ithought I was there and I
thought, well, that was amazing.
But like, like I want to gofurther.
I want to do more.
So I did park the bike and I didfly back, of course, continued
working.
But then it's like, I thought,okay, now I have a new crazy

(18:41):
idea.
So maybe instead of the nextholiday window that I go there
and ride the bike back, maybe Ican go there and ride the bike
even a little

SPEAKER_07 (18:49):
bit further.
Nice.

SPEAKER_09 (18:50):
So then I thought about, OK, maybe I ride it to
like the next stretch could befrom there to Ghana, for
example.
I just made up a like a thingand then I could maybe ship it
back from Ghana from Dakar.
Shipping is a bit difficult, butfrom Ghana, it's there more
options.
So that was then my plan.
But then while I was planningthat trip, I thought like, yeah,

(19:13):
actually I really want to do somuch more.
So I decided in the end after,so I did write to Ghana, but
then after that I wanted to dothis, like I don't want to go
forth and back.
So I decided to do this fulltime and not go back in between.
So that's what I did basicallyfrom Ghana onwards.

SPEAKER_08 (19:34):
Did you have anyone who inspired you or like you're
reading travel books besidesspeaking with Gordon and
Instagram or?

SPEAKER_09 (19:40):
Well, no.
I did not.
I did not.
It was pretty unknown.
I've not read any of thesetravel books.

SPEAKER_08 (19:50):
Yeah, it seems like you already had the bug, though.
You didn't need to have anyother inspiration.
It's interesting I mention thisbecause in season three, episode
six of Adventure Cannonballpodcast, Aaron interviewed Sam
Manicom at the Ace Cafe.
And in that, he was like...
Aaron said, if there's one tripyou could do, and the trip that

(20:10):
he said he would do was the tripyou did, all the way on the west
coast of Africa.
He didn't do that.
And this is something he was, soif you think about people being
motivational, you arepotentially motivational or
inspirational for someone who isdoing this for a living.
So good for you.
So earlier you said, sort of thequestion I have is like, why
motorcycles?
And before you said car wasn'tan option, why was car not an

(20:34):
option?
And was that not even, you'rejust like, I would never do this
in a car.
Why bikes?

SPEAKER_09 (20:37):
Yeah, that's a good question that you challenged me
on that.
That's like a statement.
I just threw out, I think thereare a few layers to it.
So one big one is, I think, acost.
So I got my like a 20-year-oldHonda Dominator for, I think,
900 euros somewhere.

SPEAKER_08 (20:53):
And then, so you bought this bike, you traveled a
lot on this bike on the F650GS,right?

SPEAKER_09 (21:00):
Um, first my Honda dominator.
I loved it, but I always sawpeople on the F six 50 GS Dakar,
and I just love this bike.
And there isn't even a, like atechnical story behind it or so.
I just love how it looked.
I just wanted it.
I already like back then I wasjust like, Hey, I don't know.
I wanted this bike.
And then now a few years ago,when I decided to buy a new

(21:22):
bike, I wanted to go for a six50 GS.
So the G six 50 GS is the.
model that's after the F650GS.
My bike's from 2015.
My reasoning was if it's a bitnewer, it's probably better.
That's probably not a correctreasoning, but that's the bike I

(21:43):
found.
So there are two versions.
There's the regular version andthe Satao version, which is
equivalent to the Dakar versionof the old 650GS.
I was looking for the Sataoversion, but it wasn't really
available.
I didn't find it.
So in the end, I got the regularversion, which has like a cast

(22:04):
wheel, tubeless tires, a smallerfront wheel and a little bit
different.
But other than that, the bike isvery similar to the F650 GS.

SPEAKER_08 (22:12):
Okay, nice.
Let's talk a bit about the rideitself.
So you explored some trulyremote locations and beautiful
locations in your Instagramposts.
You mentioned that Malawi wasone of your favorite countries
of the 30 that you visited.
Can you share why thatparticular part of the journey
left a deep impression on you?

SPEAKER_09 (22:32):
Yeah, I think Malawi, it's indeed one of my
favorite countries.
So I have a few, but then basedon like different perspectives
and all the countries arespecial from just Malawi.
completely differentperspectives.
But I think Malawi, first ofall, I spent a bit more time
there than others.
And I really like took some timeto go slow and explore, like

(22:54):
explore little corners.
And I also, I met more peoplethere.
So that also had a big effect.
So first of all, like, yeah, ifyou ride and in some countries
you meet loads of othertravelers, in some countries you
don't meet any.
And that makes it also a bit,yeah, that you don't have, too
many people to talk to.
And in Malawi, there weresuddenly loads of other

(23:15):
travelers that you can talk toand not only motorcycle riders.
It's such a big backpackingcountry.
I think there were just loads ofpeople.
That was great.
Also the general vibe of thecountry, like for some reason, I
mean, people are very friendlyin Africa everywhere, but I've
been, but for some reason, Couldbe coincidence, but in Malawi, I

(23:36):
felt even more welcome.
Everyone was friendly.
It's always an advantage wheneveryone...
They speak English as well.
So in the French speakingcountries, for example, it's
quite difficult because I don'tspeak French and I try to learn
a little bit, but I didn'tsucceed.
But then in some countries, it'salmost impossible to communicate
with the people who live there.

(23:58):
And in Malawi, that was wayeasier and they were very
welcoming and friendly.
And Malawi has this Malawi lake.
It's just also just a beautifulcountry.
So staying once like at a sortof cliff or viewing the lake,
it's just...
Landscape wise, it's alsobeautiful.

SPEAKER_08 (24:14):
And you also mentioned that you had really
good weather when you werethere.
Maybe that was just one of theposts that was nice.
Or is that also the place whereyou ended up having to have a
local drive your bike up themuddy road?

SPEAKER_09 (24:23):
Yeah, I think the weather was good.
It always depends on the season.
And for me, if you don't end upin a tropical rainstorm, then
the weather has been good.

SPEAKER_08 (24:32):
Yeah, that's a nice segue into the next question I
have for you.
So in your post, you mentionedextreme weather, the heat in the
Sahara that you almost passedout off your bike, tropical
rain.
icy mountain passes andPatagonia winds.
Of those different ridingenvironments that are clearly
challenging, is there any whichstick out as the most

(24:53):
challenging?

SPEAKER_09 (24:53):
So first of all, yeah, the Patagonian winds,
that's then because afterwards Icontinued in South America.
But in Africa, it was definitelymore challenging.
I would say the most challengingpart was the heat in general.
In many regions, it was...
it became almost unbearableespecially then with motorcycle

(25:14):
gear and then when you have todo when you ride it's usually
okay but then when you have todo a border crossing or
otherwise stop and really dothings and run around and it's
uh like i struggled dealing withthat um and yeah the most
extreme was definitely um in thethe sahara crossing which i did

(25:35):
in the summer which i would notrecommend anyone doing my
thought was Okay, this was justmy timing.
I happened to set off in thesummer and I wanted to go south.
And I thought, nah, it must bedoable.
So I cannot explore, forexample, Mauritania in the
desert then because in thesummer it's just, it's
sweltering, it's unbearableheat.

(25:57):
But my reasoning was, okay, themain road goes along the coast,
so it should be fine.
And it was fine along the coast,but there was also at least one
bit that went a little bit landinwards and then got really,
really hot.
Like hot in the sense that

SPEAKER_08 (26:13):
I

SPEAKER_09 (26:14):
regretted my decision.
It was quite dangerous.
It was really too much and wasreally dangerous.
So I thought, oh yeah, I'll justdeal with it.
I know it will be hot, it won'tbe comfortable, but It will be
fine.
But I would not recommend that.

SPEAKER_08 (26:31):
In Africa, it was the heat.
And in Patagonia, it was thewinds.

SPEAKER_09 (26:35):
Yeah.
Of course, winds are alsodifficult to deal with for a
long period of time.
Because in places likePatagonia, there's so much wind
that you ride at an angle.
Then wind comes from the side,pushes you out.
The motorcycle is tilted to theside because you have to press
against the wind.
And the worst part, I think, isthe helmet because the wind

(26:57):
presses on the helmet and thatstrains your neck a lot.
So either you have to look intothe wind or just let the wind
take the helmet and then try tokeep your eyes on the road.
So yeah, the winds were alsochallenging, but it was all
okay.
I would say the heat in Africa,that was...
most difficult to deal with.

SPEAKER_08 (27:17):
Yeah, interesting.
I was reading another travelblog and someone said that they
had the peak on their adventurehelmet and very quickly into the
first hour of the winds.
They were like, they had to sortof strip everything off their
helmet that they could do topossibly make themselves have
less wind resistance.

(27:37):
So in terms of...
bureaucracy in dealing withpaperwork.
So you mentioned that the one inWest Africa was particularly
challenging, not just because ofthe heat, but because of
paperwork itself.
Is that a fair statement?

SPEAKER_09 (27:50):
Yeah, that's absolutely a fair statement.
So there are quite manycountries you cross in West
Africa and every country hassort of their own rules for visa
and for bike imports.
Now the bike imports weren'tthat much of a hassle, but
mainly the visa, the process toobtain the visa.

(28:10):
So it wasn't like a generalapproach for the countries.
So it was really every countriesyou really have to dig your
teeth into the problem of how doI get a visa?
And some it's more easy and someit's a bit more difficult.
But just organizing all the visawas, well, it took a lot of
energy.

(28:31):
Although I have to say, to befair, I had quite a big
advantage because when I arrivedin Dakar, for example, and also
one time later, because it waspart of this holiday window,
which I mentioned earlier, so Ihad a chance to go back.
So some of the visa I could alsoget at home.
That was very nice.
And some of the visa I got onthe road.
So what you usually do...

(28:51):
It really depends on thecountry, but usually you find
the correct embassy of thatcountry would like to obtain a
visa in one of the previouscountries and try to get it
there.
But that also often changes.
So sometimes, for example, onecertain country, you got to get

(29:13):
your visa at a certain embassybecause they issue visa, but it
can happen from one day to theother that they just stop that.
I was, for example, in...
When I was in Freetown in SierraLeone, many people, that was the
go-to place to get your Ghanavisa back then, I think.
And then during the week I wasthere, from one day to the

(29:34):
other, they just stopped issuingit.
I mean, I got my Ghana visa andeverything before, but travelers
were coming, wanting to gettheir visa, and then they just
stopped issuing it.

SPEAKER_08 (29:47):
So what happened?
So I guess you learned aboutthis by meeting other travelers
and they just stopped.
Yeah.

SPEAKER_09 (29:51):
Yeah, exactly.
So what happens on these tripsis that you really get into
little communities.
So by different platforms,everyone tries to stay a bit
connected because informationchanges so quickly there.
Everyone, like you have to be upto date and you also, especially
for me, like when I travel on myown, I want to be like, it's

(30:12):
nice that other people areaware, uh, like of your
whereabouts.
So, so of course people at home,but, but also, um, other
travelers around, for example,to cross Nigeria.
So we had like our own littleWhatsApp group.
Hey, okay.
We all cross.
approximately at the same time.
So, so everyone kind of knew,and let's say someone has issues

(30:33):
so that you can reach out toeach other.
So, uh, with these samecommunities, um, there's also a
lot of communication going onabout paperwork, like, Hey,
someone might say, I tried outto get the visa here.
Uh, and it worked or I, Hey,today I tried out to get a visa
here and it didn't work or itworked, but you have to make
sure you got this, this, this.

SPEAKER_08 (30:54):
Yeah, that's, that's really cool.
It's also, I mean, thetechnology is fantastic.
If you think about WhatsApp, I,um, I was listening to a podcast
a few years back and the, it wasa large portion of the time,
the, the Indian, um, there wasthe education system in one
particular region of India usesthat technology.
as their main communication.
They have groups and subgroups.

(31:15):
And I mean, WhatsApp is anamazing tool for staying in
touch and also for cascading outcommunication.
So it's great that you guys hada network like that.
Let's talk about the gear andthe grit, if we were going to
name this segment.
So there's a theory which statesthat there's actually no perfect
bike.
And that the bike that you'vegot is the perfect bike.

(31:38):
So that said, you had alreadyowned your 2015 BMW And that was
something that you had alreadyhad.
So when you had that bike, werethere any must-have features
when you thought about the bikefor this trip, or did it all
happen so quickly?
organically that the bike wasalready there and it was in

(32:01):
Dakar.
And you're like, how do youprepare for parts and how do you
figure out what to pack and totake with you?

SPEAKER_09 (32:06):
Yeah, that's quite an interesting journey.
I would definitely agree withthe statement, any bike is good.
But in general, it was justthere.
I did get a bike that...
It had some very basic travelmodifications, so the previous
owner put that on.
So some like a more comfortableseat and the steering wheel was
a little bit higher, but notreally more than that.

(32:28):
But then, to be honest, I mainlywanted to start and to go.
So to my embarrassment.
I set off basically completelyunprepared.
So I didn't have like a setup.
I had a little luggage roll, putsome clothes in.
I didn't take camping gear to bein the start at the start.

(32:48):
I didn't take tools.
I didn't take spare parts.
I just went, I brought it.
So at that point.
Good for you.
I didn't really go like, Ididn't even work on the bike
myself at all yet.
So I, before I brought it to theworkshop and asked like, Hey,
can you please make it so itdoesn't break in the next, I
don't know how many thousandkilometers.
So that was basically theapproach.

(33:09):
I mean, later, I mean, Ilearned, yeah, like I learned so
much during that trip, butthat's basically how it started.
Also in terms of setup, yeah,like I have a little luggage
roll I bought when I got myfirst license when I was 23 for
€15.99 from a like Lewis store,it's a motorcycle store.

(33:31):
And I rode like 350, 200,000kilometers with it all over the
world.
everywhere and it's perfectlyfine so so i just i still use it
i love it very much okay so it'sjust a basic luggage roll.
Yeah.
And, and, but then, so, sothat's how I started.
And then it very quickly, like,like it really evolved.

(33:52):
So, so like from Dakar, like inthese four or five months that I
had in between.
So let's say the trip to Dakarwas like the first test taste.

SPEAKER_07 (34:00):
Okay.

SPEAKER_09 (34:01):
All of these things.
And then I really thought about,okay, what, what, what else can
I do?
So I got some, so I got some noname side bags and I, I mean, I
took my camping gear at thattime, like a little cooker and
everything.
So I was a bit moreself-reliant.
and um yeah actual tools andspare parts and everything so i
think i set myself up then dudelike while i was riding through

(34:23):
west africa um which of courseif you do one big trip you don't
have the chance to do it thatmuch on the run but i would
still say to some degree

SPEAKER_08 (34:31):
yeah great answer and it's it's it's um it ties
into something i want to ask youa bit later on which is about in
terms of people saying it's gotto be perfect to go out you just
did it i think that's amazing umSo the luggage roll that you
mentioned that you bought for$15.99 years ago, if you could
only take five essential piecesof gear with you, that would
obviously be one of them.

(34:52):
What other would you be herefor?

SPEAKER_09 (34:54):
So in terms of essential piece of gear, I think
most essential is that the...
motorcycle keeps running.
That's what I learned.
So I was stranded on the side ofthe road more than once.
And once I learned which toolsand parts to take, yeah, that
that really helped me outtremendously.
So for example, I had a lot ofelectrical problems.

(35:16):
And once I had my, like, I had alittle jump starter, so it could
always like start.
So that's just most essentialeverything else, like even the
tent.
So I didn't have a tent for allof the trip, especially in
Southern, Eastern Africa.
I camped a lot, but in Westernand Central Africa, I didn't
really camp.
So this camping gear isn'treally essential.
They're everywhere, little guesthouses.

(35:38):
You can go.
So I would say the mostessential gear, if you can call
it gear, is just take everythingto make sure the bike keeps
running.
Also, of course, I had, I think,six or seven flat tires.
I am very lucky and very happyabout my tubeless tires.
So I have little plugs and Ihave an air compressor.

(35:58):
So it's always like just okayagain in five minutes.
So I don't like, it's not a bigdeal if I have a flat tire or
something.
So I would say these sort ofsmall things are the most
essential ones to take.

SPEAKER_08 (36:11):
All right.
Good, good, good answer.
That's great.
It's interesting because yousegue perfectly into what I
wanted to ask you next, whichwas in terms of breakdowns.
So obviously breakdowns happen.
And from your post, I thought itwas really inspiring.
It said, considering the factthat you've traveled for two
years and you had a total ofonly 11 breakdowns, six
punctures, three electricalsystem issues, one cooling

(36:32):
system and one drive chainfailure.
That's a pretty amazing recordconsidering the Having said
that, and I think you touched onthis a moment ago, what was the
experience of making yourrepairs on the tubeless tires as
opposed to having to peel thetire off and repair a tube?

SPEAKER_09 (36:48):
The tubeless tire, it was really, it was no
problem.
So I didn't even have, so Ididn't even have like these
systems where you really haveto, these rubber plugs or so,
little like screws with a, theyhave a layer of...
sort of glue on it.
I'm not sure what material itis.
So you just screw them in.
So what I did, like it wasusually like a nail.

(37:10):
So I see that there's a nail inmy tire.
So just pull it out, screw inthe little plug and pump up the
tire again.
And that's it.
It was a non-issue.
Wow.
So I would say if I ever get anew travel bike, it should have
tubeless tires.

SPEAKER_08 (37:27):
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah.
That's amazing that it was soquick because I've seen so many
of these travel videos wherepeople, you know, they're
tearing the bike down, they'restrapping it to a tree because
they don't have a center stand.
They want to make sure itdoesn't fall over.
So they take it to some placeand they put a strap around it
to hold the back of the frontend of the air and they pull it
down.
But that's fantastic.
You just pull it.
I hadn't seen those plugs, but,you know, you learn something

(37:48):
new every day, right?
That's fantastic.

SPEAKER_09 (37:50):
Yeah.
Maybe I was a bit too quick toclaim it doesn't matter.
I would still claim it doesn'tmatter which bike you go on, but
I would say these little thingsdo make a difference.
But you just mentioned somethingelse, the center stand, just
little, I don't know, adjustingthe chain, doing this little
stuff.
It's just when you're in theheat somewhere in a difficult
environment, it's just...

(38:10):
It just makes a lot ofdifference.

SPEAKER_08 (38:11):
I just took my center stand off when I came
back from school because I putthe twin pegs on.
I rode a Tenere 700 in thesandpit with the twin pegs on
it.
And I was like, that's adifferent machine.
So I bought them.
And on the Tenere 700, thecenter stand, the spring on the
right-hand side interferes withthe twin pegs on that side.
So I took the center stand off.

(38:32):
And then I came back and I waslike, oh, you know, it was rainy
and nasty down there and I wasgoing to oil my chain.
And I was like, oh, right.
I can't just put the back...
in the air and then spin it andoil it, I have to do it a
different way.
So yeah, I've already missedthat, although I do enjoy the
Twin Pegs.
How many tires did you gothrough when you did this trip?
How many actual differentchanges did you have to do?

SPEAKER_09 (38:54):
In Africa, I went through only two rear tires and
a front tire.
I don't know what happened, butmy front tire just made it all
the way.
Yeah, I don't want to throw outa number of kilometers, but it
did absolutely great.
So the front tire just survivedthe entire trip.

SPEAKER_08 (39:09):
Wow.

SPEAKER_09 (39:10):
And the rear tire, I changed once.

SPEAKER_08 (39:12):
Wow.
Okay.
Fantastic.

SPEAKER_09 (39:13):
But I also put on new tires in the very beginning.
So I started with two absolutelynew sets of tires.

SPEAKER_08 (39:19):
Fresh rubber.
Good.
Very nice.
All right.
Sort of the inner journey.
I want to ask you, so adventuremeans something different to
everyone.
So for you, when you think ofadventure, for you, when does
the adventure begin?

SPEAKER_09 (39:33):
So adventure to me is when you step out of your
comfort zone, very bluntly said.
So actually all the days whereeverything went smoothly, that's
I don't really have in my mind,in my memory as the adventurous
days.
So it was the days wheneverything went wrong, when
there was a big breakdown orwhether it was like something
else big happening that wasn'treally to plan.

(39:56):
That's what felt adventurous.
And I think it also reallydepends on...
It's very personal.
What is adventure?
That's very personal.
So for me, for example, to me,riding a gravel road somewhere
in Namibia was very, veryadventurous because I haven't...
Before the trip, I didn't reallyhave experience of the paved
road.

(40:17):
I just didn't know what I wasdoing at all.
And then through Africa, I diddo some little bits of unpaved
roads, but it was morestruggling through and it was
mostly...
The most difficult parts werelike in cities, broken up parts,
completely flooded because therainy season has started and
these things.
But in principle, you could dothe entire trip from like along

(40:37):
the West coast, Europe to SouthAfrica on paved road, except for
one 25 kilometers strip inGuinea, where you have to do a
mountain pass that's not paved,but it's not very difficult.
and then the border crossingfrom Nigeria to Cameroon, but
you can take a boat there.
So in principle, except forthese 25 kilometers, you can do
everything on paved road.
And I did a lot of it on pavedroad, not everything.

(41:00):
But I noticed that like theparts I enjoyed most were off
the paved road because that'sjust most beautiful.
And it's just a completelydifferent way to experience the
countries.
So the more I got south, themore and more I tried to stroll
off the main roads, stroll offthe paved roads.

SPEAKER_08 (41:18):
Again, one of the common threads that we hear when
speaking with people who aredoing adventure motorcycle
travels is that the adventurereally begins when something
unplanned happens.
And that's pretty much what yousaid in the beginning.
You're like, yeah, when thingsbreak down, you hadn't planned
for that.
But now you're going thatdirection, and then the
adventure begins.
That's a great answer.
Thank you very much for that.
You did, in that answer, youmentioned Cameroon.

(41:39):
And I read your post.
You said you had a high-speedboat ride there.
going from Cameroon in piratewaters or something like this.
It was a reference to that.
Can you comment?
Can you talk about that a bit?
Tell me about that.

SPEAKER_09 (41:52):
Yes, so one of the big bottlenecks of doing this
trip going from Europe to SouthAfrica along the West Coast
is...
the border crossing betweenNigeria and Cameroon for several
reasons.
I won't go into everything, butthe land border crossing is
quite difficult because the maincrossing was at least at the
time closed.
I don't know how it is now.

(42:13):
So the paved normal crossing,also the Cameroon side on this
part was difficult and it's nota place to travel.
So usually most travelers, theycross a bit more north of that,
but that's like a difficultterrain so you have to go to get
to the border crossing and thento get from the border crossing

(42:35):
on the cameroon side to the nexttown it's quite heavy off-road
relatively technical and i'msure like most riders that go
through africa will have no nobig problem with it so so if
you're skilled like if you'revery confident uh off-road then
it's probably not a problem buti wasn't and i was on my own so
like there was no way for me togo uh like on this route so i

(42:58):
have heard from others theydescribed it like how you have
to go through riverbeds bigrocks and like i thought okay i
will just end up falling andlike like

SPEAKER_08 (43:09):
get washed down the river

SPEAKER_09 (43:11):
yeah i would not go through like being on my like if
you were with a group it wouldbe different but being on my own
i would not go through difficultterrain so i wanted to um go
from Nigeria to Cameroon in aboat so you can do that two ways
so there is one big boat thattakes motorcycles but I've heard

(43:32):
yeah I've just heard storiesthat it was a bit difficult to
organize and was not so nice atleast I've just heard from
people who didn't have a goodexperience with it that doesn't
mean it's generally not a goodexperience but I decided to not
do it because there was alsoanother option.
There was like, there's a littleroute where some speed boats go.

(43:55):
I think it's mostly trade.
So all the way in the east ofNigeria, there's little port,
like, I mean, little, like justa little shore with some small
boats.
They are like three motorcyclelengths big, these boats.
And they mainly transport goods,but also some passengers to go

(44:16):
to Cameroon.
So it's like a three-hour boatride to get to the Cameroon
side.
So that's the one I took.
So that was a very interestingexperience.

SPEAKER_08 (44:29):
So how'd they get your bike on the boat?
Did these guys lift it up andput it on?
Tell me about that experience.

SPEAKER_09 (44:34):
It's like a little shore.
It's a little sand shore.
And there are these...
little boats and they have alittle plank as a sort of ramp
and they kind of lift it on.
I mean, I don't know if five ofthese port guys lift it in,
that's no problem.
So my boat, like I said, waslike three times the length of

(44:58):
my motorcycle, like a littlespeedboat.
And they put my motorcycle inand thought, oh, no, that looks
quite great.
And then they started puttingmore stuff in because the boat,
of course, just doesn't just gofor my motorcycle.
Like it transports goods andeverything.

SPEAKER_07 (45:13):
Right.

SPEAKER_09 (45:14):
And they start putting more stuff in like, I
don't like packages.
I don't know.
goods like carpets.
I saw some old plastic chairs,other plastic packages, plastic
sacks with goods, like paperboxes with goods, all sorts of
things.
And they just, first I thought,oh, okay, that's fine.
But then they just stacked ithigher, higher, higher, higher,
higher.
And at some point my motorcycle,it just disappeared in the

(45:35):
mountain of all the goods.
And I could just, I could seelike one handlebar sticking out.
I was, yeah, I mean, at thatpoint you have to trust the
process because like there's nopoint in worrying or does
something break on the bike orthis or that.
like you just have to accept itbut then because so this little
harbor it's quite it seems quitechaotic for someone like me from

(45:57):
outside perspective because Ididn't really understand how it
works like it was quite loud andeverything so I didn't really
know for sure like what theprocess is like if the boat is
leaving or not so they justloaded the boat but my
understanding was it would sortof take quite some time until we
would actually leave.
And then at some point they likepushed the boat from the shore

(46:17):
and I started to panic becauseit didn't seem to me the kind of
place where they would wait forme.
So I was like, no, no, no,where's my bike going?
And then someone said like, no,no, don't worry.
The boat is very full.
They're just testing if itfloats.

SPEAKER_08 (46:30):
Oh, wow.
Okay.

SPEAKER_09 (46:34):
I was like, oh, okay.
That was interesting.

SPEAKER_08 (46:35):
And did you get in that boat with your bike or did
you go in a separate boat?

SPEAKER_09 (46:38):
Yeah, I got in that boat and Um, so there was, so
that was part, like you canreally pick like it's a tiny
boat, a pile of stuff.
So how the setup was, um, orfirst I thought there is one guy
in the back of the boat wherethe engine, the motor is.

SPEAKER_08 (46:55):
Yeah.
The outboard, like an outboardmotor.

SPEAKER_09 (46:56):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And, and, but, but he cannot seebecause there's a pile of stuff
in front.
So there's another guy who'sjust going in front, sitting on
the pile of stuff and justlooking out like where to go.
And then I was also on the backbench.
First I thought, no, yeah, thisis okay.
And then we, at some point weset off and then But then like
we passed some checkpoints.

(47:17):
So it's like a very quite fixedroute.
So they are on the water.
There are boats with likeNigerian military and they do
checks.
So they check your passport.
They check, hey, is everythingin order?
And we did a few of those.
And then we went into like, wewent back towards the shore and
I was a bit confused.
And then, yeah, we went intolike between some trees, into a

(47:39):
little village.
And then there were more peoplecoming on the boat.

SPEAKER_07 (47:42):
So...

SPEAKER_09 (47:43):
Uh, there were like, like first I had a little bit of
space, but then there were morepeople coming on this teeny tiny
back bench on the boat that wasalready overloaded.
So you didn't have any spaceanymore.
And then we did a three hourride through the sun like that.
So it was, it was quite a harsh,I have to say.
So I was sitting, I kind of heldonto my helmet.

(48:03):
I wish I had put sunscreen on orsomething to cover my head.
But at the point I realized howhot the sun was.
I couldn't like.
was no way i could move i wasjust holding on to my dear life
i was just kind of

SPEAKER_08 (48:14):
you couldn't get your bike either yeah

SPEAKER_09 (48:16):
leaning back uh couldn't really move like this
boat was just full crowded itwas full but uh yeah it was okay
uh so we wrote like that in thesetup so me and then three other
passengers on the little benchin the back and the guy who's
steering the boat and anotherone sitting on top of the pile

(48:38):
in front of us to look out,like, where are we going?
Because in the back we couldn'treally see.
There was just a pile of stuffin the front.
And then we went to a harbor inCameroon.

SPEAKER_08 (48:52):
So when they're doing these passport checks, at
any point did they say, like,were you standing out as a
potential, like, why are you onthe boat?
Did they question you or did youhave any problem with that?

SPEAKER_09 (49:00):
No.
I think they're used to it inthe sense there aren't a ton of
people doing it, but, but Iwasn't, I'm not the first person
I think who crosses this way.
So, yeah, I mean, of course Istand out as the foreigner, so I
usually draw attention tomyself.
So they sometimes ask questions,but more like, uh, but, but not,
but not in the suspicious way,but just, uh, what are you

(49:23):
doing?
And like, like in an interestedway.
Uh, so, so it's not aparticularly negative kind of
attention or something.
Um, but then when I arrived inCameroon, uh, there, there was a
big, there I really stood out asa foreigner because that was a
much bigger port and there werea lot of boats and a lot of
chaos.
Uh, it was, it looked like.

(49:44):
I don't know, the set of Piratesof the Caribbean movie.
Very, very chaotic everywhere,like people running around doing
their stuff and a lot of littleboats, like wooden decks and
everything.
But there were so many boatsthat we couldn't really get to
the shore.
But then someone like spotted meand was like, ah, okay, like she
has to go to immigration.

(50:06):
She has to like, I don't know,go through the process like for
foreigners to...
Uh, so, so, so someone spottedme and then like, it was a big
thing about getting, trying toget our boat, like in an
accelerated manner to the shore.

SPEAKER_08 (50:23):
Okay, so they expedited you guys.

SPEAKER_09 (50:25):
Yeah, there were some people coming up saying,
yeah, you have to come toimmigration.
But then I didn't really want toleave the boat, which was still
floating on the water.
So they wanted me to go acrossall the other boats, like
stepping on the other boats.
They were all waiting to go onshore, to go to immigration.
But I wasn't really sure at thatpoint.

(50:46):
It was a bit chaotic there.
I wasn't sure if I should leavemy...
all my stuff, my motorcycle andmy stuff just floating somewhere
in the harbor in the water.
And then some other passengertold me, nah, just don't leave
the boat.
So in the end, I didn't.
There was a lot of discussion,but in the end, they let the
boat dock.

SPEAKER_08 (51:06):
Oh, so you went, you passed the other boats and you
went right into the quay.
Okay.

SPEAKER_09 (51:10):
They unloaded the boat.
So, but once again, You askedbefore about how do they load
the boat.
The unloading was even moreimpressive.
They just pick up the motorcycleand just lifted it on shore.

SPEAKER_08 (51:21):
All this is being done with manual labor.
There's no lifting equipment.
There's no cranes or anything.
No, there

SPEAKER_09 (51:26):
was nothing.
Wow.
Absolutely nothing.

SPEAKER_08 (51:28):
Cool.
Very cool.
So people and places.
You met some amazing people.
people and you travel to amazingplaces.
And one of the things I thoughtwas really great as a common
thread throughout all of yourposts is that you're extremely
positive.
You're amazingly positive aboutthe experiences on the road.
These are some things I thoughtwere really cool.

(51:48):
You never paid a bribe.
You never felt unsafe frompeople, maybe from boat rides.
You never had anything stolen.
You never had a traffic accidentand you never got sick.
So you wrote that you foundpeople to be open, welcoming,
and kind.
What is one encounter or humanconnection that really stuck
with you along the way?

SPEAKER_09 (52:07):
So mostly I think it's just the general
willingness to help.
So you hear a lot like before,that's what I'm often asked,
like, oh, is it safe?
Or, oh, there's corruption orthere's this, this, that.
And just as one example, Iwas...
i was setting off i thought heyi only have soft luggage should

(52:28):
i have like other luggage to beable to lock my luggage or
something yeah but then once iwas there it was just oh this is
a different world like maybe insouthern and eastern africa
maybe in some regions it'sdifferent but but like for
example in west africa it's likeno one takes your stuff it's
it's like people are so friendlyit's just a general vibe it's
through a number of It's morethe mount of small encounters.

(52:52):
So for example, in Zambia, I wasriding along and started
drizzling a little bit.
So I stopped and I wanted to putmy jacket on.
And there were some women on theother side of the road.
They were a bit excited and theysaid, you have to find shelter,
find shelter.
And at first I was a bitconfused.

(53:13):
I thought, nah, it's justdrizzling a little bit.
But yeah, these people are fromhere, so I trust them.
So I followed them to the littlevillage.
Yeah, sure enough, once I hadlike, they made space for my
motorcycle to have a shelter andfor me to have a shelter.
And then like a big rainstormcame through.
We had a conversation.
Well, they didn't, I mean, theydidn't speak English and I
didn't speak the language.

(53:34):
So the conversation wasbasically, I was trying to
pronounce everyone's name andthey just like, they were lying
on the floor laughing.

SPEAKER_08 (53:41):
Great experience.

SPEAKER_09 (53:41):
They offered me food and it's just such a...
As soon as you're in Africa, andI'm generalizing here, of
course, Africa has many regions.
I'm describing it as if it's oneplace.
But my general experience hasbeen this general culture of
people helping each other.
Like you don't...
I'm, of course, I want to beself-sustainable and...

(54:02):
said I learned a lot about likehow to fix my bike etc but I
also learned there is no harm inbeing not completely
self-reliant or needing helpsometimes so whenever I needed
something there were people tohelp like one time I was broken
down another like in the end itturned out the ignition like
some like the ignition of mybike failed there was like

(54:23):
another traveler someone Itraveled with for a bit like
helped but also I phoned somemechanic that fixed my bike
before in like in south africaso uh via whatsapp like they
like he helped like diagnose theissue because it was quite
specific thing so i said oh okaycheck that relay okay they are

(54:45):
these wires this this color wirethis color wire this color wire
what happens if you do this andthat and

SPEAKER_08 (54:50):
wow and that's all over whatsapp

SPEAKER_09 (54:52):
yeah all over whatsapp and videos and and this
type of stuff and so somewherein rural malawi and it's still
like it wasn't really a problem.
And another time, for example,uh, so you asked me for one
encounter, but I was just, I wasjust like, and now I can think
of all these, like there wereall these little ones.
So another time I, my, myradiator leaked.

(55:13):
Um, so my, my bag wasoverheating and I kind of made
it to a little, like in somelittle town in Zambia to a car
workshop.
And they just, even though theywere working on cars, not on
motorcycles, they just made sureto organize help.
They like did everything theycould.
to try to help and in the end wegot it all fixed together with a

(55:34):
combined effort

SPEAKER_08 (55:35):
that's nice it's um it is it's as you say coming
back to your earlier commentthat's when the adventure begins
and people genuinely are thereto be helpful and they're
they're they're interested likethey're interested in you and
who you are as a person theywant to be part of that part of
the story saskia It has beensuper interesting in chatting

(55:56):
with you and thank you very muchfor taking the time to sit down
with Adventure CannonballPodcast and share with us the
stories of your time on the roadand your adventures and sort of
understanding the good in peopleand trusting society, trusting
that there's good out there andyou'll land on the happy side of
that.

(56:17):
I look forward to following yourtravels and finding out what's
next for you.
Thank you very much for joiningus today.

SPEAKER_09 (56:22):
Thank you so much for having me.
I enjoyed it a lot, having thisconversation.

SPEAKER_01 (56:28):
Ladies and gentlemen, can I please have
your attention?
I've just been handed an urgentand horrifying news story.
And I need all of you to stopwhat you're doing and listen.
Cannonball!

SPEAKER_03 (56:43):
Hey, Cannonballers, thanks for subscribing to our
podcast.
We appreciate it.
If you're not a cheap Canadianand want to buy us a coffee,
head on over tobuymeacoffee.com.
Or better yet, buy us a case ofSweet Ass Craft IPA.
We'll list it on patreon.com.
Links are in the show notes.
Now, back to the rivetingpodcast in progress.

SPEAKER_05 (57:08):
And we are back.
Nice.
Nicely done.
That was great.
And she's an inspiration.
I think we could all takesomething away from her
attitude.
It's fantastic.

SPEAKER_08 (57:18):
Yeah.
And one of the things I thoughtwas cool is that she's like, if
you look at the...
her Instagram posts.
It's like she gives somestatistics, some of which I read
in the interview, but she's verypositive.
And she's like, I just liketrust that the people, trust
that the people are good andfriendly.

(57:38):
And they're there to support youand show you the best parts of
their country and show you howgood people are.
And I think that she is, herstory really spells that out in
such a nice way.
And she's got killer pictures.

SPEAKER_05 (57:53):
Yeah, for sure.
And You know, if you listen toour Austin Vince interview from
a few episodes ago that I did inthe UK when I was there, he said
the same thing, is that when hegoes to Mauritania and all these
Islamic state places, he goes,it was nothing but positive.
It is a common thread throughthese travelers is whether it's.

(58:15):
The Arab world or Africa, it isnothing but positive
experiences.

SPEAKER_08 (58:20):
Trust that the world will support you and go.
I used to at the bottom of myemails when I was a yacht
captain, I used to sign it, livein the dream.
And then somebody said, that'snot cool because you are.
And that's a bit arrogant.
So I changed it.
And I said, trust,

SPEAKER_05 (58:38):
trust that the net will be there and jump.
Wow.
Look at you.
You're going to have a wholesign of a whole sign, a whole
series of self-affirmationposters a la Taylor Lawson soon.
I know it.
You know, I'm just, you can, um,you can get them on, uh, the
t-shirts self-affirmation, ADBCannibal T-shirt shop.

(59:00):
Yeah.
We're not aboutself-affirmation.
We're about, don't be a weenie.
Just go out there and do it.
I guess that's allself-affirmation is I'm not a
weenie.
I'm going to do this.

SPEAKER_08 (59:09):
I'm going to do this.
Yeah.
And you know what?
Gosh, darn it.
People like me.

UNKNOWN (59:15):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_08 (59:15):
Or that's what I keep telling them anyways.
Aaron Pufall, do you have any

SPEAKER_05 (59:22):
adventure cannibal news that you'd like to share?
I have a ton.
So, um, The GPS Checkpoint Rallyapp is ready for testing.
So if you are someone thatorganizes roadbook events or any
kind of a rally, whether it'sorienteering or GPX based, and

(59:43):
you need a way of verifying thatyour competitors have reached a
checkpoint or waypoint, pleasereach out at the Cannonball
website and I will set you upwith a testing profile And we
would love people to go out andtest and give us some feedback.
This could be

SPEAKER_08 (01:00:02):
anything, right?
I mean, it could be like, Imean, lately I've been doing
some sailing, so it could be ona sailboat, right?
It could be anything.

SPEAKER_05 (01:00:08):
It could absolutely be on a sailboat.
So if you have, let's say arally where people have to go to
an extreme buoy and around thebuoy and come back, but you're
not sure if they actually madeit, you just have one waypoint
out there and the app runs inthe background on people's
phones and they sail out thereor hot air balloon out there.
And once they've achieved thatcheckpoint, it is recorded in

(01:00:30):
the phone, whether it's offlineor online.
And then the next time thatdevice connects to the internet
through wifi or through acellular connection, it will
report to the database the timethat you achieved that waypoint
or checkpoint and the scoreboardis updated.
Yeah, so it can absolutely beused for anything and we've beta

(01:00:52):
tested it.
There's some videos up onYouTube, but it's available for
free for the community and we'dreally like some people to help
with some further testing.

SPEAKER_08 (01:00:59):
Nice.
So what do people have to do toget that?
Like what do they have?
How do they access that?

SPEAKER_05 (01:01:04):
Yeah, just go to the ADV Cannonball website.
There's a little form you fillout and then i will reply with
uh login credentials and thenjust watch the videos of how to
create a rally pretty easy gpxfiles what have you done with
those yeah so all thecompetitors in the 2025 adv
cannonball rally in the u.s uhall the gpx files and checkpoint

(01:01:25):
files have been released so ifyou haven't got the newsletter
please go to the notice page andenter your password and all of
the checkpoint files are thereand if you're not receiving our
newsletters you need to reachout to me because it's going to
spam.
And this has happened a fewtimes with people.
But anyways, all of thecheckpoints are released for
2025.
And I also want to talk about isthere are some extreme

(01:01:49):
checkpoints in 2025 and 2026.
And I want to talk about whoshould attempt to achieve an
extreme checkpoint.
And an extreme checkpoint is howit sounds.
It's going to take you a littleextra time to get to it.
And in 2026, there's going to besome more peril attached with a

(01:02:10):
extreme checkpoint.
And if you are interested ingathering as many points as
possible and you're notinterested in achieving the
first to arrive bonus each day,then getting an extreme
checkpoint is probably up youralley.
But don't attempt an extremecheckpoint if you are behind on

(01:02:30):
time or if you're tired or youhave a mechanical failure.
Only if If you are in 100%positive standing in that day,
those are the people who shouldattempt to get an extreme
checkpoint.

SPEAKER_08 (01:02:44):
One of the things that you put out before is that
you said if you did this, anyonecan do this rally in a Prius
with bald tires.
Could they hit those extremecheckpoints in a Prius with bald
tires?

SPEAKER_05 (01:02:55):
In 2025, yes.
2026, I haven't come up with acheckpoint, but perhaps we're
going to have to change that.
change that analysis because ithink people are asking to be
things to be a little moredifficult and challenging so
perhaps we have to change thatthat analysis in in 2026 so it'd
be like prius with um knobbiesyeah with ta all-terrain ko2

(01:03:19):
tires and you know maybe uhmaybe

SPEAKER_08 (01:03:22):
maybe a two inch

SPEAKER_05 (01:03:23):
lift

SPEAKER_08 (01:03:23):
yeah some can make big blocks on that would be good
that's right

SPEAKER_05 (01:03:29):
All right, carry on.
All right.
And then I also want to talkabout when you're at an ADV Ken
Ball rally is a little bit ofetiquette.
Because we partner with HiltonHotels, I don't want to ruin
that relationship.
So at the end of dinner, ifyou've gone out, if you've taken
your motorcycle, just make sureyour bike is in Parc Fermé by
around 10 p.m.

(01:03:50):
And this way, everyone can getto bed and we're not overly
annoying other guests in thehotel, even though we kind of
take over the whole hotel.
Let's try to plan on havingbikes in Parc Fermé by about 10
p.m.
10 PM.
That way I can go to bed also.
So let's try to be respectful.
And also in the morning, pleasedon't go to your motorcycle at 6

(01:04:10):
AM and start doing wheelies downthe parking lot.
I encourage wheelies and parkinglots, just not at 6 AM in the
hotel that we might have to comeback to.

SPEAKER_08 (01:04:18):
Yeah.
But usually do it in someoneelse's hotel.
Probably better.

SPEAKER_05 (01:04:21):
Yeah.
That's fine with me.
You know what I mean?
Just, and also cover up yourrally number.
Yeah.
Good.
Good.
Good.
All right.
What about shipping?
There is one spot left for 2025and it is one spot for after the
rally.
So if you want to get your bikehome after the rally with our
shipping, please reach out tome.
And I prefer if it was inGeorgia up to about New York.

(01:04:44):
That would be really convenientfor me.

SPEAKER_08 (01:04:48):
Good to know.
All right.
So I understand that the 2026,obviously you've had the 2026
Adventure Cannonball.
It's open for registration.
And what else do you have toshare about that?

SPEAKER_05 (01:05:01):
Yeah, so 2025, the waitlist is open, but 2026 is
open for registration.
We've already had some peoplesign up and the schedule is also
posted.
I just finished it yesterday.
The schedule for 2026 is up andwe're really excited about that.
The route is fantastic and it'sactually a lot better than 2025,

(01:05:21):
but it's a little moredifficult.
But I still think people will beable to accomplish it.
And I wanted to...
some of the signups.
I'm really excited that we havetwo signups from the 2025 rally.
That's Mr.
Skidmore and Mark Turner haveboth signed up for 2026 and they
are veterans from the 2025rally.

(01:05:44):
And also we have some newpeople, Rick from Duval,
Washington.
He signed up for 2026 and then areal badass Morgan Webb from
Washington on his Panameraspecial.
he signed up for 2026.
So thanks for you two guys,newcomers for signing up.
Very cool.

(01:06:05):
Very cool.
And you've already, you alreadyselling us the spots for the
shipping as well.
Yeah, there are four spots for2026 from the finish line in
only two spots available to thefinish, to the start line,
sorry, for 2026.
Now it

SPEAKER_08 (01:06:20):
might be a bit early, but can you say where
2026 is starting from andending?

SPEAKER_05 (01:06:24):
Yeah, the route is established.
It's starting in Plymouth RockWe always try to be poetic,
right?
So it starts in Plymouth Rockand ends on the California coast
as usual.
We haven't picked a spot for theawards banquet yet, but I will
get on it.
But the exact route is publishedand we've upped the off-road,

(01:06:48):
optional off-road sections onthe western portion of the
country for 2026.
Fantastic.
Just to be clear,

SPEAKER_08 (01:06:56):
the banquet area and venue you has been picked for
2025

SPEAKER_05 (01:07:00):
oh yeah that's uh and it's great 2025 is at the
portofino hotel and uh it'sgoing to be great we have we
have spent every penny of thebudget uh but we want the first
year to be uh to be a little bitspecial so we're really excited
about that and you will be atthe awards banquet as a matter
of fact you're going to run theawards banquet i'm not sure if
you're aware of it but uh youhave been you have let

SPEAKER_08 (01:07:24):
me just let me just make a note here hang on taylor
note to self you will be runningthe awards banquet

SPEAKER_05 (01:07:28):
yeah So congratulations on that
promotion.
That's really great.
Thank you.
Good announcement.
Thanks.
And that's it for what I have.

SPEAKER_08 (01:07:36):
All right.
Well, based on that, I'm justgoing to see if I can find a
really hideous blazer.

SPEAKER_05 (01:07:42):
Yeah, absolutely.
I have mine packed.
As a matter of fact, mine isfrom the Alcan 5000 Winter Rally
Awards Banquet.
So I have my ugly blazer alreadyselected.
All right.

SPEAKER_08 (01:07:55):
You know, I said that we're going to have an ugly
blazer contest or competition atthis.
You had announced we were goingto make it like an event every
year.
Whoever gets the ugliest blazeris going to win that award.
And I announced that.
And then some people very closeto me said I only needed to go
as far as my closet.

SPEAKER_05 (01:08:14):
Listen, if you have patches on your elbows...
On that Jack, it's probably afront runner.
Damn.
Damn it.
Or if it's made of corduroy orvelour.
These are also very positivethings.
What if I've got all three ofthose in one?
You might be a winner, sir.
You're a winner.
I'm going to win a chickendinner.

(01:08:35):
And on that note, you gotanything else?
Roll the outro.

SPEAKER_04 (01:08:40):
Thanks for listening to the ADV Cannonball podcast.
Please give us a five-starreview on your preferred podcast
platform.
That really helps us with thealgorithm gods.
All hail the algorithm gods.
You can buy us a coffee onbuymecoffee.com slash ADV
Cannonball or directly help savethis sinking ship for the price

(01:09:01):
of a pint at patreon.com slashADV Cannonball.
Follow us on all the socialswith the handle at ADV
Cannonball.
If you'd like to send us aquestion or

SPEAKER_06 (01:10:24):
And we kind of got a plan, got to get across that
sign.
Everybody lend a hand, just likebrothers in a band.
It's a motorcycle scene, it'sall about fun.
A savage run machine headingsouth of the sun.
So scream if you want to gofaster.
This is a pretty successfuldisaster.

(01:10:47):
Mondo Sahara! This is a prettysuccessful disaster.

(01:11:42):
Montessori!