Courtesy of www.SladeRide.com

  (Gallery & FAQs at bottom of post)

  Home time.

   I’ve spent a couple of months thinking about it.

  And now, I’m back in the UK, with my bike
  (Charles).

  For now at least I feel like I’ve done enough.

  I set out alone from the Arctic Ocean coast of
  Alaska at the end of May 2009, 250 miles
  inside the Arctic Circle, unsure if I could
  make it through the first day, let alone keep
  going for …

  6 months and 5,150 miles or …

  … the equivalent of cycling the length of Africa
  from Cairo, Egypt to Cape Town, South Africa.

  And yes (aside from around 50 miles after a wheel collapse and 3 miles in a pick-up through ‘construction’) I cycled every inch of that!

Before this trip (and I can’t quite believe this myself) the sum total of my cycle touring experience was … 4 days in the South Downs (near London, UK) 18 years ago when I was 16, staying in Youth Hostels.  This has been a ‘bit of a step up’ …!  Its all a little bonkers really.

I was monumentally nervous back in May but, as I remember, having to focus on the practicalities of cycling and camping wild on the Arctic Tundra somehow meant my mind did not have time to worry (much!).

To this day those 2 weeks from Prudhoe Bay along the Dalton Highway to the town of Fairbanks remain some of the hardest, yet most fulfilling of my life so far, for I carried what I’m now sure was almost 400 lb (me plus bike plus kit plus food) for 400 miles along gravel and dirt roads (and then 100 miles on pave) across a mountain range through snow, blizzards, blinding dust, headwinds so strong I had to pedal downhill and temperatures dipping to -20c, with grizzly bears literally just feet away at times not to mention the ‘oversize’ rigs carrying equipment the size of the space shuttle to the oil fields.

I had a couple of very close calls in the dust where I just missed being mown-down by one of the behemoth trucks, was buried in my tent under snow one night, survived on cold food for the first week after my stove broke, once used a welding torch to boil some water for soup, rode one day for 16 hours to make it across the mountains for a meal at a Truck Stop, spent a nervous night at the Arctic Circle after a hunter had told me of recent bear and wolf attacks at the camp and developed something akin to a Gatorade addiction.

I could write so much more but then of course, there’s the rest of the trip.

Heybridge Basin, Essex, UK - Sr. Loco con familia, mi madre y padre

It was difficult to get going again from Fairbanks and to keep heading south – I felt like I’d already done an ‘epic’ just making it solo down the Dalton, but, after a great time off the bike with a friend from the UK I did get going again and on picking up the Alaskan Highway (or Alcan) I made it across the rest of Alaska and into the Yukon, Canada.

With Alaska, northern Canada had the most astonishing wildlife of the trip – in the far north I’d see herds of hundreds of Caribou rushing across the road in front of me and I’d regularly pull round a bend in a road through some woods to come face to face with a huge Moose or Elk.  There were the Buffalo herds along the verges and the worrying but also quite weirdly magical encounters with Black Bears walking out in front of my bike, just feet away.  Full-on wilderness with vast swathes of land for hundreds of miles in every direction seemingly comprised of nothing but trees, mountains and a stupendous menagerie except there were no cages or fences here.

I also remember this section of the trip for the temperatures (approaching 40c many days) as that part of Canada underwent a heatwave and as a result drinking upwards of 10 litres per day.  And of course, I met Ward and Jacky from Iowa who taught me so much about life and the road and with whom I cycled for 2 weeks.

Monterrey, NL, Mexico - Notice the car in the sign ... it has no front wheel! (it hadn't been vandalised it actually looked like it had been made that way!)

Not before seeing the astonishing scenery of the southern Canadian Rockies in Jasper and toward Banff (up there with the best I have seen anywhere, ever) I was welcomed back to the US (Montana) by what seemed like a week of constant rain.  Montanans were a kind bunch and I slept quite a few nights, as I had done in much of northern Canada, camping on village greens or in front gardens, indeed, before reaching Montana I realised I had camped for 50 nights in a row (compared to no more than 10 days before this trip).  I was going feral I think and, starting to get used to it!

Yellowstone was inspiring but the Teton mountains really ‘got me’ – including of course a visit to the hospital for stitches after accidentally digging a still-green snapped branch into my head during a hailstorm at a campsite!  The Rockies of central Wyoming were like I’d imagine to moon to be, except maybe Wyoming has the odd shrub and of course the south of that state brought me my highest point (elevation) of the trip at just under 11,000 ft after a 4,000 ft climb (and mild hypoxia) over 20 miles, much of it dirt roads and tracks across open fields, followed by one of the most amazing 40+ mph descents.

Nr Heybridge Basin, Essex, UK - Maldon on its head

The snow was starting to arrive in the mountains again by mid September (after I’d said goodbye to it in June in northern Alaska) and following a welcome weekend away in LA with some friends and some great R&R in Denver with some more, I began what to Charles, Derek and I would become known as ‘The Chase’.  Climbing back up into the high Rockies from (already ‘mile high’ Denver) staying with some friends from Yellowstone initially, we made it the 500 miles south through Colorado and New Mexico just before enormous storms hit the Rockies, leaving areas that we’d ridden through only weeks before, buried under 3 ft dumps of snow in just one night!  Even the fringes of the storm in central New Mexico meant we were almost flooded out of the tent one night spent at a Freeway intersection.

If I’d thought Wyoming was empty then parts of New Mexico gave it some very stiff competition – desert conditions (despite the recent deluges) meant stretches of 50 to 100 miles with no streams and certainly no shops or even houses so carrying 10 litres of water (normally I’d carry about 4) became commonplace.  Santa Fe (quirky locals), Roswell (aliens) and Carlsbad (caverns) gave much needed distraction.

Carlsbad in southern New Mexico had been the last place that I’d begun the trip wanting to visit – it was late October by that point and the weather was worsening (getting colder) and it had been below freezing every night for weeks by this point, leading me to often wear my down jacket inside my sleeping bag whilst camping.  It was draining to say the least.  I decided to change direction and visit another new state, Texas, in the hope that it would be warmer and that I could ’sling-shot’ further south into Mexico by staying longer in the US before crossing the border.

Nr Heybridge Basin, Essex, UK - ... still calm

Texas was hotter, much so, wonderfully so, and also incredibly welcoming as I slept again in backyards and was given a bed for the night once too.  It was around this point that I started to feel some locals just couldn’t relate to how far it was from Alaska, answering ‘oh thats quite a distance’ but not really grasping what it really meant until I told them just har far away it was, perhaps because it defied comprehension (or logic / sanity!) in many ways.

And so it was that I ran out of things that I ‘needed to do’ in Del Rio, Texas, USA and with a flight booked from Monterrey, Mexico 300 miles away and my US visa having only a few days left I took a (very) deep breath and crossed the border…  It felt almost instantly as if I had travelled hundreds if not thousands of miles into another world, not just a few hundred yards across a bridge -  a lot of people actually walked everywhere for a start, there were horses, chickens, cattle and children running around, crazed dogs trying to burst my tyres as I rode by and of course the inevitable shouts of ‘hey gringo’.  I was expecting the transition to be more gradual, after all Mexico is increasingly well developed (especially in the north) and was surprised and slightly let down by how much it affected me (having spent time in southern Latin America before).

Monterrey, NL, Mexico - L to R: Richard (Ricardo), Sergio & I

I was unnerved I’ll admit.  The daytime temperature was increasing (toward 40c) as was the humidity at times – I was sweating buckets in the sun, ending my days riding with my t-shirt rippled with white lines of salt.  I spent a couple of days holed-up in a hotel with Montezuma reeking his revenge as it were.  Another night I had a knock on the door at 2am – it felt decidedly dodgy, my door fronting as it did onto the otherwise deserted carpark and the knock being unaccompanied by anyone calling out so I trusted my instincts and stayed-put and will never know if it was totally innocent.  Yet another night I realised that the (different) motel’s door-lock was, as they say, knackered, and that the ‘locked’ door could be pushed open by a meagre breeze (I shoved the bed up against the door for the night).

Later, as I climbed back up again, the mountains were beautiful.  I met lovely, kind people.  And also remembered how gorgeous some Latin women are, ahem.  But, I was expecting to be excited at coming back to Latin America (I spent 4 months in the south of the continent a few years back).  It was early November.  I was slowly realising that even as I’d approached Denver back in late September I had been starting to ‘run out of steam’, although not physically.

I’d begun the trip in late May, unsure of how far I’d go, although as previously mentioned even then I harboured a desire to visit as far south as Carlsbad in New Mexico (along with the the more northerly Jasper, Yellowstone, the Tetons, the Colorado Rockies and Roswell).  As I worked my way south into the lower US I decided that it was important for me to make it into Mexico such that I could feel that I’d crossed Canada and the US, regardless of what came after that.

Heybridge Basin, Essex, UK - And, back to the UK con Charles

And so it was, with heavy heart and after a couple of months of building-up to the decision, I decided to stop in Monterrey, Mexico.  My feelings right now are of both relief but also some disappointment that I didn’t feel like heading further south.  But that as they say would be a whole ‘nother kettle of fish …

6 months, solo, camping for 5 months, cycling all 5,150 miles, along the the 3,000 mile lenghth of the Rockies, through Alaska, Yukon, British Columbia, Alberta, Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico, Texas, Coahuila and Nuevo Leon, Mexico.  I’ve found previously untapped resolve, stubbornness and drive.  I’ve seen things that I’ve dreamt about for years and realised that if you really really set your mind to something that you can do it, but also been reminded that, just because ‘you can’ doesn’t mean you ‘have to’.

I feel like I’ve lived about 6 lifetimes and I’m sure it will be many years before I can ‘take it all in’.  But, that sounds ok to me!  Indeed, that which I’ve written about in this and prior posts only scratches the surface of what I encountered.

Thank you, profoundly so, to all of you who have encouraged me from the start.

I would like to think that I’ll use this website again for future trips so please feel free to ‘Subscribe’ using the button on the top right (scroll to the top).

Again, thank you.

Oh, and I simply love my bike – it is utterly utterly phenomenal.  Well done Charles.  And thanks Derek.

See FAQ

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Villa Grove, CO, USA - Alpenglow abounds

Courtesy of www.SladeRide.com

(Gallery at bottom of post)

“Wait here while I get the spear I used to kill him!” he says, running off to his van.

Its almost pitch black, its below zero, I’m at the otherwise deserted far-end of a campsite in a remote Colorado valley and John, half-Irish, half-Sioux has just gone to his ‘RV’ (a converted UPS truck in which he lives year-round) to get said weapon.

“And I put one end on the ground like this and the dagger-end up like this and then, HE RAN!  He ran onto the blade and I twisted and I twisted and held him down until he stopped fighting.  I had no choice.”

John is a Vietnam Vet, ex-Special Forces, a ‘tunnel-rat’, Mossad-trained in hand-to-hand combat.  In the months following the war he, in his own words became dangerously unstable after so much, well, I think you get the picture.  Again in his own words he was saved from the brink through taking a job from his father, as a cowboy spending months on end with a herd of cattle or flock of sheep, living wild up in the Colorado mountains.

The ‘he’ in the story above was a Mountain Lion (although a real one this time, not a dog / bird as per my previous experience!).

It was coming for his sheep.

(the spear was hand-made by him and carried in preference to a rifle)

I didn’t know whether to cry at how brave and protective he was of his flock or cause a distraction and run for the hills myself.

He turned out to be a lovely guy, really sweet and very paternal toward me – later in his ‘van’ we discover a mutual penchant for Clint Eastwood films and he makes me hot chocolate to warm up, we chat and laugh about life.

(he tells me how all those years ago he talked to his horse for months on end, venting all of the pain from his time in Asia – and I heard some horrific things about what went on which I won’t repeat here – and how the horse therefore saved his life, in a sense)

Langtry, TX, USA - 1 sec exposure, max optical zoom & improvised tripod but I still don't know how it came out so well!

Continuing on this slightly (!) sureal tack I’ve since been through the one area in the world which has had more UFO sightings than any other, met those who are convinced they’ve been at some point abducted (I go to Roswell, New Mexico), had thoroughly enjoyable debates with a congressional advisor about the psychology of ‘modern government’, met someone wanting to further Einstein’s ‘Theory of Special Relativity’ who is challenging the status quo over the nature of the speed of light, slept in a spare bedroom covered on every square inch by NASCAR memorabilia, met the owner of one of the biggest ranches in Texas and almost been charged by a wild boar.  Oh, and I crossed the border into Mexico.

(hi also to Joe and Toni and thank you again for dinner and to Stanley, and thanks for a great time at Carlsbad and its amazing – do go there if you ever get the chance – caverns)

For much of this time I was chasing south out of the Rockies having really, really chanced my arm as much as I could with the weather – I felt a bit like this guy except I was on a bike, the wave was the weather and, er, I didn’t have a jet ski (sadly, for that would have been quite fun!).

As Sean, a resident of Vail, CO (whom I met and had the pleasure of cycling with in Texas for a day) said to me about climbing BACK UP to 10,000 feet from 5,000 ft Denver into the Colorado Rockies in MID OCTOBER, “Woah, that was bold man”.  I knew it was a ‘bit risky’.  Ice on the road was my biggest fear as that would have been carnage on the descents.  Even in northern Alaska I wasn’t (generally) so worried since gravel roads allow (relative) tyre adhesion to much lower temperatures.  Pavement / tarmac does not, much below zero, and you’re ‘toast’ without studded rubber, especially carrying the weight I am.

One day it was so cold that the fog was causing ‘ice rime’ on any surface it touched – that was and still is the only day I’ve not ridden due to the weather.

Thank you so much again to Rose, Miki and the dogs for letting me stay (I met the guys in Yellowstone, Wyoming).  The next day I set off and it turned out to be a monumental 8 hours of two 10,000+ ft passes, 60 mph gusting side and head winds across South Park (that of the TV Cartoon, yes) and a night camping at 10,000 ft at -10c, sleeping, spent as I was, for 13 hours!  For 2 weeks it was consistently -5c and lower in my tent at night, the winds were becoming dangerous, not to mention demoralising and exhausting and the heavy snow was coming.  My luck was running out.   If I wanted to carry on riding I had to crank up the pace and get south to lower elevation and quickly.  I put in a few big big days, the hardest being over 100 miles, still in the mountains to make it to New Mexico.

(that day ended at ‘Ojo Caliente’ a very plush indeed ‘Hot Springs and Spa Resort’ where I camped and got a 50% discount to use the – wonderful wonderful wonderful – floodlit hot-pools perched beneath dramatic red cliffs, an unusually decadent evening!)

Nr Mina, NL, Mexico - Palm trees & mountains

A few lovely days to rest in Santa Fe – having the day before for the first and so far only time run out of water, such was the ’swing’ in weather from extreme cold to heat in this part of the world at this time of year – and I’m off, somewhat tentatively, south again.  Should I go lower and head south-east to the desert through Texas and north-eastern Mexico?  Or should I stay in the mountains, heading due south?  After some research I decide to head for Monterrey, Mexico, taking the desert route, at least initially.

The Rockies however had a little bit more in store for me and even after Santa Fe I was caught in the worst storm of my trip so far with my tent leaking somewhat due to slightly rushed pitching and the phenomenally intense wind and rain as I camped at a freeway intersection next to a truck stop with fellow cyclist Robert (Bob) from Canada.  The higher Rockies which I’d left just a week before had over 3 feet of snow as a result of the same storm.  Eek!

Cycle-touring in the desert was a new experience for me.  Water is the ‘thing’.  Even in remote northern Canada and Alaska with stretches of 200+ miles with no shops or taps / faucets I could at least rely on there being a stream or river every few dozen miles at worst.  In southern New Mexico and once in Texas and again in Mexico I had stretches of up to 100 miles with no guarantee of ‘fluids’ whatsoever – no streams (dried-up), no gas stations, shops or houses even.  That meant carrying up to 10 litres of water versus the normal 3-5 i.e. an extra 5-7 kilos!  Ouch!  On one of those strecthes I decided at lunch to push on to Roswell as I didn’t fancy a night out wild-camping with the rattlesnakes and with fading light (increasingly a factor); I made it, a little bit tired (!) but ok, after another 100+ mile day…

(for the first time I started on this ‘leg’ to have some days where I just felt like stopping, full-stop as it were – leaving Denver after such a lovely time was hard and the conditions and if I’m honest the prospect of crossing into Mexico -  more on this below – almost became like a bit of an extra ‘load’; it was toward the Mexican border that I started to find motels as cheap as many campsites further north so I must admit where I’d camped for months on end previously, I did stay in quite a few super-budget motels to pamper myself somewhat – so much for the Explorer persona!)

Nr Sanderson, TX, USA - this chap gave the distinct impression that he was going to charge until I rode off (he was protecting his family who are in the bushes - they're 'Javelinas')

Texas (south-west) welcomed me with some amazing hospitality – thanks to to the Putnams for letting me camp in the yard and for breakfast, dinner and the drinks and to Byron and Linda for taking me into your home and for the food after you insisted I come indoors as otherwise I’d “freeze my butt off”.  Riding along the US-Mexican border (the Rio Grande river in that area) was a strange experience for I could have (easily?) walked across to Mexico at numerous points since the Rio Grande (until the Pecos river joins from the north) is only a couple of feet wide; as I worked my way toward New Mexico and certainly into Texas, the horror-stories about how (life-threateningly) dangerous the Mexican border areas were, began.  Almost without fail US residents thought I was insane to try, solo, on a bike.  The US-based Mexicans that I met meanwhile generally just said ‘be careful / sensible’.  I’d later learn that something somewhere between the 2 was (at least my interpretation) the ‘reality’.

The border crossing was spookily quiet – I purposely chose a less-used crossing at Del Rio / Cuidad Acuna, but even so, there were just 2 cars and I in the ‘queue’.  The Mexican customs officer asked what was in my bag: “A tent”.  “Ok”.  That was it.  I was in Mexico!  As mentioned in a previous tweet, I was stopped by the police just a mile or so into Mexico … expecting (which I now feel bad about) a “shake down” of my gear, the driver just wanted a chat and to see that I had some semblance of what I was doing and where I was going.  This became a trend and I was stopped by the ‘Federales’ on a number of occasions in the following weeks, all of which were totally amicable encounters.  I thought Texas was friendly but Mexico now takes the prize for so many people wave, shriek “Go go go!” (and I’m certain they’re implying “Good for you” rather than “Leave the country!”) and stop me for a chat, fascinated by what on earth I am doing.  I’ve had meals bought for me, been given gifts (thanks to the guys at Canada Cabanas Resort in Mina, NL for a lovely stay in the otherwise empty high-class Butlins waterpark!), had offers to come to people’s homes, been introduced to friends of friends and gradually, in wading through the quagmire that is my rusty and never actually that brilliant Spanish, come to understand that Mexico is … wonderful

In the 2 weeks between the border and reaching Monterrey (the 3rd largest city in the country at 3.5 million people) I met no non-Mexicans.  None.  Nada. 

And I’ve pretty much had to speak spanish constantly.  Tourism is hugely depressed.  There are Federal Government TV ads telling the Mexican people “We’re busting the drug cartels, we’re arresting hundreds, raiding properties, seizing narcotics and rescuing ‘kidnapees’, we’re going to beat this” and there seems to be an unprecedented level of co-operation between the US and Mexican authorities to make that happen.  I still need to be ‘careful / sensible’ though and am.

Monterrey, NL, Mexico - I reach Monterrey!

In getting to southern Texas the temperatures started to rise and when lower into Mexico the daytime temperature on the road pushed over 40c on a few days (giving me a temperature range, since leaving Denver of 50c!).  Monterrey and the surrounding mountains (for I had to climb back up into the hills) are glorious, the city set as it is in an amphitheatre of soaring 6000 ft peaks.  Getting into a city of this size was a challenge and I found myself riding on sidewalks / pavements, across scrubland, beneath underpasses, down minute cobbled streets and for the first time on this trip using the streetmaps loaded onto my cellphone / GPS in order to avoid the tunnels along the ‘direct’ route shown on my larger scale paper maps.

Adding to Monterrey’s general greatness, last night I went out – with 3 gals living in Texas, 2 guys living in Vancouver and my (fantastic) Hostel’s owner & his brother – to (1) a great Mexican restaurant (2) a huge Woodstock-esque open-air private party with Mexican 60s & 70s rock cover-bands (3) a Salsa dance club and (4) a House night hosted at a club with a ‘luchador’ theme where the dancefloor was in a real wrestling ring, with costumes on the walls and hung from the ceilings and the staff wearing the associated masks! It was a ‘late one’, like 5 am.  How old am I?   Thanks Jose Juan and Antonio for showing us a great time.

(this ‘leg’ of the trip, since Denver has covered almost 1,400 miles in a little over 5 weeks – I’ve not travelled so fast over such a prolonged period on the whole trip to this point, but, I really wanted to get to Mexico to have then covered the whole of the US and to Monterrey for various practical reasons…)

I fly home from Monterrey tomorrow, back to the UK – I’m Best Man at a wedding in the UK in early December with the all important prior Bachelor / Stag Party duties and I want to see family and friends for xmas, having been away for over 6 months.  We shall ’see what happens’ as regards future plans so watch this space in the new year.  Thanks again to everyone both at home and away who have supported and encouraged me so far – I couldn’t have done it without you  

Happy xmas all.

Have I actually ridden 5,150 miles all the way from the Arctic Ocean coast of Alaska, 200 miles inside the Arctic Circle down almost all of the 3,000 mile long Rockies to a Mexican city just 100 miles north of the Tropics?  I have.  How, never having done anything like this before, I do not quite know!

End of Stage 1.

… Charles – and Derek – have decided to stay in Monterrey over xmas to see the sights …

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