Category: Creative Projects

Europe passed into history with the wave of a soldier’s hand, and smiling officials beneath big red and white Turkish flags welcomed us to their country and gave us permission to stay for three months. We’d never need that long, of course, but it felt good to have been given plenty of breathing space for the new wheels to arrive from England. The road from this remote border-post passed through misty wooded hills and suddenly opened out into an immaculate highway, three lanes wide on each side, without the slightest hint that a motor vehicle might ever have driven upon… Continue reading →

The last time I’d looked at a map of Sudan, no road had been shown on the Nile’s west bank. Nothing, it seemed, existed over there at all. But now I can see palm trees and foliage on that distant shore, just as over here. And anyway, I figure, the world needs trailblazers. For people to stop treating places and experiences as products to be consumed; to refuse to allow fear to dictate where they do and don’t go. I plan to make a small contribution to this campaign, and in order to do it I will spend the afternoon gathering… Continue reading →

Andy stopped ahead of me and I did too while we waited for the girls to catch up. Standing in the shade, I swung my arms around to warm up, and – suddenly – accidentally flung off the beaded bracelet I’d worn since leaving home. It flew through the air and into the undergrowth. I ran after it, digging in vain through the foliage, but it could not be found. I scrambled back out from the bushes. ‘Damn it!’ ‘What?’ ‘I’ve just managed to lob my bracelet into oblivion!’ ‘Was it a special bracelet, or something?’ ‘Well … erm …’ The bracelet had been… Continue reading →

In Sebeş, a dreary city of abandoned industry and loitering groups of men, we were due to be reunited with Magalie, and all of us – Maria in particular – were looking forward to the prospect immensely. Needing somewhere to stay overnight while we waited for her arrival, and having found that the town’s sole hotel was obscenely overpriced, Andy happened to get talking to a middle-aged man in a tatty leather jacket who was filling his car in nearby petrol-station. This gruff little man seemed to jump at the chance to have three desperate explorers stay the night in… Continue reading →

The rain still hadn’t stopped when dawn broke, exposing the same dark clouds and pot-holed thoroughfares that had welcomed us into the country. The heady days of good living under the summer sun now seemed like a distant memory. Grim faces drifted along broken pavements, eyeing us suspiciously as we cooked breakfast in a dilapidated bus shelter and washed up in a puddle. Although occupied by our present misfortunes, I was dimly aware that the proving grounds were coming to an end. My bike and I had survived an important test in making it this far. This was my first… Continue reading →

September began with all the warmth of summer, but threatened to end with a chill in the air. Looking at a map, I traced a simple route across another couple of borders and down to a narrow isthmus of land broken by a thin strait – the Bosphorus. Strange that such a narrow stretch of water could delineate the edge of a continent. Labelled Istanbul, this spit of land was still just about the most otherworldly sounding place I could imagine. Crossing the suspension bridge to its Eastern Quarter would mark our arrival, by bicycle, into Asia. I had two good… Continue reading →

One of Wawa’s elders arrives to share a meal with me and my hosts. The meal waltzes into the room on a metal tray balanced on a small boy’s head. It contains dishes of stewed beans with cumin, lemon, onion, hot pepper and oil; bowls of green bean and tomato stew; a kind of bread rather like a huge, thick and dense pancake; and another thinner bread like a crepe. In typical Middle Eastern style, the bread serves a dual purpose as cutlery, and we sit on the floor in a circle around the tray, digging dollops of stew from… Continue reading →

Riding through endless valleys and alpine towns, leaping into lakes of crystal clarity, grinding up smoothly paved bicycle trails and swooping down from forested passes – crossing Switzerland was the very dream of bicycle travel, and with our well-oiled feeding-and-navigating machine in motion there was plenty of time for a mind to wander. In fact, there was more than mine knew what to do with. My inner-monologue chattered incessantly, like a radio that wouldn’t switch off. It began seconds after I opened my eyes, continued throughout the day, and invaded my fevered dreams. I dearly wished to pedal carefree, lapping up… Continue reading →

What to do with so much time? If time was the new measure of wealth, I was the new Sultan of Brunei. Switzerland’s cycleways were so comprehensive and well-signposted that there was little need for navigation, and we often found ourselves separated for hours. There was little to do but ride, soak up the sun, and find new ways of entertaining myself, of which my favourite was to lip-sync the mooing of cattle as I rode past. Only occasionally, when one of us grew too eager and overshot an important junction, did separation cause any problems, and even then it… Continue reading →

Midday in the Sahara. There’s no-one to be seen. I push my bike amongst the outlying buildings. All is silence. A small boy darts from nowhere and makes a snatch at my trailer’s tattered flag. I yell at him, he yells something back into the bright heat and darts away again – gone. I hear the squeal and clang of a metal door and follow the sound, emerging from between the low houses and courtyards and onto what I guess is the main street; a slightly wider piece of desert between the mud-walled compounds. So this is a Nubian village. It… Continue reading →