I just finished Lone Rider by Elspeth Beard. She’s one of the first women to ride a motorcycle all around the world, doing so back in 1982 – 1984 and, when she finished this incredible two-year journey, she found that NO ONE CARED. No, really, no one cared: not her family, not neighbors, not friends, not motorcycle magazines, not travel magazines, not anyone. No book deal, no glowing article in the newspaper upon her return, not even an invitation by the local library back home in England to come down and do a presentation. She didn’t write her book until 30 years later – it came out in 2017. I’m so glad she did write it. I really enjoyed reading it. But I remain overwhelmed at how underwhelmed everyone was back in the day about her amazing achievement. I also greatly identify with that experience of an incredible achievement or life-changing event being met with blank stares and a shrug from the people you wanted most to care about it (other than yourself).
In short, Elspeth Beard should be as famous as Ted Simon and her book should be as famous as Long Way ‘Round.
Beard made this trip at a time when very few women were traveling long distances by motorcycle, even within their own countries. The out-and-out hostility she gets from daring to travel this way in the 1980s, even here in the USA, is jaw-dropping – and something I have never experienced now as a motorcycle traveler or solo traveler sans bike (and I’m so glad). The amount of sexual harassment and attempted sexual assaults she experiences in every country, including the USA, Australia, and all over India, is something that few world travelers, whether motorcyclists or humanitarians, will talk about, even though it remains a reality to this day – and it’s something I have experienced as well. When I’ve asked travelers about it, most will say “it’s not that bad” or “I know how to avoid it.” I’m not sure why the denial. Fear of being defined as a victim rather than a traveler? Fear of being seen as weak? As a world traveler myself, including a humanitarian worker, I can tell you: sexual harassment is real, often happens when you least expect it and happens with disturbing regularity. I bring it up with travelers because I like tips on what to look out for and advice on how to handle certain situations, and I hope I have some helpful advice to share as well. It was refreshing to see a traveler be so open about it – and never letting it stop her from doggedly pushing on.
I admit to almost giving up on the book in the first 80 pages because I couldn’t believe how she treated her ride in the USA: just something to get through as quickly as possible. The USA is an amazing country to tour by motorcycle, and was in the 1980s – it’s not something new – but you would never know it by reading Beard’s book. In those early pages, she also talked more about her failed relationship than anything good she might have been experiencing as a motorcycle rider, and I thought, if the entire book is this way, I’m not going to be able to get through it. The first 80 pages just weren’t at all a book about an adventure motorcycle rider. But after she gets to Australia and works to get enough money to continue her travels, the book improves drastically – at least for me.
I do wish she’d talked more about how she chose her routes, how she chose where to stay, etc. – the only thing she says on this regard is that she has a Lonely Planet guide for one of the countries she’s in. (FYI even in this day and age of the Internet, I’m a huge fan of those guidebooks and have frequently used them myself). She also rarely talks about how she secured her bike for the night – this is a big concern for most motorcycle travelers, and it would have been nice to have heard her advice on the subject.
The book is more about the challenges Beard faces (accidents, breakdowns, bureaucracy, extortion attempts) than the sights she sees, and there are times when I was thinking, Why are you doing this? What about any of this is enjoyable? Are you ever happy? I don’t travel for endless, overwhelming challenges, though it is rather awesome to do something you’ve never done before or face a challenge you never expected – as long as you successfully meet the challenge. I travel to see amazing places and meet interesting people and be somewhere different than what I know every day, and I like reading travel books to get ideas of places to see when I travel. Her book is rather light in terms of describing awe-inspiring moments (an exception is her account of trekking through the Himalayas) or places you might want to visit if you are in the same places she was. But, still, I really enjoyed reading how she problem-solved, I deeply admire her persistence, and I am inspired by her determination. I don’t want to spoil anything in the book – part of the enjoyment is reading about the challenges that come up and how she addressed them, over and over and over. But I will say that the challenges are intense, beyond the capabilities of most motorcycle riders I’ve ever known – and beyond what I could deal with. I really cannot gush enough about how Beard handles a myriad of dire circumstances. She doesn’t seem to think it’s any big deal that she keeps overcoming these challenges, nor that she built her own panniers or that she constantly repaired her own bike on the fly – I read those accounts and thought, geesh, you are Wonder Woman on a motorcycle and you don’t know it. I’m not sure her book will inspire many people to take up motorcycle travel – the constant difficulties she experienced make it sound like a fight to survive every day, and it’s not like that for all travelers now – at least it doesn’t have to be. But she’s not exaggerating: in the 1980s, this is what she experienced, and her abilities to overcome those challenges are nothing short of amazing.
Also, I am not a fan of bare bones budget travel, and I could never sleep and eat in the conditions Beard did for weeks and weeks at a time. I love camping, including rough camping – but I don’t want to do it because I can’t afford a safe place and I’ll be in a place where there’s a very likely chance local people will walk up in the night and mess with my bike, or me. I love budget hotels, even when I have money for something more fancy, but not if they are crawling with roaches or pockmarked with peepholes. I don’t want to be on the verge of starvation while traveling because I can’t afford a decent meal. So, again, as you read her book, know that this is how she traveled, but you don’t have to travel this way in order to see the world – even by motorcycle, though you are going to need more money that she had if you don’t want to regularly experience the conditions she did.
I have no mechanical abilities and can only just-barely-assist in changing a tire – I could never do it myself. I can’t fix wiring or an oil leak or build my own panniers. Beard did all this – and more. That’s why Elspeth Beard was able to ride across India – and it’s why I can’t and won’t. And that’s okay! I fancy myself a motorcycle adventure rider – but nothing on the level of Elspeth Beard. I’ve ridden more than 40,000 miles / more than 63,000 km, the vast majority of it done touring, but just in the USA and Canada (I’m planning on seeing Baja, California, Mexico next year). I’ve never done the kind of riding Beard has done in severely under-developed countries, nor could I, and I know that and am okay with it. And I bring this up for anyone who wants to be an adventure motorcycle rider and is just getting started, because you might read the book and think, oh, no, I can’t do that, therefore, I’m not going to travel around by motorcycle. Times have changed and you don’t have to ride in the conditions Beard did to see some amazing, even remote places and experience the thrill of adventure motorcycle riding. I could never manage to ride across India – but I did ride up the Cassiar Highway to the Yukon, I’ve ridden gravel and dirt roads to remote ghost towns few have heard of, I’ve camped rough in beautiful, remote places throughout North America. I think I could manage some Eastern European countries on my own bike – I loved my long trip there on the back of my husband’s bike back in 2008. Just know as you read Beard’s book that this is extreme motorcycle touring, and if you haven’t ridden since you were 16 like Beard, and know you could never do many of these roads, that’s okay – you still have options for amazing, exotic, challenging adventure motorcycle travel.
Despite my complaint about it while reading the first 80 pages, I ended up really liking that she shared so much about her intimate relationships – I’ve found most people are not emotionless drones, even motorcycle travelers, though it’s very difficult to get world travelers, with or without motorcycles, to open up about this at times. I found it refreshing to hear a traveler talk about love on the road – and the aftermath. It’s something to consider if you are going to invest in a lot of time away from home.
And note: I will never have legs long enough to be able to take a photo on my bike so I can look as cool as Elspeth Beard.
One thing I’ve wondered: is Dave Calderwood, who was then editor of Bike magazine, still alive and still an asshole, or dead, or alive and profoundly apologetic for being an asshole? When Beard was looking for sponsorship and advice for her trip, she wrote his magazine, among others, and he wrote a mocking letter with the sole intent of humiliating her. You can read the letter here.
I hope Elspeth Beard finally gets the recognition and admiration she deserves. And I’m so grateful she shared her adventure at last. I would very much like to be as tenacious as she is.
So, if Elspeth Beard isn’t the first woman to go around the world on her own motorcycle, who is? It’s probably Anne France Dautheville, French journalist and writer. In 1973 at the age of 28, she rode around the world on a Kawasaki 125. Both of her books, in French only, are out of print (I will totally buy into a crowdfunding effort to translate them into English and publish them!).
One more thing: Beard visited Gunung Leuser National Park in Indonesia during her travels and mentioned an NGO working in this area addressing the huge problem of Indonesians abducting baby orangutans and then wanting to get rid of them when they grow older and are so much harder to care for. Her account of this visit is a good example of transire benefaciendo: “to travel along while doing good” – she didn’t attempt to work at the NGO as a volunteer (which would have been illegal), but she did elevate its work through her book, even many years later. And that’s how I know about it – and now you do too.
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