RTW in dribs and drabs - off-road Ride Report - Iceland, Iraqi border, Korean DMZ, Alaska + beyond!

[jim-500]

Hi All, after the positive response our build pics got, I figured I'd go ahead and post a ridereport, my girlfriend and I have spent the last 8 months or so hopping countries from India to Canada, renting and buying bikes en-route, prior to that I rode several rental bikes and my own bikes across the middle-east... The goal was as much offroading and singletrack as possible!

We've sweated buckets lifting street bikes over logs in the Andaman Rainforests, huddled freezing in waist deep river crossings under Eyjafjallajökull, dodged teargas and roadblocks in Bahrain, bandaged ourselves up at the side of the road, faced off bull elephants in Sri Lanka and.... loved pretty much every minute of it!

I generally prefer mashing buttons on a camera to putting pen to paper so expect this to be pic-heavy, For now - here are a handful of teasers!

[royle100]

looks good. Travelling light by looks of it?

[jim-500]

Fairly light, our huge, yellow, £18 Lomo bag has now been on 20+ flights and sat on the back of a bike for over 17,000 miles...2 backpacks and 1 lomo bag for the last 8 months means I now look (and probably smell) like a yeti!

Basically we have only been able to carry the basic luggage allowance for the entire trip, so it's all been "strapable" to the back of the bikes without racks/panniers.

[jonesthesteam]

Great photos ! Which bike has been your favourite so far?

Jonesy

[Tramp]

Nice to see a varied range of two wheeled transport...and clothes can be bought anywhere in the world, some inspiring pics on a wet british summers day...

[YOSHIWOLVES]

brilliant photos (thumbs) (thumbs) (thumbs) (thumbs)

[jim-500]

Tramp - If it makes you feel any better, its also pouring here...we're hiding out in a Starbucks doing the "motorcyclist on a rainy day" shiver at the moment!

And you're absolutely right about the clothes...we went to a huge hunting store in Alaska recently and bought 4 t shirts for £2.50 each from their bargain section! So we're now riding around looking like Trump supporters plastered in "my ar15 is my significant other" and "duck commander" slogans! :p

[jim-500]

Great photos ! Which bike has been your favourite so far?

Jonesy

We were chatting about this the other day...I loved the ktm 990, I'm an ok rider offroad but unless you're Chris Birch it's still too big for proper singletrack imo...but a lot of fun on the gravel. The DRZ400 is still the best allrounder imo, we've done over 10,000 miles off-road and always come to the same conclusion...lightweight beats anything else, that ability to get down tracks, wheelie over logs, pull bikes under gates, lift them over obstacles etc is great - I don't think I'd go for another 150kg plus adv bike anytime soon. If money were no object my money would be going on an adv prepped ktm 525/wr450 or really throw some decent suspension/engine mods at a good drz400.

Other things we noted...$5 per day scooters can be more fun than big ktms/bmws offroad, the klx250s is seriously underated against the (too heavy) crf250l imo, the modern ktm450s/500s are epic, the 650gs is a lot more fun than I was expecting, the husky terra is very pretty in the flesh even if it is too heavy aaaannnddd... at the end of the day it genuinly is (90% of the time) more about the ride than the bike you're riding...Some of the best roads/trails it didn't matter what we were riding as long as it was a motorbike!

[ollydog]

great pics and verity how did the relationship go with the gf, just got from 2 weeks hotels with jan and i could have throttled her

steve

[jim-500]

great pics and verity how did the relationship go with the gf, just got from 2 weeks hotels with jan and i could have throttled her

steve

:laugh: Theres been the odd moment - usually made worse by indian airport security or missing a train etc...but overall, it's been great! - she fell off her road bike fairly heavily 4 weeks before we were supposed to leave and knackered her knee...so some of the riding/trails she's ridden since have been seriously impressive feats of mind over matter! B)

But anyway...I'll get going on the RR!

So we start with South Korea, specifically Seoul, this was really our first proper city after almost a month in India so it was mind blowingly efficient/high-rise/expensive, but we managed to seek out a cool little temple in the middle to show the contrast between old and new.





First stop was a pet cafe, these things are everywhere in Korea, it's basically a starbucks mated with a kennel - and means you get to drink coffee...with dogs!







So anyway onto the main event - the bikes! Nyx got a Korean made Titus 250 and I paid a little extra for a CRF250L - both were actually pretty much perfect for the sort of riding we ended up doing.





We were in Korea in late March which was right when tensions seemed to be at a peak, Lot's of US military movement and posturing on both sides; since we had planned to ride up to the DMZ unguided this was a little tense! More to come on that (think riding through road blocks rigged with explosives and getting told off by full-tactical-mask-call of duty border guards) but at this point in time it was just little things like the sign below, that reminded us we were riding through a country technically still at war.





We headed out of Seoul and up into the mountains...



Where we came across lots of leftover buildings/equipment from the winter olympics...we were the only vehicles anywhere near this incredible train station!



Then we got bored of sightseeing and I decided to take the CRF swimming under these disused train tracks...







Or the bridge-eyer option..



This trend continued for the rest of the afternoon with Nyx using the asphalt and me arsing about in the water!









That evening we got lazy and decided to just point at beer and meat on the Menu...don't worry we eat plenty of spicy/pickled/kimchee-ey things as the thread goes on!



Ok so end of day 1 in South Korea - tomorrow we find an abandoned highway and go play in the woods!