News from Jupiter
50th Anniversary
September 26, 2023
We’re ten days away from the fiftieth anniversary of that day. There was no one on earth I would have changed places with. Or so I thought – until that black night on the pavement of Grays Inn Road, when I stood dripping rainwater, sweat and despair, crushed by the unwieldiness of the monster I had created, and the enormity of the prospect I […]
Farewell My Lovely
September 24, 2023
It has been so hard to let go. I’ve been promising to do it for a year at least, but even at the last minute, with the money already in the bank, I couldn’t quite reconcile myself to losing the bike. Drew and Ruth were there with the van, all ready to load but I had to take it off for one last spin around […]
The Overland Event and Notes from India
August 27, 2023
Next Thursday I will fly to London (Easyjet permitting) to attend Paddy Tyson’s Overland Event, where I’ve been a fixture for many years. Of all the bikers’ meetings it has always seemed to me the friendliest and most relaxed, for many reasons – the wonderful site, the limited scale, Paddy’s obvious passion. There’s only one other I’m as fond of, and that’s the German one […]
A Flurry of Flights and California Beckons
July 1, 2023
This flurry of flights all over the place is nearly over. The last one, to California, starts on Monday, with a train to Paris, a hotel stay because I can hardly ever find a train to meet a plane, then an eleven hour flight to San Francisco. When I say it’s all too much, people mock me. “Oh you poor thing, having to go to […]
Of Flying, and Frying and, of course, ultimately Dying – but not yet.
June 18, 2023
I spent the last week in the province of Quebec, seeing the sights and drowning in music. Bikers can be other things too, writers, musicians, plumbers, blood donors and blood couriers, cops and robbers. Because I was there to listen to the first ever production of an opera written almost 200 years ago, I met several musicians and conductors. Of course none of them had […]
From My Notebook 48 Years Ago: Nicaragua to Honduras
June 11, 2023
Still in Managua I spent two more days with the Fowlers. On the second day the husband, Peter, returned and they organised a party including assorted foreigners, mostly conventional businessmen and wives. One very impressive Nicaraguan woman, a broker, made fun of the others for being dependent on their bosses, provoking some uneasy laughter. I wondered how they all felt knowing that they depended for […]
From My Notebook 48 Years Ago: Costa Rica to Nicaragua
June 4, 2023
In May 1975 I was making my way up through Central America. After 18 months on the road, in Africa and South America, I was almost half way round the track I’d set myself. Feeling a bit weary I was bedazzled by the prospect of California and, moving faster than I should have, I crossed into Nicaragua from Costa Rica. May 11 Drove up […]
From My Notebook 48 Years Ago: Leaving Panama
May 28, 2023
I spent a lot of my early life very close to Portobello Road, in North Kensington, so I felt a particular attachment to the Spanish port of that name. This is where Spain counted and loaded its treasure fleets. An obvious target for pirates and privateers, it was well defended. You can see the canon still lined up below, facing the Caribbean. […]
From My Notebook 48 Years Ago: In The Zone
May 21, 2023
From the rough and ready life on the road in 1975 I’m transported to the big rock candy mountain, a bubble of luxury kept inflated by the US Navy and its Marines. April 15th, a Monday Life in the Canal Zone begins on Rodman Marine Base. Thirties barracks buildings, big, spacious, landscaped – now a golf course runs through the middle. Captain John B. […]
From My Notebook 48 Years Ago In Panama
May 14, 2023
In 1975 the Panama Canal and roughly 5 miles either side of it was still US territory and called the Canal Zone. Politically I was trying to stay neutral, although the Vietnam War was at its height . . . I had no idea what to expect, but my sponsors, the Lucas company, had an important depot in Panama. 11th April, 1975 Leave San […]