This is a question that comes up often when I talk about my getaway projects. Why?
Why so long, why so far, why alone, why something as extreme as on a motorcycle and in a tent?
The short answer?
Why not?
This answer is not as naïve as it seems. Life is too short not to regularly try to ‘think outside the box’. So since I have resources, not using them would be unfortunate.
Because I consider myself lucky to be able to do it: physical capacity, law (passport, motorcycle license …) and some financial means. I am sometimes touched by the daily struggles that some poor or disabled people are fighting and I feel that I have to take advantage of my situation to have bold objectives day after day. Carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero.
Know yourself
I recognize that the conditions of a ‘road trip’ like the Australian one are singular. By the way, another question comes up frequently: ‘a journey like this long, isn’t it boring’? Considering the geography of Australia, this is a risk. A distant destination requires to make the energy spent to get there profitable. Moreover I hope to benefit from this time. We all need to regularly take a step back from our condition, close our eyes to the gaze of others to define ourselves in relation to our own values. Solicited by multiple networks, social and artificial at the same time (to the point of feeling a form of harassment at the beginning of the confinement in 2020), attacked by incessant marketing campaigns (advertisements, telephone canvassing, spam …) surgically studied to influence us, ‘retreats’ such as this expedition are for me regenerative.
Going alone is not a choice, but a consequence of the extraordinary conditions of great travel. Over long periods, the unexpected is omnipresent: detours of itinerary to discover the unknown, weather, fatigue, breakdowns … Concessions increase with the size of the group and the length of the journey, to the point of undermining the pleasure of sharing the adventure. Humbly, I tried to do only part of the tour of Australia, in pairs, but without success.
Happy he who like Ulysses has returned successful from his travels
I like to say that I can pack my bags in less than an hour regardless of the circumstances. But I have never prepared a trip as much as to go to Australia. Borders blocked by the confinement, the hours turned into weeks, months and then years of acculturation. Like the little thumb, I like to compare my travel memories to small white stones that mark the path of my existence.
This one is undeniably a rock, a reassuring bitter to guide my future crossings.
I can thank my family for having already allowed me to travel to several countries, cultures and living standards. The story, the way of approaching life, the link to the other, the link to the environment, the language, the music, the way of eating, entertaining, consuming… there are always things to discover, about others and about oneself. The effect is increased tenfold by leaving these ice palaces that are the international hotels, all melted in the same mold, and escaping long enough to interfere in the habits of the populations.
In this, the choice of the motorcycle is not trivial. Certainly, I really like to drive on two wheels. But I also know that this type of vehicle creates a bond. Whether for its originality, for the image of fragility that can be associated with it, or even for the disinhibition that the smile of the ecstatic biker provides, it facilitates the discussion. The pleasure of riding is one of the reasons for the duration of this trip: the time spent immersing myself in the country will be reduced by long road trips essential to the visit of the regions, quite diverse but all exotic.
Let’s talk about exoticism. In order not to take an unreasonable risk, a ‘developed’ country seemed preferable to me to go on an itinerant motorcycle campsite. Exoticism is then limited. But in Australia the fauna, flora, climate, recent Aboriginal and colonial history… attracted me a lot. And while, in other similar countries, freedom is gradually being held hostage by the standardization of obese companies – Wallmart, Apple, General Motors, Amazon,…, Australia seems to me to have kept from that exhilarating freedom that one feels at the dawn of adulthood. I love this feeling of ‘everything is possible’ and I would not be surprised if we share this taste, exacerbated by constraints, sanitary or not.