Motorcycle Adventure Ride – Page 24

Himalaya Calling

Himalaya Calling is the best motorcycle adventure travel series I’ve ever seen. Yes, that’s a strong statement, but this is a grand four-part series that I thoroughly enjoyed watching. It’s about two German guys (Erik Peters and Alain Beger) who rode Yamaha Teneres from Germany to India. No support mechanics, no movie star nonsense, mud and snow on the highest mountain passes in the world, and absolutely super photography and riding.

You can watch Himalaya Calling on Amazon Prime TV, or buy the show through the Amazon website. Trust me on this: You’ll love it.

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The Salton Sea 400

The date is 18 April 2021 and the event is the Salton Sea 400, an endurance motor scooter event that circumnavigates southern California’s Salton Sea. The Motor Scooter International Land Speed Federation is the group that put the event together (they do this sort of thing regularly), and I can tell you from personal experience that Alan Spears and the MSILSF crew are a good bunch of people. I rode a 150cc California Scooter (along with good buddies TK and Arlene) in a similar event around Death Valley a few years ago and it was a hoot.

The contact info is in the poster above and here (and you should register to run in the event). If you have a scooter and you’d like to run it around the Salton Sea, you might consider participating.

The Six Best Motorcycles for Baja

This is a blog that is sure to be controversial and elicit a few comments. It attempts to answer a very specific question: Which motorcycles are best for Baja?

As a qualifier, let me mention a few things up front:

- Most of my Baja riding is on asphalt, and that necessarily colors my opinions. Yeah, there’s a lot of great dirt riding in Baja, but I am a streetster at heart. Your mileage may vary.
- You don’t need to spend $30K on a Baja blaster. What good is driveway jewelry if you are afraid to get it dirty and if you’re constantly worried about where you parked? In Baja, a big, heavy motorcycle (ADV-styled or otherwise) puts you at a disadvantage. I am not a fan of huge displacement, tall, expensive motorcycles. For real world riding (especially in Baja), monster motorcycles are more of a liability than an asset. Even that new one that’s 20 years late to the party.
- What I think you need in Baja is a comfortable bike with range. There are places where you can go more than a hundred miles between fuel stops, and you need a bike that can go the distance. That means good fuel economy and a good-sized fuel tank.
- Luggage capacity is a good thing, but if your bike doesn’t have bags, you can make do with soft luggage. In fact, I’d argue that soft luggage is better, because it’s usually easier to detach and bring in with you at night.

With that said, here goes:

CSC’s RX3

Say what you want about Chinese bikes, and say what you want about smallbore bikes, I’m convinced my 250cc CSC RX3 was the best bike ever for Baja.

The RX3 tops out at about 80 mph and that’s more than enough for Baja’s Transpeninsular Highway (the road that runs from the US border all the way down to Cabo San Lucas). The bike is comfortable and it gets 70 mpg. The fuel tank holds over 4 gallons. I could carry everything I needed (including a laptop, a big Nikon and a couple of lenses, and clothes) in the bike’s standard panniers and topcase. I also carried tools and spare parts, but I never needed them. It was superbly well suited for Baja exploration, as I and more than a few others know. One more thought…before you pummel me with the inevitable “Ah need at least a thousand cc” comments, take a look at our earlier blog, Why a 250?

Kawasaki’s KLR 650

I owned a 2006 KLR 650 Kawasaki for about 10 years. I bought it new and I loved the thing. I think it is one of the best bikes I’ve ever ridden in Baja. Yeah, it was a little tall, but once in the saddle I had no problem touching the ground.

The Kawi didn’t come with luggage, but I bought the cheap Kawasaki soft luggage panniers and a Nelson Rigg tankbag and I was good to go (I didn’t need the obligatory KLR milk crate). Although the KLR was heavy, it did surprisingly well off road (especially running at higher speeds over the rough stuff), and I did more offroad riding with the KLR than I have with any of the other motorcycles I brought into Baja. It averaged 56 mpg, and with its 6-gallon gas tank, I could make the trek between El Rosario and that first Pemex 200 miles further south without stopping for fuel.

CSC’s RX4

I’ve never owned an RX4, but I’ve ridden one a fair amount and I’ve done detailed comparisons between the RX4, the RX3, and the KLR.

I’ve never taken an RX4 into Baja, but I’ve ridden both (the RX4 and Baja) enough to know that it would do well down there. Think of the RX4 as an RX3 with more top end, more acceleration, and a bit more weight. It’s got the luggage and the ground clearance for extended travels with some offroad thrown in, and it also gets about the same fuel economy as the RX3. Fit and finish on the RX4 is superior (it’s almost too nice to take offroad). The RX4 is a lot of motorcycle for the money. The pandemic hit our shores not too long after the RX4 did, or I would have seen more of the RX4 south of the border.

Genuine’s G400c

I rode Genuine’s new G400c in San Francisco, courtesy of good buddy Barry Gwin’s San Francisco Scooter Center, and I liked it a lot. It’s compact, it has adequate power, it has an instrument layout I like, and it’s a fairly simple motorcycle.

I think with soft luggage, the Genuine G400c would make an ideal Baja blaster, and the price is right: It rings in right around $5K. With its Honda-clone 400cc motor (one also used in the Chinese Shineray line and others), it has enough power to get up to around 90 mph, and that’s plenty for Baja. I rode a different motorcycle with this powerplant in China and I was impressed. I think this would be an ideal bike for exploring Baja.

Royal Enfield’s 650 Interceptor

Yeah, I know, the new Enfield Interceptor is a street bike with no luggage. But with a Nelson Rigg tailpak and Wolf soft luggage, the Interceptor was surprisingly in its element in Baja. Gresh will back me up on this.

We had a whale of a time exploring Baja on a loaner 650 Enfield (thanks to Enfield North America and good buddy Bree), and I liked the bike so much I bought one as soon as I could find a dealer that didn’t bend me over a barrel on freight and setup. There’s one parked in my garage now. The bike is happy loping along at 65-70 mph, it’s comfortable (although I’ll be the first to admit it needs a sheepskin cover on that 2×4 of a seat), and it gets 70 miles per gallon. I wouldn’t take it off road (except maybe for that 10-mile stretch to go see the cave paintings in the Sierra San Francisco mountains), but like I said at the beginning of this conversation starter, I’m mostly a street rider.

Royal Enfield’s 400cc Himalayan

I’ve seen these but not ridden one yet. Good buddy Juan Carlos, a great guy with whom I rode in Colombia, has gone all over South America on Enfield’s new Himalayan and he loves it (that’s his photo below). Juan knows more about motorcycles than I ever will, and if Juan says it’s good, it’s good.

I like the look of the Himalayan and I like its single-cylinder simplicity (come to think of it, with the exception of the Enfield Intercepter, every bike on this list is a single). 400cc, I think, is about the right size for Baja. The price is right, too. Royal Enfield is making fine motorcycles that won’t break the bank. I think the Enfield Himalayan would be a solid choice for poking around the Baja peninsula, one that probably has the best off-road capabilities of any bike in this list.

I’m sure I’m ruffling a few feathers with this piece, and I’m doing that on purpose. I’ve been taking pot-stirring lessons from Gresh (that’s him in the photo at the top of this blog). We’d like to hear your comments if you disagree with any of the above. Do us a favor and leave them here on the ExNotes blog (don’t waste your time posting on Facebook as that stuff will scroll on by and be gone; ExNotes is forever).

All the above notwithstanding, I’ll add one more point: The best Baja motorcycle for each of us is the one we have. You can ride Baja on just about anything. I’ve been to Cabo San Lucas and back on everything from a 150cc California Scooter to a Harley Heritage Softail cruiser. They’re all good. Don’t put off a trip because you don’t think you have the perfect motorcycle for a Baja adventure. Baja is the best riding I’ve ever done.

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I’ve done a lot of riding on a lot of different motorcycles in Baja. You can read all about that in Moto Baja!

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BajaBound Insurance Saver Package

This press release from BajaBound came in recently and we want to share it with you:

BIG NEWS! Baja Bound is very excited to announce our new Baja Saver Mexican auto insurance policy! The Baja Saver is a heavily discounted policy for travel in Baja California, Baja California Sur and Sonora that is available for six month or annual coverage. The Baja Saver offers up to a 60% discount compared to full territory Mexican insurance policies! Check out all of the Baja Saver features here:

https://www.bajabound.com/bajasaver.php

Since the essential travel orders are still in place we are rolling this out as a great option for expats and folks commuting across the border for work. We look forward to getting back to everything we love about Baja and hope to see you south of the border soon!

¡Viva Baja!

We always use BajaBound Insurance whenever we visit Mexico, and we’ve found it to be the best.

I’ve spoken with several folks who are in Baja, and although there is an essential travel order in place, it’s not enforced. Folks tell me that they can easily cross the border in both directions. Baja John tells me that life is Baja is much the same as it is here in the US, with folks social distancing, restaurants offering outdoor dining and socially-distanced tables, and people wearing masks. John mentioned that on a couple of recent holidays, there were roadblocks north of San Felipe and Ensenada and if you couldn’t prove Baja residence, you would have to turn around, but the roadblocks were only present during the holidays.

Gresh and I have been talking about venturing into Baja in another two or three months. I am looking forward to it. In the meantime, if you want to vicariously relive a few of our adventures in beautiful Baja, check out our Baja and Epic Rides pages!

You Writing A Book?

Sometimes people ask me about writing a book. It’s easier to get a book published than you might think. Basically, there are three approaches. You can go with a vanity publisher (not a good idea, in my opinion), you can go with one of the big publishing houses (tough to do, and I’ve found this doesn’t work very well for reasons I’ll explain below), or you can self-publish through Amazon.com or any of several other publishing outfits (this it not vanity publishing, and the self-publishing approach offers several advantages).

Vanity Publishing

The idea of a vanity publisher is that you pay a company to publish your book. You have to do all the marketing, and you have to print a minimum number of copies, so this gets expensive fast. I’ve never done this and everything I’ve heard about these outfits is strongly negative. My advice would be to not go this route. Yeah, doing so will allow you to say that you wrote a book and had it published, but that little bit of bragging rights will probably cost you $10,000 and it’s not likely you’ll ever recover it. I’ve never taken this approach, and I’ve heard from others that it doesn’t work out economically for the author. You will have a lot of copies of your book, most likely taking up space in your garage.

A Traditional Publishing House

You can market your concept to a publishing house and have them publish and market it and pay you a royalty on copies sold. This has been the traditional publishing route for more than a couple of centuries in the US. The first several books I wrote went this route.

The traditional publishing route is okay and if you play your cards right (which is to say, you are a skilled negotiator), you can secure a healthy advance against royalties. But it’s an approach with disadvantages that far outweigh the advantages:

- You have to market your book idea to several publishers, hoping that one or more will be interested. Most publishers aren’t going to be interested these days. The big publishing house printed book market is down big time, and it’s likely it will stay that way. When’s the last time you saw a crowd at a bookstore?
- For most of us, the income is meager. You would need a miracle to get a publisher to agree to give you even 10% of the published book price as a royalty.
- You give up rights to your book. If you are not happy with publisher, you’re stuck.
- You will have to market your book because the publishers generally do a poor marketing job (it will be one of many hundreds or thousands of their titles). Nah, wait a second, that’s not accurate. Publishers generally do a terrible job marketing your book. I realized this pretty quickly, and it was really brought home for me when I wrote a book about cost reduction. The CEO of a Fortune 500 aerospace company contacted me and asked about ordering copies for every manager in his organization. I thought I had gone to heaven when I heard that, and I quickly alerted the publisher’s marketing arm. I mean, the sale was already made…all they had to do was take the order. It was a big publisher (Wiley), and you’d think they would have jumped on the opportunity. They did exactly…nothing. Several weeks later the aerospace CEO called me to ask again, and I was horrified and embarassed that no one from Wiley had called to close the deal. They ultimately did, but I had to keep my boot firmly up their butt until the order came through. Bastards.

I’ve written 15 books, and I went the traditional route with established publishing houses on the first 9. I’d never go this way again. My good buddy Simon Gandolfi put it best when I asked him about publishers and, in particular, using an agent to promote your work. “Most publishers are incompetent crooks,” he said, and then he added “and most literary agents are competent crooks.”

Self-Publishing

About 10 years ago I was on a press junket promoting Lake Tahoe as a motorcycle destination (good buddy J Brandon was one of the organizers). I rode up there on my KLR 650 Kawasaki. It was a good time and good riding (the roads in the Sierra Nevadas around Tahoe are some of the best in the world, and I got a couple of magazine stories out of the deal), but the thing that really made the trip worthwhile for me was meeting Carla King (that’s Carla in the photo at the top of this blog). Carla rode a KLR 650, so I knew she was a smart person. I had read Carla King’s book about her Ural ride around America (American Borders), and this was the first time I actually met her.

Our Tahoe group stopped for lunch on one of the organized rides at Walker Burger (it’s on Highway 395), and Carla and I talked shop. I told her the story about Wiley and how terrible their marketing department was, and she told me I was wasting my time if I wasn’t self-publishing.

I never heard of self-publishing until I met Carla, so I took one of her classes and I never looked back. My next seven books I self-published through Amazon using the tools Carla shared with me, and I made more money with them than I have on any of the other books I previously wrote.

Self-publishing has a lot of advantages:

- It doesn’t cost you anything. Your books are only printed when people order them in the quantity they are ordered. You don’t pay anything.
- Within limits, you set the price and the royalty you want on your book.
- You get a substantial discount when you order the books for yourself, or copies of your books if you want to sell them yourself. I don’t too this too often, but if a dealer wants to order copies of, say, 5000 Miles At 8000 RPM, I buy the books, the dealer pays me, and Amazon ships direct to the dealer. I make good money on those books.
- You select the physical size of the book you wish to publish. Amazon has half a dozen or so different sizes (that is to say, the book’s length and width), and they provide Word formats already prepared that you can download in the different book sizes. You add the text and the illustrations. Basically, they give you a free, downloadable Word template, and you just add your work.
- Amazon is hooked up with Kindle (actually, you use a Kindle site for both Amazon and Kindle formats for your book), and you can also easily offer your book in an e-book format. I thought this was kind of silly, until I saw that a good half of my book sales were in the Kindle format.
- Your book is listed on Amazon.com essentially as soon as you upload the manuscript and the book cover. People can then find and order your book on Amazon like any other book.
- The income is way better than going with a big publishing house.
- Your book becomes instantly available essentially all over the world.

Carla offers self-publishing training and has written extensively on the topic (see www.CarlaKing.com and www.selfpubbootcamp.com). I attended one of her seminars several years ago and it was a very worthwhile experience for me. If you have thoughts about writing a book, you might consider doing the same.

Getting to One

Joe Gresh raised an interesting topic with his recent blog on motorcycle quantity. You know, how many motorcycles are too many? That blog got a lot of hits and tons of comments on Facebook. It seems like he struck a nerve.

The most motorcycles I ever owned at one time was five, which pales in comparison to Gresh’s shop full of motos and maybe the collections of a few other people I know. When my collection hit that peak, I had a Triumph Daytona 1200, a Harley Heritage Softail, a Suzuki TL1000S, a Honda CBX, and a KLR 650. That was about 20 years ago. There was no rhyme or reason to my collection and no central theme guiding the contents of my fleet. I just bought what I liked. In those days I had more money than brains, but don’t interpret that to mean I was rich. I just never had a lot of brains. Most folks who know me recognize that pretty quickly.

My Harley Softail in the muddy plains outside Guerrero Negro, Baja California Sur. There’s a kitchen sink in there somewhere.

The Triumph Tiger. Good, but tall and very heavy. It was essentially a sport bike with excess suspension travel and ADV cosmetics.

Me with a buddy currently in the witness protection program, and my Honda CBX. It was a surprisingly competent touring motorcycle.

The Triumph Speed Triple. One of my buddies nicknamed it the Speed Cripple, which became true for me.

Ah, the yellow locomotive. My Triumph Daytona 1200. Delightfully crude and fast. I loved this bike and I rode the 2005 Three Flags Classic on it.

Turning sportbikes into touring machines…my TL1000S somewhere in Baja. This was a seriously fast motorcycle.

I seemed to hover around that number (five, that is) for a while. Other bikes moved in to displace one or more of the above, most notably a Triumph Tiger and then a Triumph Speed Triple. Those were fun, but they’ve gone down the road, too.

One of my favorite former motorcycles for real world adventure riding…the Kawasaki KLR 650 in its natural surroundings (Valle de los Cirios in Baja).

Which one did I enjoy riding most? That’s easy. It was the KLR 650. The KLR 650 was the bike that led me on an arc toward smaller motorcycles, like the CSC RX3 and then a TT250. I was a bit player implementing Steve Seidner’s decision to bring those motorcycles to America. The 250s were a lot of fun. I sold off all the big bikes and only rode 250s for a few years, then I fell in love with the new Royal Enfield 650 Interceptor when it hit the market, and suddenly I was back up to three.

But three, for me, was too many. I haven’t been riding much in the last few years for a lot of reasons. The pandemic put a dent in any big travel plans (YMMV, and that’s okay), and constantly moving the battery tender around and cleaning the TT250’s jets was getting old. I couldn’t move anything in my garage because there was so much stuff crammed in there, and I had to park the TT250 under the rear porch awning. I don’t have a separate workshop area and I don’t pour concrete (I don’t have Mr. Gresh’s talents, but even if I did, it looks like too much work to me), so hanging on to a big motorcycle fleet was not in the cards.

My TT250. I’ve ridden it in Baja, too. It sold the day after I placed an ad for it a couple of weeks ago, and at the asking price. This bike held its value well.

Badmouthing Facebook has become trendy, but I’ll tell you that Facebook Marketplace came to the rescue. I already had a ton of photos of my motorcycles and whipping up ads for the TT250 and the RX3 literally took only seconds. I checked Kelly Blue Book values, picked prices only marginally below what a dealer would charge, and both bikes sold quickly. The TT250 sold the day after I listed it; the RX3 took one additional day.

All the China haterbator keyboard commandos said Chinese bikes had no resale value. Like everything else they posted, they were wrong. The haters said Chinese bikes were unreliable (they were wrong), the haters said you couldn’t get parts for them (they were wrong), the haters said they were built with slave labor (I’ve been in the factories, and they were wrong), and they said they had no resale value (and they were wrong about that, too). My 6-year-old RX3 with 20,000 miles on the clock went for 69% of its original MSRP, and my 5-year-old TT250 with 3,000 miles went for 74% of its original MSRP. That’s pretty good, I think. And both sold right away. Not that I was in a hurry to sell. I probably could have held out for more.

My current sole ride (or is that soul ride?), the Royal Enfield Interceptor 650 on Baja’s Highway 1 south of Ensenada. At this point in my life, one motorcycle is enough. Your mileage may vary.

So I’m down to one motorcycle, and that’s the Enfield. For me, at this point in my life, one motorcycle is the right number (your mileage may vary). I’m on to other “how many” questions now, like how many guns are too many, and how many bicycles are too many. The answer to both of those questions is something south of my current number, but those are topics for future blogs.

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There’s lots of Baja photos in this blog, and for good reason. Baja is one of the best places on the planet for poking around on a motorcyle. Check out our updated Baja page, and pick up your copy of Moto Baja!

The KLR 650 is back!

An new exciting thing is that Kawasaki brought back the KLR 650. A review of the Kawi info makes it look like the big change is fuel injection, along with a few other things (like digital instrumentation, accessory and USB outlets, higher alternator output, optional integrated locking luggage, and optional ABS). Per the Kawasaki announcement:

The all-new KLR®650 dual-sport motorcycle is built to empower your passion to escape and explore. Featuring a 652cc engine, new fuel injection system, all-digital instrumentation, disc brakes, and optional ABS, the KLR650 is ready and eager to make new memories. Dual-sport capability allows the journey to go on- and off-road with all three available models, including two special edition models that are equipped with factory-installed Kawasaki Genuine Accessories. With the KLR650, KLR650 Traveler, and KLR650 Adventure motorcycles, your next great expedition awaits.

This is good; Kawasaki is finally catching up to CSC’s RX3 and RX4 series of adventure motorcycles. Don’t get me wrong; I owned a KLR 650 (first gen) and it was a stellar motorcycle. One of my good buddies is still riding it. They were fabulous motorcycles; I hope the new one is as good. By the way, if you’d like to read our comparison of the KLR 650 to the CSC RX4, you can do so here.

Pricing, per Kawasaki, is $6699 for the base model and $7,999 for the fully-loaded model, with a Kawasaki-listed destination charge of $410. There’s no mention of the setup fee. But they do mention in the small print that the dealer sets the actual destination charge and your price may vary. You think? Mark my words…dealers will throw on a $1500 freight and setup fee on this bike. When you enter the green room, be forewarned: Having worked in the motorcycle industry, I can tell you that actual freight (what the dealer really pays) is well under $400, and setup on a KLR 650 takes under an hour. And as point of reference, when I bought my ’06 KLR 650 new, it was $5200 out the door. Let the good times roll.

Dancing with the Devil

Another blog title dilemma. I went with the one you see above. I almost went with “Quoted by the NY Post.”

This is a blog about a dynamite So Cal loop ride, one that I covered for Motorcycle Classics magazine a couple of years ago and one that was (as the saying goes) critically-acclaimed in the NY Post. No kidding. I’ll get to that in a second or two. First, the ride: It’s circumnavigation of the San Gabriel Mountains, with a stop at the Devil’s Punchbowl State Park. The Punchbowl was burned out during one of the recent California wildfires, but it will be back. Here’s the route:

This ride includes a stretch along the northern side of the San Gabriels, a hop over the San Andreas Fault, Mt. Emma Road to cut around the northwest corner, the magnificent Angeles Crest Highway, and more. I like to start south of the San Gabriels and head up through Cajon Pass on I-15, grab the 138, and then take a quick left on Lone Pine Road. That’s a nice long climb up into the San Gabriels, it’s desolate, and it’s scenic.

I wrote up this ride for Motorcycle Classics, and suprisingly, the NY Post newspaper had nice things to say about it. They prepped an article critiquing other motorcycle mag articles, but they liked my piece. Here’s what they had to say:

Funny how it’s Motorcycle Classics, a magazine focused more on the bike than the ride, that really revved our two-wheeled wanderlust.

Joe Berk takes us on a ride through a passage in California’s San Gabriel Mountains called “The Devil’s Punchbowl.” The piece opens with a picture of a San Andreas Fault sign. Berk only gets one page to draw us in, but he has us ready to put our keys in the ignition.

“The Nirvana-like northern segment through the San Gabriels’ scenic twisties is … where the fun begins,” Berk advises. Later he describes a “ragged and rugged canyon” created by “a misbehaving San Andreas fault.”

Having indulged in the “crisp pine-scented mountain air” and taking in views of the Mojave Desert to his right and the San Gabriel summits to his left, Berk stops to recommend the French toast at the Grizzly Cafe. “You can thank me later,” he writes.

You can read the NY Post article here (you might want to see what they said about a couple of the other moto mags) and the Motorcycle Classics Devil’s Punchbowl story here.

You probably already know this, but both the guys who write the ExNotes blog (yours truly and Joe Gresh) are well published. You can read some of Gresh’s work here, and some of mine here.

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Sam Manicom: Master Story Teller

When I rode to the Overland Expo in Arizona a few years ago with good buddies Duane and Paul on CSC RX3 motorcycles, I met a bunch of interesting people. One man I saw at that event but didn’t meet was Sam Manicom. When this quiet and friendly-looking guy stopped by the CSC booth and left a flyer, I stuck the flyer in my pocket, from there it went into my saddlebag for the freeway blast back to California, and a week or so later I read it.

My first reaction when I read the flyer was that I had missed an opportunity. Had I known who Sam was back then I would not have let him slip by without a conversation. Just a few lines into the flyer I knew I wanted to read his books. I did (I bought and read all of them) and they were great. In fact, I’m wondering now why I didn’t include them in the Five Best Moto Books blog I recently wrote (they were that good). I should have, and I’m making up for that oversight with this blog.

Fast forward a few years, and I was at another adventure touring motorcycle event (the Horizons Unlimited gathering in Mariposa), and Sam was there as a speaker. I wasn’t going to make the same mistake again. I met Sam, we had a great conversation, and I attended his presentation later that evening. The guy is a mesmerizing story teller, and Sue and I enjoyed his travel descriptions. He has a voice and a manner of speaking that made us feel like kids listening to stories around a campfire. The word “hypnotic” comes to mind. Trust me on this, folks: Don’t miss an opportunity to listen to one of Sam’s talks or read his books. The guy is a master.

I wrote about Sam when I was doing the CSC blog, and the thought occurred to me I might post an updated blog here on ExNotes. I wrote to Sam to make sure he was okay with that, and he is. Sam sent materials and links to me for inclusion here on the ExNotes blog, and I’m sharing them with you today.

So who is Sam Manicom? Well, this is a man who went out and did what many have always wanted to do. Chuck it all in and set off on an epic motorcycle adventure.

A senior manager in retail, but wanting to do something completely different, Sam learned to ride a motorcycle and set off to ride the length of Africa on a 1991 BMW R80GS. He’d been riding a bike for just three months the day he arrived at the Sahara. This one-year trip turned into an 8-year, 55-country, 6-continent adventure (Europe, Africa, Asia, the Middle East, Eastern Europe, Africa again, South, Central and North America).

But there’s a twist. Sam now has four books published about the journey, and he never intended to write a thing. The point for him was to hunt out new adventures, but along the way other travellers encouraged him to write magazine articles.

He did this successfully over the latter four years of the ride, but he’s quick to point out, “Writing never took over as being the point of the journey. I was out there to learn, to have fun and to enjoy the freedom travelling by motorcycle was giving me. But sometimes you find yourself in places for longer periods of time. It might be because you are on a visa hunt that takes longer than anticipated, or that you have simply found yourself in a place that you really don’t want to leave in a hurry. I wrote all of my articles in times such as these. The journey is what really matters.”

Sam’s first book, Into Africa, was written as a result of readers’ letters to editors. His other books include Under Asian Skies, Distant Suns, and Tortillas to Totems. He’s been described as being one of the foremost and most readable adventure motorcyclists writing about their adventures on two wheels, and I will tell you that description is accurate.

Why attempt to write the books? As Sam tells it, “I guess it was a new challenge and I’d spent time during the last year or so on the road, wondering what I could do with all that I’d learnt. Not only would trying to write a book be a new adventure for me but I had another thought in mind. In part my books are aimed at those fortunate enough to know that they actually can go out and live the dream, with the hope that they might encourage them to just do it. But also for those who love the sound of travelling but are quite happy with adventure from the pages. I’ve also consciously written them for those who live in circumstances that may never allow them to ride into adventure.”

Sam writes for ADVMoto Magazine, Overland Magazine, Motorcycle Sport and Leisure, Adventure Bike Rider, Motorcycle Monthly and various other motorcycle magazines and newspapers around the world. He is a regular presenter at BMW dealerships, and Horizons Unlimited, Overland Expo, and Adventure Bike Rider Festival events. Sam is also a co-host of the Adventure Rider Radio RAW show.

Sam has a fairly unusual background in that he was born in the Belgian Congo in Central West Africa. His parents worked and lived through the two rebellions that preceded the change of the country’s name to Zaire. They brought the family home to England when he was ten years old. For the first few years at school in the UK he was known as “Jungle Boy.”

Sam’s first solo journey was by bicycle age 16. His next big trip was a backpacking, seat-of-the-pants voyage of discovery across Europe, India and Australia, which often saw him down to his last $10. On arrival in Australia, no one asked him if he had any money and a return ticket. He had neither. What was needed, he earned along the way and this he says was a great learning experience.

Though not looking for a girlfriend, Sam met his partner Birgit Schuenemann in New Zealand during year two of his 8-year motorcycle trip. After riding pillion with him for 3 months through Nepal and India she joined him for the latter four years across Africa and the Americas. She was travelling by bicycle when they met but transferred steeds to ride her own motorcycle, a 1971 BMW R60/5. She started her ride in Africa with just 600 miles experience on a motorcycle. Sam’s BMW R80GS, at the time of writing, has 278,000 miles under its wheels and is still his only means of transport in the UK where he is based. He also owns an F800GS which he keeps in the USA for his regular trips to the States.

For more information about Sam and his books check out www.sam-manicom.com. Sam’s books are available from Amazon and The Book Depository with free delivery. All four of Sam’s books are available as Kindles (and you can find them at the links provided above), and also as as Audiobooks and on iTunes. You can get free audio sample chapters from each of Sam’s books (Into Africa, Under Asian Skies, Distant Suns, and Tortillas to Totems). And if that’s not enough to pique your interest, you should watch Sam’s Adventure Bike TV Under the Visor interview on Youtube, as well as a Youtube conversation between Sam and Ted Simon.

So there you have it: My thoughts on one of the best adventure motorcycle story tellers ever. Take advantage of the links we’ve provided above. You can thank me later.

Favorite Baja Stops: Santa Rosalia’s Hotel Frances

A hidden treasure and one of Mexico’s national historic monuments, you might blow through Santa Rosalia on a trip through Baja and miss the Hotel Frances. That would be a bad thing. A stay in the Frances is one of Baja’s great pleasures, and Santa Rosalia is a fun town to explore.

Santa Rosalia is the first town you ride into after crossing from the Pacific side of Baja to the Sea of Cortez side.

Santa Rosalia is the first town on the Transpeninsular Highway along the Sea of Cortez after you cross the peninsula. The highway drops sharply as you descend Baja’s eastern seaboard through a series of dramatic and delightful twisties. The stretch is called La Cuesta del Infierno, and I could make the case that this road, all by itself, is worth a Baja visit. After that, it’s a short ride along the Sea of Cortez, and then you enter Santa Rosalia. There’s a main street that cuts due west (Alvaro Obregon) into Santa Rosalia, and the Hotel Frances sits high on a mesa to the right as you enter the downtown area.

The central part of Santa Rosalia runs roughly east and west, and the Hotel Frances is on the right as you enter town.

The Hotel Frances is constructed entirely of wood in a colonial style, as is most of Santa Rosalia. It was built in 1886 when the French Boleo company mined copper in this region. I started to say I could write a book about all this, but I guess I already did. Two, in fact. But I’ll give you the commercial at the end of this blog.

The gorgeous Hotel Frances wood lobby. It’s like stepping back a century, but in a good way.

Fabulous balconies run all around the hotel. I like to savor a cup of hot coffee and watch the sun rise from that balcony. In the evening I do the same, but with a Tecate.

An early evening photo. The Frances has a nice pool in the courtyard. After a couple of days riding through Baja (it’s at least a two-day ride from the border), it feels great.

The view from the balcony, watching northern Santa Rosalia wake up. I can smell the coffee just looking at this photo.

Spacious, luxurious, and comfortable describe the Frances’ balconies, as seen in this early morning photo.

I’ve taken more than a few photos in and around the Frances, but as I looked through them to write this blog, I only found one inside any of the hotel rooms. The rooms are wood, too, and they really are unique.

The floors, the walls, the ceiling…everything is wood and it’s more than a century old. It all creaks when you walk.

I shot that photo above as I was packing my Triumph Tiger’s panniers, and I guess I probably should have grabbed a shot with the bed made the night before. But that’s okay. It gives me a reason to return. Not that I need a reason beyond simply wanting to tour Baja again. In my book, that’s reason enough.

You might be wondering about security and safety. You know, if you read the papers, Mexico is a dangerous place. But not these small towns in Baja. One time when I stayed at the Frances, I noticed an older Mexican fellow in the parking lot. He was a security guard, the first I had ever seen in the area.

A well-armed graduate of the Barney Fife School of Hotel and Restaurant Security, and a charismatic Smith and Wesson Model 10.

The security guard didn’t speak English and I don’t speak much Spanish, but we had a nice conversation. Being a gun nut, I asked him about his Smith and Wesson. He took it out of his holster and handed it to me. I was shocked, but I quickly saw that his well worn revolver was unloaded. I asked about that and he smiled a knowing smile. My new friend reached in his shirt pocket, withdrew a single crusty old .38 cartridge, and held it up to show he was strapped and ready for action. What do you know…I was having a conversation with the real deal: Baja’s very own Barney Fife!

The mesa the Frances sits on is an interesting part of town. There’s a mining museum there, an old steam locomotive, and other mining things. Santa Rosalia, you see, used to be a mining town until the copper played out. But then the price of copper went up sharply, and now it’s being mined again.

Santa Rosalia grew up as a company mining town, and Boleo was the French company that owned it.

Tools on display in the Santa Rosalia mining museum. It’s across the street from the Frances.

I’ve always liked Santa Rosalia. There are good restaurants in town, the place has a nice feel to it, and there’s the Iglesia de Santa Bárbara, an old all-metal church unlike any I’ve ever seen in Mexico (or anywhere else, for that matter). I first heard it was designed by Gustav Eiffel (the same guy who designed the Eiffel Tower); more recently, I’ve read that story wasn’t true. Whatever version you subscribe to, it’s a beautiful church that was built in 1897 and it’s right at the bottom of the hill from the Frances.

Santa Rosalia’s Iglesia de Santa Bárbara. This church, all by itself, is another reason for a trip to Santa Rosalia.

Stained glass in the Iglesia de Santa Bárbara.

Ah, the wonders of shooting RAW photos. The camera catches details way beyond what I could see when I grabbed this Iglesia de Santa Bárbara interior shot. You can get photos like this, too, with the entry-level Nikon digital single lens reflex camera.

The El Muelle restaurant is catty-cornered one block away from the church, and the seafood there is excellent (El Muelle means “the dock” in Spanish). There’s an old bakery a block or two west on Alvaro Obregon, the Boleo Panaderia, that offers outstanding pastries. There’s a Chinese restaurant, the Comida China, about a half mile south of town on the Transpeninsular Highway that is surprisingly good. And there are taco stands and other interesting spots throughout Santa Rosalia. At night, Santa Rosalia is a hopping place.

A pleasnt young tortilla lady on Santa Rosalia’s Alvaro Obregon. To me, this photo defines Santa Rosalia’s friendly feel.

After dinner at the El Muelle, it’s a short walk for pastries to the Boleo Panaderia. When I asked if I could take a photo, these ladies laughed and responded with a quick “Si.”

A walk through the downtown area is a rewarding experience. Like I said earlier, all the architecture is wood, as is fitting for an old mining town of French ancestry. It’s just a fun place, and it’s one of my favorites in Baja. Trust me on this: You’ll enjoy a stay in Santa Rosalia.

The phone number for the Frances Hotel is (011-52-115)-2-20-52. Last I checked, there’s no email address. The lack of an email address notwithstanding, the Frances Hotel has great wi fi coverage and I’ve posted more than a few blogs from there during my several visits. I love the place and I think you will, too.

On that book commercial I promised above: I’ve written two books in which Santa Rosalia figures prominently. One is Moto Baja; the other is 5000 Miles at 8000 RPM. You will enjoy both.