Sirpa & Paolo's Motorbike Travels Around the World
We are a Finnish-Italian couple writing about our life on the road since 1 August 2023. Follow us on our megalomaniac journey through the world on a motorcycle. Immerse in the romance of vagabond life through candid accounts of life from the road as we visit the off-the-beaten-path destinations.
We'll pass epic mountain ranges and deep forests to the sizzling metropolitan cities and palm-fringed beaches. While it's not our first long
trip, this is the one that takes us away from the daily lifestyle with the comforts of a home, Nine-to-Five routines, to an adventure on the road.
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Departing for the Road: 1 August 2023
HOW NOT TO START YOUR ROUND-THE-WORLD MOTORCYCLE TOUR
The D-day should have been a celebration, a smooth day of rolling onto the tarmac, without mishaps and plunders. Our start was not like that. We had been waiting to get on the road, free of obligations, ready for everything, to explore the world for the good and the bad, for more than 20 years. We had planned it each Sunday and were growing more and more frustrated with the long wait. Patience was running out. But now, parting ways with our normal reality proved uneasy, muddled, and emotional. More than anything, it was real.
Sitting on the bare bedroom floor of my Bangkok apartment, I watched the last piece of furniture disappear through the door. The floor gleamed in the sun that filled the room. In just a few hours, my entire life had been reduced to what fit inside a backpack next to me. Outside, blue-winged sparrows still darted through the Langsuan gardens, indifferent to me and my sad goodbyes. Every day in paradise, we had longed for the road. Today was finally that day. Like a butterfly, I had changed my corporate identity to one of a vagabondo by squeezing into my riding jeans. I was leaving all of this — deliberately leaving my pretty little life in paradise, to catch up with our 20-year-old dream, now coming true.
Twelve hours later, I was sprinting through Doha's airport in heavy riding boots, chasing a flight I was about to miss. The loudspeaker had slowly made it into my dozing consciousness, screaming my name mangled in some strange sort of pronunciation. The airport staff rooted me on: "Run, Lady, Run!" Resolute, I kept running and made it, puffing and panting. I squeezed onto the bus as the last passenger, dropped into its plastic seat, and retied my ponytail - I am in shock, went through my mind. Am I really doing this?
One Day Before D-Day — Lost Key to the Ride
Paolo had flown to Piacenza in Northern Italy a few days before me and collected our brand-new BMW R1250GS Adventure Trophy from a dealership. It was a beauty. With an extended tank, raised saddle for his long-distance comfort, and extra lights for any possible night driving, which he hoped to avoid. Then, he had taken the maiden ride South through to Tuscany to his hometown, with a smile on his face, he rode the new bike up to the hilltop village of Tirli to make arrangements for a big farewell dinner. Strangely, he had found the restaurant chained shut. He was going to find another option.
In the morning, a pinch in his gut had him swiftly back on his feet. Two days and we'd be throttling off. He sang an old tune to himself as he ran down the stairs two steps at a time. At the bike downstairs, the dashboard on the new BM flashed, asking for the key. Stunned, Paolo climbed back to his mother's apartment to check the breakfast table for the key. He went through his pockets. Twice, and ran back to the bike. He searched the bike and his pockets again— a key was nowhere to be found. "Ma che?" he muttered, confused, trying to trace his steps in his mind to figure out what might have happened.
Back at the restaurant up in the mountains, he remembered having opened the pannier to put his gloves in before getting to the gate of the restaurant. He had obviously used the key in a pannier lock. He must have forgotten it there, and somewhere, down a hillside, it would have dropped off its miserable ride and rolled somewhere in the Tuscan thick Macchia-forest.
While still airborne, Paolo cruised toward Fiumicino airport, his thoughts troubled: How could I have been so … what's the word, oblivious? How can we now get started? He worked on his story about how he lost the key the day before our D-day for the round-the-world tour. "Imagine," he muttered, "you buy a thirty-thousand-euro bike, and they give you just one key." When we hugged at the airport, his huffing dwarfed my story of almost missing the flight. There was a spare in a small pouch — it had the sensor that the dashboard sought to start the bike, and it would even open the panniers, but it was not a long-term solution. And it was the only spare.
The BMW dealer in town ordered a replacement for €250. But it would arrive in a couple of weeks. Until then, we would start the bike with the tiny plastic spare that meant squatting under the chassis, holding the reserve key against a sensor under the seat, and pressing the ignition at the same time. Not very elegant, but it worked. For now.
DAY Zero — The Heart Break Hotel Send-Off
Angelica, our daughter, had flown in from Paris to see us off. Composed, stylish, and accompanied by her French boyfriend, who seemed to wonder what was going on in this family, where the parents take off to the world on a motorbike. She found us in a hotel car park in 42-degree heat, drenched in sweat, engaged in what can only be described as combat with our panniers. The panniers had concluded that we had overpacked. The sun scorched as our frustrations peaked each time we locked the bike, even for a little coffee stop. We began to select the unnecessary items. Angelica watched this with a sour expression and marched back into the air-conditioning with her companion, satisfied that she could not help the situation.
Our packing was simple: two computers (non-negotiable), high heels (negotiable, it turned out), cocktail dresses (also negotiable, regretfully), a second pair of jeans (gone), enough cables to rewire a small building (stayed, somehow), and a soft toy named Nalle who made the entire journey without complaint and remains the most well-adjusted member of the expedition.
Our favourite restaurant closed, and the key saga having taken some of our precious time, we decided to stick to the departure day and do without the farewell dinner and get going. At the Florence airport, the keys of Angelica's rental were returned to the yellow-vested African, and shortly after that, the boyfriend disappeared through the sliding doors to get back to Paris for work. Angelica would follow us to Florence, where we would spend our last evening together before the actual take off. The mood was gloomy. In the Florence evening, where history breathes upon you, Arno flows slowly under the aura of Ponte Vecchio in a golden moonlight, and the fragrance of Franciacorta enhances events to perfection, we, in turn, were enveloped in irritation and tension and were collectively miserable. What was wrong? She said that she was scared for us, that she just wanted to go back home and to her life. This all seemed wrong? Our dream.
So our daughter took off early. No beautiful goodbyes, no last-minute hugs and kisses and talks. I was left crying - an adult woman, about to explore the world, on the balcony of our B&B. Paolo tried something diplomatic, but that helped no one. Having read those great farewells for the departures of others, was this how it was supposed to be?
DAY 1 — Venice · 350 km Things Are Getting Better - Lighter
We loaded the bike, and for the second time shed weight from the panniers by posting extras back to Paolo's mother. The high heels were gone now. We did one more trip to the post office in Venice, next to the motorbike parking at Piazzale di Roma, before catching a Vaporetto to Giudecca to settle for the night. The city is sinking and not just under the weight of the ancient structures that bathe in the canals, but also the crowds of tourists. Thankfully, they had not discovered the old Jewish quarter, where you can still immerse yourself in the ambience of the Venetian explorer spirit. Still, before hitting the sack, we needed to visit our touchstone before taking off to the East, to the Silk Road: Marco Polo's home. Marco had hidden in an empty barrel when his father and uncle had started off to China, and by doing that, he had helped brand this magical trading route for the centuries to come, and now for us, and hundreds of other motorcyclists to conquer the world on their own.
Through the small alleyways, we quickly got lost in their labyrinth and walked and walked, until the sky cracked open. Running in a full Venetian downpour, we made it back to Giudecca, where the infamous Acqua Alta pushed the water over the canal walls onto the pavement. There, a waiter, who collected the chairs from the Pizzeria's terrace, gave us a footballer's nod toward a red door. Inside, the Signora pointed us to the dining room, never lifting her gaze from her cash counting. A carafe of red wine appeared on the table within seconds, as outside, the storm hammered the lagoon. Inside, it was going to be a good night. This was real. A true send off. Rain had brought us luck, ran through my mind.
DAY 2 — Zagreb · 374 km - and the Hunt for Cash
Past Trieste, the road rolled through to Slovenia across deep green meadows so manicured they looked Swiss. Red geraniums nodding from the roadside, a welcoming us to the terrace of a lunch restaurant in the curb. We stopped for a Ljubljana Wienerschnitzel, one of a kind, smothered in cheese. In the afternoon, we crossed into Croatia without even noticing the border. No passport check. No formality.
Zagreb in August closes its bars early and opens its streets to dogs, children, and tall cold beers. On Tkalčićeva — declared the best street in all Croatia by our waiter with complete authority — we ordered Crna Kraljica, a dark, sweet Black Queen beer from the Medvedgrad brewery. One small crisis brewed for us: our ATM cards were not giving us enough Euros. We need a lot of cash for Iran, as credit cards were going to be notoriously useless, and the US dollars were unwelcome. A growing anxiety until, back at the hotel, I realised I hadn't activated my new ATM card. I punched in the numbers into the computer to accomplish the activation, ran across the road to the machine, and returned with a fistful of euros. When I got back, I found Paolo staring at the back tyre that was slowly going flat.
DAY 3 — Ilok · 338 km Sasha And The Five-Centimetre Screw
By the morning, the back tyre was completely flat. A Facebook search directed us to Sasha's workshop — a garage boasting six BMWs, a row of KTMs and shelves loaded floor-to-ceiling with bike parts. Sasha, in his Valentino Rossi No. 46 shirt, rose to his two-metre height and radiated enthusiasm as he introduced us to a five-centimetre screw like a jeweller presenting a diamond. Then, he got to work. The fix — a rubber plug pushed through to the inside, glued, sealed — took exactly fifteen minutes, as he had promised. The kind of repair you read about in other people's adventure blogs. Watching it done in person, on your own tyre, on day three of your round-the-world trip, the repair was a fairy tale happening in front of your very own eyes. That plug held until Malaysia, where we finally swapped to knobby tyres.
We made it to Principovac that evening — a vineyard estate on the Croatian wine road, with a glorious restaurant overlooking vine plantations. Principovac offered modern suites and even a game of tennis in the morning. Getting started with a game behind you felt good, another turnaround on our miserable farewell.
DAY 4 — Sofia · 510 km Forty Degrees And Fire On The Road
We pushed East for five hundred kilometres. The Mercury had reached 40°C by midday. The road flattened into a long, burning corridor across empty fields, with petrol stations for fuel and water stops. On the opposite side, a car burned in flames — the driver throwing bucket after bucket of ditch water against it, while the fire brigade arrived to foam his poor little carcase of a car.
By dusk, the Vitosha mountain rose dark green above the plains. We climbed onto the hilltop town above Sofia, parked outside a sleek hotel, showered in real luxury, and walked down the hill to find dinner. At the restaurant, we found Elena and Stefan — a Bulgarian couple, raised in Sofia in the sixties, now thirty-eight years into an American life in Virginia. They had ordinary jobs, ordinary problems, ordinary grown-up children and grandchildren. Back in Sofia for a few weeks, to load up on missed spices to take back to the States. We talked through plates of kebabs, meatballs, and Guvech stew, with carafes of Villa Melnik red. Elena and Stefan had a full life, the whole family on the same continent, I noticed. A slight glint of regret and jealousy got us to revisit the unceremonious departure party back in Florence and our daughter's disapproval of the entire endeavour to round out the world on a motorbike at an advanced age. We set up a plan to do it all again and better.
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Looking Back on What The First Week Taught Us
Now, with 50,000 kilometres later, and a half the world under the wheel, our first steps leave us laughing - truly: how not to start your round the world. Sharing our journey with you is and will be our great pleasure, giving meaning to our trip. Join us as we explore the world more.
On the lessons, first and foremost, messages from our first week included these. More came up later, keeping your eye on the key to your transport seemed to be the first message we contemplated. It has been weeks now that we have been kneeling below the chassis and starting the bike with the emergency key. Pack lighter than you think possible; then remove some more of your packing was another obvious message. I was back to the usual problem of nothing to wear. Thirdly, don't imagine that everyone in your family feels the excitement of your round-the-world odyssey. Others may feel left behind, or even embarrassed about such an old folly idea to dirty and desiccate yourself on remote roads somewhere in the world. Pack lightly, but do pack a tyre plug kit, which would be another lifeline. For independent motorbikers, Iran is still a challenge. Most adventure travellers hire tour companies, but even then, most don't make it. Everyone knows that you must bring lots of cash, specifically Euros, to Iran. The credit cards wouldn't work. Iran had, over the past decades, become an isolated and hopeless country, and separated from the global financial system. Carrying a lot of Euros across Europe might be a risk, but a necessary to consider early in the piece. Making a difference in these items seemed to make the difference between a tourist and a traveller.
The hardest part of the first week wasn't the mechanics. It was saying goodbye to someone you love, and carrying that longing through Tuscany, the Balkans and the world. Until we received the call. It was her. She apologised, we apologised, and she told us how she wished us well and missed us. Finally, our hearts were lifted, and the road absorbed us in its calling again.
We had been sent off.
China from the Saddle: Silk Road Adventures
The eleven of us from all corners of the world, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, New Zealand, Switzerland, and the UK, met on 11 September at Kyrgyzstan's Eastern village of Sary-Tash. As the sky grew orange over the snow-capped Pamir mountains, the Sary-Soul Extreme Homestay filled with excitement. One by one, the riders appeared at the door until the last roadster swayed in from the cold. Meeting for the first time before a 29-day crossing of the Chinese Silk Road, from Xinjiang to Yunnan, wanderlust bonded us. We shared an ambition to see China from the ground up, on two wheels, and to return rich with stories and encounters with our new Chinese friends.
The Kunming Scenic International Tour Company had led Ride China Motorcycle Tours across the Middle Kingdom for decades, as China still did not permit motorcycle travel. Men and women of all ages joined with their bikes. All riders had made it to Sary-Tash independently and at their own pace. The lineup at Sari-Tash Homestay boasted nine bikes, including the romantic Indian Royal Enfield to the mean machines of Bavaria. The group of like-minded travelers and motorcycle enthusiasts shared the costs of the guide, making the trip affordable, possible, and very unique.
"Welcome, Welcome! Jia, the 2023 Ride China guide, and his buddy, Tang, the support vehicle driver, greeted the Riders at immigration under a giant red star. "All the bikes will be inspected for safety. And then we will ride together to Kashgar, to the ancient listening post of the explorers in the day," Jia guided the excited group in fluent English.
A rising expectation to see the other side stirred the pilots. "Don't worry, everyone will get through, everything has been arranged, and no rider will be left behind," Jah assured. And we all did. The formalities to enter China took two days. All riders received their Chinese driver's licenses, registrations, SIM cards, and exhaustive travel advice. After the long ride to the Chinese border, some bikes needed check-ups. Jah arranged all these.
We were about to travel through China on two wheels, a total distance of 8,000 kilometers on the Chinese highways and national roads, paved and unpaved. We would reach heights of 4,000+ meter altitudes, ride through the rain and shine, the heat of 40 degrees Celcius, and rise into below-zero temperatures in the Tibetan highland plateau. Every evening, we would snug in at comfortable hotels, all for a total fee of <$4,000.
The 2023 Ride China route offered unforgettable experiences. Throttling off from the remote Xinjiang province, the Western oasis of the early adventurers more than 2000 years ago, the riders explored the hustle of the streets of Old Kashgar. We visited Guli's (the Pretty Girl's) House and joined a Turkoman dance. We crossed the inhospitable Taklamakan desert to the flaming Huoyan foothills of Tian Shan and cut through the Gobi desert, where two centuries ago caravans had got lost never to be found again.
Like Marco Polo, we browsed the ancient markets in Khotan and explored 10th-century grottos and Buddhas in the Magao Caves. There was something for everyone. At the edge of the Gobi, the Riders climbed up to the Qin Dynasty's suspended western end of the Great Wall of China, which triggered the historical unification of China. We witnessed a medieval stone-faced change of guard at the Jiayuguan Pass.
In Hami in Gansu Province, some switched to the camelback to experience a real caravan ride across the shifting sands at sunset. Some found their inner child and slid down the dunes on slick bamboo slides. At the end of the day, everyone gathered around local hot pots, kebabs, and Chinese delicacies. We devoured Hami's famous sweet melons for dessert. From Xi'an, the Eastern hub of the Silk Road to the subtropical Yunnan, the route offered a crescendo of culture, Tian Shui, Shangri-La, Weishan, Cali, and Lijiang.
The group delved into galleries of wonder: the stunning Terracotta Army, the fantastic art of Face Changing Opera, the somersaulting Pandas of Chengdu, and Po'er tea tasting at Jonghong's China Tea Company under the shade of 1,000-year-old tea trees. Days were spent riding the wow-class scenery at the Yangzu River valley. Evenings promised delightful meals, peppered with unique encounters with the local people, who cheered the Westerners with selfie sessions.
Roaring up the Alps of the G318, the Bikers climbed the Kham Region to greet the Tibetans in the yak-grazed high plateaus. They curled around the jaw-dropping gorges to the powerful falls of Tiger Leaping Gorge. Everyone spun the prayer wheels in the Tibetan village up on the Inner Tibetan plateau to wish for more China rides.
Jia took care of everything and everyone's needs with patience and diligence. He and Tang made sure that everyone's bikes ran smoothly, and if they did not, they rapidly found mechanics and the spares. Jia made sure that everyone was comfortable and had everything they needed, from altitude medications to extra charging cables. Jia and Tang were always ready to help, always a step ahead of what the riders might want, even a local beer after long rides.
The group came together easily. Conversations swirled around the day's adventures, and lifelong friendships emerged from riders' camaraderie, even among the newbies and the most experienced.
On the 29th day, the group steered South to Laos. Farewelled by a rich Yunnan dinner, the riders crossed over to the Land of Million Elephants, with their hearts packed with stories of wonder from China. "China grew on me. I am seeing something new," said Alison to me as we swore to always stay in touch, wherever we'd find ourselves. I saw her sign up for the next ride to explore more of China."
Under a spell, the riders keep finding one another to share meals and stories from their rides and plans for more motorbike travel in the world.
Crossing Nullarbor on a Motorcycle, golfing all the way…
Friendly Steve slid our Nullarbor Links scorecards across the counter at the Visitor Center in Ceduna, South Australia, like a treasure map–for AUD78 each. Each hole on the World's Longest Golf Course was marked by the shape of the fairways, pars, and distances. For five bucks each, he also equipped us with three used clubs: a putter, a five-iron for the long game, and an eight-iron, which we fitted under the biking jackets on the top pannier at the back of our motorbike. The grand golfing adventure would get kicked off at the 1st and 18th holes of Ceduna's home course, but the other 16 holes would be scattered across the sunbaked nothingness of Nullarbor Plain, stretching 1,365 km to Kalgoorlie.
Nullarbor Links had been a brainchild of Alf Caputo and Bob Bongiorno over a bottle of wine - a merger of a golf enthusiast and the current manager of the course, and the owner of the Belladonia Roadhouse. They had stitched the 72-par, 18-hole, World's Longest Golf Course with a goal in mind: to slow the mad rush down the dead-straight Eyre Highway, to reduce lethal accidents, and draw tourist attention to the region. The accident rates had plummeted dramatically as drivers stomped onto the fairways to perfect their game.
Thanking Steve, we shoved a few used balls and tees into our riding pants and stepped into the sizzling Ceduna afternoon. To beat the heat, we returned to the golf course in the morning and teed off at the Oyster Bay Hole at 7 am. This was going to be a game of a lifetime.
How did we get to play this unique challenge? Our Round-The-World (RTW) trip started two years ago on a BMW Adventure Trophy. We had roared from Castiligione della Pescaia in Italy through the Balkans, Turkey, Georgia, the Stans, China, and Southeast Asia, and had finally shipped our bike to Brisbane from Bali. Now, after 36,000 kilometers, the time had come for us to round out the Australian outback.
Riding Australia from Brisbane to Victoria, threading the Great Alpine and Ocean Drives, and ferrying to Tassie, we had been privy to many amazing adventures and had met lovely locals everywhere we went. So far, we have found the Land Down Under irresistibly hospitable, fun, and easy. Then came Nullabor, the famously long, flat, and monotonous stretch to Perth and now, a golfer's paradise. Nullabor Links had turned Nullarbor into a golfer's Disneyland, connecting roadhouses into an orienteering golf quest. We met no other players on those fairways but were told that some 200 have played each month since 2009, when the course was constructed, and that we were the first to attempt it on a motorcycle.
But it was no Glen Eagle. It was wild, desert-bush, with ball-snatching ravens, fairways through airstrips, snakes, bushfires, and winds that demanded to murder your ball to gain any distance. A game full of adrenaline. Each hole was a postcard from isolation: open horizons, wide blue sky, and prairie winds that make you push hard on your drives.
Memorable holes? Plenty: The Wombat Hole, a 520-meter tribute to the wildlife that we only saw as roadkill. The Dingo Den hole of 538 meters crossed an active airstrip. We collected more balls in the scrub than we lost, which felt like a sort of win. The Nullarbor Plain is an endless horizon that shimmers in the heat. But suddenly, with the bushfires blazing on the horizon, the sky opened, and we played in our rain gear. At the Kangaroo Hole at the Border Village, I lost my phone as I struggled in the rain with my hood, but miraculously found it caked in mud. We had to circle back to the Western Australian border twice to look for it, and we got searched for vegetables both times at the border control. The Nullabor Nymph Hole–a legend of a wild blond running with kangaroos, the ball fell deep into the mud, never to be found, and at the Watering Hole in Mundravilla, it theatrically splashed into the hole.
The weather here has an attitude, one minute chilly teens, the next baking 40s, the rain and wind drenching and tugging. At times, the ground was hard to bore the tees in. Steve's advice? Improvise a tee from a cut water bottle. We snapped many tees as we muscled drives over the red gum trees.
Crossing this massive span of Australia meant booking accommodations in advance to secure a good night's rest. This marathon is broken up by rest stops and roadhouses every hundred kilometers or so. Many of the roadhouses offered cozy, ensuite rooms, while others were more spartan, but all had fun bars with pool tables, friendly road-train drivers, backpackers, and overlanders, and their restaurants served hefty meals. One electrician on the road muttered that no one would want to work here, save the 20-something Euros who had obtained work visas from Roadhouse sponsors. Each hole validated our scores on our treasure maps with a colorful stamp.
Before taking a turn South to Margaret River for our next adventure on the Round-The-World tour, we tallied up the scores at the historic Kalgoorlie and proudly received our certificates for finishing the World's Longest Golf Course - the Nullarbor Links. Our battered clubs crossed the counter again to wait for the next players. The balls came home with us as souvenirs.
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