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YOU have to inspire yourself first before you inspire others. This is what fuels Nick Sanders, the man, who has taken his mean machines for a spin around the world like no other. Touted as the most experienced solo rider, the “biker boy” has astonishingly circumnavigated the globe seven times. A true adventurer and a gear junkie, Nick is in the driver’s seat wherever he goes. “Thirty-three years on the move. At times, I begin to ask myself ‘what’s there left to do’ or ‘who really cares.’ But when I take the saddle, I realise that it is up to us to create new meanings in life,” says the man who hogged the limelight at the recent Harley Owners Group Rally in Goa, from where the India Bike Week kick-started.
India has figured prominently in Nick’s itinerary. “Each time around, I see so much change. Still some aspects are stuck...like tribal issues and religion. I really wonder how you dally with a billion gods,” he says. “It’s most difficult to travel in Mexico,” he shares. “One of my clients I was riding with was kidnapped. We lost everything. At last, we could get him back alive but he was in a pretty bad shape,” recalls Nick. The easiest one has to be the US, he says. “Roads, navigation aids, motels by the road, all in place.” “They say if one has a family, a mortgage to pay and a car to keep, then travelling around the world is not possible. Well, I have all these, and three children, still I do it. If I can, so can you,” he vrooms off. Nick Sanders’ books and films earn him the money to carry on his passion for travelling. There are people who pay him to ride with him. Riding write: Simon Curiosity killed the cat. But in the case of Ted Simon, it made him go miles. A late bloomer, Simon took to riding at the age of 42. But soon this journo-turned-biker caught up with his passion fast.
The need for speed is visibly alive in the man who is well into his seventies. He took a road trip from Mumbai to reach Goa. His last long trip was from Germany to Greece. “I thought it to be an easy ride as I had done it twice earlier. But then the life’s journeys have the ability to trip you anytime. I forgot all my documents at a place and made a real fool of myself more than once,” he shares. “You can practically cruise through Argentina, Chile, and South Africa. But Ethiopia is the hardest to cover,” says Simon. Like Nick, Simon is in love with India too, and has stayed here for close to nine months at a stretch. Ted Simon was sponsored by The Sunday Times for his first journey. Been to India a few times, Simon knows the country as on one of his trips he stayed here close to nine months. Well, this also is the country that gave him food trouble. “By no way that’s a reflection on the country. It was I who decided to treat myself by choosing to go to this expensive restaurant.” Here’s his limerick he wrote while travelling in India, “The food in Bihar is really bizarre/ One should not strive after lunch in Bihar/ Not even as far as the nearest bazaar/ For none cannot outrun the food in Bihar.” Biker’s special * Do it, don’t bother if you don’t have the latest machine * Get started, on road you will find way * Dangers are nowhere as imposing as they look * Go slowly, get involved, everyone will help you! Trip tips * Don’t come with excess baggage * Go first to a place you feel comfortable in * Eat hot street food. It’s delicious and germs are killed *
Be good to all, you are the lucky one who travels
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An avid traveller and a real globe-trotter, Nicks has documented his adventures in the form of books and DVDs, including The great bike ride: Around the World in 80 days, Fastest Man Around the World, Loneliness of the Long Distance Biker and, most recently, The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man, his autobiography. “While many travel, my USP is that I make money out of it,” he chuckles. 
His first trip in 1973 made him traverse 45 countries and his four-year labour resulted in the birth of Jupiter’s Travels a book that beckoned many a traveller on their dream journey. A few years later, Simon hopped on to on a modified BMW R80GS and rode through 47 countries, registering a whopping 95,000 km on his trip-metre. This time Dreaming of Jupiter was born. “A writer or a rider,” we ask. “A writer, always. In fact, I never learnt to ride a bike properly,” he laughs, sitting comfortably with Harley riders at the Goa rally. 