8/12/00, Verdun, France — I have now cycled across southern Belgium and am in Verdun, France. Imagine that! I have crossed two European countries without a single speeding ticket. This is because the police over here ride BMW K 75′s and are no match for a BMW P2 A/M.

I’m taking a lot of pictures over here, but it’s not possible to really capture the beautiful scenery on film. It’s just something you have to see for yourself: old medieval villages and castles, and I keep expecting to meet Don Quixote over the next hill.

Camping in Belgium was a little nicer than Holland; at least the cows didn’t try to get into the tent with me.

Most of the time I have spent in France prior to this trip has been in Paris, where the people are rude and crude even by my somewhat vulgar standards. Here, the people are quite friendly. They are probably calling me a bourgeois capitalist, but at least they smile when they say it.

Verdun is the first big city I’ve seen in awhile, population about 20,000, so I have a hotel room with a hot shower and am going to rest for two days before heading south again.

Talk to ya later,

Bill

8/8/00, Maastricht, Holland­—Well, I’ve always wanted to really see Europe, and for the next few months that’s just what I intend to do. I’ve always come over here on business before, and had unreasonable and overbearing bosses who insisted that I spend at least some of my time working.

This trip I am taking a low speed tour from Amsterdam to Morocco on a Beemer that has been specially modified for European driving. The modification consists of starting with an official BMW logo and attaching  a bicycle to it. This allows me to avoid the high cost of petrol here on the continent. I can now get 90 km per liter of espresso, this drops to 50 km with regular coffee and I develop a terrible ping with decaf.

The proper nomenclature for my custom driving machine is the BMW P2 A/M: this stands for BMW 2 pedal Amsterdam/Morocco.

So far my trip has gotten off to a slow start. I cycled for 20 km in Amsterdam following the signs to leave town, and ended up one block from where I started. I decided to have breakfast again and got off to a fresh start. Holland has excellent bicycle trails with excellent road signs written in perfect Dutch, but I still kept getting lost even though 99% of the Dutch people speak good English. The 1% that don’t speak English spend all of their time on benches by the side of the bicycle trails.

My first experience camping out and getting back to nature was probably about as comfortable as that of the GIs just after D-Day. Nobody warned me that the Dutch mosquitos are almost the size of Messerschmidts and as bloodthirsty as Count Dracula. I quickly got inside my tent and spent a somewhat comfortable night until the cows arrived. I think they came into the woods to escape the mosquitos, who were using their pasture for a runway.

On Friday evening I arrived, tired and saddle sore, in Maastricht, which is the prettiest European city I’ve seen so far. The city was founded in 50 B.C., and the waitress in the inn down the street was here to greet the first Roman legionnaires when they arrived to put up the city walls. I’ve also found one of the neatest hotels I’ve ever seen in my travels. The Hotelboot was an old river boat that is now moored at the edge of town and rents cabins.

Talk to ya later,

Bill

3/28/00 — I’m going to start backtracking back north in a few days. I want to see some more of Nicaragua and Guatemala before I come back, and besides I can get a better deal on the airplane ticket.

I’ve talked to some of the people in the various motorcycle clubs down here, and although riding here won’t be the same as riding in India, it still looks like fun. Besides, I’m not sure I really want to experience riding in India again.

I might also stop in El Salvador for some custom motorcycle boots. There are some really good buys on some items there because of their economically progressive child labor laws, and the trickle down economists pass some of their savings on to the consumer. U.S. business could learn a few things from these people. We haven’t had such a progressive business climate since before the Lincoln administration. I think I’ll write an article for Forbes magazine when I get back.

Talk to ya later,

Bill

3/20/00 — I’m still here in Costa Rica, and the place is as nice as the travel literature describes it, although a little more expensive. As you can see, so far I haven’t been having much luck in getting kidnapped by a tribe of beautiful Amazons, but I’ll keep trying.

While I’m down here I think I’ll see some more of Nicaragua and Guatemala and then fly back from either Guatemala or Mexico City. Right now I’m in Heredia, and will probably head for Arenal in a day or two.

See you in a couple of weeks,

Bill

3/6/00 — It took me a little longer than I expected, but I’ve finally arrived here in Antigua, Guatemala. This is an interesting little colonial town, the sort of place where you would expect to see witches being burnt at the stake by Spanish Inquisitors. I’ll try to round up a few Protestants and have some interesting photos when I come back.

Needless to say, buses down here are somewhat slower than airplanes, but you do get to travel with a better class of people. I’ll spend a few days here and then move on to El Salvador.

Talk to ya later,

Bill

10/2/99 — I am due to turn in the bike soon, and after these roads and traffic it will be nice to take buses and trains for a change. I’m hoping that within a month or so my adrenalin level will be down to that of a kamikaze pilot.

Only a few more major stops in India, then back to Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore. I should be back in five or six weeks. After resting up for a month or so I still want to point my handlebars south for a nice, leisurely, safe ride to Costa Rica, to rest up and read all I can find about the stock and mutual fund markets. I have a few hobbies I want to get into, and I need to plan my next great adventure.

I still have a love-hate relationship with India. Next time I come back I won’t just rent a bike and go in almost any direction; I’ll research a few places that I think I might like and go by train or bus.

See you in a month or two.

Love,

Bill

9/22/99 — I was beginning to think of myself as India’s Easy Rider. After this far I’m too saddle sore to think of this ride as easy.

Road conditions could easily be described as somewhat primitive. Also, gas stations and most restaurants don’t have bathrooms, so it is not uncommon to see Indians relieving themselves, rather immodestly, by the roadside.

Being more of Western culture, I was at least discreet enough to go into the bushes, that is until I encountered my first cobra in the wild. I didn’t get all that close to it, but the flat head was unmistakeable. From now on I prefer to think of myself as Easy Flasher.

By the way, I had gone at least 50 km before I remembered why I had wanted to stop.

N.B. Bill’s first official Rogue Vagabond adventure, in the summer of 1999, was largely taken up with a motorcycle trip through India.

9/8/99 — “…I’d thought I had seen it all by now, but the other day I stopped for gas and walked down the road to the bus stop for a cold soda. When I got there, there was a hit-and-run victim in very bad shape. About 50 people were waiting for the bus and all seemed to be ignoring him.

“I tried to be of some help. He was in shock, and I almost got into a fight getting some gas cans to keep his feet up. I was at least able to slow the bleeding in his arm most of the way, but had to buy ice and dirty rags from the Coke vendor to put a cold compress on a very serious head wound. During this time two traffic police and three police patrolmen arrived. They acted like they were doing me a favor by radioing for an ambulance. I’m sure all the cops had much more first aid knowledge than I, but they just stood by. I couldn’t understand what they were talking about, but it sounded like it was probably last night’s cricket game or something of equal importance. Meanwhile, the crowd at the bus stop was getting more and more pissed off about the late arrival of the bus. Read more…

8/11/99 — “On the flight from Osaka I met a very interesting mushroom-munching Arab gentleman who, even though I am a heathen and an infidel, was kind enough to show me a part of Bangkok that I had not seen on previous trips. Bangkok actually has an equivalent to Telegraph Ave., although it is not nearly as influenced by the Christian right wing conservatives.

“I am going to spend a couple of days here absorbing the local culture before I move on to Calcutta to skinny dip in the Ganges and hopefully get a motorcycle. I think I have a scheme where I can get a bike there for very little cost, and dirt bike climbing Mt. Everest will be the ride of a lifetime, if I can pull it off.

“…don’t worry, I brought my lucky rabbit’s foot and a four leaf clover, and just to be safe have bought a charm blessed by Lord Bushnahara.

“I’ll write again soon.”

Bill

King of the Jungle

My late brother Bill was a born storyteller with a flair for the exotic. Filled with restless energy, he was instrumental in shaping my earliest impressions of magic and darkness. Throughout childhood, he chafed at the confines of small-town suburbia, and at sixteen he ran away from home to join the Army. He volunteered to become a paratrooper and go to Vietnam, and he spent two years there in the late ‘60s.

Maybe he was searching for adventure and excitement—I don’t know, I never asked. Right out of the starting gate into adult life, we ran in different directions—me to the left and him to the right. It wasn’t until mid-life that we struck up a friendship and found out how similar our world views were. But I think it’s safe to say he got more than he bargained for at the tender age of nineteen.

In 1999, after thirty years of struggling to lead a conventional life down in the LA urban jungle, he decided to cut the shackles binding him to civilized society and set out in search of adventure.

For a few years, he had a wild and exuberant time. Read more…