Shipping your motorcycle to the UK and Europe by sea or air.

In this episode, we discuss how to ship your motorcycle to the UK and Europe (EU) by air and by sea, as well as Green Card Insurance. We also talk about the ADV Cannonball Rally and many other adventure motorcycle topics.

We offer private motorcycle tours all over the world. Just send us an email with your dream trip details. RM@ADVCannonball.com

“Two Wheels, Three Sheets” disaster with DHL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jctbff16y7g 

Contact Kathy at MotoFreight at www.motofreight.com

Transcript

Welcome to the ADV Cannonball podcast, where we discuss all things on 2 wheels, the adventure bike cannonball, and other motorcycle related nonsense. Alright. And welcome to this episode of ADV Cannonball podcast. Thank you very much for joining us. My name is Taylor Lawson, and I'm your host.

And today, I am joined by Aaron Goff. Hey, Taylor. Aaron. What's happening? Man, I'm just sitting here trying to, I guess, well, you know, we had a bit of snow last night here in Stockholm and, but it's above freezing.

So it's pretty much just gonna turn to slush now. But still, I have to say it's not the most ideal riding weather. No. As a matter of fact, I think, here, I'm in Port Angeles, Washington at the worldwide headquarters of ADV Cannonball, also known as the barn, also known as the band cave. And, it's the first day of winter, so they say.

And, we are on the upswing. We're gonna start gaining some, some daylight, which will be, which will be helpful, and that's for sure. Oh, it is the 21st. That's right. 3 and a half minutes a day.

So let me ask you. What are you drinking? Okay. I'm drinking, very boujee, leftover, champagne with, Aperol and ice. You can't, you know, I can't beat that, but I can say that I'm drinking a, a Danish Deepa, double I p a.

Oh, nice. Yeah. Go big or go home. That's what they say. Right?

Go bigger. That's what that's what they say in Texas anyway. Shout out to our good friend, Steve Doble. That's right. And now go big or go home.

And everyone at the, tour of Texas, we, we attended that, for the cannonball. It was, it was a great success. Yeah. Good. Hey.

I'd like to start with a bit of listener mail. Let me jump in here. So, I've covered a bit of listener mail. Yeah. Yeah.

This this this is a little embarrassing, but we'll go there. And then we'll talk a bit about what it takes to prepare for a trip, and and I'd like to focus on the actual getting your machine, assuming you're not gonna rent 1, getting your machine to the location and potentially taking on trips that are a little bit further afield than you, yeah, or than you than you might normally consider. So Great. First first listener write in is from John in Bakersfield, California. And, and John says in very kind words, he says, are you guys idiots?

And just to be clear. And it was in reference to the fact that we don't seem to understand, our geography very well. And that is that, in our podcast, we talked about the, yeah, field nose, you were, you know, you were tired, and you said, yeah. I'm I'm in the, going down the West Coast. I'm heading over to the Atlantic, and I didn't even pick it up.

And, but what we did so so we did later, we did at the end of that podcast. So so John from Bakersfield, we we thank you for that because we get to embarrass ourselves once again and put this right out there front and center. At the end of that podcast after the after the credits rolled, we I did call Aaron, and, and that phone call is in there. And, and and we'll play that right now. Aaron, guess what?

What? I just went back and listened to the podcast we recorded. Absolute genius. Pure gold. Pure gold.

Some some might say that we shouldn't be geography teachers, based on yeah. You know, when you did the field notes bit, when you when you actually recorded them, you know, you were it was great because your voice is all over the place. You're up, down, background noise, etcetera, etcetera. You could definitely see your mood and your, and the tone within that. But one of the things that that you said, which was clearly because you were exhausted and you had just done that trek down there, but you're like, 15 and a half hours in the bike.

I was just over on the West Coast, of Mexico, the Atlantic Ocean. You and I both know that is the That's not the Atlantic Ocean. I didn't really say that, did I? You really did say that. And to make it worse, I doubled down on it.

Yes. Because I speak with authority, and you just you just fell into line. Yeah. Yeah. I just I just yeah.

Dumbass. I didn't Anyway, I just thought I thought I'd share that with you. That's called that that's called losing all your all your credibility in one shot, but it's all good. There you go. And and and and, and there we are.

Yeah. Well, I I you know, I was tired and, you know, who knows? That probably was Don't say that. Don't say that. Don't say it.

Don't say it. Really bad ceviche or something. So I was, you know, hallucinating, but who knows? Yeah. Indeed it was.

Alright. Well, anyway, I thought I'd share that with you. But go back. If you wanna have a good laugh, go back and check that out. Oh, god.

No. I'll just take your word for it and never listen to it again. Alright, brother. Have a good night. Yes, sir.

Bye. Bye. Alright. So, we did we did catch it, but, you know, these you know, you know, what what are you gonna say? You know?

We caught it. Keep keep keep keep keep keep keep Warriors are, are not only located in California. They are they are everywhere. So we will we will we will learn just just just just to, ignore them at some point. No.

I think it's really brilliant because, like, we're all human beings here. We all make mistakes. And, I think one of the things that that is really authentic about about people is when they say they've made mistakes. So, I like I like to say, I make a lot of mistakes. But what I do what I what I like to make sure of is when I was, when I was in boating, I always said, I always wanna work for a captain who's made more mistakes than me so that I so that yes.

He said, uh-oh, more times than I had. You know, it's funny because, you know, I'm not sure if everyone knows, but Taylor and I were both captains for our whole, you know, professional career for, like, 25 years for me. You know? And I've been on the Sea of Cortez. I was based out of, La Paz for for months.

I've gone up and down the the the the Pacific. I don't know how many times. It's so funny to to, to instantly forget a lifetime of, of expertise and experience. It's a it's a wild it's a wild thing, turning turning 50 years old. Now that's it.

You've dated yourself now. Here we go. That's it. Alright. And we did have another.

Oh, yeah. That was another thing. Let me I'm just gonna use this opportunity to gloat a little bit. So at the at the conclusion of this I'm taking a beating this episode. You're taking yeah.

And we're just at the beginning. Imagine how it'll be imagine how you feel at the end. Alright. So so I can I was online? I was looking for information, that was looking at the, the details from a previous podcast or sorry, a previous YouTube episode that I had referenced about the new BMW, the, the f 450 that had come out.

And I happen to see that no man's Sweden had a last episode. And when I said that, you said it is what? I said it was clickbait because it was a thumbnail, and it says, you know, it seems 50% of YouTube thumbnails are I quit or this was a disaster or my bike failed. And then you watch the video and 20 minutes in, I'm like, well, I'm not really quitting, but I'm quitting, you know, drinking on Tuesdays. Right?

So but it turns out that it was an authentic, thumbnail, and and and, of course, this is your time to, you know, to gloat. Alright. So here we go. So it turns out that it was true. And Robert Baldinger, who has been the, I haven't ever seen anyone else do any video things.

I've seen him with his his, 3 other buddies that he travels with that is nomad Sweden. And I've never seen anyone else put a video up besides him. So, anyway, so he is, I guess, no longer doing any videos, doing any more videos or content for Nomad Sweden, and he himself is now under his own name. So, so good for you, Robert. And Yeah.

I've already watched I've already watched what you've what you've put up, on YouTube. So, so keep it up. And, yeah. Great. Keith, have at it.

Yeah. It's awesome. And I I actually have taken a lot of inspiration from, his turkey series, and that's on my my bucket list of trips is, starting off, in your neck of the woods and ripping across to, Turkey. Actually, Itchy Boots is in, just went through Turkey. And, it just reinforced that that, that want to, to go to go do some more riding in that area, which is, which is definitely, moving up on my on my bucket list.

Alright. Well, that's probably a good a good transition point. So one of the things we wanna talk about is shipping a bike. And as we know, you're based in the US, and, and that's where you keep your toys. But I'd like to talk to you about let let's just use a real example.

So last summer, you shipped your bike over to Europe and you spent how long were you here? Was it it was a 30 day trip. And, as as you know, it was for my former employer. And, and, you know, we had a habit of of planning as, as you know, you being roped into some of them. And we had planned, a trip to with the end goal of, Norway.

And just doing some cursory, research into motorcycle shipping, we found, we found this group called, Moto Freight. And and that's what we're gonna concentrate on today is that, you know, real world experience and case study. Alright. So before we before we jump into that, maybe we should talk about why someone might wanna ship their bike as opposed to riding it. Yeah.

So we're gonna avoid the cost question first. And in our specific case study, my employer, was older gentleman in his seventies, and he was just used to his bike. You know? And when you're when you're, you know, daddy Warbucks and you're used to your bike and you just wanna get off your plane, you just want everything to be the same as it was last time. So that's that's one really good important reason if you're if you're able to afford that.

And then for my reason, you know, I've I've organized rallies all over, and often, you have to rent motorcycles for people. People wanna fly and ride. And, unfortunately, the reality of that is, you know, unless you're getting a white glove concierge, you know, private private rally, it's always a a nightmare. Someone's always getting shortchanged. It happens every single time.

You ask for 6 GSs, and there's one that is something other, like a f FJR or something like that. Well, it's kind of a a GS. Well, it's not. And, if you're gonna go do, a month trip, it's something to consider that you will get your bike, if if indeed that's, that's important to you. So I just wanna clarify.

So you commented on the fact that yeah. First of all, getting there's getting roped into things, and then there's getting roped into things. Let me let me just clarify 2 points here. I'd like to clarify. The first point is, what the definition of getting roped into.

Yeah. Let me just start with the perspective of having having to attend a, a motorcycle rally event that has been privately curated where, you know, you turn up and there is a a GS 1250 waiting for you with the appropriate seat height, that has been polished and ready to, you know, fueled and ready to roll. And then having to endure, you know, the company of of, you know, of of people who just wanna go out and have a good time for an entire week. So that's your definition of getting roped in. So, anyway but the other thing I wanted I wanted to comment on and is you mentioned if your daddy wore bucks that you want your bike.

But let me ask you. Do you really think that you need to be a billionaire to ship your motorcycle around? Okay. It's just something that, like, normal guys like you and I can do. Yeah.

And, and, you know, that's important too because, you know, there are different kind of riders. Right? And there are different situations. But if I'm going specifically to Europe and United Kingdom, I'm interested in performance. Right?

I'm interested in having my bike I'm interested in knowing what my tires are. I'm interested in knowing the condition of my brakes and when the last time the brake fluid was changed. I'm interested in the settings I have in my bike. I'm interested in the clutch levers that I have. I'm I'm interested in everything in the way my bike is set up.

So, if that's not important to you, this this this this may fall on deaf ears, but my bike is set up, and I really enjoy riding my bike. And I and I like to even, on occasion, push my bike to, you know, 8 tenths or 9 tenths even still today. And I will choose my tires and I will choose the way the bike is set up according to the type of trip that I'm about to go into. So, for for this case study, I absolutely had road 6 tires on. I had, you know, the bike set up a certain way.

So, yeah, I I definitely would be miserable if I showed up. And, instead of getting a 12 50, they handed me 800. I I, you know, I would be miserable for an entire month. So it just wasn't worth the risk to me. Yeah.

Good point. Good point. Alright. So, so in this case, you shipped your bike over. And would you like to talk a bit about the choices you've made when you evaluated the different ways to go about doing that?

And, actually, since we talked a moment about since I mentioned a moment ago about cost and you were like, maybe it's time to we could just we can just, you know, bang that right now and just say what exactly the costs were associated with that because I think that it's important for people to recognize that Yeah. You you don't have to be, you know, a super rich person to do this. Yeah. So it's really interesting, the case study, because on the way there so shipping from the US to and we ship to London Heathrow. So we're shipping to, right next to the airport.

And on the way there, her name is Kathy, Kathy at Motor Freight, just happened to have half a container open in LA. So, I had rode the bikes down, you know, roped in another friend, and we rode bikes down to, to LA. And it was, through one of their partners called Schumacher Logistics. And they you literally just drop off the bike, and there's you know, it's really cool, actually. They got, you know, really cool little sports cars.

They've got a bunch of motorcycles. They've got antiques bikes, and you drop it off at this facility. Now shipping by sea is a bit sketchy, because you don't have an exact flight number and timetable. But in this particular case, it was fine. So you save at least, you know, 3, 4, $500.

So shipping it there, by sea from LA to London Heathrow, is probably around 1200, $13100 US. And that's and that's net. There's no other fees in that in that in that estimate. How long in advance did you need to have your bike like, how long were you separated from your bike? Yeah.

I know. I don't wanna talk about the separation and anxiety part. I just wanna talk about the time. Well, you know, we were lucky enough that, you know, we purposely have more than 1 bike for doing rally. So we always had 1 bike we shipped we shipped around and ran rallies with, and one bike always I always had at home.

So that that was, that was definitely lucky. So in that case, we just dropped the bike off at the end of the riding season. So we had finished rallies in in Colorado. And then on our way back, I'm like, yeah. I'll just go to I'll just go to LA.

So we just went to LA. We dropped it off at the end of the riding season. So that's, you know, November or December. And then I didn't even think about the bike until I showed up in June in, in England. So I don't know when it left.

I don't know anything about it, but we just agreed with with Cathy that I'll just drop it off, and I'll just see that bike, those bikes when I when I when I arrive in June. Alright. So that's good if you have 2 bikes. So for someone who wants to spend as little time as possible away from their bike and maximize their riding season, what's the minimum amount of time? If they if they I guess they have to plan it.

So when that container gets closed up, then their bike is in it. So Yeah. The actual time on the water, what does that look like? Do you know? Yeah.

So it's it's a tough trip. So if you know anything about shipping, shipping from LA to UK is not a regular route. It's basically an empty container route. So if you're concerned about time, you you have to go air. If if if you can't just forget about your bike for 6 months, you have to go air.

So we can talk about the return, the return trip that I that I did because I wanted that bike for the riding season. So I actually didn't know what I was doing, where where the bikes were going. So I had pulled into, Moto Freight's warehouse and went into the office. And she's like, well, where do you want the bike to go? And I said, well, I'm gonna go back to the Vancouver area or Seattle.

Which is easier? And she actually said coming into Canada was easier at the time for customs, but it didn't really matter. So she literally said, okay, I can have it fly tomorrow. And I'm like, What are you talking about? That seems insane.

So she literally put the bike on a passenger plane. So that moment when I dropped it off, it was being shipped as dangerous goods. So in that particular case, they don't need to disconnect the battery. They don't need to worry about fuel. It goes into the the belly of the airplane, and the guy literally put it in a crate that hour.

And it was on the next airplane that flew into Vancouver. And it was it was super easy, and that cost around, I think, 16, $1700, US. And that's net. That's that's every every fee that you can imagine. You don't even think about it.

They they they just handle everything. So that's all in. Okay. Alright. And then you got home.

And then and then when you flew back, then your bike was, what, ready? Like, you went and picked it up. It was ready. It was ready to go because it So is that flown for you? You you become very much used to dealing with ports and customs and and how all that works.

You just show up with your documents. You have to print them out. It's an old school system. You walk in. There's a guy sitting there.

He looks at the paperwork. I had to go over customs, and I did it myself. We didn't use a broker. And, it's a funny story. He's like, well, we're going to do an inspection on it, you know, because I had a US bike, and I'm a Canadian citizen, and I'm a US green card holder, and it was plated in the US.

They're like, this seems fishy. I'm like, yeah. I get that. So they want to do an agricultural inspection on it. Right?

So I'm like, you know what I mean? And I'm like Check check the dirt in the knobbies to make sure you're getting cut of these. You know, but I you know, as as you know, I'm I'm a bit of a I'm a bit of an oxymoron because I think bikes should be abused, but I also think you should clean them up after you're done abusing them. Right? So anyways, when I had dropped the bike off, at the airport, I had made sure that I had cleaned it.

So hold on. I just had I just had a vision come to my head. So when we were we were in, in Colorado and we were going into I can't remember. We had we were riding about 4 or 5 days, and we stopped. And the bikes were pretty much covered in mud.

We took them over to a car wash, to a, to a power spray place, and I remember getting a picture of you with the spray in the bikes and with the sun behind it. All you could see was just this cloud. I remember we we posted that one, and we tagged it gorillas in the mist. Yeah. And but you were cleaning the bike stuff.

You're getting everything. Base of This whole wall. Yeah. That was at the base of base of Pikes Peak. It's a great great little town.

I forget the name of the town. Oh, yeah. Pikes Peak. That was a fun ride. You know, and it always drives me crazy because people in the group are always like, well, I'll just clean it when I'm done.

Well, that's not the way things work because if you have mud on your bike and then you touch it in any way, you will physically scratch the bike. Right? So we're talking about 35, $45,000 machines here. Right? Like, I'm fine with going flat out on the Nurburgring, and I'm fine with dropping them on the trail.

But, you know, it takes 20 minutes, not even, to to to just knock the dirt off of it, and get the blow dryer thing and just clean it. So, anyways, before you drop off your bike at any shipping place, make sure it's clean. So these guys in Canadian Customs, you know, the fun police, the rule followers, they they said, we're gonna go inspect it. I'm like, here we go. He goes, I'll just call you.

I'm like, what am I gonna do? So, you know, I go to the Tim Hortons and I just wait. So I get a call an hour later, and I go over to the shipping place. Obviously, it cleared. And I go over there, and they didn't even open the crate.

So clearly, some lackey went over there. They looked at the crate. They said, well, that looks like work. And they go, okay. Whatever.

Cleared. And and then I went and I proceeded to, uncrate the bike. There's a little bit of interesting discussion there too, is that the guys in the loading docks are just guys like me and you, and they're usually happy to help. So they usually need a screwdriver and a crowbar, and you'll sit there off in a corner somewhere, and you will take apart the crate, and you'll prepare your bike. Wait a minute.

Wait a minute. Let the loading dock. So do you mean within so we are you in customs now, or are you picking that up? Or So customs just cleared it. I walked back to to the the the, the air freight people.

You hand them the paperwork, and the guy comes out with a forklift and puts it down on the ground. Just tell the guy, hey, put off to the side. This is gonna be a while. And hey, man. Here's, here's $20.

Can I borrow some tools? And they'll usually reluctantly go get the tools that they keep for cases like us. And then you take off the crate. Crates are usually built in a way that, you know, a Muppet with basic skills can disassemble the crate. And then you sometimes have to put your windshield on, which on a GS is particularly easy.

It's just 2 screws. And then, and then you reassemble your bike. And then usually, sometimes, if it was shipped as dangerous goods, they didn't disconnect the battery. If they did ship it as dangerous goods, so if they didn't ship it as dangerous goods, you have to reconnect the battery. But in in my particular case, I didn't have to do anything.

I just I just Yeah. Put the windshield back on, and I, you know, wrestled it off the off the off the pallet. And then the guy threw the pallet $20, and then, and then I was off. Easy peasy, man. It was so, so easy.

Boom. Bob's your uncle. I do wanna go back. You know? Not everybody has a 25, 35, $40,000 motorcycle.

I have to say that keeping bikes clean, even those people who are routing t sevens around the, what, 13 12, $13,000 mark, also like to keep their motorcycles clean. And you're right. If you if you don't take advantage of the opportunity when it arises to a, fuel, and or clean, you know, or or and clean the bike at the same time if you got a power washer there, it's good to do that because it will save a lot. Also, it saves a lot of wear and tear on your your change, your sprocket, your equipment. So if you're running sand through there Yeah.

You know, it's it's it's it's not a good idea. A lot of that flings off. Yes. But, you know, if you the whole point of it was, like, get a good chain lube is so that it doesn't fling off. And if it's doing its job, it's holding the sand in there too.

So Yeah. And we just I'm not something like ADV weenie. Right? I'm not like, I don't wanna take my bike out because it's gonna rip. No.

I'm saying, like, nothing worse when when you have something as simple as a flat tire or something has broken or your bike is overheating that you'd have to fix something, and there's 2 inches of mud caked on the damn thing. Right? Like, I'm gonna go abuse the bike. Something's gonna break, and I want it in a in a in a condition that's gonna run well. It's gonna stay cool.

And, when something breaks, I can get in there and fix it. So that's my you know, I'm not a weenie. I just I just want it I want it I want it in a decent repair. So when when something goes wrong, we can, we can get we can get in there and fix it. Yeah.

It's true. Yeah. I I have to say I've I've done changes of tires in the in the wild, shall we say. Mhmm. And the first the first order of business is to be able to actually get to the to the bolt scraping the mud off.

So yeah. The worst. Yeah. Exactly. Alright.

So let me let let's talk a little bit more about the I have a question for you. Let me let me preface it with this with this antidote. When I was in my twenties, I ran it I was I went back to my hometown, Annapolis, Maryland, and I ran into one of my dad's family friends. And I said, hey. What are you doing here?

And he's like, oh, I retired. I moved down to Costa Rica. It's an amazing ex expat community in I can't remember. It was a city just outside of Costa Rica, out of out of the the capital. I can't remember the name.

Anyway, he he said he came up to buy a car. And at the time, I was living in Texas, and I was in the shipping business. And he said, Yeah. I came to buy a car. And I was like, Why would you come all the way up here to buy a car?

And he goes, You wouldn't believe how expensive cars are down there. They cost twice. He said, I can come down he said, I can come home here. I can buy a car. I can ship it down there, and I can keep it for a year, sell it, and then I can double what I bought it for even including shipping costs.

And I was like, oh, here's an opportunity. So I asked him. I said, do you want me to start buying cars in Texas because it's a short distance from here and start shipping them down to you? And, and he said, yeah. Let's do that.

So the first car that I shipped down there was absolutely stripped. Everything but the wheels, if it was anything that wasn't attached or bolted onto it, it was stripped off the car. They didn't steal the wheels because it was a it's a nice 4 wheel drive vehicle, and they didn't steal the wheels because they figured that they would go notice if they couldn't drive it off the ship. But my question leads to you. Have you had any challenges with people?

Because from what I from what I've seen and what I remember, you put your whole kit. Like, if you want it to show up there and you don't wanna have to travel with it, you put it on the bike. Yeah. So let's talk a bit about that. If you had issues with theft, or what does that look like?

Yeah. So the stories that I've always heard about theft are not motorcycle related. They're always like someone having their camper van from Africa to, I don't know, UK. And the camper van is sitting on a ship, and the crew are, you know, bored. And they're going, you know, they're gonna go rip things out of your out of your camper van.

And that's a story as as old as time, and you can't help that. Now I've never had anything go missing, shipping shipping a bike. And one of the the things I like about shipping shipping my bike is not only having my bike, but I have my tools on board that I know every single tool on there. I, you know, I often end up helping other people. Even just on that trip, I was on the ferry, from Norway or No, sorry.

From Sweden to, Denmark. And, you know, there was a guy, fixing a bike on a ferry. And here I am giving him my Loctite and my and my flashlight. Right? So I have my tools.

I have my my tire repair kits. I have everything on board that I, that I normally want to have my bike cover. Nothing worse than, than coming out of, of a cabin or, or, or, or something like this. And your bike is soaked. Just having your cover is such an important thing.

And then you can load up on your bike as long as it's not obscene. You know, don't don't be that guy. Your your bags are full of all your camping equipment. Your bags are full of your spares. You can load your bike.

I use the term load lightly. You can discreetly fill everything up. You will have to fill out a packing slip, a packing list, sorry, when you do the paperwork, for shipping your bike. And everything will be imported on what's called a temporary import bond. You do not need a carne de passageto go into the UK.

And once you're into the UK, you can ride, you know, for 2, 3 months without even considering to need a a, any other document besides the temporary import, which costs nothing, which is something that Motifreight handles. Yeah. So having the stuff on your bike, having your stuff on the bike is a is a huge is a is a huge plus. So when you say you can ship it into the UK, obviously, the UK is no longer part of the EU. We won't even talk about that.

That's that's like a that's a whole different podcast, like, a whole different with a different name. But so my question is this. Now that the e that the UK has left the EU, does that Carnet decide it's not a Carnet. Does does that allow you to travel all through Yeah. Europe?

Yeah. So they will one of the reasons why I like going into the UK is because, first of all, everyone can fly into London Heathrow for cheap. Right? And, you know, it's very easy to navigate and communicate with people. Right?

You're not, you're not, you're not the a the space alien. Right? Everything is easy. So you will import your bike. They will import the bike for you under a temporary import bond, which you know nothing about.

And then when you go get on the ferry to go somewhere else or the tunnel, you're just like any other vehicle. You just show them no one ever asked me for any documentation for the bike in the whole trip the whole trip that I did. And I went to 10 countries. Right? So once you're on the ground, unless you're going somewhere exotic, you know, you start going into, you know, Iran and Iraq and places like that, somewhere far field or Russia or Morocco.

Those are places where you need to check if you need that carnet or not. But for 2, 3 months' worth of of great European riding, there is nothing even to consider. It is that easy. What, I remember before you plan your trip, and I and I said to you, I think you might need to get a sticker that says USA on the back of your bike. And you were like, oh, right.

Now I'm a you know, you you may you made some other reference, which I will not bring up now. But, what what was the story on that? How did that turn out to you? Funny because, technically, after after after, you know, checking checking mother mother mother Google, she said that, yeah, because most license plates in in in Europe will have a country, emblem on it. So when the cop is behind you because you were just doing a wheelie on on the beach, and wants to run your plate, first of all, don't stop.

But, but if if someone wants to run your plate, you know, the alphanumeric thing is only part of a license plate when you're travelling internationally, which are so spoiled in the US and Canada because, you know, but they're even running the, the state or province. So they need to know the country and what the plate is. So yeah. So it is not only customary. It is part of some treaty.

And I I don't know which one it is, But there's a treaty that says if there is no decal on the license plate denoting the country, you should have a sticker. Now my resistance to all that is I just wanna blend in. It ended up being the only time anyone ever talked to me was when I was at a gas station or a ferry and I had the classic USA sticker on. And they're like, no, you didn't really do that. And I'm like, oh, yeah, I rode it here over the ocean, but people are like interested in your story.

So, so it ended up being ended up being a positive thing. Yeah. I can I can say that, when we went to Norway, then that was the same thing? I do I do recognize that people would come up and start talking to you. And that was just that was usually it.

They go they'd they'd say like, we're both be standing around talking, like, you know, the fueling station, you know, having something to eat. So nobody really knows who's sitting on what bike if we're standing there talking together. And then they would come up and they just walk up to both of us and then say, who's from the US? Right? And then it was what?

Because they're because, because the first of all, they wanna they wanna practice their English. Right. Because because most people who speak it, they're like, I wanna show that I can speak English and most of them speak amazing English, in Europe. And then, and it's a great conversation starter because then you're like, oh, where are you from? And then I remember we were on the ferry, we were in Norway and we met a young couple and they were like, they were doing some They were from Spain, they were doing this YouTube channel, and they had all kinds of craziness going on.

They were fun, though. They were we just saw a ferry ride with them, but they didn't they, their Spanish is really good, but my my my Spanish has turned to Swedish, and and that sort of slip that slipped away now. Yeah. And you know what? There's there's Sorry.

Go ahead. I was just gonna say if you if you if you speak to a Swede, they'll go, no, we don't speak Swedish. But if you speak to if you if if somebody else listens in to me speaking Swedish, like, during my 80 minute Monday morning Sweden you know, Swedish lesson, then they go, somebody else listening who doesn't speak Swedish is like, wow. You speak great Swedish. But then a Swede's like, he's still working it out.

He's working it out. He's still he's still working it. He's still working it. I think people always take a perverse pleasure in pointing out that you don't quite sound like us. Right?

You don't quite sound like this. Yeah. But hey. Look. But I just wanna give you credit, Aaron.

We've been I don't know how far I had this recording, and you've not apologized once. So good. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry about that.

I'll work on it. I'll work on that. I actually, I, really stepped on you there. Sorry about that. I I wanted to, mention that one positive interaction I had was because of that USA sticker is that I was on a ferry going to Isle of Man, which, by the way, whenever podcasts come out, we should really unpack this this whole month long trip and why I wanna do it again and why, why I'd like to do, several months there.

But I was going to I Love Man, and this super nice guy is like, well, what are you gonna do when you're there? I'm like, I'm not sure. I'll go do the the the course, and and I'll and I'll go check it. And he proceeded to sit down The course. The the course.

The the tourist trophy. Yeah. The, TT course. You know, the the the cliche thinking you're a you're a superbike rider on your GS and going around the course because they, of course, have no speed limits in most in most of the island. But that's a that's a story for for another day.

But because of the sticker, this this this this old boy comes up and and proceeds to give me a list of things to do for the next 2 days. And, you know, I'm a terrible tourist, when I'm on my own. I'm a great tour guide, but I'm a terrible I'm a terrible tourist when I'm not when I'm on my own. And this guy gave me everything to do. I did everything on the list.

It was things I never would have thought of. And it was all because this guy saw that I that I wasn't from there and, came up and was an ambassador for for his little I his little, island nation. That's pretty cool. So a $6 sticker actually ended up getting you to see some things that you wouldn't have seen before had you not Yeah. Labeled yourself.

It was yeah. It was great. And, yeah, as you as you say with European tags, like, you know, here in Sweden, my tag starts with an s. Okay. And not not the numbers, but actually there's a there's a there's a separate designation on the left hand side showing EU, which is a blue background with the stars around it with the number of nations that are in the EU and and then s being the the letter designation for that particular country within it.

Yeah. And funnily enough, because I started in the UK, and there is a great riding culture in the UK. And every ferry I got on was, you know, you're always grouped up with the bikes. And all of the UK bikes had UK stickers for that reason because because they're no longer part of the EU, and their license plates or new replacement license plates don't conform to those standards. Everyone had to have the UK stickers.

So, I felt I felt at home because, we were all part of the, all part of the group needing to have, the sticker on the back of the pipe. Nice. Nice. Also, yeah, you guys you you you you different people need to be together. That's alright.

Yeah. Good. Yeah. That's fine. I'm just I wanna talk I wanna yeah.

Your your story of your life. So in this European trip, you had intended to ship you shipped 2 bikes over, and it turned out that you ended up riding, solo on this. Talk to me about other individuals so that you may have come across who were doing the same or ended up doing it alone. Do you have any good examples that you'd like to share about that? No.

Everyone was, was was riding in a group. I was the only, the only guy doing doing a big trip like that. But you you mentioned a good point is that let's talk about using the shipping agent. So, I follow a group called 2 wheels 3 sheets, and they just recently had a disaster with, shipping their bike without someone like, Moto Freight. So they actually lost their bike for, I don't know, weeks months.

And they were meeting the bike somewhere else because it was being shipped by by Air Cargo. But they just went up to, like, a DHL broker in Africa, and it was a nightmare. And they have a whole video of it. And, you know, don't don't ever try to do things that are complicated because shipping agents have special access. They know the pitfalls.

They know everything about what they do. So don't think that you're gonna watch a YouTube video or listen to a podcast and think you're gonna ship your bike without the possibility of having a nightmare. So and there sometimes is no extra cost, involved, in having someone help you because they're getting a discounted rate anyways. Yeah. So taking advantage of someone else's professional expertise.

There's a, there's a there's before I moved to Sweden, there was a great commercial on TV, and it was a guy and he's like he's back well, maybe he's a bit older than before when I moved to Sweden. But there's a there's a commercial with a guy who's leaning against the counter and he's on the telephone. Mhmm. And he's got, like, a butter knife, and his doctor is on the phone with him. He's like, yeah.

So just put your fingers there. Yep. Three fingers below the bottom rib. Yep. Cut put the insertion in right there.

And he goes, yeah. So then it was making a silly example of fact, why would you do surgery on yourself in the kitchen with a butter knife? Why would you plan to ship yeah. Why would you sort of wanna run this gauntlet by yourself and potentially have one of your most cherished assets disappear into the ether. It's not even them.

Like, they were waiting in a hotel, and they had to, like, you know, stay in a hotel in the city, which was wildly expensive. I'll I'll actually post the YouTube link in the in the, in the show notes to show you what can happen when when things go wrong. And when you call as just, you know, a customer, you call customer service, like 1 800 call DHL or whatever. And it's a nightmare. You're getting someone's working from home just looking at something on a screen.

But when a shipping agent calls, they don't call that number. They're calling and investigating. They're calling, you know, oh, that's so and so down at that port. I'm gonna handle this. Right?

It is a whole another game. And it it it you know, I've had nothing but but perfect experiences using using, Motifray. And I've heard nothing but nightmares otherwise. Yeah. To your point, when I was in, in my twenties, I worked for a freight forwarding company, and we managed project cargo.

And we had big business into the Middle East, but, primarily, any place that we shipped anything, we had a personal relationship with the people on the other end who are receiving it. So Mhmm. It really makes a great point is that what you're paying for is the fact that this person runs a business, and their business is to get cargo from one spot to the next without any any hitches at all. So Mhmm. That's what you're paying for is that is those relationships.

Yeah. Speaking of hitches, I had a a phone call with, Kathy yesterday, and we're talking about Kathy from Moto Freight. And, I just wanna make sure I don't have any of my any of my notes wrong. And here's a great example is that about recently, there was, an incident with DHL in Germany. So some, you know, nefarious dudes, put a, incendiary device in, in regular shipping, parcel shipping, and there was a fire in a sorting station.

Now everyone in the US and Canada had a knee jerk reaction, and they shut off all what they call personal effects. Now motorcycles fall into personal effects. Flying on passenger planes. Now Canada is still, at this date of December 21, 2024, still has a prohibition on your bikes flying on passenger planes. Now that will go away.

They're just they're just having a knee jerk react a knee jerk reaction. Cargo works a little little bit differently, where your crate goes into a queue. And if it gets on the plane, it gets on the plane. It may arrive a day early or a day late. So it's not the end of the world.

It's just not as perfect as a as a as a passenger plane. So you may be, out an extra day of, of hotel waiting for that waiting for that, bike to show up. Or if you're dealing with a tour operator like someone like us, we obviously receive your bike days before, and we washed it, and we fueled it, and and we pick you pick you pick you up pick you up at the airport. That's a that's a that's a different animal. But so they are still shipping bikes, but they're going on freight planes right now.

But Canada is still accepting, sea freight, which is actually fine for when you're coming home. So if you're, something to consider, if you wanna save a few $100, if you don't need your bike, if it's not coming back in the middle of riding season, just ship it sea freight. It's very reliable. It's not gonna get, it's not gonna get damaged. And, not that I've ever had damage, but it's just going into a, you know, into a sealed container.

So that's something to consider as well. I also want to mention about, about shipping it to other places. You know, they have, Moto Freight has partners, in Australia, in Cape Town, in the US, and the major ports in the US. So they offer that white glove service in in some locations where they will someone one of their partners will go to the port, receive your bike, bring it back to their their shop, uncrate it, and have it and have it waiting for you. This service isn't available everywhere, but if you call, Kathy at motor freight, she can tell you, which which ports, have that.

And that's the reason why I always fly into the UK is because it's a known quantity. And, you know, I like the fact that I it gets there before I get there, and someone started it, and someone has made sure that, everything is working. And they're bike people. So if something's gone wrong, you know, they're they're gonna help you as a port as as as opposed to just a port. You are on your own.

So, yeah, I just I just I just wanted to mention that, that breaking news, with the Yeah. No. That's interesting. People are doing that. Let me ask you.

What kind of paperwork do you need to ship your bike? Like, let me give you an example. So maybe I probably should say this out loud, but I'm gonna anyway. So I I have I'm registered in one place in Sweden, and my wife, where we spend most of our time as a family, it's a much cheaper place to register. It's outside of the city, so it's much cheaper to register cars, motorcycles, whatever out here.

So my wife owns everything. Mhmm. Can I ship this bike? Or does it need to be in my name? That's an interesting question.

I actually don't know the answer to that. With the same last name, you know, it it should be okay. But I would I would make that a specific inquiry. I will say having things in different places is fine. So, in Port Angeles at The Man Cave, we register everything there because there's lots of advantages, for for that.

But I have a Canadian passport, but I'm also a green card holder. So that wasn't an issue. They just care that the name matches. And you must I have to, really, hit this point. You must own the bike.

You must have the title in hand. In other places, they call the ownership. So you must have the physical document, and you will ship that with the bike. The shipping company wants that, so you know you're not involved in, you know, stealing motorcycles from your from your, from BMW Finance. So you must own you must own the bike, and don't even bother saying, well, I'll get a letter and this and that.

No. You must you must own the bike. You must have the physical title, and it must be a cool colorful old school piece of parchment because that's that's what they wanna see. Got it. Alright.

I think that answered the question then. So to wrap up this point about shipping, is there any any final points that you think that the listeners might find interesting and useful if they plan to ship their bikes? Yeah. So one of the things with going to the UK or going to one of their partners, the MotoFreight partners, is that, you know, they're bikers. Right?

There's always a stack of bikes in the corner that that that are, you know, their own bikes. Right? Is that so when you travel, I'm often traveling with my gear. And gear is the worst to travel with. The boots, the helmet, the space suits, the nonsense is always a pain in the butt.

So I'm always traveling with a large checked bag, and I'm always taking on my helmet as my personal item. So they have no problem holding on to that stupid giant bag. And it's a huge deal because what do you do? If you're going somewhere for 2 months and, like, you have this roll aboard not even roll aboard, a rolling, you know, checked bag or even your roll aboard, they will take it. So they will just throw it up on a shelf, for for you.

And they will also, and they will also receive packages for you. So if there's the the thing that you can't, go without, that the German beer stein because you went to Oktoberfest and you think it's gonna be important, you can go ahead and ship it, to them, and they will stick it in your, in your in your, in in in your pile. Alright. Cool. Very good.

Good to know. One of the things I wanted to mention earlier, you talked about someone having a hard time losing gear, etcetera, etcetera. One of the things when we plan things like the, for example, the Himalaya trip or people who are ship shipping things from abroad, One of the things that I do and recommend to our our participants within that particular if I take the Himalayas for an example. Like, if I rocked up to the Himalayas and I didn't have my riding boots, it would be I'd be, you know, I'd be bummed. A nightmare.

Yeah. Not to mention I'd have yeah. It'd be a nightmare. Right? Then I have to go try to find some some boots that don't fit me that I'm, you know, just buying in a country that I haven't done research on.

Mhmm. Think about the amount of time, like, just to research a pair of boots. It's right for this kind of the trip they're doing. So my intention is to, believe it or not, not not I'm not gonna wear a pair of a motocross boots on the airplane. But what I will do Come on.

Or a helmet or a helmet. No. I'm serious. I'm not gonna I'm not gonna do it. I thought about it, though.

What I'll do is I'll put, an Apple AirTag in my boots, and I'll put a Apple AirTag in my helmet. I'll probably carry the helmet on because that's really a crucial piece of equipment. I can probably sort out boots in country if I had a challenge, if they got if they got separated from me. But anything that I'm putting in the belly of the aircraft, I, I'm gonna put Apple AirTag in. And, also, I know that there's other types of, security safety mechanisms that you can put in your actual bike.

I've seen, actually, Nomad Sweden, Robert, turn me onto this in one of his earlier videos, about mounting a security. It's a tracker, and it, you know, it it's powered by your battery, and it runs and it sits under your seat. And, yeah, I like to put them in, you know, in cars for tracking, and it gives a lot of information about the location, not more than an Apple AirTag would, for example. But these are some things, another way to keep track of your your kit. Apple AirTag is a super cheap way, and there's an Apple.

I keep saying Apple, but there's a lot of other competitors to that now that will even operate on an Apple or Android, whatever whatever device you have. Yeah. So I've I'm gonna try to remember a few points here. With AirTags, the airlines are actually, talking about listening to you when you have an Apple AirTag and also using the that data. So there's discussions about because there's so many horror stories of, I can see my bag.

It's behind it's behind in the sorting area. And they're like, no, sir. We can't help you. I'm like, you can't go back there. Right?

You know? And this is why, you know, people, you know, burn down airports because of moronic moronic things like this. Right? So first of all, the airline Just to the just to the listeners, no one should burn down the airport, just to clarify. You know, you're not getting your bag by your bag back.

So so so, yeah, airlines are talking about using that data in the future. 2, the tracker you're talking about, uses a low current cell phone, connection, which is highly effective. So you don't need an Apple device to go near the bike. It will just ping on any cell phone network where that bike is. And, that is highly effective.

But it's a whole it's a whole another animal, and you have to wire it in. And, you know, there there are people that don't know positive or negative when it comes to wires, so it's not it. That's that's not for everyone. But, yeah, but that's that's that's the difference between the AirTag and a tracking device. Yeah.

I was just took me back. I was in, years ago. I was in, South Africa, and I was meeting some friends, and they were they came to pick me up in what was supposed to be a new, the Toyota Hilux. Mhmm. And they came and picked me up in a Mercedes.

And I said, what happened to the Hilux? We're going to a an animal farm, and they said I said, what happened to the Hilux? And they said, oh, they, the yeah. That that got stolen. I said, It's brand new.

And they said, Well, you know, it doesn't take long. I said, Well, tell me the story. And they said, Well, I went over and I was watching my kid play soccer, football, and they had parked it. And in that in the vehicle, they put 2 of these trackers in, and they put 1, which is in the obvious place and people just rip that out. And then people who are, I guess, new at this business Mhmm.

Don't find the second one. He said, so that's, of course, the way they didn't find it, and they they put it in a different place in the vehicle. And and he said, yeah. He says, I knew it was gone when I saw it flying at 365 knots towards Zimbabwe. Okay.

He's, like, traveling straight across the mountain pass. I was like, no. That one's gone. That car is gone. That car is gone.

Anyway but, hey. But he he knew where it went. That's true. Point, it worked. Yeah.

I also I, you know, I also want to talk about the insurance quickly. I know I know we're we're we're way over time, but I wanted to talk about insurance when going to Europe. And the next time, we can talk about, a greater greater detail. So if you don't listen to another podcast, you need to get what's called green card insurance. I know it's it sounds silly, but it's literally painted on, it's actually literally printed on green paper.

And you just need to decide, if you want the theft and collision or you just want liability. And in our next podcast, we'll talk about, how I regretted buying the theft and collision, and I wouldn't buy it again, and how to avoid simply getting your bike stolen, and the planning that that that goes into that and what and what to avoid. I'll also post in the show notes, my insurance documents so people can take a look at that, in which countries, are covered and for liability, in which countries are covered for theft, which are surprisingly different and interesting just, just just for a, just just for a read. Yeah. That's good.

Actually, there's, there's a website Azure mentioned that I pulled up, and it is, this one is particular is for Swedish Motor Insurers. However, there is a lot of information about green card. For example, there's a spot here. Countries that require a green card, Albania, Azerbaijan, Morocco, Moldova, North Macedonia, Tunisia, Turkey, and Ukraine. But there are yeah.

It it's a huge amount of information, but, yes, as it ties into insurance, you need to make sure that you're traveling in countries and you have the right insurance for this. Yeah. And then countries that are not insured for theft are some of those, like Albania, Ukraine, Poland, Montenegro. So so you may they require the green card insurance, but the green card insurance for theft and, collision are not are not are not covered there. So we can talk about, my strategies, for for not getting your bike stolen, and, and they're, highly effective because I've never lost anything yet.

So, so we can talk about in, in the next podcast. Yeah. And and, sort of as a you did mention that when you were talking about your notes, when you talked about when you were in your field notes when you were in Mexico, and you had already gone across the bottom to the Sea of Cortez when you had left to clarify the Pacific Coast. Yeah. Yeah.

I know. I don't live in the hottest forever. And then you were northbound. You said you kept traveling northbound until you found because you couldn't find a place that where you felt comfortable leaving the bike. Yeah.

So I had a plan. So I don't, you know, as they say in the hunt for October, you know, I don't take a poop without having a plan. Right? And, and so I had a place and, booked, which I knew from experience, had a courtyard and a security guard and everything, but it was getting late. And I said, oh, I'd rather just stop here.

So I actually stuck to the plan. I rode, you know, over mountain passes for for an extra two and a half, three hours, just to stick to the plan. Because, you know, once your bike is gone, it's gone. I don't care what kind of insurance you got. You know, you are out, so forget it.

So just to be, you know, just to be clear, I just think I had a vision. Had a flashback to when you and I tried to catch a ferry in Norway, and the only thing at the bottom of that mountain pass, like, was the ferry stop. Uh-huh. And I just had a vision of you, but, like and we were like, well, you know, if we have to ride over that mountain pass again, well, you know, it's it's it's not such a bad day. It was a pretty amazing road.

One of the best part about that. Yeah. Yeah. I was like, oh, gosh. I guess we're gonna have to we missed the ferry.

I guess we're gonna have to go. The next ferry is in, you know, 3 days. Oh, guess Yeah. Exactly. I guess we're gonna have to ride that mountain pass again.

What a bad day for us. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, I just when you said that, I was like you're like, oh, and I had to ride the mountain pass again. I'm like, oh, yeah.

I bet it was tough. I'm gonna have to go I'm gonna have to go shred these curves on top of this hill again. Yeah. We did. That was fun.

Alright. Alright. Let's see here. Our how about news? Is there any cannonball news?

I mean, let me just stop here for a second and and and regroup. This podcast is called adventure cannonball podcast or ADV, Cannonball podcast. And the reason for that is partly to talk about rallies, in particular, the ADV cannonball rally. Let me first let me ask you a question. When is that?

It is in 2025, it is October 6th, I think, starting in Kitty Hawk. And we should talk about what is the cannonball in one of our future podcasts. But in 2025, it's October 6th. And you can go to, cannonball sorry, advcannibal.com, to, to get all the, to get all the details. Alright.

Thanks for that. Is there any any new news, anything else? I know last time we talked, we talked about the fact that you were you were testing 2 different apps. You were looking at, Ravi Richta and, and Revver as 2 possible apps, and there's obviously lots of work that goes into this. You had just booked 80,000 US dollars worth of hotels.

Ouch. That must have that must have shocked you. So there's a lot going on. Obviously, there's something that to prepare for a rally and to be the one who organizes this. You know, it it takes a lot of organization to show up and participate in a rally, but to be the organizer, it's significantly more.

So is there anything new news wise that you wanna share with us? Yeah. So we confirmed that we're going to be at the Touratech rally west. I think it's in June of next year. So we're gonna have our fancy new, vendor booth there.

So you can come, badger us, ask questions, and get super cool ADV stickers, which, actually, if you don't show up, you can get them from, from our website for free also is, ADV cannonball stickers. So what would be really cool is if you actually showed up there and signed up. Well, it'd be really cool if you signed up now. But, yeah, it's actually a, it's an online process. So we actually can't sign anyone per in a in a perp in in person.

But I think sometimes people, especially in this day and age is, you know, everything's just a website and a guy with a phone and a laptop. Right? So I think when we go to rallies, people say, oh, he's got a display, and he's a human being. And, you know, I feel I feel better about this. So, you know, people people take, take comfort when they when they physically see you.

Yeah. And, also, just like you had at the last one that you attended, was it, the Texas one? Touro what is Texas? Touro, Texas. Touro, Texas.

I remember that you had a QR code that was there as it would quickly link you down to people signing up to that actual spot. So if you wanted to scan with your phone, boom, you can get right up. And then put your details and then sign up for it immediately. Which was actually funny because, I think there was a couple of guys that were from, I think, the Harley, the Harley experience. You know, they bring they bring trailer bikes, and I saw a sign up that night.

And then in the morning, there was another one. And I'm like, you guys were talking about this last night. There might have been beer involved. And if someone shows up in the morning and says, well, you know, I'm like, hey, listen, you know, you gotta show up now. But, you know, thankfully, no one no one showed up with, with regret and a hangover in their in their, in their eyes.

Yeah. Good good to hear that. Yeah. I'm super excited about that. This should be, an amazing one, especially since you've, again, the promotion of this, and you already have a significant number of people who have already signed up for this.

And you're gonna you're gonna you're gonna limit it to how many I guess, we talked about that briefly last time is how many rooms. Was it how many rooms, not how many riders? Yeah. So the challenge is is, keeping it manageable and also booking rooms. So we're keeping it to, 30 rooms.

And I actually take this opportunity to mention some other new sign ups. Frank Bachele from Folsom, California, and he is on a Triumph Tiger 850. There is Lucas, from Yukon, Oklahoma, and he's on a Harley Panamera. And then let's also mention Dwayne. Dwayne is from Dalton, Georgia, and he is on a Honda Africa Twin.

What other news do I have for you here? I'll go to my notes. Alright. And oh, yeah. I uploaded, some long format videos, from the Baja rally on YouTube, and I uploaded some reels to TikTok and Instagram, some short format, videos.

I also wanted to mention that, people keep asking about our upcoming India trip, and, that is fully booked. So, we're not we're not taking more people on that. And I also wanted to mention that, at the opening day of the cannonball 2025, the, Hilton is giving us a private, breakfast room so we can have a quick driver's meeting in the morning in Kitty Hawk, which was super nice of them. Thank you very much. And, we have, the meeting room secured for day 0 and negative one for people who wanna come do rally check-in early and also want to, get some help running the test routes that are on the Outer Banks, islands.

So that's just some housekeeping with, Cannonball. Yeah. Fantastic. So you obviously have been doing a lot of work on that. That's great.

It's not stopping. It's a lot. Yeah. Is there, any additional information that's, that's worthy of conveying, or should we save it for the when we do a full break down of the, again, what's coming is a full breakdown of the actual rally, what it looks like, what the I know we we touched on this before, but I think that, again, some of the other mail that we didn't mention is people looking for a bit more detail about what actually what does that rally look like on a day like, how many hours am I gonna be on a bike? I know that when you and I travel together, I think about the Norway trip, for example.

One of the most fun days of that trip, granted we had to wait for the weather to clear because there was cloud layer at the top of the mountain, welcome to Norway. But I remember we got to our location by 2 or 3 in the afternoon. We had a nap and then went out and just left all we took the took the panty off the bikes and then just ripped around, and it was amazing just to go and explore because you knew that you didn't have to like, if you get to a dead end, well, that was fine. You turn around and go back. It didn't matter who got lost.

You went out, you rode, you're like, let's you didn't look at the computers, didn't look at GPS, you just rode and to where it looked like it was fun. And then when when it was time to go back, if it turned out that you just ridden to the point where you're lost, well, you could always you know, then you could turn on the computer again and go, where where are my bags? Where's the hotel? Where am I staying tonight? Anyway, just another perspective on things.

Yeah. No. For sure. We'll, we'll talk about the route and, how many hours you ride. And there's a great example is that a lot of times on those kind of tours, we're trying to get somewhere, and we may not have always chosen the most adventurous route to get there.

I will say on day 5, 6, and 7 of a cannonball, it is nonstop, fantastic riding. So you're always gonna get that feeling of, of of being on a really great curated road. And on the second half of day 1 and the first half of, day 2, is, also fantastic. In fact, it may be fatiguing for some people, and they may wanna stop, grabbing checkpoints, and do a direct to the hotel when they get fatigued. So, you know, Cannonball is more of a mission and a friendly competition.

So there are times to, you know, be an adult and go, I've had enough for today, and, I'm gonna stop competing, and I'm gonna go to the hotel. But, but, yeah, it's, it's definitely a balance of this is really awesome and twisty, and, perhaps this isn't appropriate for the weather conditions or, me getting tired or something wrong with my bike. Who knows? But just to clarify, you have ordered good weather for this. Right?

Yeah. Oh, yeah. That's, that's all part of the package. Yeah. Yeah.

Okay. Good. Excellent. Good to hear that. Nice.

Alright. Hey. Something that you mentioned to me and something that I I, I didn't get in I I wasn't early enough to get tickets for last year. It's in Sweden, and it's the, Skoog 2025. Skoog.

And it is it's it's what they Skoog means forest in Swedish. And it means, so they they they term it the adventure riders Woodstock. I'll put that back. Yeah. Anyway, it's so I I'm gonna do my best to get, tickets to it this year.

Tickets go on sale at I'm not gonna say because if everybody in the everybody who listens to this podcast doesn't go you know? Yeah. Goes I'm I'm never gonna get a ticket. Anyway, if I end up getting a ticket, I'm gonna set my alarm. I'm gonna get up you know, be there at midnight when the tickets go on sale, like trying to get into a Taylor Swift concert.

Good luck. Yeah. I know. Thanks. Anyway, hopefully, I gotta take it to this, and then I can do some really I can do some some, some field notes like you did when you're doing the Mexico, rally.

Yeah. And that's your classic ADV rally, which is you go to a place, you camp, and then during the day, they either have trainings or they have led rides. So that is a classic ADV rally. One of the reasons why we started the Cannonball is because we wanted more of a mission competition traveling type of, event that wasn't a tour necessarily. So yeah.

And, I think it's really interesting. I actually enjoy, waiting for the videos, to be published by Nomads Sweden and also the people that put it on. I forget the guy's name, but it's Brapp and Bang or something or and, and, and, he is an interesting guy to watch, on YouTube as well. Yeah. And his his, his his email is top dog at Is it really?

Top dog. Top dog. I love it. Anyway, I hope to have that. And then, actually, if I end up if if you know, it's a limited number of people, and then, hopefully, I get a chance to do a a quick chat with Robert.

And, yeah, and he'll be down there with us. He'll be have his drones up, and he'll have his full kit going on there. So Awesome. It'll be fun to to touch base with him. Fun.

And, and on that note, Aaron, I think we've we've hit all of our high points today. On that note, I wanna say thanks very much for another, great conversation, and, and thanks to all the listeners out there. The, the listener base is growing, is growing really quickly. I was surprised to see just how many people we've got, tuning in now. So it's it's really nice.

Thank you for the, thanks for the 5 star reviews for those who've who've dropped those in there. I know it was potentially under duress, but we do have some people we do have a lot of people that we've actually had, you know, out of the blue, we've come up and said, great, you know, nice comments. So, thank you for that, and, we'll continue to deliver to deliver what what appears to be valuable content, so things that people are interested in. So, again, we like to say that, we've done it wrong the first time to help you get it right the the next time. So and with that, I I like to thank you all for tuning in 1 to, to one more episode.

So thanks very much, and you guys have a have a great day. Alright. Thanks, Taylor, and play the outro. Thanks for listening to the ADV Cannonball podcast. Please give us a 5 star review on your preferred podcast platform.

That really helps us with the algorithm gods. All hail the algorithm gods. You can buy us a coffee on buymecoffee.com/advcannonball or directly help save this sinking ship for the price of a pint@patreon.com/advcannonball. Follow us on all the socials with the handle at advcannonball. If you'd like to send us a question or comment for the air, or if you are a musical artist and want your royalty free music played on our podcast, or if you'd like to contact us for advertising opportunities, email us at podcast at advcannonball.com.

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