This is a story of my motorcycle misadventures, in the context of a career as a writer and publishing consultant. I wrote a version of this just to keep track of my various activities for myself. Because so many people ask me, geez, how did this whole motorcycle travel and writing and publishing thing start, I thought I'd share it here on my website. Once we reach a certain age, I think most of us have this kind of long and winding road to our current state, right? This is a work in progress. So...
My motorcycle misadventures began when I was 14 years old in rural North Carolina. I spotted a broken-down Honda Enduro in our barn and declared it my escape vehicle. My dad, ever pragmatic, said, “If you can fix it, you can ride it.” Together, we got that bike running. From then on, I roamed the tobacco fields, explored the woods and the creek, and pushed to the edge of impassable human-made and natural boundaries on all sides. I fell. I broke down. And I either fixed the little motorcycle or walked it home.
When I was 16, my family moved to South San Jose, California, and my dad (who worked at IBM) got another bike: a red Honda CL 175 K7 Scrambler. He bought it to carry on the back of the RV we took camping. My dad is an accomplished engineer and mechanic, and conveniently outfitted it with a luggage rack, a carrier to hold groceries, and a windscreen. It even had a front crash bar with pegs. The bike was rugged enough to strap onto the RV for trips to the Reno Air Races. Looking back, that little red Honda seemed ready for an around-the-world journey.
Sidenote: Today, in 2024, my dad is 90, and he volunteers at the Computer History Museum taking care of the IBM 1401 and all its peripherals. (See this post by my brother Jeremy on LinkedIn.)
But back in the day, I was 16, and I had other ideas. I took the windscreen and luggage off and rode it on the trails and fire roads in the hills, back when Highway 101 in South San Jose was just a four-lane road with tractors turning off from the orchards. My boyfriend, another IBM transplant, had his own bike—a much more capable Bultaco—but I kept up.
After high school, bikes exited my life for a while—“stage left,” as they say—until I married a man who rode. I got a Yamaha 650 Maxim, and we rode everywhere together. Until we didn’t. Why’d we split? It might have been the fourth year in a row he skipped out on taking that trip to Europe, citing work obligations. I went alone, angst-ridden at first, but got quickly hooked on the freedom: I could go where I wanted, when I wanted, alone or with anyone I chose. After that trip, and a divorce, solo travel became my thing.
Over the next few years, I motorcycled and mountain biked across Europe, making money as a contract technical writer. While living in Nice, I even wrote a guidebook to mountain biking the Alpes-Maritimes—there wasn’t one in English or French at the time and I'm not even sure there is, now.
Then, in 1993, I bicycled through West Africa with my brother Jeff. It was an epic adventure, fascinating and very challenging but a happy and rewarding exploration of a place that was then, completely off-the-grid. I got malaria, and if Jefff hadn't been there to give me the medicine and take care of me, I may not be here today.
Geared up to bicycle South of France and then West Africa
Back in the States, I took motorcycle trips up and down the California coast, mountain-biked Mount Tam, and kept working and saving for my next adventure.
Then, in 1994, at a writers’ conference in Marin, I caught my first break as a travel writer. Allen Noren, a travel editor for Tim O’Reilly’s Global Network Navigator (one of the first internet publishing platforms), pulled up on a BMW touring bike. I introduced myself, dropped a few techy acronyms—HTML, FTP, email—and pitched the idea of sending live dispatches from a motorcycle trip. He hired me on the spot: $25 per dispatch, a great editor, and instant internet notoriety among the 500 people online at the time.
That trip turned into a series of blogs and my first book, American Borders, chronicling my 1995 breakdowns—mechanical and emotional—during a four-month ride around the United States. I was a test rider for Ural America, helping them improve their rugged but temperamental Russian sidecar motorcycles for the American market. My Motorcycle Misadventures series was born and continued in China, India, Europe, Asia, and Africa on equally cranky indigenous bikes, like the Chang Jiang and the Royal Enfield Bullet. I even got to ride a few Moto Guzzis, Indians, and Harley-Davidsons along the way.
In 1998, I rode a 1995 Chang Jiang sidecar motorcycle through Northern China. The motorcycle belonged to Jim Bryant, owner of Jimbo's Classic Sidecars in Beijing, now located in Nevada.
The 1998 trip had a lot more breakdowns than my American Borders journey, but by then I was pretty familiar with tearing apart and putting together the boxer twin engine. About 10 years later I went back to ride another one of Jim's bikes, this one with a BMW engine, around Northern China with friends Teresa and Diny. Here are the dispatches.
Here is a story in Adventure Motorcycle Magazine.
Later in 1998, on a 1998 Moto Guzzi California 1100 EV: Starting in Mandello del Lario, the home of Moto Guzzi, and riding to the southernmost tip of Italy (The Boot) plus the islands of Sardinia and Sicily. I recently bought a 2002 Moto Guzzi Stone, based on the California. I love the rumbly cruiser, the loping 90-degree "inverted" V-twin really has personality. The Wild Writing Women luxuriated in a castle in Tuscany for a week. Otherwise I camped, mostly on beaches. Read the dispatches.
Back home again, I was working as a freelance technical writer in Silicon Valley and in Multimedia Gulch, scripting multimedia CD-ROMs, and was really digging in to explore this thing called the World Wide Web. I'd met my life and sometimes business collaborator Michael Gosney (July 11, 1953-April 28, 2022), in 1994. He lived in San Diego and I lived in Santa Cruz, and in 1995 we moved to San Francisco. Michael was a thought leader in the fields of conscious technology, deep ecology, biomimicry, sustainability, and green economy. His work as a multimedia publisher, festival and event producer, artist, deejay, and psychedelic visionary, was a fascinating journey to share. Though we were very different in many ways, we shared a sense of curiosity about the world and people and how things operated in the consious and subconsious planes. Within the triad of Body, Mind, and Spirit, he was skewed toward Mind and Spirit, and I, toward Body and Mind. The combo worked, mostly.
Michael and me at hist Digital Be-In event n SF 1995, just after returning from my American Borders journey.
The internet was exploding. I authored little guides like Beginner Bikes for Women, that helped new riders make sensible choices—smaller bikes, first! Continuing to write stories about my travels, my writing was published in a lot of webzines and many printed anthologies like Travelers’ Tales and even The Best Travel Writing series.
When I returned from my motorcycle misadventures in China, I joined a notorious group of female adventure writers called the Wild Writing Women. We workshopped stories, drank wine, and laughed until we cried. Together, we self-published Wild Writing Women: Stories of World Travel, and sold 1000 copies in a week. It was so successful it got picked up by a New York publisher, Globe-Pequot—where it languished, forgotten, but it is still loved by readers who find it today. I have never forgotten that lesson. With self-publishing you can sell a book forever, change it, re-release it, and keep it alive. Publishers can kill a book. And they did.
We continued to meet, write, and publish together for many years. I set up a website for the group and produced ebooks and magazines of our writing, including Ireland: The Sacred and the Profane, Taking Flight: An Offering for First-Time Travelers, and Writing: Your Passport to Life.
In 1999, I'd made a bunch of money writing Y2K adjustment manuals for computer systems. Everybody was scared about the changeover to 2000. Exhausted from working double time throughout the previous year, I queried Royal Enfield company, and got a gig to promote their Bullet 500. I flew to Delhi and then Madras (now Chennai), and nabbed a bike at the factory.
This was a crazy journey. India is just nuts to travel and Southern India is more relaxed and slow, so I hear, than the North. To organizez my trip, I decided to ride to each one of the temples dedicated to one of the elements: fire, water, air, ether, earth. I loved this bike so much that I bought one when I got back to the states, but it was not as reliable as my Indian steed. Go to the dispatches.
In 2001 I made a circumnavigation of the Adriatic Sea: Italy, Greece, Albania, Herzegovina, Croatia. I picked a Moto Guzzi 650 Breva at the dealer in Mandello. It was a great bike, except that in Albania, there were no paved roads at the time. Challenging! On my way around the Adriatic, I met the Wild Writing Women, this time in Greece. The Breva was a great ride, a versatile, light, sport touring bike that, maybe with some more dirt-friendly tires, could be turned into an "adventure" bike. Hmmmm... gives me an idea for a project! Sadly, they discontinued the model a few years ago, but you can still find them around.
A few years later I accepted an invitation by Sam Correro, Mississippi-based creator of the TransAmerica Trail map, on a week-long dual-sport motorcycle adventure. It began at 8,000 feet and was a beautiful exploration of the sweeping views of the famously scenic Chaffee County area of Colorado.
In 2009, I heard about this little event in Amado, Arizona, called Overland Expo, which has turned into a huge event. Kind of a Burning Man for Overlanders. Those first years it was an intimate, insider gathering, and I met some of my best travel friends ever, there. As a participant, and instructor, and the pilot of the "how many women can we pile on a Ural sidecar motorcycle at the same time" contest. Yes, it was eventually banned due to safety concerns, after the event was purchased by a corporation.
And Burning Man. Don't get me started! My first burn was 1995 where only about 2000 people attended, mostly in tents. It was not the RV extravaganza that it is today. That first year, we were largely unprepared. Having been advised to bring 2-foot long rebar to stake our shade structure, we were able to keep our camp from blowing away in a dust storm, yay! I had borrowed my mother's Suburban for the trip, and it blew playa dust for three years, every time you turned on the air conditioner. Sorry, Mom! But... worth it! I continued to attend the festival for about 10 years and stopped. Who knows, I may try again, soon.
In 2010, writing, technology, publishing all converged. I started helping other authors self-publish in a program that started as a favor to a few author friends which quickly grew into workshops, online courses, and books. I spoke at writing conferences, and at the SF Writers Conference I organized their self-publishing and technology track. I even taught writing and publishing at travel events, motorcycling events, and overlanding events. It seemed that everybody wanted to blog their journeys and publish their books.
Penning a self-publishing technology column for PBS MediaShift was a great gig for me, a perfect intersection of technology and books. Robin Cutler invited me to sit on the advisory board of IngramSpark. I worked as VP of Biz Dev at the Nonfiction Authors Association for over a year. Hosted the Nonfiction Authors Podcast and the Author Friendly Podcast. And have been a frequent guest on podcasts. And I always love working with authors. If you need help finishing and publishing your book, I'm here! Visit my publishing page for details.
People see me differently depending on which hat I’m wearing: motorcyclist, writer, traveler. But I’m all of those, as well as a hiker, paddleboarder, scuba diver, gardener, and occasional yogi. I'm an avid reader and a compulsive writer, and I wish I had more time for those activities.
I live in Santa Cruz, California, but for a few years, I split my time between California and Baja, penning a column for Discover Baja and drafting a guide to Bahia Concepcion, near Mulege, halfway down the peninsula on the Gulf of California. lMy life is a moveable feast, a constant adventure I wouldn’t trade for anything.
Paddling Bahia Conception near Mulege on the Sea of Cortez.
I hope you’ll join me—whether it’s in my writing, on the road, or online. Follow me, subscribe, say hello. And if you’re thinking about that road trip of your own… just go.
Connect with me on the socials...
- Facebook Virtual Travel Writing Group (join here)
- Facebook Group for Destination Published (join here)
- Join my free Writing and Publishing Circle (for learning about publishing your book)
I look forward to connecting with you!
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