Pacific Coast Highway... Simple as it is, this route was given the number "1" in the California highway numbering system. I suppose they had the map open on the table and started numbering the roads from left to right. It is one of the most spectacular roads in California. The heavy commercial traffic between San Francisco and Los Angeles is directed to Interstate 5, a more inland and flat road, so most of the people you see on California 1, are either locals, or there to enjoy the road. Tourists from all over the world come to California to do ...Read More

I was very excited when Grant had asked me to make a presentation of my journey at the HU California meeting. I started working on it as soon as I arrived in San Francisco. I only had a few days. Horizons Unlimited began as a small travel website Grant and Susan Johnson used on their travels around the world back when the Internet was a new thing. Soon they started getting so many e-mails with questions and comments, that they decided to make it into a database to share all the information they had related to motorcycle traveling. Currently, it is ...Read More

The bus drive to Incheon airport, through the morning mist felt like a dream as I watched the countryside through the foggy windows falling into sleep occasionally. Soon I found myself in the airplane rising above the clouds. After a short transfer in Tokyo and a long flight over the Pacific, we landed in San Francisco. I entered the passport and customs line. There were more than 10 booths and hundreds of people waiting. I enjoyed the fact that despite the technological and organizational differences, this whole thing was essentially in the same category with most of the other borders ...Read More

I met a nice girl here in San Francisco. We checked into a hotel and I think we'll be staying for a few days. Read More

Sokcho surprised me. I was expecting a small fishing town dominated by a large port. What I saw was a clean-cut, modern city with banks, shopping malls, parking lots etc... I needed to pay a rather large amount of cash to the shipping company. One of the agents drove me to the nearby bank in his brand-new super-silent Hyundai. The large GPS screen displayed something that looked like a "Hello Kitty meets Sim City" version of a navigation software. There was an animated character who was constantly happy that we were driving to the bank. This was my introduction to ...Read More

The Dong Chun itself is like a piece of the far eastern land. The ship and the crew is very Chinese. It operates between Zarubino, Russia and Sokco, South Korea. For me, it was a way of skipping North Korea as there is no way of riding a motorcycle as a foreigner in this weird country. The lights of the seaside towns was all I could see of it. The voyage takes about 16 hours excluding the amazingly long waiting time as they load and unload cargo. It took about 7 hours to leave the port of Zarubino. It's not cheap. Customs ...Read More

During my days in Chita, I met a nice guy named Max. He was interested in what I was doing so we spent some time talking and exchanging views. He helped me look for a new tire, which proved to be a useless struggle, and get the new suspension from the DHL office. We also talked a little bit about Amur Highway. Max drove this road more than a few times so he seemed to know it well. As I was leaving the town, I expected to spend at least 10 days on this part. It felt quite exciting and maybe ...Read More