ALL TEXT IS COPYRIGHT CHRISTOPHER P. BAKER LLC AND MAY NOT BE REPRODUCED IN ANY FORM WITHOUT THE WRITTEN CONSENT OF THE AUTHOR

In October 1912, 21-year-old Carl Stearns Clancy and his friend Walter Storey set out from New York City to circle the globe on their 943cc, 7hp, inline four-cylinder Henderson Fours. Given the parlous state of roads, total lack of fuel stations, and relatively unproven technology, this was a feat of true daring. Storey soon abandoned the journey. Fearless and confident, Clancy continued alone, arriving back in New York in August 2013 after completing a 18,000-mile journey via Europe, North Africa, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Hong Kong, China, Japan, and San Francisco. He had made history as the first person ever to circumnavigate the globe on a motorcycle.

As I type, literally scores of adventure motorcyclists are following their own RTW (round-the-world) journeys, while hundreds—perhaps thousands—are pursuing regional-specific long-distance adventures. Most are riding a BMW GS, KLR, KLM, or other dual-purpose motorcycle specifically designed to ford rivers, cross deserts, and conquer rocky terrain, with knobby tires, crash bars, auxiliary fuel tanks, and customized luggage systems, and farkled with GPS, GoPros, emergency SOS devices, mobile travel apps, and other high-tech instrumentation. Much of their trips will be on sealed roads, with no shortage of places to buy fuel. Getting replacement parts in the event of a major breakdown is, as often as not, just a cellphone call away. And so many motorcyclists have completed RTW trips—more than 2,000 according to Grant Johnson, founder of Horizons Unlimited—that today’s riders can tap into no end of forums, websites, and guidebooks offering dedicated guidance for adventure riders.

Clancy and other intrepid adventurers who pioneered the way had no such luxuries. They conquered a more challenging world on comparatively basic bikes, and with ingenuity and inspirational and unconquerable determination. Fearless: The Motorcyclists Who Conquered the Globe profiles these pioneers: their backgrounds, personalities, and motivations, as well as their honored place in the evolution of adventure motorcycling and, especially, round-the-world voyages. 

Not least, of course, Ted Simon’s riveting tale of his four-year (1973-77), 78,000 journey around the world on a Triumph Tiger. Perhaps the most beloved motorcycle touring book ever written, Jupiter’s Travels has sold more than 400,000 copies! As much as anything to date, it paved the way for other moto travelers who revered Simon as a pioneering role model and the acknowledged “godfather” of adventure motorcycling.

Ted Simon and his Triumph Tiger

Spanning more than a century of adventure motorcycling, Fearless: The Motorcyclists Who Conquered the Globe explores the theme chronologically. Along the way, it profiles such RTW greats as...

• Robert Fulton, Jr. (One Man Caravan), for his 18-month RTW journey by Douglas twin in 1932-33
• Hungarians Zoltán Sulkowsky and Gyula Bartha (Around the World on a Motorcycle) eight-year circumnavigation of six continents, 1928-36
• Joy McKean, the first female motorcyclist to circle the globe solo,  1955-57, on a 150cc two-stroke BSA Bantam
• Elspeth Beard (Lone Rider), the second Englishwoman to circumnavigate the globe on a stop-start 1982-84 peregrination by BMW R60
• Helge Pedersen (10 Years on 2 Wheels), for his decade-long (1982-92), 250,000-mile, vagabond’s non-stop journey by air-head BMW R80 G/S
• Emilio Scotto (The Longest Ride), whose own often perilous 10-year sojourn (1985-95) on the most unlikely of bikes—a Honda Gold Wing GL1100 full-dress tourer—logged 450,000 miles for a Guinness World Record
• Sam Manicom, whose eight-year adventure (1991-99) aboard ‘Libby,’ his long-suffering BMW R80 G/S, resulted in four books
• Slovenian Benka Pulko (Circling the Sun), who spent six years (1997-2002) traveling to all seven continents—a world first—on her BMW F650, establishing a Guinness World Record for the longest solo motorcycle ride by a woman

Joy McKean... the first woman to ride solo around the world by motorcycle

“Short” and special-theme journeys also deserve equal time in the sun,. Not least,  who wouldn't want to know about...

• Francis Flood and Jim Wilson’s mind-bogglingly arduous 1927 five-months trans-African journey—the world’s first—using two 5hp single-cylinder Triumphs with sidecars?
• Meanwhile, in 1934-35, Theresa Wallach and Florence Blenkiron paved the way from London to Cape Town on their 600cc single-cylinder Panther motorcycle with sidecar and trailer.
• Danny Liska (Two Wheels to Adventure) is renowned among ADV (Adventure) aficionados of a certain age for his 1959-61 journey from the end of the road in Alaska to Ushuaia and 1963-64 journey from the northern tip of Europe to the Cape of Good Hope.
• Then there’s Ed Culberson, who in Obsessions Die Hard regales his determination to conquer the Darién Gap during two Alaska to Patagonia attempts in 1985 and, successfully, in 1986.
• And, of course, Che Guevara’s Motorcycle Diaries chronicles his journey through South America by Norton 500--perhaps the most consequential motorcycle journey of all time!

Fearless: The Motorcyclists Who Conquered the Globe profiles dozens more individuals--many of them previously total "unknowns"--whose journeys were consequential, from the first RTW by scooter to the first motorcyclist to reach the South Pole.

Along the way, Christopher P. Baker regales the evolution of adventure motorcycling itself... from the introduction of the revolutionary BMW R80 G/S and the subsequent evolution of dedicated ADV tourers to the seminal post-Millennium impact of the Long Way Round TV show... that of drones and social media... and, notably, the massive growth in popularity of ADV riding among females.