Riding the World: The Biker's Road Map for a Seven Continent Adventure [Paperback]

Greg Frazier has been around the world 4 times on a motorcycle, clearly he has a wealth of knowledge and experience, but mostly only disappointingly vague generalities are included in the book.

The chapter on shipping motorcycles starts "There is no one simple way to ship your motorcycle across the US or around the globe." This is something I already knew before I bought the book! Describing the details of shipping his bike from Vladivostok to Los Angeles, Greg writes "Three weeks went by; then, the Russian air cargo company demanded an additional 25% be wired to a numbered account." Readers seriously contemplating a RTW trip will want to know: How much was the originally quoted cost? What was the name of the company? Did they offer any explanation for the cause of the delay? Instead of helping readers avoid a similar bad situation, this story included in "Riding the World" may only be repeated time and again by RTW riders because readers are not given enough information to avoid the shipping company Greg used.

Many readers will be interested in the amount of money a RTW motorcycle trip may cost. From the book: "One American couple spend between $250k and $300k on their ride around the world. At the other end of the scale, there are riders who claim to have spent only about $10 per day." What would be tremendously illuminating here would have been the inclusion of Dr. Frazier's own data from his rides: year(s) of ride, days riding, days not riding, amount of cash spent of gas, oil, maintanence, border/customs fees, mechanical difficulties encountered, and shipping the motorcycle as well other expenses. Indeed, a modestly detailed 5-10 page write up of each of his RTW trips with included map and financials could have easily made this a 5 star book. The world being a continuously changing place, I doubt anyone would expect or want to identically duplicate anyone's prior trip, but specific knowledge of what someone did experience before may give the first timer a basis of what to expect on a RTW trip.

Putting down the book, I really can't say that I have any greater knowledge of how to plan and what to expect on a RTW motorcycle trip than before I bought the book.

However, the details on preparing a Kawasaki KLR 650 and BMW GS motorcycle are reasonably well done (and the only thing in the book that buoyed my rating to 2 stars instead of 1).

There are several tid bits of useful information in the realm of adventure travel.

This interlaced with personal stories makes for an entertaining read.

Although not as nuts and bolts as "Adventure Motorcycling Handbook" I would consider it a welcome addition to my collection although not an entirely necessary one.

The easiest way to review this book is to note that it compares rather unfavorably to the Adventure Motorcycling Handbook (AMH). It's a breezy read with a few important pointers, but once again, nothing that isn't covered in other, better books.

With that said, the prose isn't exactly hackneyed, and if you're seriously contemplating riding a motorcycle around the world you should probably spend the $14 for this book--who knows, it might emphasize the one piece of information that will save you out on the road. On the other hand, if you're just trying to figure out if long-distance unsupported motorcycle travel is for you, buy the AMH.