I've been on the road for almost 2 years now. When I started, I did not even want to go into my motor to check the valve clearance. Now there is noting I would trust a mechanic to do. If/when something breaks on my bike or I hear a different sound, I look at this as an opportunity to learn the bike.

I also carry spares. The wheel bearings that I carried for 50,000 km came in very handy in Siberia. There are failure modes for every bike. Replace these with better parts before you start.. or as you go.

One thing I've also learned.. don't trust the touratech catalog

This thread should be required reading for any rider starting out! It should be of help to new travelers on several levels, both practical and metaphysical. Kudos to all the experienced riders who've contributed!

I hope our BIG EXPENSIVE BIKE BROTHERS are not too put off by some of the comments ... but reality is ... sometimes you do just have to walk away from your bike. Even carrying massive stocks of spares ... you still may not be able to manage a complex repair in a remote village without expert help.
Not all of us are experts.

But as said by several experienced guys here: If you start off with a reliable bike that you know well and that is 100% trip ready, with many NEW components to start, then you are ahead of the game and improve your odds. Also, carrying appropriate spares for suspect components is also wise.

As far as getting a ride somewhere from remote location, I think it's easier than we may imagine. I've read Walter Colebatch's Sibirsky Extreme report
(the latest one):
Sibirsky Extreme 2012 - The Toughest Ride of Them All - ADVrider

Several of their party hired a truck to drive their bikes all the way from Outer Mongolia (?) to Russia or the EU (??) at the end of their ride. They took 2 or 3 bikes IIRC. Of course the driver was paid. It really helps that Walter speaks Russian.

The KTM 690 rider did have some problems. He got towed a few times and eventually was left behind. IIRC, he got a truck ride to some town to get parts. Then, once the bike was fixed, he powered on and caught up to the group! (I think he had a bad fuel pump?)

Colebatch and friends are probably the premier expert explorers of that region. I imagine any local with room in his truck would be happy be make easy money carting a light weight travel bike any distance.

This is certainly true in Latin America where I have personal experience getting both bikes and injured riders trucked hundreds of miles to help. We ALWAYS insist to pay ... even if refused, we find a way to pay something.
It's just the right thing to do.

There are no reliably good freight or courier companies. The whole industry is based on a labour pool of drivers and clerks who really aren't paid to think and once they have your money and package there isn't a lot you can do. UPs, DHL, FedEx, all as bad as each other. I always pick the one with nearest office. Knocking on the door and asking for your stuff makes it harder to be given the run around, but not impossible.

Andy

It depends...
Is there anywhere to walk? To start walking you need somewhere to walk. If the chances to meet people increases if you walk then start walking.
Your need of water will increase when you walk and this will limit your time, so if water is an issue it might be smart to wait (and hope). Walking at night might be an option.

I've walked 36km through a forrest (lightly injured) in mx-boots and it wasn't nice.
Always use a battery-powered GPS.

IMHO the cost of the bike is not an issue, it's always cheaper to stay at home.

I don't really want to add much to the practical information that others have given as it's all pretty much on the nail but whether a breakdown becomes a disaster or just an interesting day is down to how you approach it. Notice I said breakdown and not accident. It's a different matter if someone gets injured or becomes ill. That takes priority over everything (in many cases you may not have a choice).

If you're away for any length of time everyone has good days and bad days and one of our rules of thumb has been that whoever is having a good day takes charge if there's a problem - even if all they can do is provide some sort of upbeat "we'll get this sorted" message. It's one of the advantages of travelling with other people.

My approach had always been to try and anticipate what might go wrong and work out in advance a kind of graded response depending on how severe the problem is. You have to be prepared to go to the end step on the list though. For example - the bike grinds to a halt in the middle of nowhere. My first concerns would be more about me than the bike - is it 50C in the shade or -50C in the sun and do I have enough water / warm clothing to spend any length of time in this environment. Only after I was happy about that would I turn my mind to what had gone wrong.

Just about every breakdown or problem will fit into one of the following categories -

1. I can fix this myself, here and now.

2. I need better facilities, a base, maybe some spares, some help moving the bike / car etc but I know what's wrong and can sort it out.

3. I need professional help, this is beyond me

4. This is the end of the road for it / me. All I can do is remove the tax disc for refund purposes and head for the airport.

Categories 1 and 4 are the easy ones - if a luggage strap has come undone or the bikes's gone up in flames your options are fairly straightforward - from the bike's perspective anyway. If its a burnt out wreck in the middle of the Sahara and you were on your own you really should have thought it through before heading off. Many years ago I had a bike catch fire in the middle of Athens. I jumped off and ran but someone came out from a local garage with an extinguisher and put it out. I got towed back to my campsite and spent the next couple of days rewiring it. In a more remote area I'd have let it burn - but, I was travelling with other so wouldn't have been stranded.

Ultimately though you have to be prepared just to walk away. I have gone off on so many trips where the interesting part wasn't where I was going but how far I would get. For last year's Elephant rally (a 1700 mile round trip) I went on a bike I'd riden six miles after it had been sitting in a garage for over 25yrs. My backup plan was a kindle and some movies on my ipod while I waited for the breakdown services.

If you're British the breakdown services are easy to use in the UK. One call and they swing into action (kind of). It's what they're there for. It's lightly harder in mainland Europe with language issues etc but it still works eventually. In both cases though, when you phone up, they're expecting to be told about some kind of problem. You don't feel as though you're putting upon the kindness of strangers - it's their job.

For many of us though, having to involve a total stranger moves us well outside our comfort zone. The realisation that, despite all my planning, all my forethought, I'm now dependant on someone taking pity on me. Every time I've been in that position I've had to move mental mountains to kick things off and subsequently been amazed by how generous people have been. OK, often (but not always) cash changes hands (even a couple of times from them to me!) but I've no problem with that as long as it's proportionate. The most important thing though is to be in charge of your own destiny and decide what you want to do

I think that's the main thing, to be prepared to walk away from your bike if its beyond repair, If you cant afford to walk away from it, don't overland on it.
But if you have to leave your bike somewhere fairly remote or hide it off the beaten track (and you are going to find help) and you carrying a GPS, make sure that you save the bikes position as a waypoint, you may not be back for a while, vegetation and landscapes can change quickly especially with rain, some places without prominent landmarks can be difficult to find again. As Ted mentions a duffel or dry bag with shoulder straps to take the essentials with you and always carry extra food and most importantly water.
If you are really going out into the boonies solo or as a pair, then a sat phone/spot for sure, but everyone has their own comfort levels, personally Im not too worried about breakdowns, something normally turns up somehow, as long as you have enough food/water/shelter to cover your ass until someone finds you, most people genuinely want to help. Id be far more concerned about a serious injury that might need a medevac, than my bike breaking.
If your bike is in a country on a Carnet and it has to be abandoned/ left by the road/burned, then make sure you take detailed pictures of it, you will need to convince customs that its a write off to avoid potentially paying duty.

__________________
Cheers
Grif

'11 KTM 450 EXC
'09 Suzuki DR650
'00 Discovery Series 2 V8
'95 Defender 90 300 Tdi Overlander
http://gipperstravels.blogspot.ca

That's a really good point (no pun intended)

Seriously though... I remember travelling back through Argentina back in 2008 and there was an American on the HUBB who had left his broken down GS at someone's house in a non descript location

He was begging anyone to check up on it as the phone number he scribbled down didn't work.. People were happy to help but when they asked they asked, all he could say was "The garage has a red door. Off down a track near some shacks, Somewhere on a 50 mile stretch of road"

No one is going to try to hard to find that one are they. He didn't even know where it was himself.

That bike is probably still there.... Or what's left of it.

__________________
Did some trips.
Rode some bikes.
Fix them for a living.
Can't say anymore.

That happened to me back in the pre GPS days. I'd been to the Elephant rally on my mother's Honda C50 but something went wrong with the clutch on the return trip followed by a shredded tube and a rear wheel collapse. It had stopped outside someones house near the German / Belgian border and the owner kindly offered to look after the bike for me while I returned to the UK via a lift to get parts etc. When I came back a couple of weeks later I couldn't find the house - I hadn't written down the address as I was sure I'd remember it.

Once bitten, twice shy though and I made sure I had a GPS location when I had to walk off and leave my broken down XR600 in the Mauri dessert years later. I also thought to leave my contact details on the bike, something I hadn't done with the C50 either.

If you are not carrying a GPS a few snap shots of the front of the property and any street numbers or signs where you are leaving your bike can jog yours and locals minds.
These days, if there's something written down or an address I need to remember, I tend to take a photo of it, instead of making a note on a piece of paper that I will invariably lose after a few s.

__________________
Cheers
Grif

'11 KTM 450 EXC
'09 Suzuki DR650
'00 Discovery Series 2 V8
'95 Defender 90 300 Tdi Overlander
http://gipperstravels.blogspot.ca

Some of my very best long distance rides have been when my equipment (bike, riding gear, electronics, etc.) have functioned perfectly.

So it is imperative that you ensure your kit is in top form before to start off.

Having said that, I echo what other travelers have said about "issues" being part of the adventure.

When you find yourself in trying or difficult circumstances, be assured that you can know at the time that LATER you will have some great stories!

(That's helped me be patient in times of "troubles" I've encountered along the way.)

You can trust me and Ted Simon when we say this...

IMHO you can also over prepare. I once met a rider at the Elefant rally who'd gone for the full monty police spec alternator, sump heater, thin oils and so on. His R100 was leaking because either the newly fitted sump had been assembled wrongly or the extreme winter oil was just incompatible with gaskets designed in the 1960's. If you are going to do major work, build up to the places its harder to get back from.

Andy

Interesting thread.

The quick answer: you will manage.

During my one year around South America my bike broke down EVERYWHERE. We managed either to fix it ourselves or found help somewhere. We even had to put my bike on the back of a 4x4 once as it died on the road, about 60 miles from Bariloche.

It also got stolen (in Brazil) then retrieved by the police (damaged). We dealt with that with local help (HUBB Communities can be great help in such cases!).

Then again some idiot in Chile crashed into me and destroyed the whole front of my bike…. We were stuck for a month in a small town in southern Patagonia without a motorcycle workshop…. Well, long story, but again, we managed, with plenty of help from local people and got back on the road.

In Vietnam the chain broke on my husband rented bike. Again we found some place to fix that, with plenty of gesturing to communicate.
Etc etc… I have a very long list of examples like these occurring anywhere on our own bikes or rented bikes, in many countries, where the bike won’t start or dies!

Ultimately, most problems on the road can be solved with 2 things: time and money. So make sure you have plenty of time and contingency money. You will need it!

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Maria

www.franglais-riders.com

I've just copied this from a friends status on facebook" Says it all...



"Last Sunday we broke down on our way from Miahcatlan to Zipolite, Oaxaca where we were to meet Pat and Belinda. The bike was trucked 12 kms to San Pedro Pochutla, a small town with not much happening. How wrong could we be!! Every night since we arrived there has been bands and dancing in the main plaza. A local festival has been in full swing and finished last night. We thought tonight would be quiet but there have been school bands/junior banda bands playing. As I type the off key trumpets and bass blast away in my ears. ... you would love it here!!!!!!!!!!!!!

On another note, parts have been ordered and should arrive sometime next week Mexican time! Oh well, more R & R!!"

__________________
Did some trips.
Rode some bikes.
Fix them for a living.
Can't say anymore.

In the words of Ted Simon: The interruptions are the journey.

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Brighty's website: TheBrightStuffDotCom

CURRENT RR WITH REGULAR UPDATES: The Wife Takes on Chlamydia: A South American Retrospective