Dreaming of a motorcycle trip to distant climes? This section will help you to plan your trip, whether it's to the next state, country or all the way around the world! Start here!
The Achievable Dream 5-part series - the definitive video guide for planning your motorcycle adventure. Get Ready! covers planning, paperwork, medical and many other topics! "Inspirational and Awesome!" See the trailer here!
You could just get on a plane with your credit card and passport and buy or rent everything you need when you get there. That includes the bike, riding gear, etc. etc.
Gear Up! is a 2-DVD set, 6 hours! Which bike is right for me? How do I prepare the bike? What stuff do I need - riding gear, clothing, camping gear, first aid kit, tires, maps and GPS? What don't I need? How do I pack it all in? Lots of opinions from over 150 travellers! "will save you a fortune!"See the trailer here!
So you've done it - got inspired, planned your trip, packed your stuff and you're on the road! This section is about staying healthy, happy and secure on your motorcycle adventure. And crossing borders, war zones or oceans!
On the Road! is 5.5 hours of the tips and advice you need to cross borders, break down language barriers, overcome culture shock, ship the bike and deal with breakdowns and emergencies."Just makes me want to pack up and go!" See the trailer here!
Tire Changing!Grant demystifies the black art of Tire Changing and Repair to help you STAY on the road! "Very informative and practical." See the trailer here!
With an HU blog, you'll get a lot more readers than in some obscure corner of the web, it's all set to go, no setup required, and it's free! Start your Travel Story Blog right now!
800+ HU Communities in over 115 countries! People who want to meet travellers - yes that's YOU - and can provide local assistance, and may be your new best friends!
Make a DifferenceTips on fundraising or donating time and energy to a cause.
After the big trip - Was the trip the best - or worst - thing you ever did?
Resources and Links
Horizons Unlimited Presents!
Ladies on the Loose! For the first time ever, a motorcycle travel DVD made for women, by women! These intrepid women share their tips to help you plan your own motorcycle adventure. They also answer the women-only questions, and entertain you with amazing tales from the road! Presented by Lois Pryce, veteran solo traveller through South America and Africa and author of 'Lois on the Loose', and 'Red Tape and White Knuckles.'
"It has me all fired up to go out on my own adventure!" See the trailer here!
Meet people who don't think you're crazy for wanting to ride your bike to South America or across Asia! They will encourage you, share their experiences and advice on how to do it!
We're not a big multi-national company, just two people who love motorcycle travel and have grown a hobby into a full time job and a labour of love.
When you decide to become a Member, it helps directly support the site. You get additional privileges on the HUBB, access to the Members Private Store, and more. Of course, you get our sincere thanks, good karma and knowing you're helping to keep the motorcycle travel dream alive. :-)
All contributions are gratefully appreciated and acknowledged.
T-shirts, Calendars, Stickers
T-shirts Cotton or synth sweat-wicking t-shirts with the cool Horizons Unlimited graphic on the front and a snappy slogan (changing every year) on the back.
Calendars Featuring the 13 winning photos from the Horizons Unlimited annual motorcycle travel photo contest!
World Map Sticker for PanniersShow your route on your panniers. Great conversation starter when you meet people on the road!
Travel BooksMotorcycle and travel books to inspire and inform you!
Videos - Watch and Learn!
Horizons Unlimited presents!
Achievable Dream The definitive guide to planning your motorcycle adventure! This insanely ambitious 2-year project has produced an informative and entertaining 5-part, 18 hour video series. "The ultimate round the world rider's how-to!" MCN UK.
"The series is 'free' because the tips and advice will save much more than you spend on buying the DVD's."
Advertisers- Horizons Unlimited is well-established as the first source of reliable, unbiased information on all aspects of adventure motorcycle travel.
We reach a dedicated, worldwide group of real travellers, and are the only website focusing exclusively on long distance motorcycle travellers.
If you sell motorcycles or motorcycle accessories, riding gear, camping equipment and clothing, transport motorcycles, organize motorcycle tours, or have motorcycles to rent, you should be advertising with us!
Ride TalesPost your ride reports for a weekend ride or around the world. Please make the first words of the title WHERE the ride is. Please do NOT just post a link to your site. For a link, see Get a Link.
Search Forums ONLY searches the HUBB, and not well. Use Site Search to search everywhere.
It's a wonderful ride, the sun is shining on the twisty tarmac below our wheels, great view of the sea to our right, dramatic mountains on our left!
The coastal road turns up into the mountains and we stop for a break at a scenic turnout. A friendly stray dog comes bounding up to greet us. He seems very socialized to people. Perhaps someone's former pet? Or perhaps he can smell the doggy treats in Neda's tankbag?
"Awww... who's a good boy? Yes! You're a good boy! You're sooooo good!"
Besides riding around the world, I believe it's now our unofficial mission to feed all the stray dogs around the world.
Oristano. Very pretty, but we don't spend much time here.
We're feeling a little bit tired. I think we're going to call it a day and stop somewhere around here. Yes, I know. We've only gone about 120 kms today and we're already done. Ride for a couple of hours, rest for a couple of days. This travel fatigue is kind of getting out of hand...
So we tried to book a place in Oristano for the evening, but we can't find the same deal we got in Alghero. Too expensive. Instead, we ride about 20 minutes outside of town to stay on a farm just outside the town of Marrubiu.
The couple that owns the farm has a couple of guest suites on site that they rent out to tourists
Surrounded by all this nature, it turned out to be a much more picturesque place to stay than in the city. We just had to ride a bit into the neighbouring town to grab some groceries, since there was absolutely nothing around us.
Preparing to leave the next morning... is it my imagination or is it getting warmer?
Sardinia is not that big, only slightly larger than Corsica at 260 kms lengthwise. So I'm not sure if this warmer weather is the result of us moving further south in latitude or just the daily temperature fluctuations. But we don't complain, as we ride out of the farm into the brilliant, sunny day without any sweater or any base layers on underneath our mesh motorcycle jackets. I can't remember the last time it was this warm!
Not a cloud in the sky and there's mid-20s on the forecast for today. Nice!
Today we are going to try to hug the western coast as much as possible, all the way until the edge of the land curves from south to east
Somewhere near the southern shores, we spy this fantastic beach from the road
I'm not really sure where we are, we're just exploring all the little roads that follow the shoreline. Later on I try to retrace our route on the map. I believe this is Capo Pecora.
We want to get as close to the water as possible. Trying to find a way down to the beach
I think this epitomizes what we love most about riding motorcycles around the world. Just wandering around with everything you need and own on the back of your bike. No schedule... if you see something interesting, just pull over and take all the time you want to explore without rushing to meet some kind of deadline. It culd be a monument or a vibrant, major metropolitan city. Or it could just be a pretty, deserted beach out in the middle of nowhere.
The world truly feels like our oyster.
Continuing our shoreline trek, lots of empty sandy beaches around but no tourists
We arrive at the southern end of Sardinia, near the port town of Cagliari.
Exhausted.
Relaxing in Quartucci, at the very end of Sardinia
We've booked a couple of nights at a really nice guest house in the suburb of Quartucci, cheaper than staying right downtown near the ferry. Which means it's decision-time, once again.
We never really resolved our "discussion" in Marseille. I wanted to go to Tunisia. Neda wanted to drop the bikes off in Croatia and fly to Thailand.
I admit that the Corsica -> Sardinia side-trip was a trick to get Neda to eventually come around to crossing over to Northern Africa. I told her, "Let's just traverse the islands, it'll be sunny and lazy and we can take our time. We'll ride down the western side of the islands, and when we get to the tip of Sardinia, if you don't want to go to Tunisia, we'll just come back up the eastern side of the islands and go straight to Pula."
Come on, I can't be the only guy to ever beg a girl: "Just the tip"...
Hey, there's a Pula in Sardinia! Who knew...
Well, here we are at the tip. And I'm friggin' exhausted. I can't continue riding into Tunisia, let alone back up Sardinia and Corsica again. I just want to catch a ferry straight to Croatia right now, dump the bikes and lie on a beach forever in Thailand.
Neda smirks knowingly. She knew I'd run out of energy. My little "Just the tip" scheme backfired spectacularly.
We're too tired to even ride back up through the mountains on the east coasts of Sardinia and Corsica. Now that we've decided to leave Europe, we find ourselves in a great rush to get the heck outta here.
Since we've both agreed not to venture any further south, the ferry at Cagliari is useless to us. The only boat back to mainland Europe leaves from Olbia, 275 kms away on the northeastern corner of Sardinia. We don't even think about it. The next morning we jump directly on the highway and within hours we're checking in at the ferry that will take us away from the islands.
It took us four whole days to wander down Sardinia and now that we're on a mission... three hours to come back up!
No pictures of the boring highway ride back.
But here's one of the ferry back to mainland Italy
Ten hours later, we're spit out onto the shores of Genoa.
From here, we're planning on heading east back to Croatia to dump the bikes and fly to Thailand.
Neda had a thought. Since we're going to be passing through Cinque Terre on the way to Pula, why not drop in and see the famous Italian Riviera? It's on the way...
Sure. Why not?
Beautiful southern shores of Italy
As the name Cinque Terre suggests, this part of the Italian Riviera is comprised of five towns. Although the towns are all within 20 kms of each other, it's still too much to see in a single day, so we're going to set up a base at a campsite on the west end, in a town called Sestri Levante.
Riding out to our campsite. This whole area reminds us of the Amalfi Coast, further south on the boot of Italy.
Our HQ for the next couple of days
We had actually wanted to visit Cinque Terre when we first landed in Europe back in 2014, but when we got close, Northern Italy experienced severe flooding, so we skipped the Italian Riviera. This part of Italy frequently gets flooded. The worst one was back in 2011, nine people were killed and there was extensive damage to several of the villages.
Heavy rains in the spring of this year led to extensive landslides which closed down several hiking trails and roads. Several months later, the roads still haven't reopened. This means that we have to take the main highway all the way east to La Spezia and then double back to visit the villages of Cinque Terre.
This is unfortunate. There's a system of narrow, twisty roads that connect all the villages, and it runs along the cliffs overlooking the Mediterranean Sea!
Routing through the city of La Spezia
La Spezia is pretty, but it's not one of the old villages of Cinque Terre
We make it to our first Cinque Terre town: Monterosso al Mare
Wonderful pastel-colored buildings line the pedestrian streets. It's definitely off-season, but there are still a lot of tourists enjoying the Riviera's warm, late-fall weather.
I found out that the buildings were only painted these pastel colours in the 1970s
Have YOU ever wondered who has ridden around the world? We did too - and now here's thelist of Circumnavigators!
Check it out now, and add your information if we didn't find you.
Check the RAW segments; Grant, your HU host is on every month!
Episodes below to listen to while you, err, pretend to do something or other...
2020 Edition of Chris Scott's Adventure Motorcycling Handbook.
"Ultimate global guide for red-blooded bikers planning overseas exploration. Covers choice & preparation of best bike, shipping overseas, baggage design, riding techniques, travel health, visas, documentation, safety and useful addresses." Recommended. (Grant)
Ripcord Rescue Travel Insurance™ combines into a single integrated program the best evacuation and rescue with the premier travel insurance coverages designed for adventurers.
Led by special operations veterans, Stanford Medicine affiliated physicians, paramedics and other travel experts, Ripcord is perfect for adventure seekers, climbers, skiers, sports enthusiasts, hunters, international travelers, humanitarian efforts, expeditions and more.
Ripcord travel protection is now available for ALL nationalities, and travel is covered on motorcycles of all sizes!
What others say about HU...
"This site is the BIBLE for international bike travelers." Greg, Australia
"Thank you! The web site, The travels, The insight, The inspiration, Everything, just thanks." Colin, UK
"My friend and I are planning a trip from Singapore to England... We found (the HU) site invaluable as an aid to planning and have based a lot of our purchases (bikes, riding gear, etc.) on what we have learned from this site." Phil, Australia
"I for one always had an adventurous spirit, but you and Susan lit the fire for my trip and I'll be forever grateful for what you two do to inspire others to just do it." Brent, USA
"Your website is a mecca of valuable information and the (video) series is informative, entertaining, and inspiring!" Jennifer, Canada
"Your worldwide organisation and events are the Go To places to for all serious touring and aspiring touring bikers." Trevor, South Africa
"This is the answer to all my questions." Haydn, Australia
"Keep going the excellent work you are doing for Horizons Unlimited - I love it!" Thomas, Germany
Horizons Unlimited is not a big multi-national company, just two people who love motorcycle travel and have grown what started as a hobby in 1997 into a full time job (usually 8-10 hours per day and 7 days a week) and a labour of love. To keep it going and a roof over our heads, we run events all over the world with the help of volunteers; we sell inspirational and informative DVDs; we have a few selected advertisers; and we make a small amount from memberships.
You don't have to be a Member to come to an HU meeting, access the website, or ask questions on the HUBB. What you get for your membership contribution is our sincere gratitude, good karma and knowing that you're helping to keep the motorcycle travel dream alive. Contributing Members and Gold Members do get additional features on the HUBB. Here's a list of all the Member benefits on the HUBB.
helps answer the question - Why Go? Inspirational stories by veteran travellers Greg Frazier (5 times RTW), Peter and Kay Forwood (193 countries), Tiffany Coates (Mongolia Mayhem) and Rene Cormier (University of Gravel Roads).
Get Ready! covers planning, paperwork, medical and many other topics! "Inspirational and Awesome!" See the trailer here!
What stuff do I need - riding gear, clothing, camping gear, first aid kit, tires, maps and GPS? What don't I need? How do I pack it all in? Lots of opinions from over 150 travellers!
break down language barriers, overcome culture shock, ship the bike and deal with breakdowns and emergencies."Just makes me want to pack up and go!" See the trailer here!
Grant demystifies the black art of Tire Changing and Repair to help you STAY on the road! "Very informative and practical." See the trailer here!
Ladies on the Loose! For the first time ever, a motorcycle travel DVD made for women, by women! These intrepid women share their tips to help you plan your own motorcycle adventure. They also answer the women-only questions, and entertain you with amazing tales from the road! Presented by Lois Pryce, veteran solo traveller through South America and Africa and author of 'Lois on the Loose', and 'Red Tape and White Knuckles.'
Cotton or synth sweat-wicking t-shirts with the cool Horizons Unlimited graphic on the front and a snappy slogan (changing every year) on the back.
Show your route on your panniers. Great conversation starter when you meet people on the road!
Motorcycle and travel books to inspire and inform you!
The definitive guide to planning your motorcycle adventure! This insanely ambitious 2-year project has produced an informative and entertaining 5-part, 18 hour video series. "The ultimate round the world rider's how-to!" MCN UK.
446Likes
Linear Mode
