Many thanks for your detailed and very thoughtful post. Much of it I recognise and share.

I do think that these are issues that affect, or will affect most of us. I fully admit that when younger, I paid little heed to the thought of being older.

I was interested too, in people's response to this, if any. It's actually about keeping on riding, and adapting to changing circumstances. However, like Ogri, "I've still got my bike"!

Beyond agreement or disagreement, I like your post. It's thought-provoking, honest and respectful; some may not agree, as said, but that's a different issue. It's a good starting point to hear opinions. Some are really nice to read. It comes to my mind Clifford T. Ward's song "Thoughts from Abroad": [I've been reading Browning, Keats and William Wordsworth], Well I like the words they use, and I like the way they use them.

I agree with many points and see no contradictions between what you stated and what others said against. I tend to position myself a lot, but here I cannot see a clear statement 100% right, but many nuances.

Not the big issue discussed here, but I'm sure I profoundly dislike the BMW GS+Touratech+Sunday coffee life-style. I may not go anywhere far, but I prefer that to be a pretender.

Esteban

Right, I've had a couple of glasses of red so I'm hoping what I say makes sense.

I agree with what a lot of the OP says. It's become something of an obsession here. Not at retiring age yet but seriously looking forward to being able to get away more. We've noticed how much the cost of everything has increased over the last few years. Increased costs at home have meant there is now much less 'disposable income' to spend on breaks and holidays. Fuel costs are a major issue making it more expensive to go any distance on our old airhead than use our modern diesel car.

Dreams of 4/5 star hotels on our bike tours are just that (dreams) so we're looking at ways of making camping more comfortable (we like camping but unless you do it a lot it takes a while to get used to it).

We don't have as much opportunity for hopping on a cheap Ryan air/Flybe as people living in the UK but we do have the advantage of being only a few hours from Biarritz, the Pyrenees, Barcelona, Marseille etc. which is a big plus, however the prices for hotels and food in big cities is generally beyond our means.

I enjoy meeting up and riding with other adventure bikers but personally can't bear standing around all day with the express purpose of talking about bikes, so avoid the Ripley and Ace cafe stuff as much as I can. I'm also stongly anti farkles - in my book it's either essential or a waste of money

No no no! It's: "I've still got me bike"!
And a brilliant summing-up it is.

Like BoB above, I often give thought to all the different opinions and outlooks and ideas featured all over the HUBB, but usually I can't relate to many of them.
And I wonder why.
In the end I think it's mainly down to personal circumstances, your 'baggage' or experiences and influences from the past.
The possibility of being influenced by individuals isn't often mentioned. We've had Ted Simon and Charlie&Ewan brought into posts above, which indicates to me that probably they are amongst the people with the biggest influences at the moment, albeit at opposite ends of the spectrum I think.

On the other hand, how many members of these forums would say their parents have influenced them insofar as riding motorbikes is concerned?
My dad, a lifetime rider (mainly sidecars 1960s to 80s, bicycles before) is still a big influence for me I think, which might put me in a minority. And maybe is why I don't relate to a lot of what is on the HUBB. But notwithstanding that, these forums are a big resource for me and I read a huge amount of what gets posted, and enjoy it all and take note.
There are as many different views about riding a motorbike across continents as there are people doing it. And it will always be so, I think.

On the question of where we are now and what the future holds, it looks to me as though the popularity of riding off into the sunset continues to increase or at least remains steady. The changing stability of borders and countries has always been a factor and always will be. Ditto personal spending power. And fuel costs are probably the third major factor but that too has had its spikes in the past (for some of us - still have the ration books).

So routes, modes of transport, and sizes of vehicles will always change to suit the world situation and personal circumstance, at any given time. As it has done in the past.
For instance, it seems to me over the last 1 to 2 years, the popularity of going east (from UK) towards eastern Russia and SE Asia has increased enormously, while fewer are going to Africa. And the size/costs of bikes in use seems to be going down. (Standby for the major 'farkles' merchandisers to launch their new range of overlanding gizmos for the Honda C90!)

And there's a lot to say for the "travel to nearby places, look further while there" philosophy. If nobody is hearing that now, I think they may do in the future. It has a lot going for it, which I'm beginning to find myself and hope to explore more. (Although maybe, in reality, it's not much cheaper than overlanding on a distant continent).

For one thing that isn't mentioned much above, (just one brief reference), is health. And you need it more than money.
Consequently I find there's a lot to keep me interested in researching places nearby; finding I can travel there easily by bicycle, stay a good while and still see new things. And as I've learnt from a few long bicycle trips in the past, fuel costs don't matter.

Yep, I've always got me bike(s)!
(And a bus pass now, - which changes everything yet again!)

__________________
TTR250 - London to Cape Town

Corrrection fully accepted on the Ogri quote. "Moybe its becorz Oi ain't a Londonaa"....

And there's a lot to be said for the Honda 90.

Given that some of the posts here are thoughtfully written, some may care to look at
http://International Journal Of Motorcycle Studies
for something a cut way above the bike magazine stuff with its talk of "loads of grunt" and "grin factor" clichés..

McCrapkin refered to some thoughtful points... (as usual).

Of course, travelling by motorcycle now is MUCH easier now than it has ever been and I'd say that -as for travel by any other means to remote regions- the main reason IMO is the easy access to information, call it internet (forums as HUBB, LP Thorn Tree, etc) and quick/cheap communication as e-mail, fax, etc. Add these new technologies to security, such as GPS, Satellite phones, and SPOTs and similars. It's tailwind!

In the past, it was jumping into the unknown. Now you know what to expect, that's the main difference. I guess that if this access to information/communication were not here, less than 10% bikers would be accessing very remote areas. But that's happening in many fields: how many used to dive in the past? Now it's easier, safer, etc.

BUT, I understand that (obviously) Caminando's opening post takes that into account, since this is the time we are living in, but nonetheless, some factors may look to be against.

Totally agree it's never been easier. I 've often thought about those early riders and the sheer heroism of what they did.

BTW, I think the contribution of Ted Simon and Ewan & Charley are pretty different.

LWR showed that it could be done and relatively easily. "If these guys could do it, then I could as well". Otherwise, you did not get that they are actors "at work". No doubt, they made A LOT for overland biking (whatever the term), since they showed it at a big scale. So thanks for that contribution, which is being very inspirational.

While Ted Simon's approach is much more cultural, sort of a great personal growth, a long-term experience (not a 3 month RTW which sounds more like an organized tour in LWR). Sure LWR helped to boost his sales of books (as it did with BMWs!), as sad as it sounds, not the other way around. By contrast, by no means I would consider myself capable of crossing the Nubian desert in the same conditions Ted did it.

Many people in quiet areas of the UK like mine will never have a passport, however cheap and easy it may become to travel everywhere!

Will bikes/cars/vans/trucks of tomorrow actually be any use for travel far from a dealer once California's and Boris Johnson's plans come to fruition?

Do we have more time now than "back in the day"?

I've spent a fair amount of time on two feet exploring some of the greener bits of the UK, and am always amazed at the history thats gone before. I was told it would take 25 years to walk every street just in Londons City. There is so much history in the UK and Europe in depth and breadth I really don't want to waste one more second at work!

How anyone can be happy with two weeks a year on the beach in Spain I'll never fathom!

Jason

One of the issues mentioned here and many times elsewhere is the cost of petrol. Maybe someone with a better memory than me will correct me and maybe my calculations are incorrect after a few glasses of wine.
Around 1970 in the UK I seem to remember £1 would buy almost 3 gallons of fuel. That's around £0.35 per gallon. I started my first job in 1970 as a Heating and Ventilating Design Engineer. I was told when qualified I could expect to earn about £1500 pa. So on that basis a years salary for someone with a decent job would buy them around 4,285 gallons. (As an apprentice on £6 per week I struggled to put even a gallon a week in my little Bantam)
Today, if we say the equivalent job would pay around 40K and £1.30 per litre is about £5.90 per gallon, a years salary would buy around 6,760 gallons.
So we moan like mad about the price of fuel but in real terms it has actually gone down quite a lot in value. (Or am I out by a factor of 10 somewhere along the line?(
That's no excuse though for the government taking such a large % in tax and then squandering it.

Strangely, yesterday I was looking through an old motorcycle mag from 1970 that I found in the loft and there was a reference to petrol at eight shillings a gallon (and how expensive it was!). That's 40p in current money or about 9p a litre. On the income side my new graduate salary a couple of years later was the same £1500/yr that you mentioned.

These days though a similar new graduate job would only attract about £20,000 (or so my new graduate son tells me) so if £40K is a reasonable current income for a heating etc engineer he might have made a poor choice at uni . My rule of thumb though that prices have gone up x10 since the early/mid 70's would suggest that science graduate salaries have roughly kept pace and it's heating engineers that have moved up the ladder.

When he does get a job his £20k will buy him 3350 gals of petrol (at the price my local garage is selling it ) whereas I could have bought 3750. A little better but not a huge difference. I did wonder whether bikes had become cheaper / dearer over the same period but not a single advertiser in the mag quoted prices. I do remember though going to Morocco in 1970 two up on one bike (Yamaha 250) and it cost us £22.00 each. That £44.00 would be roughly the equivalent of about £600 now. Anyone think that's a reasonable budget for two people to go from London to Tangiers including ferries, fuel and (very downmarket) camping over just short of three weeks?

A good point about prices related to income, I think this can be applied to much of the cost of travel, bikes for instance, my 1991 R80GS was a years take home pay for me at the time, a new F800GS is closer to 8 months take home pay in the same job. People tend to get rose tinted spectacles about the price of things and forget how much less they earned way back when.