Dear all,
Thanks for tuning in! I'm very happy to announce that summer has truly arrived to the North East of the England. The weather has been perfect for riding, dry, warm (but not too warm) and, best of all, the roads are full of bikers.
This week has been another busy week. I'm still super busy at work and I've been busy planning Arctic Ride stuff as well as doing usual life things! In fact, on Tuesday I was so busy I had to fit my Arctic Ride stuff in between finishing work and visiting the physio about my hip. The only solution was to hook up my hands free kit (a sat nav holder and a pair of headphone) and do the call from my car on the drive from my work to the hospital.
My call was with Stuart from Nomad Biker. Nomad Biker provide adventure motorcycle travel, survival, and hostile environment training for bikers and travellers and have kindly offered to put me through a course to get me ready for my trip. Now I understand that I'm not riding my bike through the Middle East, Somalia, South America or North Korea, but Norway and the Arctic Circle have their own challenges and its the the sensible thing to do to get some training and knowledge from the experts. During the call with Nomad Biker, we decided it would be a good idea to have the course focus on the kind of things I will be doing rather than some of the usual course content of being kidnapped or bribing coppers (I'm guessing thats what Hotsile training means). My course will focus on wild camping (as I plan to do a lot of this in Northern Norway), solo first aid (in case I fall off the bike or set my hat on fire while cooking) and how to use the motorbike as a survival tool (yeah I hadn't thought of that either). I've also asked for wild animals to be on the agenda as I want to prepared for any wolves, moose or any other of natures delights that might be trying to share my food with me while I'm wild camping..GORDON DOESN'T SHARE FOOD.
The plan is to imitate the conditions I will have in Norway so the course will involve me getting packing up the bike and riding up to Scotland and doing some wild camping of my own. To keep all the knowledge I will gain fresh in my mind, the course will take place next Spring just weeks before I depart for Nordkapp :) Fro more information about Nomad Biker and the services they provide visit their website www.nomad-biker.com you never know, it might just save you life!
The other big news of the week is that I finally got my wife Kirsty to jump on the back of my Suzuki. I've had the bike since March but as I hadn't fitted my top she refused to get on the back for a ride. As the weather has been so good, and the top box is now fitted, Kirsty rode pillion for the first time this year and recorded a Vlog ot treat you all. Check it out below.
To round of this week I wanted to let you all know that my ride last week with Ant to Bamburgh Castle won REALRIDER® ride of the week. REALRIDER® is an web and mobile network for bikers where you can record and share routes amoungst other things. Check it out!
So thats all for this week folks. Thanks for tuning in and viewing my blog. Please keep spreading the word about my trip.
Twitter - 'Follow' @arcticride2014
Facebook - 'Like' Arctic Ride 2014
YouTube - 'Subscribe' - Arctic Ride 2014
Donations - With 100% going to charity Cerebra
CLICK HERE TO DONATE
Ride Safe,
Gordon
Thanks for tuning in! I'm very happy to announce that summer has truly arrived to the North East of the England. The weather has been perfect for riding, dry, warm (but not too warm) and, best of all, the roads are full of bikers.
 |
| I don't live in Seghill but my iPhone thinks that I do |
This week has been another busy week. I'm still super busy at work and I've been busy planning Arctic Ride stuff as well as doing usual life things! In fact, on Tuesday I was so busy I had to fit my Arctic Ride stuff in between finishing work and visiting the physio about my hip. The only solution was to hook up my hands free kit (a sat nav holder and a pair of headphone) and do the call from my car on the drive from my work to the hospital.
My call was with Stuart from Nomad Biker. Nomad Biker provide adventure motorcycle travel, survival, and hostile environment training for bikers and travellers and have kindly offered to put me through a course to get me ready for my trip. Now I understand that I'm not riding my bike through the Middle East, Somalia, South America or North Korea, but Norway and the Arctic Circle have their own challenges and its the the sensible thing to do to get some training and knowledge from the experts. During the call with Nomad Biker, we decided it would be a good idea to have the course focus on the kind of things I will be doing rather than some of the usual course content of being kidnapped or bribing coppers (I'm guessing thats what Hotsile training means). My course will focus on wild camping (as I plan to do a lot of this in Northern Norway), solo first aid (in case I fall off the bike or set my hat on fire while cooking) and how to use the motorbike as a survival tool (yeah I hadn't thought of that either). I've also asked for wild animals to be on the agenda as I want to prepared for any wolves, moose or any other of natures delights that might be trying to share my food with me while I'm wild camping..GORDON DOESN'T SHARE FOOD.
The plan is to imitate the conditions I will have in Norway so the course will involve me getting packing up the bike and riding up to Scotland and doing some wild camping of my own. To keep all the knowledge I will gain fresh in my mind, the course will take place next Spring just weeks before I depart for Nordkapp :) Fro more information about Nomad Biker and the services they provide visit their website www.nomad-biker.com you never know, it might just save you life!
The other big news of the week is that I finally got my wife Kirsty to jump on the back of my Suzuki. I've had the bike since March but as I hadn't fitted my top she refused to get on the back for a ride. As the weather has been so good, and the top box is now fitted, Kirsty rode pillion for the first time this year and recorded a Vlog ot treat you all. Check it out below.
To round of this week I wanted to let you all know that my ride last week with Ant to Bamburgh Castle won REALRIDER® ride of the week. REALRIDER® is an web and mobile network for bikers where you can record and share routes amoungst other things. Check it out!
So thats all for this week folks. Thanks for tuning in and viewing my blog. Please keep spreading the word about my trip.
Twitter - 'Follow' @arcticride2014
Facebook - 'Like' Arctic Ride 2014
YouTube - 'Subscribe' - Arctic Ride 2014
Donations - With 100% going to charity Cerebra
CLICK HERE TO DONATE
Ride Safe,
Gordon