In order to kick start our fundraising campaign for the main expedition and well and truly start our fight against modern day slavery, we decided to do a tour of the UK on our 125cc motorbikes. We figured it would be an excellent opportunity to try out living on the road and also give us a chance to start spreading our message. Here’s what happened…
Living in London can feel a bit claustrophobic at times. All of that concrete keeps you from getting to what the UK is really about: it’s unbelievable countryside. From the South West’s perfect sandy beaches to Scotland’s snow-capped Cairngorms, we were expecting to go on an adventure that would allow us to really enjoy the sheer beauty of Great Britain. How wrong could we be?
The reality of the situation was far worse than we had anticipated. We knew that Lands’ End to John O’Groats was quite a journey and that doing it in winter while camping would be a little chilly but we really didn’t expect it to be quite as hard as it was. In the end, we travelled a gruelling 2200 miles on our over-packed, beaten-up 125cc learner bikes. The route looked a little bit like this:
We always knew we’d rack up some serious mileage and that the bikes would struggle but what we didn’t expect was the persistence of the rain. Over the 12 days of travel we had very little respite from the wet conditions and although we had some okay gear, we were completely soaked for 95% of the journey. To give you an idea, this is what the driving conditions looked like for most of the trip:
Driving in those conditions was, at times, soul destroying and a bit scary. Equally, the Great British countryside that we thought we would see stayed hidden behind a screen of cloud and fog. Which essentially meant we sat on our own in the cold, soaking wet, uncomfortable and bored out of our minds for up to 14 hours a day. Which left us feeling a little like this:
It wasn’t all doom and gloom though, the other 5% of the trip was incredibly rewarding and amazingly made the 95% worthwhile. We had some fantastic views, especially up in Scotland. They looked a little bit like this:
But more importantly we were finally able to get our message out to a few more people. We were welcomed in to a couple of schools and did talks at Devonport High School for Boys, in Plymouth, as well as, the place ultimately responsible for this ridiculous expedition, the Warriner School, which wasn’t where Harry met Sally but where Matt met Reece. It was great to share our message and talk to some inspiring young people who were really interested in the expedition. Here’s a quick clip from the talk in Plymouth:
After thousands of miles, multiple breakdowns and even a trip to A&E, the trip finished with a gig night at The Tattershall Castle in Central London. The proceeds from which, along with donations we received on the journey, meant that we doubled our fundraising total to over a £1000 in just two weeks!
All in all, our first experience on the road was tough but worthwhile. Oh, and because Reece got a disgusting infected blister, we only had to camp once – apparently it was the doctors orders.
You can see all of the videos from the trip on our Facebook page or read updates from the journey on our IndieGoGo page.
Post on the board