MOTONOMAD Surviving a 7000km Adventure Film.

When you travel around the world or through different countries on a dirt bike, you see things in a way that you would never see on a bus, on a train, on a plane, walking, cycling, whatever. There's something about getting behind your helmet and just sealing yourself in your own little existence and hurtling along the landscape at 60 to 130 kilometres an hour to ride a bike in extreme terrain isn't really going out of my comfort zone anymore. Years of racing has given me that. I've spent a lot of years racing KDMs, so for me it was no question, I had no concerns about riding an enduro bike, a race bike for that matter, over this distance because it wasn't a race. We pushed them through some pretty serious terrain, but it's a big difference when you're racing a bike as opposed to travelling on one, and I had no doubts that the 500EXE was going to make it, and 99% of the reliability of any motorcycle is all based on the idiot that's controlling it, really. So you can wreck a bike in 10Ks or you can make it last 7,000Ks, and the 500EXEs, they did it that easy, and the condition they're in at the end of this ride. I'd go straight into an enduro on mine tomorrow, and Mark would do the same. Travelling with Kortz has been an experience. The whole reason this came about is because he messaged me on Facebook, believe it or not, about eight months ago, and all he said was, hey man, be good to catch up if you ever need a track to ride at or you want someone to chuck a camera on their head, come down and let me know. He wrote back and said, Kortz, do I have an adventure for you? And then he detailed a list of the most amazing adventure I'd ever heard of. I thought he was joking. And I fired this message back at him saying, well, would you be willing to take a month off work and join me on this adventure? One thing led to another. Hey, I'm in Germany. Explain what's happened. Righty-o. So, a slight screw around. They won't let us take our drone batteries into Austria. So we had to leave the airport, find a courier, which is just over there, and post them to the KTM factory. And then hopefully they race us there and get there at the same time. He could have chosen anyone. He's friends with all the top enduro riders in Australia. The cool thing about Kortz is that he is a good rider. He's a talented rider. And for an adventure of this scale, that was the one thing I didn't want to have to worry about. I didn't want to have to worry about the second person not being able to hold their own on the motorbike. When he said we're going to do between 6,000 and 8,000 kilometers through Europe and end up at the pyramids in Egypt, I was beside myself with excitement. You know, to be offered something like this. And I didn't really understand why I got picked. I can ride a motorbike pretty well. But as far as film, see shots, see all the stuff he wanted to do, I am an absolute amateur at all of that. Send him up and over that rise and we'll, like as he's coming lower, as he's coming through the gap, the skimmet, we'll come up and over and pass him. Okay. He said, Kortz, don't worry about it. You'll be fine. All I need is someone who can ride. I can teach people how to use cameras, but I can't teach someone how to ride. I've set it up for you. So you don't even have to frame it. You don't have to frame it. Don't touch the... I just thought you meant to go up in the middle. No, no, no. That, when you half trigger it, see how it's off to the side? Yeah. Okay. I might have started in the square on you. Yeah, it looks good with the light. Turn your high beam on. That was my sort of first experience of being a cameraman was in Romania. That's where I was tested and thrown into the fire. Crazy river crossings, impossible hills. Adam saying to me, keep up, keep up. You've got to be right there with the camera. Struggled a bit in Romania and dropped it a couple of times. Other than that, he's been there over my shoulder with a GoPro through some of the gnarliest situations. Hello. Be our friend and your friend is not allowed to do it. Because the motorcycle is not allowed here. Yeah, okay. Because nobody sees the motorcycle. Oh, okay. Oh, don't leave that camera bag, okay? Neither are. Not a bike, Sam? No, neither are. Not sailing? Huh? Was he squealing? Yeah. He's on his head and his fingers are going. We came down the best way possible. In the sand. Well, that's all we got out of that ******* battery. I guess you could say he's been the perfect companion for this journey. I need a throw. Fuck off. You try throwing after you've dislocated your shoulder seven times. Adam's been focused the whole trip. A man who's so focused and so dedicated to what he does. He's seen the bigger picture. He's been with me right with everything that I've wanted to do. He's been behind me the whole way and hasn't questioned anything. Everyone said to me, do not go to Egypt. Don't go near Israel. Don't go near any of these places. Everyone was generally concerned for me and Adam. All these points of transit we had ideas of doing were essentially ruined. We started out in Austria not even knowing if we could get to Egypt. So here we are Iskenderun. It's like 30km from the Syrian border. So obviously we're not riding any further. Eventually we got the bikes on a boat. We hopped on a plane. Flew to Egypt. Oblivious to how hard it was going to be when we got there. You can't understand the amount of steps it took just to get two motorcycles out of a port. There's not even spaces to hide anything bad on it. They x-rayed the bikes and everything. And they made it the most. It took us three days to get the bikes out of there. Adam was going insane. It's pretty much been the biggest screw around I think I've ever had to deal with. With anything. I was just over it. It was just a terrible time. That was the only downer of the whole trip. Was that port. Demiette port. Trying to get our bikes out of there. Everyone was dubious about the destination to ride into Egypt. And just given the current status of this country. The stuff the news was sending on TV was just really horrific and bad. 3,000 dead. Buildings burning and stuff like that. We were watching CNN from our hotel room. We wanted to camp. Too scared to camp with what was going on. And the news headline was Giza. Terror attacks again. And there's a police station burning down. And people hiding behind tanks as gunfire was going. And this is while we're in Giza. We had no idea whether we could get there or not. We got there. It was a life changer for me and a life changer for Adam. I just, I guess, went with my desire and belief to come to Egypt. To see it for what it is. Not what the media projects. It has been tough. But we've really seen into the hearts of the Egyptians. And, you know, although it's potentially a dangerous place. 99% of the people in the world are good people. I'm very, very happy for the trip. I've had the most amazing time. I'd just like to thank Adam and Motology Films and all the people behind him. For allowing me to be involved in one man's passion and an epic movie, I hope. It's set us in stone for a lifelong friendship. Because we've covered some ground together, literally. Hey Adam, what are you doing? What are we doing, more to the point parts. We're clearly inside the tent. Safe from the bears and wolves out there on the mountain. And it's the nightly ritual of downloading all the footage. The GoPros, the Canons, putting it all safely onto the hard drives. What's the little black box? The black box, which contains the hard drives, stays with me wherever I go. In a bum bag. It's waterproof. I've got two backups. And no matter what happens, when this tour is over and done with, I have to get on a plane back to Australia with this black box. It doesn't matter if the bikes, the camera gear, all else goes. This black box must get back to Australia. Or we don't have a movie. I hope I can do something like this again. Me and Adam have become great mates because of it. So come with me. And my mate, Port, no, I've got to say Mark. People will go, what the, where's that from? To ride 7,000 kilometres on a bike through seven countries, it's just epic overload really. It fills your mind with so many new experiences, one on top of the other. For us, we're not really going to take it in until we're back in Australia. And I guess looking back on the footage, this is the exciting thing for me. I get to edit a movie. And that was the whole purpose of this project, to create a film. And as much as it's something that I've wanted to do for myself, there was a certain element of pressure there to come good for KTM because they really have supported me big time on this one. And they've effectively given us a couple of bikes and let us take off around the world at our own peril and to the bike's detriment. And I understand what it means to represent a company, but at the same time, things can go wrong. And they had a lot of belief in us and the logistics of trying to get the bikes into Egypt. If anything, this trip has taught me that if you just attempt to make your dreams materialise, then you're already living them. KTM Races www.ktmraces.com