I can’t help feeling sometimes that we’re all rushing through our lives, living so quickly that we’re burning out in the process. Jump on a plane and get where we’re going just as fast as we can. All you would have to do is jump on a plane.’ It wouldn’t be hard, but then it wouldn’t be that challenging either. ‘I wouldn’t mind doing it,’ I told Russ, ‘but I don’t know if it’s feasible.’ It started in Kununurra,Western Australia, and finished in Perth six days later.

I was eager to start on a new adventure.Īs we finished eating I brought up the subject of the Australian Safari: a southern hemisphere ‘Dakar’ with bikes, cars and trucks. At the same time, I couldn’t stop thinking about what I would do once the season was over. It was going to be a cracking finale to the season and I was looking forward to it. Qualifying for the race was over and Dani Pedrosa was on pole. On Saturday night we ate dinner in the hotel. Michael Schumacher himself had ridden it just a few weeks before. He said nothing, but he had to be, didn’t he? I’d be green with envy: a couple of laps on a GP bike that weighs 165 kg and produces in excess of 250 bhp.

I was really excited because I had been invited to do a couple of laps on the back of Randy’s two-seater Ducati on the race day itself. I’ve got a lot of friends in the paddock: Chris Vermeulen, Randy Mamola, Kenny Roberts – it’s a race we always try to get to. In November we flew to Valencia for the last Moto GP of the season. It was now the back end of 2007, and Russ and I were kicking around a few suggestions about what we should do next. Russ Malkin was our expedition leader – he’s also a great friend and along with Ewan had been instrumental in getting not only Long Way Down off the ground but also our first trip, Long Way Round. In August 2007 Ewan and I had completed our ‘Long Way Down’ trip from John O’Groats to Cape Town. The following is an extract from ‘By Any Means’ by Charley Boorman: Charley was accompanied by his good friends Russ Malkin and cameraman Mungo.

The journey included sailing the English Channel in a twelve foot dinghy, riding a helicopter up to Everest and taking a container ship from Dubai to Mumbai, to name just a couple of the 100 different modes of transportation used. The epic voyage started from Boorman’s childhood home in Wicklow Ireland and finished up in Sydney Australia. MCN has teamed up with By Any Means to bring you an exclusive extract of Charley Boorman’s new book, which chronicles his exploits in his latest round the world adventure.īy Any Means is the story of his latest journey, which saw Charley travelling over 20,000 miles through twenty five countries and three continents… by any means.

Ireland to sydney by any means