Why We Ride Page #6

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because I didn't know anybody who

rode bikes, and there was no Google.

I'm neither brave nor strong,

and so I realized

that you don't need strength and

bravery to be able to do this,

you just need the

determination to do it.

It got rid of

all my anxieties.

I can't think of a better way

of changing your life

than to lose fears

and anxieties, I mean,

that's the...

that's the main thing.

I wasn't counting miles, I

wasn't even counting countries,

I was just going

'round the world.

There were people where there

shouldn't have been any.

I was like Lawrence of Arabia

coming out of the desert.

So I had these very immediate

and intense relationships

with people all the way around, and

carried stories from one to another.

I don't know how I can convey

the sheer excitement

that I was feeling almost the whole

time about being able to do this.

It's the interruptions that are

the journey, not where you're going.

I swear that never

in those four years

did I ever wish

that the journey was over.

I really wasn't suited

to being home.

I was more comfortable

on the floor than in a bed.

I couldn't do small talk.

I couldn't believe

what was obsessing people.

The problems they were having

seemed be absurd, you know.

Why were they worried

about that?

Things weren't going

right for them,

they were getting

in all sorts of turmoil.

And I thought, it's... nothing.

You're alive,

what else do you need?

I have great trouble coming

to terms with social media.

I simply don't understand

how people have the time

to be so involved in

the lives of so many people,

and I can't imagine how their

interest in those people

can be anything

but superficial.

The advantage of the technology

in this world

is that if you have a really

good idea about what it is

you want to achieve, the technology

can generally make it a lot easier.

The disadvantage is that

having all this technology

probably doesn't encourage

people to have

very great ideas

about things to do,

because it's so easy to just

swim along with the current.

So I went on home from Vietnam. I was

depressed and I was miserable and I was angry,

like a lot of us, and I

just couldn't settle down.

It was nobody's problem

but my own.

And I looked at Israel as a

country that had something together,

they had just fought the

1973 war, the Yom Kippur War.

And, uh, and I said,

"I want a part of that. "

I served two years,

and then I went on to be

in the Rhodesian Light Infantry,

then I went on to South Africa.

I served in a special

organization,

the parachute brigade called

the Pathfinder Company.

August 29th, 1981, about

100 miles up inside Angola,

we were in light vehicle

operations and, uh...

...the light vehicle I was in,

was a Toyota Land Cruiser,

which was a firing platform for heavy

machine guns, 250-caliber Brownings.

And, um, the left rear

wheel of that vehicle

- initiated a Soviet-made TM-57

anti-tank mine. -

When that mine went off, the last thing

I ever heard in my left ear was "pop,"

and I watched

the vehicle going away.

And I said to myself,

"We've hit a mine, I'm dead,

and I'll be answering for my

life in front of God very soon. "

Well, God had other ideas.

And I was transported down

to one military hospital,

Pretoria, South Africa

in a medevac transport,

where I was to spend the next

nine months and 18 days.

During that time,

I underwent 20 operations.

All right. And it left me...

And four of those operations

were amputations,

which left me with

my right leg off...

...above the knee,

and my left leg off just below.

I got out of the Army, and

I went home to my mom and dad.

After a very touching reunion, I was

out in the garage having a reunion

with something to that

time now I'd owned ten years,

and that was a 1972

Harley-Davidson Wide Glide.

Within a few days, my dad and I,

we had it out of the mothballs,

we had it cleaned up, we

had it all put back together,

and we knew we were gonna have to fix

the rear brake for the mechanical knee.

So we extended the brake pedal,

we put overload springs on it,

my dad welded a stirrup

on that pedal,

where my foot would sit

on the brake all the time.

The overload springs compensated

for the weight of the leg,

and the idea was, when I was

driving, I would push on the stump,

that would push on the leg,

that would push on the brake,

that would stop the motorcycle.

And it works most of the time.

Ask my passengers.

And I got out to the freeway,

and I just let go.

And I cannot tell you

the wonderful feeling

of being on that machine,

after four years overseas

in some of the most hateful,

angry places

this world has to offer,

you know, and all of the sudden

I'm moving on my machine again.

What I felt was something

that was so far beyond words,

I can't tell you, you know.

And all of a sudden something hit

me in the top of the head and say...

It was a vision.

It said, "Why don't you ride...

you need to ride this thing

around the world for those that

are more unfortunate than you,

especially in the Third World

countries where they don't have access

to positive examples, like

we do in the United States. "

I left in the

rain, for western France...

- ... across Northern Europe...

- Three days later I made it to the Atlantic Ocean...

- ... Russia, Siberia...

- ... to the UK, and from there...

I went north to the Arctic.

- And headed east...

- Tanzania, Burundi, Rwanda...

...and onto Tunis, the

North Cape, Marseilles...

The bottom of one continent,

to the very top of the other.

And rode back into this

driveway, into this garage,

and the journey

around the world,

three years, seven months,

83,000 ridden miles, was over.

That was to be the establishment

of a Guinness World Record,

something that no one in

recorded history had ever done,

and it had nothing

to do with my disability.

I am 160 percent disabled

and I did what no one's done.

It became more than

a motorcycle.

It was a vehicle for me

to take an idea

about commitment and attitude,

and rising above,

out to the world.

Each motorcycle has its

own soul. They're alive.

I still find it incredible that I

can push that motorcycle out here,

and hit a button,

and it goes, vroom!

Once you get out of

the town, out on some country road,

putting along and taking in all that

energy from all the trees budding,

all the bright greens coming

in, it's... it's awesome.

I love riding first thing in

the morning when the sun's coming up.

It's a magic time, the light's warm and

inviting, and the air is crisp and clean.

I can't imagine a

better way to experience that

than on a beautiful motorcycle.

There's a love and a

passion that can bring people together,

they can have incredible rides,

incredible experiences,

incredible adventures, but there's

always that one common bond.

You're riding down the road,

there's another biker,

and suddenly you guys decide

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