Alastair Humphreys // Rowing the Atlantic Expedition 2012 // Adventurers of the World

Rowing the Atlantic Ocean: Sea Fever

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by alastairhumphreys

An attempt to give some of the flavours of the ocean and try to explain what motivates me to relish challenges such as rowing across the Atlantic Ocean.

Winter is a time for Dreaming, Inspiration! ...Cycling to Light!!!

Around the northern hemisphere of our world, we enter the toughest season for feeling motivated, positive, and determined to achieve our success. 

Do not give up HOPE, just try a little harder to see the LIGHT in the DARKNESS. 

Bicycle riding and bicycle touring are my means to find inspiration between the dark days of winter. Enjoy, I will share this inspiration with you, return if you need a boost of positive energy. Recharge yourself from the inside-out. Exercise is key to your health. (: 

Photos are winter cycling in Korea. The other photos come from HimalayasX2011, an expedition starting in a Dream in Korea,  turning to Adventure starting around Beijing and continuing across western China in the summer of 2011.

Famous Quotes - From those who chose the road to inspiration, never stuck on the ice.

"It is the unknown around the corner that turns my wheels." ~ Heinz Stucke 

"If you worried about falling off the bike, you'd never get on." ~ Lance Armstrong 

 "Anything is possible. You can be told you have a 90 percent chance, or a 50 percent chance or a 1 percent chance, but you have to believe, and you have to fight."~ Lance Armstrong 

"Nothing compares to the simple pleasure of riding a bike." ~ John F. Kennedy 

"When man invented the bicycle he reached the peak of his attainments. Here was a machine of precision and balance for the convenience of man. And (unlike subsequent inventions for man's convenience) the more he used it, the fitter his body became. Here, for once, was a product of man's brain that was entirely beneficial to those who used it, and of no harm or irritation to others.  Progress should have stopped when man invented the bicycle."  ~ Elizabeth West 

"Think of bicycles as ride-able art that can just about save the world." ~ Grant Petersen 

"To all the cynics, I'm sorry for you. I'm sorry you can't believe in miracles." ~ Lance Armstrong

"A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step." ~ Lao Tzu 

 "When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race." ~ H.G. Wells

 "Get a bicycle. You will certainly not regret it, if you live." ~ Mark Twain 

"The bicycle is a curious vehicle. Its passenger is its engine." ~ John Howard

"Things look different from the seat of a bike carrying a sleeping bag with a cold beer tucked inside."  ~ Jim Malusa

 "Cycling is unique. No other sport lets you go like that - where there's only the bike left to hold you up. If you ran as hard, you'd fall over. Your legs wouldn't support you." ~ Steve Johnson

 "After your first day of cycling, one dream is inevitable.  A memory of motion lingers in the muscles of your legs, and round and round they seem to go.  You ride through Dreamland on wonderful dream bicycles that change and grow."  ~ H.G. Wells

"It is by riding a bicycle that you learn the contours of a country best, since you have to sweat up the hills and coast down them.  Thus you remember them as they actually are, while in a motor car only a high hill impresses you, and you have no such accurate remembrance of country you have driven through as you gain by riding a bicycle."  ~ Ernest Hemingway

"Cycle tracks will abound in Utopia."  ~ H.G. Wells

 "Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving." ~ Albert Einstein

WT: Interview upcoming with Tim & Cindie Travis, Downtheroad.org

Being a cyclist and activist for adventure cycling has one advantage: you meet people who love to experience life on the road. Meet Tim & Cindie Travis, the traveling two! Whom decided in 2002 to leave their offices (or classrooms) and travel the world through adventure bicycle touring fueled by their self-supported, sponsorship-driven website & creative self-publishing which all service the inspiring bicycle World Touring (WT) community.

They have now published two books, The Road That Has No End and Down The Road in South America to document their past adventures and provide illustration of the elements required to successfully participate in world touring. Their third book is being prepared for publishing. More information will be provided in the upcoming Korean-World Podcast! The pilot interview will be an opportunity of speaking to them about their equipment choices; sharing their best moments on expedition; and uncover their plans for the next 7 years of their adventure-cycling World Tour.

Their website DOWNTHEROAD.ORG offers information about their explorations and features links to many companies that supply the gear. These cyclists have transformed their lives from suburban Americans to International Explorers and they chose bicycles as their means of transportation and lifestyle.

  

Nature Conservationist: Kai Unu. Communicating with Natural Earth

[Photos/text courtesy of Kai Unu, Conservationist]

his family has been damaged by companies and individuals who pollute its ecosystem

Animals are not objects, they feel and they are wonderful in every way, this should be swimming for example, but for someone stupid, they take it out of his habitat and make this from it's life.

another image made with mobile phone, this was at the mouth of the Rio Rancheria in Rioacha Guajira.

[Photos courtesy of Kai Unu]

Sierra a Nevada vista desde Camarones Guajira [Photo courtesy of: Kai Unu

Hey Kai, I translated your text chat. Thank you! I love cycling, nature and I love meeting amazing people all over the world that have a dream to ride bikes. Your right, I need to practice my language exchanges, especially with Spanish speakers, I will be traveling through Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, Equador, Peru, Bolivia and Argentina in late 2012 or early 2013 I should have arrived in southern Patagonia. This expedition starts at 65 degrees North latitude above the Arctic Circle in the Northwest Territories of Canada and ends in Urshuaia, Argentina.

Hey Kai, he traducido el texto de su charla. Gracias! Me encanta el ciclismo y me encanta conocer a gente increíble en todo el mundo que tienen un sueño de montar bicicletas. Su derecho, necesito practicar mi intercambios lingüísticos, sobre todo con hablantes de español, me va a viajar por México, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panamá, Colombia, Ecuador, Perú, Bolivia y Argentina a finales de 2012 o principios de 2013 I debería haber llegado en la Patagonia austral. Esta expedición se inicia a los 65 grados de latitud Norte por encima del Círculo Ártico en los Territorios del Noroeste de Canadá y termina en Urshuaia, Argentina.

Kai Unu is a Nature Conservationist and Cyclist. He inspires others to see the vision of preserving the delicate ecosystem of mother Earth, we only have one planet to sustain life, therefore, we should start to protect it. These photographs are a powerful reminder of what resources exist in nature, that should be left in nature's element. And we can see what happens when man enters the natural environment and destroys nature, or harms the living creatures that belong there. THINK.