Bridget comes from a riding family, and when she was considering her first bike, her brother made it really easy. “Get a Kawasaki Ninja. They’re not expensive and you can basically drop it off the side of a building and not do much damage to it.” So at 19 she listened to him and purchased a 2004 dark blue Ninja 250 for $1,400.
Bridget and her Ninja
She rode a little that winter near her home in Wisconsin, but when spring came, she got the itch to visit some old colleagues and volunteer as a deckhand on the The Lady Washington, one of only 30 tall ships left in the world. So she packed her things and rode to Washington. In three days. On a Ninja 250.
When I heard about this ride, I was intrigued. Bridget was just wired differently. She didn’t really plan her route. She didn’t think about how much she could ride in a single day. She just grabbed some things and she rode. Which is why she will be the youngest person to ever ride around the world on a motorcycle.
When I connected with her, she was in Oaxaca. We quickly switched from Google Meet to Whatsapp because of spotty service, and then got into her ride.
It all started when her older brother realized that she’s young enough to set a new world record for riding around the world on a moto.
Bridget's brothers, Thomas, Sean Paul, and Michael
There were a few rules:
- First, she had to be on the same bike for the entire trip. She didn’t really understand this one, because “riding is about the ride, not the motorcycle!" but so be it.
- Second, the ride has to be at least 24,900 miles long, which is the length of the equator.
- Third, she must start and end in the same place.
- Fourth, she needs to be making forward progress every two-week period. So she can’t decide that she’s going to stay in Lima for a month.
- And finally, she must ride over two antipodal points, which are points on the exact opposite side of the globe. Hers are in Russia north of Mongolia (near Lake Baikal, the deepest lake in the world) and the other is in Peru.
If all goes well, she will finish in August, when she’s 22 years old, beating out Henry Crew, the current record holder who was only a year older.
Bridget started the trip in Wisconsin on August 10th and spent the first two months riding in the US and seeing friends. She recently crossed the border into Mexico, with a very smooth border crossing at Baja. After Mexico, she hits Panama and then Columbia. Bridget is currently researching how to cross different borders around the world.
Although she did some planning, she’s open to exploring and allowing to pace herself. Unlike her three-day trip to Seattle, where she averaged 650 miles a day, she is limiting herself to 200 daily miles. It takes her around eight hours to ride this distance on her Versys 300 (yes, you read that correctly), but she said the bike is perfect for Central America and South America and the roads and speeds there. Also, this slower pace allows her to meet people along the way.
For example, in San Luis Portosi, she met Yuri, “A Russian man who was riding a small motorcycle around.” Yuri (ig: @elvaqoruso or visit his youtube page here) and his friend Andrea joined Bridget along the ride, and they experienced Día de Muertos (the day of the dead) together in Mexico.
Or Maria the glass artist, “an older German woman,” who she met on the beach in Baja (her Facebook page can be found here). This artisan lived up the road and would stop at the beach every morning to go swimming. Bridget was inspired and awed by her intricate creations.
Some of Maria's glasswork
As she rides, she stops wherever she wants and does some wild camping, or camping outside of campsites. She said that in Mexico, this is more difficult because unlike the US - where the Bureau of Land Management has designated space for wild camping - the available space is limited. So she’s resourceful. She tries to camp near rivers and has had luck staying on an abandoned property near the ocean. When she’s not this lucky, she will meet people along the way, and offer them 50-100 pesos for the ability to camp on their property. In more urban areas, she stays in a hostel.
When I asked about how she’s planning for repairs, she said “I have some basic tools for minor repairs, and if something happens that’s more major, I’ll just figure it out. Hopefully, there is a Kawasaki dealer close by!” Her basic tools include a tire patch kit, a cycle pump air compressor, an extra inner tube, basic tools for minor repairs, and two MSR bottles, one for extra fuel and the other for her stove. She’s also having a fuel pump and spare clutch cable sent to her in Panama City. Her views on running out of gas? She’s not too worried. “Roads take you to people, and where there are people, there’s gas.” However, she also has a two-gallon fuel bag that she plans to use in the future as her riding becomes more remote.
So what worries her the most? “That’s easy. Running out of money.” She started with $19K and thought that would last through Central and South America, and maybe to Europe, where she plans to be on May 1. She thinks her trip will cost around $30K, and she started a GoFundMe page to raise some extra cash. So far, she’s raised $14K, but she’s dreading the expenses associated with shipping her bike from Buenos Aires to Madrid. Her estimate is that it could cost $7K.
On this trip, she will be skipping Africa and Australia, and she’s still figuring out her route. You can see her progress on her website. She thinks that after Russia, she will need to ship her bike to Mexico due to the limitations of current sanctions. Maybe she’ll just ride home to Wisconsin. Or up to Canada first. Or, as she told me, “Who knows? Maybe I’ll go to Alaska!”
Here is Bridget's proposed route:
