blog entries (till 2008)
New to the 14degrees website?
A JOURNEY OF OPPORTUNITIES - Welcome to my website about my journey around the world by bicycle and skateboard. I am an ex-office worker, and I never intended to travel all the way around the world. I certainly never expected to end up breaking a long distance skateboarding world record!
What started as a 12,000km cycle journey across the Eurasian continent quickly became a very different kind of challenge.
I began in July 2006 by cycling 12,000km from Japan to Switzerland across Central Asia, the Caucuses, Turkey (the Middle East? Asia?), and the Balkans. I endured -23 degrees Celcuis daytime temperatures (Eastern Turkey is rather chilly in winter), cycled over 4,600m high passes (Tajikistan, I love you), and put up with some of the most frustrating bureaucracies in the whole universe (Central Asia...headaches).
However, on the 25th of June 2007, almost a year since I set out from Japan on my recumbent bicycle, I sent my bicycle home and started out again on a longboard skateboard.
I ended up successfully doing what had never been attempted before; I skateboarded solo and unassisted across Europe, North America, and China. On the 28th of September 2008 I finally arrived in Shanghai after skating just over 12,000km (7,500 miles). The previous world record for distance skateboarding was 5,800km.
I started this journey in 2006 hoping to experience the world at large in it's most raw forms from a bicycle seat. What I got was a humbling, often exhausting, and always challenging journey into my own soul. These two and a bit years were physically, mentally, and emotionally the most difficult years of my life.
I spent countless hours every day recording and sharing my journey while I was on the road. Every day is accounted for on this website, in text, photos, and video. Browse through the pages and relive the journey. They are there for you to enjoy.
