Long Way Up (2020) s01e11 Episode Script
Oaxaca to L.A.
1
Got sun on my face
Sleeping rough on the road
I'll tell you all about it
When I get home
Gonna roll up the sidewalk
Gonna need letting up
Comin' round to meet you
The long way up
We're gonna ride 13,000 miles through 13 countries.
From Ushuaia, in and out of Argentina and Chile, to the Atacama Desert,
heading up to La Paz before we cross Lake Titicaca,
continuing along the Andes to Colombia, over to Panama,
through Central America and Mexico, arriving in Los Angeles 100 days later.
We're gonna give these guys video cameras,
and they're also gonna have cameras with microphones on their crash helmets
so they can film themselves as they're riding along.
Is this a road? Oh, my God!
A third motorcycle will travel with them,
and on it will be Claudio, our cameraman.
In addition, Russ and I will travel in two electric pickup trucks,
along with cameramen Jimmy,
Anthony and Taylor, who will also help with logistics.
We'll be filming the guys from the vehicles,
linking up with them at borders,
but otherwise, the motorcycles will be on their own.
We've gotta go through all these different parts of Mexico.
Some people say they're quite dangerous.
Some people say they're not so dangerous.
It's best not to ride at night.
Probably not a good idea.
Yeah, exactly. We'll see, we'll see.
But certainly, it's gonna be a bit of a laugh when we get that bus.
Can't wait to see what it's like on the move.
Holy crap, it's good, Dave.
-Come in and take a look at it. -Let's have a look. I see.
Okay.
-Yeah. Really sinks. -Wow.
-That is low. -Well, a lot-- a bit too low.
If we have an issue, we'd rather have it here
and not in the middle of Chihuahua, right?
-Don't want an issue in Chihuahua. -Hoses?
I'm gonna find a puppy in Chihuahua though.
Chihuahua.
-You guys should decide. -What if they do blue--
these blue on one side and orange on the other side?
Should have asked.
Oh, my God.
Look.
Maybe that was the wrong decision to make.
Yeah. Let's go for-- You stop when you see an orange that feels right.
-That blue's quite good for me. -That one?
-There. -There.
Yeah, that could be good.
Yeah, man.
-I was thinking Long Way Up. -Or-- or--
-We should have a Long Way Up logo. -How about a lightning thing?
-Yeah. -You know, an electric lightning thing?
With a line through it because this is not electric.
Okay. Seats.
Your call on how you wanna do it.
-Yeah, I mean, if these are okay, then-- -We could just leave four or five rows
and still have enough room for the bunks and the bikes, I would have thought.
It's just a bit too far away for the feet.
It's massive, this bus.
There're so many of these chairs.
Oh, dear.
These are the brakes.
The emergency brakes, for when it lowers next to the sidewalk.
But where are the-- Just brake lights--
-Tap the brakes. Here. -It's the brake lights.
Yeah, there it is. Okay.
How much lighter is it gonna be without all these chairs?
It's gonna fly. It's gonna do 100 miles an hour.
The flying bus.
I mean, they all need to be unbolted underneath, no?
-You can see them? -Yeah.
Well, one of us will have to get under and hold the nuts,
and one of us will have to unscrew the things.
Okay, we're just gonna have to get down and
Down and dirty, man.
Right.
Charley, you should put on some safety glasses.
I've got my reading glasses.
Oh, dear.
That's the only one I can't get to, is that one.
This one?
I have to take at least one out, come on.
I mean, we're gonna be the laughingstock--
I spend my life watching-- You know, not acting and doing this stuff.
Watching these shows.
People building bikes and cars.
Tattooed people all over America just--
And you try and take a nut off on camera
and you realize just quite how good they are, these people.
I'm trying to undo a nut.
Come on!
Glad to see the steel's arrived because building these ramps is essential.
Stay right there. Just hold that thing.
-Is there enough room to put two in there? -Yeah, he says yes.
So what we could do is two 20s.
We'll make it a meter wide.
Three meters.
Three meters.
50 centimeters wide and 3 meters long.
-He's solving my problems. -Yeah.
I found one
-I found one here. -Okay.
Jesus, it's very difficult to find.
I've got one. I can feel one.
He doesn't know how difficult it is and how little space I have to work.
That's it.
Okay, that one I've got. Hang on.
Wait, wait.
Let's start with that one.
You got it. Keep going, keep going.
Go on. Give it a bit--
Almost there.
Almost there.
Go on.
Almost there.
-Now this-- -We've done one!
-Yeah! -We've done one.
Okay. Gracias, amigo.
Perfect timing.
We got one out, Dave!
So, we just got the beds to make, gotta get the Gs out,
gotta do all the lighting, gotta do all the electrics,
finish the door, get the door open a bit more,
put the roof rack on, find somewhere to put the generators,
find some generators.
And that's about it, really.
Not much more to do.
Well, we didn't see this coming, did we, when we started off in Ushuaia?
That we'd be--
That we'd be under this bus ten days from the end.
Like today and tomorrow to get this done.
We have no-- I have no time, man. It's--
The guy hasn't even started welding
'cause this shit was supposed to be here at 8:00 in the morning.
Even though it's crazy, I want steel and aluminum, so I have an insurance policy.
I need to get this thing mechanically sound.
The ramp is the most important part of this whole thing other than mechanical.
So, right here is the main support beam
that, I'm assuming, holds the whole bus from doing this. The body.
We need to cut into that.
So what I'm gonna do is, there's a vertical support here and there.
And I'm gonna make a gusset to come from about here
and come up at a 45-degree angle to that vertical support on each side.
That way, it holds everything in place while I cut this out.
Brake lights, indicators, headlights.
This thing, the one in the back and then the LEDs.
-Just in case time is of the essence. -Yeah.
And, in fact, if the LEDs don't work, you could just have six little lights.
I have to put in pieces to support it,
so when I do cut it, it doesn't go boing and something happens.
Do we have any scrap metal?
Let's at least get this built.
-I gotta get the ramp going though. Jesus! -Yeah, I know.
It's funny that we rode up from Guatemala, isn't it?
Just the other day.
I just look at the map going, "How did we do that?"
And then I remembered we rode it.
It's all getting a bit bonkered.
My brain, I can't take it in.
You look at the bottom of Argentina and it's absolutely miles away.
You think, "Jesus Christ, we-- That's a long ride."
It's a really long way up, this one.
Isn't it?
So much longer than the other ones, it seems, but it's not.
It's shorter, but it feels longer.
Yeah, it does. I don't know why.
Older.
-Do you think so? -We're all just older and tired-er.
-Dirtier. -I'm gonna throw you under that bus.
What you've done these past three days, I could not have done without you.
Awesome work, all right. Look at this thing.
I mean, we're not finished yet.
I need tomorrow, right?
Tomorrow, it's gotta be like-- All the loose ends gotta be tied.
-All right. -But let's have a great day tomorrow.
-Okay? Gracias. Thanks, man. -Yeah, yeah. Of course, of course.
The bus looks amazing, but there's still loads of work to do.
There's only one day left to finish it.
How are they gonna get all that done?
I wanna see if any of the stuff's arrived.
The rack is supposed to be here.
Yeah!
Look at this.
They built this in one day.
This and the ladders.
Look at these lovely welds and painted it.
One day.
I don't ask these guys what to do.
They know how to do it, and they do it better than even I dreamt about doing it.
They're doing their best to set us up.
This is the 5th.
We got started on this thing on the 4th.
That doesn't happen anywhere. It just doesn't happen anywhere.
Look at these guys.
Yeah, igual.
Right here, no?
Yeah.
That's one really sweet hinge.
Then maybe there's just, like, a little--
You know, give me a little--
Yeah, he said he can do like--
All right.
The orange is on!
-Charley. -Look at that.
He's unveiling it.
So sick.
-Looks great, the blue and the orange. -Amazing.
To me, I think the orange seems to pop a bit more than, you--
Well, I'm concerned about being at the top of this ramp
and trying to get it in.
What do you--
You know what I mean?
I'd love to go back and just measure that again properly
and see how much actual space there actually is.
Yeah. We'll go back and measure the bike.
What did we say it was? 52 inches?
-51. -51.
Are you sure we can get it done by tomorrow morning?
You are, aren't you? Look at you.
Yeah, we'll be done.
Mexico has been extraordinary so far,
and the people here have just been incredible,
but we have to take the advice seriously about not riding at night.
I just got off the telephone with SOS International,
who are the people that do our security advice,
and they basically said go this way.
-Okay, to El Paso? -To El Paso.
I don't want to demonize Mexico 'cause I love it here, and there's--
We've had nothing but friendliness and nice people here so far.
As someone once said, "It's not how you start, it's how you finish," right?
-Yeah. -So, we have to finish strong.
Generators, if you can at least tee them up,
so I can tell the guys we're gonna drive through
I'll deal with that. I need Javier.
I wanna make sure the paperwork is cool.
How are we with paperwork?
The insurance company is coming in 50 minutes.
The plates, 11:00 a.m.
-The which? -The plates.
We're leaving at 7:00 a.m.
Yeah, man, but it's the government.
-It doesn't depend on me, you know, man. -It's the system.
It's the system.
Is there anything we can do?
-No way. -The office is closed now.
We're missing documents,
but the bigger problem is the bikes might not make it onto the bus,
and we really need to get back on the road tomorrow.
The bikes are 51 inches to the top of the wing mirror.
How many inches to the top of the wing mirror?
51, 52 inches, which is exactly the height of the door.
So we'll have to remove the screen,
and I don't think they'll even go in as they are.
Ewan went to double-check, and to the handlebar, it's 52 inches,
and that opening is only just 52 inches, so you'd never get it in.
But the problem is
I mean, if you're looking at it, it's 5:30.
We leave in the morning.
We have a lot of work to do.
We're modifying the bus to carry the bikes.
If the bikes can't fit on it, this just won't work.
-Here, here and here. -Yeah, yeah.
Sí, sí, sí.
How do you say "maximum" in Spanish?
-Mucho. -Mucho?
Where you were.
-Yeah. -Exactly.
It's 3:00 a.m., on the morning we're supposed to leave.
The fellas are still working.
They've been working all day.
They've been working all night. All of them.
Some of the best guys I've ever met.
The big thing that we're trying to deal with right now
is getting these ramps in.
Two ramps, side by side, will let us get in.
I'm so touched by how hard these guys have worked.
They haven't asked for a damn thing extra.
They haven't asked for much at all.
And they've just been so committed to try and help us.
Bus day.
Bus day, bus day, bus day.
I should be careful you don't see my
bum in the reflection on the TV.
David's done an unbelievable job at finding a bus,
getting two mechanics and welders, getting Matt to cut the door out.
He just orchestrated this in a blinking of an eye.
It's gonna be so fantastic.
We're gonna ride, put the bikes up in the bus, and then drive into the night.
You know, while the bus is-- the bikes charge.
I'm so excited.
Beautiful.
They've taken this old, shabby bus
and turned it into this crazy, Long Way Up,
bike-hauling,
team-sleeping dream machine.
Thank you.
Look at that!
Well done, Dave.
-Yes! -It looks amazing.
-It looks great. -Wow. The bunk beds are in.
-Dave. It's brilliant. -That is incredible.
Well done, mate.
Yeah, cushions here.
Well, the mechanical stuff, there were a lot of parts that were missing,
and we had to get them from all over Mexico.
So they did all the mechanical work 'cause we wanted it to be mechanically sound.
And then we wanted to modify it for our use.
So to find an ironworker who'd build that roof rack in time and these beds
just to, sort of, keep it as usable and allow for the bikes to come in.
I think the biggest thing is, this is one of the sexiest bits of the vehicle.
This took them forever.
-Oh, my God. -Wow!
And it's not an 8-footer.
-It's a 10-footer. -Did they make that ramp?
-We made the ramp, yeah. -Rung by rung?
Rung by rung. Welded the whole thing.
Dave, man. I think you've got your own show.
Dave's Do-Ups.
Dave does it up again this week on Dave's Do-Ups.
How does he do it?
It's awesome,
especially when you look at the blue and the orange against the bikes here.
And what-- everything that's just been done inside.
This is the moment we've all been waiting for. Will it start?
Yeah, just a little.
-One. -Yep.
-No. Oh, hang on. Yeah. -There it is. Yeah.
Now good?
Yeah.
Yeah!
You have small moments and big moments in life.
That was a big moment, working on this thing.
She started up so nicely.
And it means a lot to me, you know?
They've been working. They love it.
They're here smiling and working their tails off.
And they got it done.
The only bummer is the damn paperwork.
We're supposed to get plates last night.
Unfortunately, they didn't arrive last night, so we're getting them this morning.
I'm staring at that gate, hoping that they arrive but
What's the plan? Just so that we all-- we're all on the same page.
The plan is you guys leave now.
We're going to see if we can get this thing going.
But whatever happens, we'll meet you at the same place.
If the paperwork arrives, that leads and catches us up.
So, we're heading off without the bus.
The bus is gonna meet us later, and we're heading off into Mexico.
Oh, my God. The cactus are everywhere.
This is like the home of the cactus.
This is the valley of cactuses.
Like a bridge through the cactus sky.
-That one's-- yeah. -It's like monkeys' tails.
Yeah, like hundreds of monkeys' tails or snakes or--
This one's a little bit like us.
I'm doing it like a cactus. Mime.
I've never taken a ride in a balloon before,
but now we get the chance.
Jesus! This is just amazing.
Oh, my God.
Ewan.
-Look at that view. That's incredible. -Oh, my God. Oh, my God.
It's happening. We're off.
There's the pyramid. Look at that.
-Wow, there. -Two of them. Oh, my God.
It's beautiful. Look at it. It's just ridiculously beautiful.
I never thought I would be flying along with 40 other balloons.
It's extraordinary.
Over the temple in the middle of Mexico.
It's extraordinary.
Can you imagine back then coming out of the jungle
and seeing three massive pyramids with streets and shops?
Like the Mayan version of London in 350 AD?
I love it.
I don't like looking down that way.
It still gives me the heebs that you might fall out.
But I love the feeling of it, how graceful it is and smooth.
-It's so gentle, isn't it? -Yeah.
I really like it. It's lovely.
Will you go in front of the road or behind the road?
-I don't know. -Okay.
I love how casual it is.
-Very nice. -I would be cacking it right now.
There we are.
Good luck, everyone.
They've got us, they've got us, they've got us.
Quite dramatic.
If you didn't have someone to grab your rope though, it'd be really dramatic.
Look at this landing.
Well done.
No crashes.
Did you like the flight?
-I loved it, yeah. Thank you so much. -It was lovely.
-Yeah, thank you very much. Bravo. -It was so beautiful, yes.
For my first flight, it's good, no?
These guys are doing a sort of pilgrimage run,
but I don't know anything about it, you know,
other than they're jumping off that lorry.
Yeah, we have all the stuff ready.
-The beds are ready. The bus is ready. -Come on, don't--
The mechanic stuff is ready.
The lights are ready.
-Everything works. It's on the way now. -I'm gonna--
I am gonna squeeze you and bite you.
I got a lot of man love for you.
Thank you, dude.
I'm losing my mind.
We'll meet up with the bus and the bikes in a few minutes.
Charley, I think this is getting close
to where we're supposed to meet up with the bus.
Beauty.
Can't wait to see it on the road.
What were they up to? What were they doing?
We're on a pilgrimage to Juquila.
We carry our Virgin there.
Some go on foot, others by bicycle. And we took our trucks.
Those who walk left 13 days ago.
What's at the end of the journey? What's their goal?
As we arrive, the people in the village wait for us.
They set fireworks. There's music and confetti for the Virgin.
Hola!
Gracias. Gracias.
No, no. Okay, this time--
I got him again.
Bye-bye!
There she is. There's the bus.
First time up the ramp.
-Beauty, guys. -We're driving 'em.
-Well done, guys. -Well done. It's so cool.
No.
As they say
It's actually happening now.
Very close to not happening.
That was our first mile.
Let's see if we can do 1,000 of them.
It is amazing, innit, this bus?
I love it.
I think the seats have tidied up well.
It runs real smooth.
And more importantly, it's got character.
It's got a bit about a personality in it.
Beautiful.
There's a bit of dodgy areas apparently here and there, you know
where we've been told to not stop and to keep going.
And today
had more of those areas in it than any other day, so
If there is, you know, certain worries or anything like that,
I think we should definitely take it seriously.
And with a bit of luck, everything will be okay.
Last man standing.
Sitting.
Yeah, there's all the fearmongering that's been going on
with regard to the north of Mexico.
We've taken all of the relevant precautions.
The weather might not be pretty, but it's daylight.
And the guys are keen to get the bikes off the bus.
95 miles from the United States border.
And we're ready to go.
And if we can cross the border today,
that's the last core border crossing of the trip.
And we'll be back in the States, so that's kind of exciting.
So, here we are in northern Mexico.
I must say, it's very, very, very nice to be back on the bike.
It was supposed to be our, sort of, most dangerous passage,
that part, you know.
So now they're back on the ground, and we're riding to the border and America.
And hopefully, this afternoon, we might even be in America.
I'm hoping that we can get over today.
Crossing into familiar territory.
You can't help but think,
"Okay, it should be easy. We'd be going into America."
But there's a very real chance that it might not be.
Everyone says that in any given trip, it's the last 5% where things occur.
So, it's hard
because we wanna start to allow ourselves to feel like we're nearing the end
and having accomplished something we set out to accomplish.
And, you know, this is the most vulnerable part of the trip.
Charley, can you believe it? We're heading into Juárez.
No, I really wasn't expecting this, I must say.
I was expecting yesterday's weather a little bit, you know.
Totally.
-That got me. -You okay?
Look at the water over there.
Look at that.
That's like a river.
We missed the border crossing by 40 minutes.
We weren't told it shuts at 2:00.
Not for people. People can be processed 24 hours, but
the stuff that we take through, cameras, etcetera.
We got lost from our navigator,
so now we're trying to figure out where the hell the border is.
And I think we lost the bikes 'cause I don't see 'em.
We're not precisely in the most pretty place though.
To be lost.
Are we actually lost in Juárez?
We are lost in Juárez, yeah.
We're probably in cartel territory.
-Are we far from the border or no? -No, no, no.
Like ten minutes. It's not far.
-Okay. -Please.
Calm down, my friends.
The weather's made a complete mess of things,
and I think we've missed our chance to cross the border,
which means we might be stuck in the exact spot where we were warned to be careful.
-This is the border? -Yeah.
That's a refugee camp.
Here. The bike is here.
There's the bikes. There's Charley.
Yep.
-Great job. -Gracias. Gracias.
Lico, thank you.
We're trying to cross into El Paso.
I think many of us have grown really attached to the bus.
We're trying to get her through.
There's a big old mountain of paperwork to try to get that done but
This is where we had to check out as people, right?
And we've done that. Passports are stamped.
But now, just as it turns out,
Ewan and Charley have to get their stamp on their passport for their motorcycle,
stamped out 25 miles that way.
Then they have to come back this way to cross into El Paso, Texas.
We, because we have all this camera equipment,
have to go 20 miles, I can't believe it, in the opposite direction
with camera equipment.
But it's hard to complain about our delay
when there's a community that's been living here for months
waiting to get through the border.
Looking at all these tents and everything, the border is just over there.
Who are these people?
These people came here from southern Mexico
to look for asylum in the US
because of the insecurity in different Mexican states.
They were threatened by the organized crime
that if they didn't sell their drugs, they would kill someone in their family.
So they run away.
And how long has he been here?
Two and a half months.
Well, I'm sorry. We wish you good luck.
This is the harsh reality of what's been going on.
The instability of gangs makes it so difficult for anybody to live.
Everybody needs a chance, man.
They've been checking, you know, very hard.
Every vehicle, every car, you know, they check.
People stay four hours, five hours just to cross the border. So it's hard.
Most of the people wanna go to US to work, you know.
Some very hard workers, you know.
Okay. Well.
Yeah.
We're not quite-- We haven't really left Mexico yet,
and we haven't gotten into America yet, so
Funny, we don't know what anyone's doing.
-No idea. -No, no idea where anyone is.
Don't know where Russ is. Don't know what happened to Dave.
Don't know what anyone's doing.
Listen, all I know is that Russ just said,
"Look, get across to America however you can. Good luck."
And the phone went dead.
Okay.
My ass is wet.
It's half past 2:00 in the morning.
We've been at that border now officially 12 hours, and we've only just got out.
In a positive sense, all the boys are through.
The bikes are through.
We're in America.
Long Way Up has arrived in America.
I found it quite emotional arriving to America.
Just-- When he said to me--
I really hoped he was gonna say, "Welcome home, sir." You know, 'cause--
Gave him my passport,
and he asked a few questions about the trip
and looked at the bike and then
just gave my passport back, and he went, "Ride safe, sir."
And he was beautiful, this guy.
He was super handsome. Tall guy. Steely-gray eyes.
And I was thinking
"In a movie, this is the guy you cast, you know, as the border guard."
And
But he said, "Ride safe."
And then we were across, and I just was through.
Sort of excited about today
because it'll feel different traveling in America.
We're gonna try and do 200 miles plus today.
Day one in the United States.
Careful. Charley.
Almost just on cue.
Day one in the United States.
Literally, this road takes us to LA.
That's it.
There's still moments of great confliction with the electric bike
because we're used to a simpler way.
It's just that simpler way is polluting,
and that simpler way's ultimately got to change.
It's interesting how our concept of it has changed.
A little bit like when people first started driving petrol cars,
and they would fill it up with fuel and--
But they wouldn't know where they would get the next tank of gas.
There was no infrastructure, and it felt a little bit like that.
We're just at that moment or that cusp of change.
You know what? We'll look back and we'll go,
"God, we did it then," you know, when nothing was ready and
That's why it's probably really exciting that we did it now.
Look at that. It's working.
It's done 6% in three minutes.
These are just amazing.
This is a game changer.
It's great, man.
Yeah, baby. It's so good.
I've seen these, I've heard of 'em
and this is the first time I've seen 'em work,
you know, actually out on the road.
It's unbelievable.
Just thought I'd show you how
the conditions are out here this morning.
You can see that there's some frost,
so we better wait for a bit before we leave.
It's only, like, 7:00.
Think we'd better leave till 8:00 or 9:00.
Maybe try and find some coffee would be really, really good.
What a perfect way to end a perfect trip.
I feel a bit sad actually.
Just a wave of sadness.
I've got the travel blues today a little bit.
You know, realizing that it's gonna be all over,
and it's kind of sad.
And now that it's getting close, I'm a bit like, "Oh, no!"
It's just so beautiful riding along with you, Charley.
It's been amazing. Amazing.
But when you're on the bike, you're in it
and you're sort of connected to it and belong in it and you feel part of it,
and your relationship to that landscape is much closer in a way.
When you ride on a motorcycle
and you go through all these, kind of, different places, maybe remote places,
or you get into small towns or villages.
And I think people are automatically drawn to you.
You're in their environment.
And people kind of often feel sorry for you
because you are either wet or super dusty.
And because you've ridden there on your bike, and you belong there more.
You haven't sort of dropped in by airplane.
You sort of deserve to be there more in a weird way.
It's more yours.
Everywhere you look is our friends, the cactus!
I love the cacti.
Our brothers in arms.
You don't remember the easy days.
You don't-- They all just blend into each other.
The things you remember for the rest of your life
are the things that were difficult.
It's just something you get through and the gnarly bits and the gnarly bits.
And without them, you maybe wouldn't have had such an amazing experience, you know.
I don't enter into it thinking that it's dangerous or that it's risky or--
Just excited to do it.
I don't think it is.
I mean, I think there are inherent risks about riding a bike anyway.
I'm at peace with that. I don't care. I liked--
I won't stop riding a bike because it's dangerous.
I love it, and it's part of who I am.
Going through South America and Central America and Mexico,
people were so, so friendly and so wanted to help
and interested in what we were up to.
In Bolivia, I was just scared.
I got scared for Charley because of the roads
and just the idea that Charley's legs are so vulnerable.
You're naturally protective about yourself when you're recovering.
Sometimes it takes to go somewhere like Machu Picchu
and actually do all those stairs
to realize that I could actually do much more than I thought I could.
Welcome to California
Such a lovely place
Yeah.
We have some family and friends meeting us in Palm Springs
so we can ride in convoy to LA tomorrow.
My love.
-Get the helmet off. -My love.
My darling, hello.
-Hey, baby. -Hi, baby.
My darling. My darling, darling.
Here we are.
On the last day.
We're just getting all the bikes and everything ready.
It was funny to pack my bag this morning knowing it was the last time.
The last three months, we've been getting up
and putting everything away in that black road bag and cinching it down.
Stick it on the back of the bike and
I just was struck with the idea
that I won't have to do that tomorrow morning, you know.
This is quite a day that we've got organized.
We're gonna meet some other riders.
Meet some people who have been amazing to us in this whole trip.
Our partners who've been super cool.
Get there, and then we've got 20 miles to go into downtown Los Angeles.
And then that's it.
Brother, how are you?
This is the guy who made it all possible. Kept it freaking alive.
-RJ! Please. -How's it going, man? Good to see you.
-How you doing? You doing good? -Jesus. I'm so glad you're here.
-Absolutely amazing. -Those are the prototypes,
wait till you get to the It's twice as much as torque as that.
-And we put them to this crazy test. -Yeah.
Every morning they looked at me like, "Is that it?
-You wanna give me a little more?" -You got more?
Bikes weren't good. They weren't great. They were perfect. They were unbelievable.
Better than anybody could have ever expected.
You didn't have that mustache the whole time, did you?
-No-- -This was for Mexico.
They said, you know, blend in, so I'm trying my best.
He got that 'cause if we were kidnapped, he could claim to be a local.
-"They nothing to do with me, hombre." -"Take him. Take the English guys."
-My lovely, how are you? -Hello.
You look so cute in your massive helmet.
Your little face. It looks so cute in there.
Okay, we can go.
And then of course Charley amplified the pressure
by putting his youngest and second-favorite daughter in the car.
-Hey, gorgeous! -Hey, Daddy!
Hi, my love.
Oh, God. Dad, why?
Behave yourself.
Unbelievable.
Far be it for me to say, Charley, but don't come off now.
Is RJ in the car or am I dreaming? Pinch me.
Am I-- I'm dreaming right now.
Look at that. We're taking up the whole road.
I just love Charley to bits, and I'm so happy we did this third one. I really am.
We always talked about doing a third
and when we were a little bit older and maybe a little bit wiser.
I'm not sure. We're certainly older.
I can't believe how much of the world we've ridden together,
and it really did change my life.
Thanks for the memories. Thanks for the journeys.
Thanks for changing my life.
And I'm daydreaming about doing other trips
and literally fantasizing about bikes and roads and--
But I'm on my bike riding this trip now.
You know, like, I've really got it bad.
You know, and I've had moments where I thought, "I could just do--
I could, you know."
You know, you could just do this.
Like, I could just sit on a bike and just this could be it for me.
I could just do this forever, you know.
Well done, everybody!
Wow, look at that.
He did it!
Well done, man.
-You've done it! -Crazy enough to say yes.
You've done it.
It's done. You're alive. You're well. It's all good.
Yeah, thank you very much.
13,000 miles.
We've arrived in one bit.
I'm, like, relieved. I'm very, very happy.
I can't really feel like it's the end of the trip yet.
I mean, it'll hit me in a week, you know. I'll go
"We're not doing the trip anymore.
I think we'll have to start planning the next one."
Got sun on my face
Sleeping rough on the road
I'll tell you all about it
When I get home
Gonna roll up the sidewalk
Gonna need letting up
Comin' round to meet you
The long way up
We're gonna ride 13,000 miles through 13 countries.
From Ushuaia, in and out of Argentina and Chile, to the Atacama Desert,
heading up to La Paz before we cross Lake Titicaca,
continuing along the Andes to Colombia, over to Panama,
through Central America and Mexico, arriving in Los Angeles 100 days later.
We're gonna give these guys video cameras,
and they're also gonna have cameras with microphones on their crash helmets
so they can film themselves as they're riding along.
Is this a road? Oh, my God!
A third motorcycle will travel with them,
and on it will be Claudio, our cameraman.
In addition, Russ and I will travel in two electric pickup trucks,
along with cameramen Jimmy,
Anthony and Taylor, who will also help with logistics.
We'll be filming the guys from the vehicles,
linking up with them at borders,
but otherwise, the motorcycles will be on their own.
We've gotta go through all these different parts of Mexico.
Some people say they're quite dangerous.
Some people say they're not so dangerous.
It's best not to ride at night.
Probably not a good idea.
Yeah, exactly. We'll see, we'll see.
But certainly, it's gonna be a bit of a laugh when we get that bus.
Can't wait to see what it's like on the move.
Holy crap, it's good, Dave.
-Come in and take a look at it. -Let's have a look. I see.
Okay.
-Yeah. Really sinks. -Wow.
-That is low. -Well, a lot-- a bit too low.
If we have an issue, we'd rather have it here
and not in the middle of Chihuahua, right?
-Don't want an issue in Chihuahua. -Hoses?
I'm gonna find a puppy in Chihuahua though.
Chihuahua.
-You guys should decide. -What if they do blue--
these blue on one side and orange on the other side?
Should have asked.
Oh, my God.
Look.
Maybe that was the wrong decision to make.
Yeah. Let's go for-- You stop when you see an orange that feels right.
-That blue's quite good for me. -That one?
-There. -There.
Yeah, that could be good.
Yeah, man.
-I was thinking Long Way Up. -Or-- or--
-We should have a Long Way Up logo. -How about a lightning thing?
-Yeah. -You know, an electric lightning thing?
With a line through it because this is not electric.
Okay. Seats.
Your call on how you wanna do it.
-Yeah, I mean, if these are okay, then-- -We could just leave four or five rows
and still have enough room for the bunks and the bikes, I would have thought.
It's just a bit too far away for the feet.
It's massive, this bus.
There're so many of these chairs.
Oh, dear.
These are the brakes.
The emergency brakes, for when it lowers next to the sidewalk.
But where are the-- Just brake lights--
-Tap the brakes. Here. -It's the brake lights.
Yeah, there it is. Okay.
How much lighter is it gonna be without all these chairs?
It's gonna fly. It's gonna do 100 miles an hour.
The flying bus.
I mean, they all need to be unbolted underneath, no?
-You can see them? -Yeah.
Well, one of us will have to get under and hold the nuts,
and one of us will have to unscrew the things.
Okay, we're just gonna have to get down and
Down and dirty, man.
Right.
Charley, you should put on some safety glasses.
I've got my reading glasses.
Oh, dear.
That's the only one I can't get to, is that one.
This one?
I have to take at least one out, come on.
I mean, we're gonna be the laughingstock--
I spend my life watching-- You know, not acting and doing this stuff.
Watching these shows.
People building bikes and cars.
Tattooed people all over America just--
And you try and take a nut off on camera
and you realize just quite how good they are, these people.
I'm trying to undo a nut.
Come on!
Glad to see the steel's arrived because building these ramps is essential.
Stay right there. Just hold that thing.
-Is there enough room to put two in there? -Yeah, he says yes.
So what we could do is two 20s.
We'll make it a meter wide.
Three meters.
Three meters.
50 centimeters wide and 3 meters long.
-He's solving my problems. -Yeah.
I found one
-I found one here. -Okay.
Jesus, it's very difficult to find.
I've got one. I can feel one.
He doesn't know how difficult it is and how little space I have to work.
That's it.
Okay, that one I've got. Hang on.
Wait, wait.
Let's start with that one.
You got it. Keep going, keep going.
Go on. Give it a bit--
Almost there.
Almost there.
Go on.
Almost there.
-Now this-- -We've done one!
-Yeah! -We've done one.
Okay. Gracias, amigo.
Perfect timing.
We got one out, Dave!
So, we just got the beds to make, gotta get the Gs out,
gotta do all the lighting, gotta do all the electrics,
finish the door, get the door open a bit more,
put the roof rack on, find somewhere to put the generators,
find some generators.
And that's about it, really.
Not much more to do.
Well, we didn't see this coming, did we, when we started off in Ushuaia?
That we'd be--
That we'd be under this bus ten days from the end.
Like today and tomorrow to get this done.
We have no-- I have no time, man. It's--
The guy hasn't even started welding
'cause this shit was supposed to be here at 8:00 in the morning.
Even though it's crazy, I want steel and aluminum, so I have an insurance policy.
I need to get this thing mechanically sound.
The ramp is the most important part of this whole thing other than mechanical.
So, right here is the main support beam
that, I'm assuming, holds the whole bus from doing this. The body.
We need to cut into that.
So what I'm gonna do is, there's a vertical support here and there.
And I'm gonna make a gusset to come from about here
and come up at a 45-degree angle to that vertical support on each side.
That way, it holds everything in place while I cut this out.
Brake lights, indicators, headlights.
This thing, the one in the back and then the LEDs.
-Just in case time is of the essence. -Yeah.
And, in fact, if the LEDs don't work, you could just have six little lights.
I have to put in pieces to support it,
so when I do cut it, it doesn't go boing and something happens.
Do we have any scrap metal?
Let's at least get this built.
-I gotta get the ramp going though. Jesus! -Yeah, I know.
It's funny that we rode up from Guatemala, isn't it?
Just the other day.
I just look at the map going, "How did we do that?"
And then I remembered we rode it.
It's all getting a bit bonkered.
My brain, I can't take it in.
You look at the bottom of Argentina and it's absolutely miles away.
You think, "Jesus Christ, we-- That's a long ride."
It's a really long way up, this one.
Isn't it?
So much longer than the other ones, it seems, but it's not.
It's shorter, but it feels longer.
Yeah, it does. I don't know why.
Older.
-Do you think so? -We're all just older and tired-er.
-Dirtier. -I'm gonna throw you under that bus.
What you've done these past three days, I could not have done without you.
Awesome work, all right. Look at this thing.
I mean, we're not finished yet.
I need tomorrow, right?
Tomorrow, it's gotta be like-- All the loose ends gotta be tied.
-All right. -But let's have a great day tomorrow.
-Okay? Gracias. Thanks, man. -Yeah, yeah. Of course, of course.
The bus looks amazing, but there's still loads of work to do.
There's only one day left to finish it.
How are they gonna get all that done?
I wanna see if any of the stuff's arrived.
The rack is supposed to be here.
Yeah!
Look at this.
They built this in one day.
This and the ladders.
Look at these lovely welds and painted it.
One day.
I don't ask these guys what to do.
They know how to do it, and they do it better than even I dreamt about doing it.
They're doing their best to set us up.
This is the 5th.
We got started on this thing on the 4th.
That doesn't happen anywhere. It just doesn't happen anywhere.
Look at these guys.
Yeah, igual.
Right here, no?
Yeah.
That's one really sweet hinge.
Then maybe there's just, like, a little--
You know, give me a little--
Yeah, he said he can do like--
All right.
The orange is on!
-Charley. -Look at that.
He's unveiling it.
So sick.
-Looks great, the blue and the orange. -Amazing.
To me, I think the orange seems to pop a bit more than, you--
Well, I'm concerned about being at the top of this ramp
and trying to get it in.
What do you--
You know what I mean?
I'd love to go back and just measure that again properly
and see how much actual space there actually is.
Yeah. We'll go back and measure the bike.
What did we say it was? 52 inches?
-51. -51.
Are you sure we can get it done by tomorrow morning?
You are, aren't you? Look at you.
Yeah, we'll be done.
Mexico has been extraordinary so far,
and the people here have just been incredible,
but we have to take the advice seriously about not riding at night.
I just got off the telephone with SOS International,
who are the people that do our security advice,
and they basically said go this way.
-Okay, to El Paso? -To El Paso.
I don't want to demonize Mexico 'cause I love it here, and there's--
We've had nothing but friendliness and nice people here so far.
As someone once said, "It's not how you start, it's how you finish," right?
-Yeah. -So, we have to finish strong.
Generators, if you can at least tee them up,
so I can tell the guys we're gonna drive through
I'll deal with that. I need Javier.
I wanna make sure the paperwork is cool.
How are we with paperwork?
The insurance company is coming in 50 minutes.
The plates, 11:00 a.m.
-The which? -The plates.
We're leaving at 7:00 a.m.
Yeah, man, but it's the government.
-It doesn't depend on me, you know, man. -It's the system.
It's the system.
Is there anything we can do?
-No way. -The office is closed now.
We're missing documents,
but the bigger problem is the bikes might not make it onto the bus,
and we really need to get back on the road tomorrow.
The bikes are 51 inches to the top of the wing mirror.
How many inches to the top of the wing mirror?
51, 52 inches, which is exactly the height of the door.
So we'll have to remove the screen,
and I don't think they'll even go in as they are.
Ewan went to double-check, and to the handlebar, it's 52 inches,
and that opening is only just 52 inches, so you'd never get it in.
But the problem is
I mean, if you're looking at it, it's 5:30.
We leave in the morning.
We have a lot of work to do.
We're modifying the bus to carry the bikes.
If the bikes can't fit on it, this just won't work.
-Here, here and here. -Yeah, yeah.
Sí, sí, sí.
How do you say "maximum" in Spanish?
-Mucho. -Mucho?
Where you were.
-Yeah. -Exactly.
It's 3:00 a.m., on the morning we're supposed to leave.
The fellas are still working.
They've been working all day.
They've been working all night. All of them.
Some of the best guys I've ever met.
The big thing that we're trying to deal with right now
is getting these ramps in.
Two ramps, side by side, will let us get in.
I'm so touched by how hard these guys have worked.
They haven't asked for a damn thing extra.
They haven't asked for much at all.
And they've just been so committed to try and help us.
Bus day.
Bus day, bus day, bus day.
I should be careful you don't see my
bum in the reflection on the TV.
David's done an unbelievable job at finding a bus,
getting two mechanics and welders, getting Matt to cut the door out.
He just orchestrated this in a blinking of an eye.
It's gonna be so fantastic.
We're gonna ride, put the bikes up in the bus, and then drive into the night.
You know, while the bus is-- the bikes charge.
I'm so excited.
Beautiful.
They've taken this old, shabby bus
and turned it into this crazy, Long Way Up,
bike-hauling,
team-sleeping dream machine.
Thank you.
Look at that!
Well done, Dave.
-Yes! -It looks amazing.
-It looks great. -Wow. The bunk beds are in.
-Dave. It's brilliant. -That is incredible.
Well done, mate.
Yeah, cushions here.
Well, the mechanical stuff, there were a lot of parts that were missing,
and we had to get them from all over Mexico.
So they did all the mechanical work 'cause we wanted it to be mechanically sound.
And then we wanted to modify it for our use.
So to find an ironworker who'd build that roof rack in time and these beds
just to, sort of, keep it as usable and allow for the bikes to come in.
I think the biggest thing is, this is one of the sexiest bits of the vehicle.
This took them forever.
-Oh, my God. -Wow!
And it's not an 8-footer.
-It's a 10-footer. -Did they make that ramp?
-We made the ramp, yeah. -Rung by rung?
Rung by rung. Welded the whole thing.
Dave, man. I think you've got your own show.
Dave's Do-Ups.
Dave does it up again this week on Dave's Do-Ups.
How does he do it?
It's awesome,
especially when you look at the blue and the orange against the bikes here.
And what-- everything that's just been done inside.
This is the moment we've all been waiting for. Will it start?
Yeah, just a little.
-One. -Yep.
-No. Oh, hang on. Yeah. -There it is. Yeah.
Now good?
Yeah.
Yeah!
You have small moments and big moments in life.
That was a big moment, working on this thing.
She started up so nicely.
And it means a lot to me, you know?
They've been working. They love it.
They're here smiling and working their tails off.
And they got it done.
The only bummer is the damn paperwork.
We're supposed to get plates last night.
Unfortunately, they didn't arrive last night, so we're getting them this morning.
I'm staring at that gate, hoping that they arrive but
What's the plan? Just so that we all-- we're all on the same page.
The plan is you guys leave now.
We're going to see if we can get this thing going.
But whatever happens, we'll meet you at the same place.
If the paperwork arrives, that leads and catches us up.
So, we're heading off without the bus.
The bus is gonna meet us later, and we're heading off into Mexico.
Oh, my God. The cactus are everywhere.
This is like the home of the cactus.
This is the valley of cactuses.
Like a bridge through the cactus sky.
-That one's-- yeah. -It's like monkeys' tails.
Yeah, like hundreds of monkeys' tails or snakes or--
This one's a little bit like us.
I'm doing it like a cactus. Mime.
I've never taken a ride in a balloon before,
but now we get the chance.
Jesus! This is just amazing.
Oh, my God.
Ewan.
-Look at that view. That's incredible. -Oh, my God. Oh, my God.
It's happening. We're off.
There's the pyramid. Look at that.
-Wow, there. -Two of them. Oh, my God.
It's beautiful. Look at it. It's just ridiculously beautiful.
I never thought I would be flying along with 40 other balloons.
It's extraordinary.
Over the temple in the middle of Mexico.
It's extraordinary.
Can you imagine back then coming out of the jungle
and seeing three massive pyramids with streets and shops?
Like the Mayan version of London in 350 AD?
I love it.
I don't like looking down that way.
It still gives me the heebs that you might fall out.
But I love the feeling of it, how graceful it is and smooth.
-It's so gentle, isn't it? -Yeah.
I really like it. It's lovely.
Will you go in front of the road or behind the road?
-I don't know. -Okay.
I love how casual it is.
-Very nice. -I would be cacking it right now.
There we are.
Good luck, everyone.
They've got us, they've got us, they've got us.
Quite dramatic.
If you didn't have someone to grab your rope though, it'd be really dramatic.
Look at this landing.
Well done.
No crashes.
Did you like the flight?
-I loved it, yeah. Thank you so much. -It was lovely.
-Yeah, thank you very much. Bravo. -It was so beautiful, yes.
For my first flight, it's good, no?
These guys are doing a sort of pilgrimage run,
but I don't know anything about it, you know,
other than they're jumping off that lorry.
Yeah, we have all the stuff ready.
-The beds are ready. The bus is ready. -Come on, don't--
The mechanic stuff is ready.
The lights are ready.
-Everything works. It's on the way now. -I'm gonna--
I am gonna squeeze you and bite you.
I got a lot of man love for you.
Thank you, dude.
I'm losing my mind.
We'll meet up with the bus and the bikes in a few minutes.
Charley, I think this is getting close
to where we're supposed to meet up with the bus.
Beauty.
Can't wait to see it on the road.
What were they up to? What were they doing?
We're on a pilgrimage to Juquila.
We carry our Virgin there.
Some go on foot, others by bicycle. And we took our trucks.
Those who walk left 13 days ago.
What's at the end of the journey? What's their goal?
As we arrive, the people in the village wait for us.
They set fireworks. There's music and confetti for the Virgin.
Hola!
Gracias. Gracias.
No, no. Okay, this time--
I got him again.
Bye-bye!
There she is. There's the bus.
First time up the ramp.
-Beauty, guys. -We're driving 'em.
-Well done, guys. -Well done. It's so cool.
No.
As they say
It's actually happening now.
Very close to not happening.
That was our first mile.
Let's see if we can do 1,000 of them.
It is amazing, innit, this bus?
I love it.
I think the seats have tidied up well.
It runs real smooth.
And more importantly, it's got character.
It's got a bit about a personality in it.
Beautiful.
There's a bit of dodgy areas apparently here and there, you know
where we've been told to not stop and to keep going.
And today
had more of those areas in it than any other day, so
If there is, you know, certain worries or anything like that,
I think we should definitely take it seriously.
And with a bit of luck, everything will be okay.
Last man standing.
Sitting.
Yeah, there's all the fearmongering that's been going on
with regard to the north of Mexico.
We've taken all of the relevant precautions.
The weather might not be pretty, but it's daylight.
And the guys are keen to get the bikes off the bus.
95 miles from the United States border.
And we're ready to go.
And if we can cross the border today,
that's the last core border crossing of the trip.
And we'll be back in the States, so that's kind of exciting.
So, here we are in northern Mexico.
I must say, it's very, very, very nice to be back on the bike.
It was supposed to be our, sort of, most dangerous passage,
that part, you know.
So now they're back on the ground, and we're riding to the border and America.
And hopefully, this afternoon, we might even be in America.
I'm hoping that we can get over today.
Crossing into familiar territory.
You can't help but think,
"Okay, it should be easy. We'd be going into America."
But there's a very real chance that it might not be.
Everyone says that in any given trip, it's the last 5% where things occur.
So, it's hard
because we wanna start to allow ourselves to feel like we're nearing the end
and having accomplished something we set out to accomplish.
And, you know, this is the most vulnerable part of the trip.
Charley, can you believe it? We're heading into Juárez.
No, I really wasn't expecting this, I must say.
I was expecting yesterday's weather a little bit, you know.
Totally.
-That got me. -You okay?
Look at the water over there.
Look at that.
That's like a river.
We missed the border crossing by 40 minutes.
We weren't told it shuts at 2:00.
Not for people. People can be processed 24 hours, but
the stuff that we take through, cameras, etcetera.
We got lost from our navigator,
so now we're trying to figure out where the hell the border is.
And I think we lost the bikes 'cause I don't see 'em.
We're not precisely in the most pretty place though.
To be lost.
Are we actually lost in Juárez?
We are lost in Juárez, yeah.
We're probably in cartel territory.
-Are we far from the border or no? -No, no, no.
Like ten minutes. It's not far.
-Okay. -Please.
Calm down, my friends.
The weather's made a complete mess of things,
and I think we've missed our chance to cross the border,
which means we might be stuck in the exact spot where we were warned to be careful.
-This is the border? -Yeah.
That's a refugee camp.
Here. The bike is here.
There's the bikes. There's Charley.
Yep.
-Great job. -Gracias. Gracias.
Lico, thank you.
We're trying to cross into El Paso.
I think many of us have grown really attached to the bus.
We're trying to get her through.
There's a big old mountain of paperwork to try to get that done but
This is where we had to check out as people, right?
And we've done that. Passports are stamped.
But now, just as it turns out,
Ewan and Charley have to get their stamp on their passport for their motorcycle,
stamped out 25 miles that way.
Then they have to come back this way to cross into El Paso, Texas.
We, because we have all this camera equipment,
have to go 20 miles, I can't believe it, in the opposite direction
with camera equipment.
But it's hard to complain about our delay
when there's a community that's been living here for months
waiting to get through the border.
Looking at all these tents and everything, the border is just over there.
Who are these people?
These people came here from southern Mexico
to look for asylum in the US
because of the insecurity in different Mexican states.
They were threatened by the organized crime
that if they didn't sell their drugs, they would kill someone in their family.
So they run away.
And how long has he been here?
Two and a half months.
Well, I'm sorry. We wish you good luck.
This is the harsh reality of what's been going on.
The instability of gangs makes it so difficult for anybody to live.
Everybody needs a chance, man.
They've been checking, you know, very hard.
Every vehicle, every car, you know, they check.
People stay four hours, five hours just to cross the border. So it's hard.
Most of the people wanna go to US to work, you know.
Some very hard workers, you know.
Okay. Well.
Yeah.
We're not quite-- We haven't really left Mexico yet,
and we haven't gotten into America yet, so
Funny, we don't know what anyone's doing.
-No idea. -No, no idea where anyone is.
Don't know where Russ is. Don't know what happened to Dave.
Don't know what anyone's doing.
Listen, all I know is that Russ just said,
"Look, get across to America however you can. Good luck."
And the phone went dead.
Okay.
My ass is wet.
It's half past 2:00 in the morning.
We've been at that border now officially 12 hours, and we've only just got out.
In a positive sense, all the boys are through.
The bikes are through.
We're in America.
Long Way Up has arrived in America.
I found it quite emotional arriving to America.
Just-- When he said to me--
I really hoped he was gonna say, "Welcome home, sir." You know, 'cause--
Gave him my passport,
and he asked a few questions about the trip
and looked at the bike and then
just gave my passport back, and he went, "Ride safe, sir."
And he was beautiful, this guy.
He was super handsome. Tall guy. Steely-gray eyes.
And I was thinking
"In a movie, this is the guy you cast, you know, as the border guard."
And
But he said, "Ride safe."
And then we were across, and I just was through.
Sort of excited about today
because it'll feel different traveling in America.
We're gonna try and do 200 miles plus today.
Day one in the United States.
Careful. Charley.
Almost just on cue.
Day one in the United States.
Literally, this road takes us to LA.
That's it.
There's still moments of great confliction with the electric bike
because we're used to a simpler way.
It's just that simpler way is polluting,
and that simpler way's ultimately got to change.
It's interesting how our concept of it has changed.
A little bit like when people first started driving petrol cars,
and they would fill it up with fuel and--
But they wouldn't know where they would get the next tank of gas.
There was no infrastructure, and it felt a little bit like that.
We're just at that moment or that cusp of change.
You know what? We'll look back and we'll go,
"God, we did it then," you know, when nothing was ready and
That's why it's probably really exciting that we did it now.
Look at that. It's working.
It's done 6% in three minutes.
These are just amazing.
This is a game changer.
It's great, man.
Yeah, baby. It's so good.
I've seen these, I've heard of 'em
and this is the first time I've seen 'em work,
you know, actually out on the road.
It's unbelievable.
Just thought I'd show you how
the conditions are out here this morning.
You can see that there's some frost,
so we better wait for a bit before we leave.
It's only, like, 7:00.
Think we'd better leave till 8:00 or 9:00.
Maybe try and find some coffee would be really, really good.
What a perfect way to end a perfect trip.
I feel a bit sad actually.
Just a wave of sadness.
I've got the travel blues today a little bit.
You know, realizing that it's gonna be all over,
and it's kind of sad.
And now that it's getting close, I'm a bit like, "Oh, no!"
It's just so beautiful riding along with you, Charley.
It's been amazing. Amazing.
But when you're on the bike, you're in it
and you're sort of connected to it and belong in it and you feel part of it,
and your relationship to that landscape is much closer in a way.
When you ride on a motorcycle
and you go through all these, kind of, different places, maybe remote places,
or you get into small towns or villages.
And I think people are automatically drawn to you.
You're in their environment.
And people kind of often feel sorry for you
because you are either wet or super dusty.
And because you've ridden there on your bike, and you belong there more.
You haven't sort of dropped in by airplane.
You sort of deserve to be there more in a weird way.
It's more yours.
Everywhere you look is our friends, the cactus!
I love the cacti.
Our brothers in arms.
You don't remember the easy days.
You don't-- They all just blend into each other.
The things you remember for the rest of your life
are the things that were difficult.
It's just something you get through and the gnarly bits and the gnarly bits.
And without them, you maybe wouldn't have had such an amazing experience, you know.
I don't enter into it thinking that it's dangerous or that it's risky or--
Just excited to do it.
I don't think it is.
I mean, I think there are inherent risks about riding a bike anyway.
I'm at peace with that. I don't care. I liked--
I won't stop riding a bike because it's dangerous.
I love it, and it's part of who I am.
Going through South America and Central America and Mexico,
people were so, so friendly and so wanted to help
and interested in what we were up to.
In Bolivia, I was just scared.
I got scared for Charley because of the roads
and just the idea that Charley's legs are so vulnerable.
You're naturally protective about yourself when you're recovering.
Sometimes it takes to go somewhere like Machu Picchu
and actually do all those stairs
to realize that I could actually do much more than I thought I could.
Welcome to California
Such a lovely place
Yeah.
We have some family and friends meeting us in Palm Springs
so we can ride in convoy to LA tomorrow.
My love.
-Get the helmet off. -My love.
My darling, hello.
-Hey, baby. -Hi, baby.
My darling. My darling, darling.
Here we are.
On the last day.
We're just getting all the bikes and everything ready.
It was funny to pack my bag this morning knowing it was the last time.
The last three months, we've been getting up
and putting everything away in that black road bag and cinching it down.
Stick it on the back of the bike and
I just was struck with the idea
that I won't have to do that tomorrow morning, you know.
This is quite a day that we've got organized.
We're gonna meet some other riders.
Meet some people who have been amazing to us in this whole trip.
Our partners who've been super cool.
Get there, and then we've got 20 miles to go into downtown Los Angeles.
And then that's it.
Brother, how are you?
This is the guy who made it all possible. Kept it freaking alive.
-RJ! Please. -How's it going, man? Good to see you.
-How you doing? You doing good? -Jesus. I'm so glad you're here.
-Absolutely amazing. -Those are the prototypes,
wait till you get to the It's twice as much as torque as that.
-And we put them to this crazy test. -Yeah.
Every morning they looked at me like, "Is that it?
-You wanna give me a little more?" -You got more?
Bikes weren't good. They weren't great. They were perfect. They were unbelievable.
Better than anybody could have ever expected.
You didn't have that mustache the whole time, did you?
-No-- -This was for Mexico.
They said, you know, blend in, so I'm trying my best.
He got that 'cause if we were kidnapped, he could claim to be a local.
-"They nothing to do with me, hombre." -"Take him. Take the English guys."
-My lovely, how are you? -Hello.
You look so cute in your massive helmet.
Your little face. It looks so cute in there.
Okay, we can go.
And then of course Charley amplified the pressure
by putting his youngest and second-favorite daughter in the car.
-Hey, gorgeous! -Hey, Daddy!
Hi, my love.
Oh, God. Dad, why?
Behave yourself.
Unbelievable.
Far be it for me to say, Charley, but don't come off now.
Is RJ in the car or am I dreaming? Pinch me.
Am I-- I'm dreaming right now.
Look at that. We're taking up the whole road.
I just love Charley to bits, and I'm so happy we did this third one. I really am.
We always talked about doing a third
and when we were a little bit older and maybe a little bit wiser.
I'm not sure. We're certainly older.
I can't believe how much of the world we've ridden together,
and it really did change my life.
Thanks for the memories. Thanks for the journeys.
Thanks for changing my life.
And I'm daydreaming about doing other trips
and literally fantasizing about bikes and roads and--
But I'm on my bike riding this trip now.
You know, like, I've really got it bad.
You know, and I've had moments where I thought, "I could just do--
I could, you know."
You know, you could just do this.
Like, I could just sit on a bike and just this could be it for me.
I could just do this forever, you know.
Well done, everybody!
Wow, look at that.
He did it!
Well done, man.
-You've done it! -Crazy enough to say yes.
You've done it.
It's done. You're alive. You're well. It's all good.
Yeah, thank you very much.
13,000 miles.
We've arrived in one bit.
I'm, like, relieved. I'm very, very happy.
I can't really feel like it's the end of the trip yet.
I mean, it'll hit me in a week, you know. I'll go
"We're not doing the trip anymore.
I think we'll have to start planning the next one."