Motorbike Writer readers have been offered a 20% discount on the annual Adventure Travel Film Festival in Bright in February 2016.
To claim your 20% discount, just use the code is “riter” when you book online at the festival website.
The annual festival (February 12 -14, 2016) includes 15 films, several of which have a motorcycle theme.
The festival also includes inspiring speakers such as Jacqui Kennedy who has ridden around Australia on a postie bike and Bev and Lang Kidby who have travelled the world using many and varied forms of transport including vintage cars, a 1919 Vickers Vimy bomber and a 1927 AVRO Avian, a 1928 Austin and a Russian Army sidecar.
Some of the feature motorcycle films are:
Going the Distance (2015)
Brit newlyweds Mike and Alanna Clear decided to do things in reverse. So they spend their first three years together, testing their marriage to destruction! They bought a 1930s styled URAL motorcycle and sidecar, shipped it to Alaska and then set their sights on Ushuaia, 20,000 miles away in Argentina. Rather brilliantly, the stress kicked in well before they left because they had a secondary mission: to make a serious documentary about what it takes to hold a relationship together – a project they cleverly called ‘Going The Distance’. En route they interviewed hundreds of couples (which in Mormon Utah comprised of considerably more than two people) and asked them what it took to make a marriage ‘work’. The resulting film is one of the most original and remarkable films of the last decade. An odyssey in the truest sense but more than that, a film that has absolutely no competition.
Somewhere else Tomorrow (2013)
Daniel Rintz is fast becoming something of a legend in the world’s adventure motorcycle community. His old-fashioned, unpretentious and consciously un-macho movie may well be the shape of things to come. Part of the new cohort of ‘digital nomads’ Daniel makes his way around the world and every now and then is able to earn a few euros with some dongle-based computer wizardry. His route starts in Germany, careers over to the UK, takes in North Africa and Asia on his way to Nepal before sliding down to Australia. The multiplicity of cultures, religions and experiences are lapped up by this two-wheeled drifter but not without him first hovering over the scene with his hungry lens. This is a heart-warming and visceral film that re-establishes the fact that long distance trans-continental travel isn’t about miles, it’s about people.
14 Horsepower through Africa (1935)
The vintage films at this festival are always a treat, if only to humble us modern day travellers who fancy ourselves as ‘explorers’. It’s all been done before! There exist only a few film documents from the early years of motorcycle travel. This is a rare and spectacular example from those times – an overland expedition from Cape Town to Cairo! Six Austrians embarked in 1935 on a 14,000 km journey through Africa with three 14hp two-stroke motorcycles, each bearing a sidecar and passenger. On they plough, across a continent totally devoid of asphalt and wearing what nowadays could only be described as ‘fancy dress’. Along the way they also climbed Mount Kilimanjaro before crossing the Sahara desert. They bounce their way back to Vienna, team and bikes intact, just in time for the Anschluss and WWII. If you need inspiration that it’s all about your attitude and not your equipment, this is it.
If you need inspiration to take that epic motorcycle trip, this is a great place to start!