Editor’s Note: This story originally appeared in Volume 5 of B.H. Magazine. To get your copy (and access to future issues), subscribe here.
A little over 20 years ago, Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman talked themselves into the deal of the century. Sky One would effectively bankroll a raw and rugged travelogue following the duo’s 31,000-kilometre road trip from London to New York City, on motorcycles of their choosing, with a support crew in tow.
Three once-in-a-lifetime road trips later – Long Way Round (2004), Long Way Down (2007), and Long Way Up (2020) – the two best mates have reunited for their new series Long Way Home, once again proving to be a major source of envy for every deskbound civilian.
During my recent chat with the pair, I am quick to ask: is theseries and latest instalment, which appears to be another tailor-made vacation, the cushiest coup in television?
“Well, when you put it like that…” says Boorman, laughing.
“It’s not quite as cushy as you’re suggesting,” says McGregor. “Charley and I are still very involved in the prep: the route, where we go, what we do.”
“We have things planned along the way, because there are some things we don’t want to miss. But a lot of it is just what we come across on the trip. That’s why it [the show] has the flavour it has.”
The pair tell me that Long Way Home was conceived in the thick of the previous instalment, Long Way Up – a journey from the bottom of Argentina to Los Angeles, spanning 21,000 kilometres and 13 countries.
The limitations of their prototype Harley-Davidson LiveWire electric motorcycles, however, proved to be a greater challenge than anticipated. Unsurprisingly, this pushed them to “dream of old bikes” – though a refurbished 1974 Moto Guzzi Eldorado and BMW R75/5 weren’t exactly devoid of their own issues.
“When you have old cars or bikes, you only really have an 80-per-cent chance of getting where you want to go, because so much can go wrong,” reveals Boorman. “That also creates something amazing as well, because you rely on other people to help you fix it, or you fix it yourself. And those things that go wrong on the journey and the people that you meet and the places you end up… that’s why we get into it.”
With approximately 90,000 kilometres on the collective dashboard, the true accomplishment isn’t even the duo’s mortal survival. It’s the almost miraculous preservation of their friendship after consecutive months of what many would describe as forced intimacy.
For Long Way Home alone, this meant leaving from McGregor’s doorstep in Scotland; crossing the North Sea to Scandinavia and up to the Arctic Circle; before coming back down to the Baltics and through continental Europe; eventually hopping over the English Channel towards Boorman’s hometown.
A lesser friendship would’ve surely crumbled under thesame circumstances. And yet somehow, their bond has only strengthened with every passing series.
“As soon as we get going again – sitting behind Charley or seeing Charley in my mirror – it feels like a very familiar and very lovely place to be,” says McGregor, while reflecting on their 20-year undertaking.
“We’ve learned to become much more accepting of each other,” he adds. “We may be riding down the same road together, but we’re allowed to have completely different experiences.”
“There are days that I’m up and Charley’s down; and vice versa. And that’s okay. That’s part of it. And also to just give each other space when needed. It’s like our second marriages.”
Boorman’s idea of space leans more logistical than emotional.
“When we first started, we shared a tent. That was before we realised we probably needed a little bit of space at night. Because we snore at different times and things like that,” he chuckles.
“I ended up keeping the two-man tent, Ewan got the one-man tent – that was our only ‘divorce’. I’m not sure who had the better deal, though, because while mine was bigger, I had less room on the bike. Space is really precious.”
McGregor says if there’s one thing they’ve gotten better at it’s not carrying quite so much “shit on our bikes.”
“If you look at us leaving for Long Way Round, we’ve both got these massive BMW motorbikes and huge tool kits,” he adds. “We were only ever riding side-by-side though, so if we needed tools we could’ve just shared them.”
Boorman also tends towards the Buddhist principle that wisdom is knowing that, at the end of the day, you really know nothing at all.
“We only got about 200 metres from Ewan’s house this time with all the old stuff, jeans, canvas, jackets… and it started to rain. We hadn’t even thought about that,” Boorman recounts. “We were just sitting there in all the wrong gear, in open-face helmets with the rain hitting our faces, trying to put our waterproofs on, when Ewan turned to me and said: ‘Charley, it’s been 20 years and we have learned absolutely nothing’.”
Long Way Home, along with all previous Long Way series, is now streaming via Apple TV+.
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