Bait And Switch?
Forgive me everyone, but I’ve got to tell it like it is and at the same time make a confession. Each month I receive several opportunities to take a brief vacation from the day to day grind. This short diversion arrives in the form of bound and stapled glossy paper, complete with photos delivered come rain, snow or gloom of night by the United States Postal Service. Yes, each month I am filled with the anticipation of the arrival of a pile of freshly printed motorcycle magazines. Like a kid waiting for his/her once a year present from a distant family member, the anticipation builds with each passing week until the next edition of the magazine arrives.
First days, then weeks, pass and suddenly it happens. With a rattling stop of a blue and white beat up right side drive delivery truck and the squeak of the mailbox door, the excitement is repeated. Upon the opening of the mailbox door, smooth glossy paper and sexy bright colors assault my senses and stimulate my mind. It’s like a paper version of the anticipation of an overnight date with that supermodel you’ve been dreaming about for years.
You quickly glance at the cover and there she is. That new bike you’ve been lusting after, wrapped in silky paint and sporting voluptuous curves. It’s a feast for your eyes and food for your motorcycle soul. That cover photo freshly seared into the frontal lobe of your brain, you can’t wait to open the magazine and get to know her even better.
But then it happens. You open to the page where your dream girl is supposed to be waiting. There’s another picture, not quite as large and glossy as the cover, but still sufficient to send another rush of adrenaline surging through you. You gaze upon her and she seems hotter and more exciting than ever.
Your eyes move from the glossy photo to the accompanying text. It can’t be, no it can’t be! Beside the glossy photo and smaller randomly placed and tilted snapshots are a couple of captions and two little paragraphs of text. To make things even worse, most of the text comes straight out of the manufacturers brochure!
Where’s the review? Where are the opinions, the comparisons and the road test? Where is the evaluation and the conclusion on how good or bad she is? There’s nothing; nothing at all for your brain. This can’t be! So close and yet so far, they’ve pulled a fast one on me. They’ve pulled a bait and switch and I’ve fallen for it hook line and sinker. Again!
Motorcycle magazine publishers, I’ve long been an admirer. You’ve been like family to me, at times bringing me closer and tighter into the fold. But I can’t deal with the continuing heartache. Propelled to a zenith by a big glossy cover photo of excitement and suddenly, unceremoniously dropped from the heavens into the pits of hell by the lack of data and the failure to opine. I can’t put up with this forever.
Please, please don’t torture me any more. Your loyal readers and I are getting restless. We understand that publishing is a business, and that you have to sell magazines. But you do your readers and yourselves a huge disservice when you print little more than a photo and a byline just to sell a couple more copies.
Leave the ill-gotten sales to the other guys and you’ll gain the respect and loyalty of a bonded community. Take the easy way out, and you’ll alienate us from your pages. Sorry to come across so hard, but when you care about something, we’re driven to tell you like it is and let you know that there’s a problem to be fixed. So step it up folks, there’s a line of faithful readers lining up by the door… and it’s not the entrance.
So what do you think?
Glen Heggstad
It seems almost fitting that we start off with a rider, world traveler, motivational speaker and one of the most amazingly strong hearted individuals I have ever met; Glen Heggstad. Glen has led a life of significant twists and turns that could have led him down a patch of destruction. However, Glen was able to convert all of this adversity into positive influences for himself and the people he met as he circumnavigated the world.
Two separate books, Two Wheels Through Terror (a title he dislikes but was demanded by his publisher) in which his motorcycle trip from California to the tip of South America was interrupted when he was kidnapped and held hostage, and his second book One More Day Everywhere, chronicle his motorcycle circumnavigation of the planet. Both books will hold you spellbound for different reasons.
Two Wheels Through Terror for Glen’s ability to deal with adversity and his will to continue and One More Day Everywhere for the excitement of navigating the entire planet on a motorcycle and visiting people and places that some would not dare. All in the quest to meet the people of the planet.
Glen has been so touched by the people and places he’s visited, he donates 100% of his book royalties to charitable organizations. You can puchase Glen’s books from the Ride2ADV Gear Store by clicking HERE or at his website directly.
From Glen’s website @ www.strikingviking.net:
For half a century, it’s been a rocky road of contrasting lifestyles for Glen Heggstad. Growing up in San Francisco and influenced by Jack Keroauc’s novel On The Road led to hitchhiking across the US at the age of sixteen. Toggling between living in the streets and foster homes, a rebellious Glen followed the sentiments of his high school teachers who warned of winding up behind bars—he did: handlebars. And then into life of an outlaw biker. By age twenty-seven he had retired from the Hells Angels motorcycle club.
In 1979, Heggstad committed to full time martial arts training, eventually earning Black Belt teaching credentials in: Chinese Kung Fu, Shotokan Karate, Japanese Judo and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. During thirty-three years of devoted practice, he’s earned numerous titles in International championships while training troubled youths to believe in themselves via similar paths in martial spiritual development. But because of his Norwegian heritage, a lust for travel runs deep in his Viking blood.
Looping the planet four times over the last three decades, Heggstad has sought unique adventures wandering through fifty-seven developing countries via chicken buses, riverboats, by foot and even by elephants. From twice trekking the Himalayas to the jungles of South America where he was taken prisoner in the Colombian civil war, Heggstad’s crowning achievement became a multi-year solo motorcycle odyssey around the earth as chronicled in his second book One More Day Everywhere. From the wilds of Siberia and the Mongolian Gobi Desert to zigzagging the Middle East through the West Bank, Israel, Pakistan and India, to the length of Africa, Heggstad rode into one challenging experience after another.
Glen has encountered generous hospitality on nearly every level imaginable from Gobi Desert Nomads, to the cannibals of Indonesia and Middle Eastern Bedouin tribes, to later surviving for weeks on cows blood mixed with honey on the Ethiopian savannah. Being equally at home with city folk, simple villagers and primitive tribesmen, enhanced his empathy for those still struggling. This compelled him to donate 100% of his book royalties to international aid organizations committed to building schools in the developing world.
Now channeling energies into motivational speaking about achievement and goal orientation, he uses lessons gleaned from the martial arts competition arena and adventure travel to encourage others to better their lives and enhance their careers.
Books
We’ve found that books nourish the mind and spirit. They can inspire you, give you courage, thrill and frighten you. Skillful writers can convey sights, sounds and experiences while transporting you to places that you might never have the opportunity to visit. While your physical being may not have arrived, your mind has and you are a more fulfilled person for it. In this section, we’ll offer a few words about books and authors whose writing skills and abilities will bring you to new places or teach you a thing or two about yourself or others.
Enjoy!
Spirit & Soul
Here you’ll find all sorts of things that Kim and I have found to enriches our riding experiences either on or off the bike. We’re not talking about gear to use while your riding, but things you might enjoy while you are riding, or perhaps while you are taking a break from riding.
In any event, we hope that all of the things you’ll find listed in this section will be food for your riding brain, enriches your adventure soul and increases your riding pleasure.
We hope you enjoy.
Mike and Kim
Ride2ADV 