Long Way Round (2004) s01e08 Episode Script

Got sun on my face
Sleeping rough on the road
I'll tell you all about it
When I get home
Comin' round to meet you
The long way round
We're gonna ride 20,000 miles in 115 days through 12 countries.
Europe, Kazakhstan and Mongolia.
And then ride the Road of Bones in Far Eastern Russia.
Then we're gonna fly to Alaska
and go through Canada, America, and New York.
We're gonna give these guys video cameras.
They'll have cameras on their motorcycles.
They will have cameras on their helmets.
And mics in their helmets.
Here we are in deep sand. Always a favorite with the biker.
Third motorcycle travel with them
and on that third motorcycle will be a cameraman.
In addition, there will be two support vehicles.
We will travel around the world as well, linking up with the guys at borders.
But really, the motorcycles will be on their own.
We've successfully now crossed the biggest continent in the world
and are now going to the next one.
You don't wanna watch this.
No, I think I'm gonna go.
I don't wanna watch this 'cause it's just gonna freak me out, actually.
What the fuck are they doing? What are they doing?
Oh, that-- Oh, now that's good.
Bounce it around when it's right on the edge.
I'm sure they'll get it done.
Planning to go up by Fairbanks and down,
but there's massive forest fires here in Alaska
which doubled in size overnight, apparently.
Up north of Fairbanks?
The road to Fairbanks, so far, it's good. There's no problem with that.
But north of Fairbanks and east of Fairbanks, it's bad.
Right, wow.
So your visibility might not be that good when you get up there.
East or south?
They were going to this ice hotel as well. Where's that?
That's on the way up?
Oh, up in North Pole. North Pole area. That's relatively new.
Yeah, we're going up past-- What's the mountain called?
-Might not be there anymore. -Mount McKinley?
If there's fires-- ice hotel, fires. No, forget it.
Yeah, that's what I'm thinking. But I'm there, man.
Forget about it.
We are here for the bikes.
Oh, my baby.
My baby's back
This one came off. This came out of the belly.
This piece came off the plane this way, right.
I don't know where that piece came from.
They flew for 12 hours in the aircraft lying on the pistonhead,
lying on the engine guard.
Just on the side.
Can you imagine?
I mean, they must've been skating all over the place.
We realize that this leg of the journey
may not be as simple as we thought.
There are forest fires all over Alaska.
And we don't know if there's anything seriously wrong with the bikes.
Bastard!
Really annoyed me.
I suppose 'cause we're so tired and stuff and haven't slept all night.
Easy to lose your temper at the little things.
Jet lag.
This is true. I haven't had jet lag on this trip yet.
London to Far Eastern Russia with no jet lag, and now jet lag.
A little bit of a surprise. Missed a whole night.
All right!
Now you're talking.
-Is this the new warrior? -This is it. This is it.
Oh, look how small you look in there, Dave.
It's the biggest truck in the world.
Pack them in, guys.
I think we should go to a fantastic breakfast place
and have an enormous breakfast.
-Oh. -Wow.
-Oh, my God. I did, thank you. -Yes.
Oh.
While the bikes are being serviced,
we're gonna take a couple of days off and see some Alaskan wildlife,
and then start leg two.
The long road to New York.
We're gonna go ahead and get your body weight, so without your bags.
One eight one.
God. We're just
I'm 181. You're 182.
It's amazing.
Especially when I was over 13 stone when I did this.
Yeah.
So, what are you guys doing here?
-Huh? -What are you guys doing here?
-What are we doing here? -Yeah.
Well, she's a pilot. I work for a cargo company.
We're just kinda hanging out.
Decided to go see the bears.
Hey, come in between us.
We're gonna give you the American sandwich.
-The American sandwich? -Yeah.
-Lovely! -Yeah!
Oh, that's nice.
-Do that again. -Okay.
-That's an Alaskan hug. -Funny, yeah.
I think they've been in the outback a little bit too long, you know.
Quite nice.
If I could have another one of those when I get back,
that would be nice, thanks.
Let's hope we get back.
We've got a very nervous pilot in the back here.
Yeah, shouldn't he be up the front?
-Claudio. -He's getting the--
Claudio's getting the moss on the lake.
Because he's not looking at the bear.
Did you see that bear coming towards you there, Claudio?
There are bears all the way down the river.
You can see them just dotted all the way down.
Look, that's mama bear with her three babies.
The mother down here, up until three or four days ago, had four cubs
and has had four cubs since last summer.
And she was crossing over the river from that bank to this bank.
And the smallest of the cubs got swept away down the river.
So it's possible that, you know, that little cub's still wandering around,
but it's also very possible that one of these big males took him out already.
'Cause the big males kill cubs.
It's very unusual, I think-- I would imagine,
to see mother, cub so close to males.
Must be very strong to stand in that current for that length of time.
But, I mean, he's right on the edge there.
Yeah.
That was unbelievable.
I mean, that fish couldn't have jumped more directly
into the bear's mouth if it tried.
Patience.
Seeing the bears at Brook Lodge
reminded us of the driver shooting the bear in Siberia.
And that brought us onto the subject of hunting.
To take pleasure from killing a beast like that, a wild beast--
Like, we just watched fishing in the river, it was abhorrent to me.
But if you're gonna kill it, and use it and eat it
-and make good use of it. -You're still deciding to do it.
-Yeah, but I don't see the difference -As opposed to another animal.
-between killing a cow, I mean-- -But the natives had to.
-'Cause it's a fucking bear, that's why. -If you have that--
-But-- -It's not a cow.
But what about the poor cow? It's still an animal.
It's farmed.
I, personally, wouldn't go and kill a bear or whatever,
but I'll certainly go and kill a venison and eat it.
And I'll kill birds and eat it and have pigeon pie.
But why? Because you take pleasure in killing it.
If you go and have fish in a restaurant,
you know, someone has gone and killed that fish for your pleasure.
You have the desire to eat the fish, so you eat it.
I don't see the difference in going out and killing it and eating it yourself.
You're still gonna eat the fish. You've still gotta eat.
It's man's human nature to survive and eat.
If I was out in the wilderness and I had no food
and I was up to the point of starvation, then of course you would hunt and eat.
Of course you would.
But the idea of when there's no need to,
to go out and kill a bear in the wild is purely--
It's not a food argument, because there's plenty of food.
It's a pleasure argument.
You're taking that bear's life for your own pleasure.
Looking forward to going kayaking with the whales.
Got a new mosquito bite to add to the collection.
Oh, my God, mate.
You react terribly badly to them.
-That's-- Looks deformed. -It's huge.
Just rub it in.
You're deformed! How nice.
You're a freak.
You're like a Georgia peach.
We're gonna go Blackstone for the day.
You swell like the sea, son.
So I might have forgot,
anytime we're out here on the deck or whatnot,
just in case he has to stop real quick or something happens, just heads up.
'Cause, you know, even though it seems real calm, you could lose your footing.
We don't want-- Don't go swimming, not until we get back, at least, anyways.
Can't get used to the time difference having changed.
I can't get my act together to get phone calls and stuff.
And also the mobiles don't work here, and--
It's quite hard to keep in touch now.
Before it was easy 'cause anytime after 4:00 in the afternoon was good.
Does it all get frozen solid up here?
And it should just be the same now,
but it's somehow harder in the mornings, isn't it?
I find it harder to get up on the blower in the morning.
Just can't do it.
"Hi. Yeah."
Whereas in the afternoon, you're like, "Hi--"
Hey!
-Got your sea legs then? -You all right?
In the afternoon, you're like--
Do you like my trim, by the way?
I just got-- I had to trim it 'cause it was all just
There was things living in it, and
there were some things nesting over here.
There was field mice up here.
Got myself a beard trimmer.
Well, it was the first culture shock. We went to the supermarket.
Charley was getting root beer.
So I went to get a beard trimmer and some toothpaste and a toothbrush.
And then I was walking by and got some hair products.
And then I suddenly was looking at shotguns, high-velocity rifles,
Magnum handguns, 9-millimeter semiautomatic pistols
just right next to where I bought my toothpaste.
And I thought, "My, God. Only a minute ago I was in the Road of Bones
where there's absolutely nothing."
And suddenly there was just everything under one roof that you could need.
Well, I mean, not that you really need a .44 Magnum, but
Unbelievable. Couldn't--
I can't get my head into it, really.
The choice and all the
It was weird.
'Cause literally for months we had
nothing on offer.
-Teatime! -From
from Kazakhstan.
And now, bang!
Pizzas, Starbucks, you know, discos.
Discos?
Bagsy the gray one.
When you've been on the boat, I've already bagsed it.
-You take the gray one. -I'll go for this one right here.
I want the blue one anyway.
No, you bagsed it, mate. So, you know, you gotta live with your decision.
Watch you guys have fun.
What's that?
After our last accident, we haven't been back for a while, so
Anyone wanna go with the red?
Oh, actually, maybe red would be--
Looks good with the orange.
-Don't you think, Jim? Red. -Yeah.
That's a medium. I don't know. You might be too big for that.
Don't be ridiculous.
How dare you?
I'm sure maybe it's all this bulk. Maybe a little bit.
-No, no, I don't mean to-- -Do it up. Do it. Do it.
"Don't be ridiculous."
Zip it up. Fucking make it work.
How dare you! Put it on!
Always been a medium, always will be.
Now I'm just about to go over there.
Do you know what we need now?
-What? -Absolutely nothing.
Look. It's all here.
-I just don't know-- -How much do you want
a huge big chunk to fall off though?
-Oh, so desperate. -I know.
Every time it cracks and makes that noise, I'm like, "Come on, son!"
I don't want him next to that ice.
There's some ice. It's fucking chunks coming off right now.
Charley!
Ewan!
Ewan!
Yeah, it was just fantastic. I didn't really wanna come back.
The one time I came back, turned around and bang,
there goes a big block of ice, and I missed it.
They were falling. Like, they were these huge lumps of ice,
but they looked like they were falling in slow motion.
Ewan, what are we looking at here?
We're looking at sea otters.
Six of them here.
And they were in front of us, and we're just following them now, slowly.
They're beautiful.
They go down to the bottom. They get a stone.
And they go down to the bottom. They get a seashell.
And then-- Like a clam or something like that.
And they come back up, and they roll on their backs.
And then they smash the shell with a stone like that
and then eat the mussel or whatever is inside.
Go down for another one. With a stone. It's cool, isn't it?
Gonna try and find some orcas. There's a pod of killer whales.
Somewhere in this channel. They were seen about an hour ago.
There were ten of them.
So we're desperate to see them.
The orca up here, they're killer whales,
but you can kayak with them, but if you fall out
-They'll eat you. -they'll think you're a seal.
So then you're obviously in danger.
So, do you think you wanna have a go at that?
I don't think so, no.
They're out here, but it's big water. It's a big ocean.
-So you never know where they're at. -Yeah.
Roger that.
They're watching us.
Gonna need a bigger boat.
Oh, there they are! There! They're just there! Look! On your right!
They're just there!
That's fantastic!
Oh, my God! They were just there! Look!
-Right here. -Right there!
Look, look, there they are! Oh, my God! I could touch them.
Oh, look, look. Oh. Look.
That's a cool shot.
Oh, that-- Jesus Christ, they're close.
They are, man. This is great.
Oh, but this is fantastic.
-Great, did you see that? -Yeah, I did.
Oh, they were so close. And they're so slow as they come out of the water
and just having a bit of a breathe.
Somehow that's just staggeringly lucky that we've seen those guys.
Unbelievable.
It's been fantastic to have a couple of days off in Anchorage.
But the bikes are fixed now, so we really need to get on to New York.
You guys have done so much work on them. It's incredible.
I think it's gonna be good fun. It's gonna be very different.
I mean, whereas we were before, you never knew where you were gonna sleep.
You never knew where you were gonna stay.
You
You always had to think about food.
You always had to think about carrying water.
You had to think about fuel.
These are the new road tires. There are still wide enough grooves
where they're gonna handle very good in the dirt.
-Uh-huh. -But yet,
they're gonna give you really good street and handling capabilities.
And a smoother ride.
-It's not gonna vibrate you to death. -Oh, tell me about it. Brilliant.
I can go into my little GPS here.
Look. I can find.
Go to my "Food & Drink."
Go to my "All Food & Drink" list.
So, what do you want? American, Asian, barbecue, Chinese
deli, international, fast food? Fast food.
It's just amazing how--
It wasn't very long ago we were in Mongolia having that--
those terrible, hard days.
It's just-- It's gonna be great. It's gonna be a lovely change.
We're planning to go by Fairbanks and down,
but I think with the fires,
-we maybe won't be able to do that. -Nope.
I just got a video from Mom and Dad up at Fairbanks, and it's just an absolute--
They live near Harding Lake.
And Little Harding Lake is right across the street.
And they can't see Little Harding Lake from the house.
They said that its visibility is a quarter of a mile.
Yeah, quarter of a mile visibility. Which means you're gonna see Alaska,
-but you're gonna see it just like this. -Yeah.
Do you know how long it's taken us to get here?
And now we can't see it.
Back on the road again
Yeah, first day riding. Beautiful rubber. Really smooth.
I mean, the roads. You could probably play snooker
on the roads.
A huge truck. My God. Look at that.
But really nice to be back on the road again.
Really, really nice.
How many miles are we averaging between stops?
Be lucky if we do about 20, but we've actually done 50.
-Since the petrol station? -Since the petrol station, yeah.
So that's all right.
And
And I reckon we do another five miles. Next motel, just--
I mean, what's most important is that we're safe.
-And at the moment, we're -Not safe.
so tired that
Why are we all so tired, Charley?
Well, because none of us, since we got to Magadan
have been to bed before
2:00 or 3:00.
That's why.
It's just the days off. We can--
We can--
We get so excited to be having days off
that we stay up till 3:00, 4:00 in the morning.
But the idea, now that we're back on the road,
the three of us, à trois.
We'll find a little motel.
Three rooms.
A ménage à trois?
No ménage à trois. Just à trois.
And three rooms
by 5:00, 4:00.
-3:30. -Oh, God.
Get into the bed, you know
at about 6:00 in the afternoon with a big bucket of
Kentucky Fried Chicken
a bit of telly
and bed-- sleep.
-There's no TV in the room. -There's no TV in the rooms, Claudio.
There is a big TV downstairs.
And there's a lot of nuns in there.
-Like Japanese nuns or Korean nuns maybe. -Korean. I think they're Korean.
-Korean? -They look Korean.
Could be a bit of a swinging party in there tonight, eh?
Just you, me, Charley and about eight Korean nuns.
In the spirit of
seeing how people live in different parts of the world, you know,
if there's forest fires up there, we should go and see them.
With forest fires
you can't make a prediction of what they're gonna do
because it all depends on environment, the humidity, weather, stuff like that.
I'm not a fire expert.
I just know that it's only 27% contained right now
and that it can change at any time.
So we should proceed with caution.
About 1.8 million acres of burning in Alaska.
-Wow. -1.8 million acres?
And is it still burning now? The--
Still burning. Not the danger that it was before
because it was north of Fairbanks moving toward us.
-Moving towards us, yeah. -And now that
it's being driven back on itself--
One of the biggest forest fires America's ever had
at the moment up here.
Look at this tent city.
This is all for the firemen.
And how are the firefighters getting around? Helicopters or
We do have helicopters that have the capability
of carrying crews in if we need to.
Most of our helicopters have been doing more bucket drops.
How do you stop a fire?
-How do we stop it? -Yeah.
We're still working on that.
Whenever you're battling Mother Nature, it's always tough.
I think we have about 76 village crews.
Sixteen members to a crew from all over the state from different villages.
And they're really the best remote area firefighters in the world.
So that just sweeps-- That's just what's sweeping along.
And then it sets all the trees up from the bottom upwards, yeah?
And it's coming this way, yeah.
See, this fire stuff is easy. Anyone can do it.
The ice hotel that we were gonna visit actually melted.
I hadn't realized it was actually gone.
-Yeah, gone completely. Yeah. -Gone.
Milepost 34. There's a house
on this side of the road.
And there's a landowner there that was, during the fire--
He tells quite a story. You should stop and talk to him.
I could hear it roaring, and it was getting darker all the time,
and the sky was getting red.
-Wow. -And it was real dark and--
And then it got pitch dark in the daytime.
I mean, it was nighttime here.
But you could hear it, and it sounded like a whirlwind.
It sounded like a tornado.
You know, it sounded like it was in a pipe or something, you know.
And the heat was intense.
It was coming over, but I didn't know when.
So I figured, well, I'll take a quick snooze.
And when I woke up there's this orange glow.
And I ran over to the window, and I'm looking all over here, and
there's just a wall of fire 100, 200 feet high.
Well, I gotta get outta here. And I just ran for the truck,
and jumped in the truck,
and headed on down the driveway, and it's coming for me.
It's coming right in the driveway. It's coming right up to the truck.
I made it out to the gravel pit and parked her there and--
And I said, "Well
jeez, it's not too bad here. I think I got a chance."
So I went and grabbed the pump outta my truck.
And the hose. And I started working my way back in.
I soaked everything down.
-I got it. -Unbelievable.
I got it. I saved it.
It only dawned on me the other day that I'm riding across America.
It's like a lifetime dream to be able to go across America.
So I'm so happy
to be here.
Over here is a female moose.
A moosette.
A moostress.
Looks like a horse.
Actually, it doesn't look like a horse. It looks more like a mule
when it's got its head down.
That's what I thought at first.
And then just as I went by, it lifted its head up,
and it's got that big moose mouth.
The roads are just beautiful, I must say. Just fantastic.
And we're just coming into the Rocky Mountains now,
and it's really nice.
And I'm gonna show you the road, okay?
Here is the beautiful, beautiful road.
I have a terrible cold. Did I tell you, Claudio?
But riding along, there's nothing-- You can't blow your nose in a helmet.
It's really uncomf-- You have to keep wiping it with your gloves,
and it's irritating my soft skin.
It's not easy.
Nice riding though, isn't it?
Was talking to a guy in a petrol station just now,
and he was saying
I think, "These roads are just so smooth and so nice."
And he was going, "Really? Do you think?"
"Isn't it a bit cracked and--" Oh, God.
I was saying, "I'm telling you, this is just great."
My dad, he was 70-- He was 72 years old when he drove it up here
from Phoenix, Arizona.
My folks lived in Sun City.
Dad died when he was 86, and he was still riding Harleys.
He was a Harley lover.
It's the 7th of July,
and we're gonna be in New York on the 29th of July.
It's fantastic. It's just a different ball game now.
I mean, tomorrow we might have some gravel and stuff
where they're redoing the roads, but, you know,
we've done gravel, and we've done
dirt tracks, and we've left that behind us, you know?
That's a nice bike.
I was just at this rally up at Dawson,
and I got this sticker.
One of the guys had these made up in Anchorage.
Nobody's shot at it yet anyways. So, yeah.
Listen. Harleys riding around outside.
There's loads and loads of bikers here.
Quite a bizarre feeling that it's done, you know?
That we've done London to Magadan, and we, you know,
we don't have to go back that way.
And we've got the most beautiful asphalt to ride on now.
Asphalt.
Sounds like such a lovely thing, and it is.
Feels great to be here.
It feels great to be feeling that I'm on the way home to my family.
And
I was speaking to my wee girls this morning, and
you know, we're talking about a matter of 20 days now
till I'm back with them.
Back with my wee ladies, so
That's fantastic.
Did you hear that guy yesterday, that biker?
The Harley guy, he was driving up here yesterday,
-and he hit a black bear -Yeah.
at 55 miles an hour.
This bear stepped out onto the road, and he just managed to get past him.
Just glanced him. Brushed him with his leg.
A nice shot of my bike 'cause it's so lovely, my bike.
I think I love it more and more every minute. Look.
Look how cool it looks now.
Always reminds me of when I dropped it
riding through a huge pile of gravel in Mongolia because I was stupid.
No other reason.
Oh.
Home, sweet home.
So we left Alaska today,
which is very sad 'cause Alaska's beautiful, beautiful.
We gotta really be careful that we get the miles done, I think.
Because we've got a long way to go.
And we wanna make it into New York for the 29th
of July. And
you know, it could be very-- it could be-- It would be very easy
for the last, you know, two weeks to become really tight.
And everyone was warning us when we left
Tok, that, you know, there'd be a lot of stretches of gravel.
And take it easy. Be careful.
And we're on this gravel--
It was like a really good road because of what we were used to.
And the whole business thing is kind of cropping into this trip at the moment.
I've had to read a script or two
and have a chat with my agent in London and in LA.
When you've been through Kiev
and met the kids who suffered from the Chernobyl disaster,
and the kids on the climbing wall in Kazakhstan,
and the little kids in Mongolia
you know, suddenly, multimillion dollar movies
seem like a complete fucking farce.
It is
the 9th, about 12:30, and we're in an aircraft hangar
as you can see behind me.
And we're just about to go up to this massive ice glacier.
I don't wanna go. They're forcing me.
Any thoughts, Charley?
Thoughts.
-Fears? Feelings? Emotions? -Well
they're all so much now that I can't-- I don't know what to do.
No, I'm kind of excited.
-I love it on planes. -It'll be great. Me too.
-I just love it. It's fantastic. -Can I keep this on the seat?
So many of the vehicles we've been using and flying in and driving in and
aren't new, you know?
And it just makes you think all these nobs that get brand-new cars every year.
Get the new model every single year.
I mean, people that buy new sports bikes, for instance, every year, Charley.
Such a waste of money and time.
Oh, let's not-- No, sports is different. You know, that's just different.
-It's true, isn't it? -It is.
-Everything can be fixed, including this. -It is.
Well, let's decide when we get back on the ground, actually.
I love these funky old planes. They're working planes, you know.
He's flown here-- For 30 years, he's flown in the mountains.
-Where is he from? -I don't know. He sounds kind of English.
-Where are you from, mate? -Llwyngwril.
-Excuse me? -Llwyngwril.
Where's that then?
-You don't know? -Swingarill?
-Llwyn, Llwyn. Come on. Llwyn. -Oh, Welsh.
-He's Welsh. No wonder he's-- -Welsh!
Ah!
God, they play great rugby in Wales these days, don't they?
Nice singing voice. Go on. Give us a few notes.
You know?
We did our off-road training in Wales in the-- What valley was it? The
-The Pissy Valley, he called it. -Said it's known as the Pissy Valley
'cause it's always fucking pissing with rain.
Here we go.
Whoa!
Oh, fucking hell.
A little steep, this. I wasn't expecting that.
-Oi, hey, hey! Oi, oi! -Oi! Steady on, love!
We're flying over the Hubbard Glacier.
Look at the size of it.
It's apparently the longest tidewater glacier in the whole of Alaska.
There are bits of ice that fall off it
that are the height of ten-story buildings.
Kinda cool back here.
This is a very, very comfortable seat.
-Is it the old swing saddle? -Yeah.
-Thank you very much. -That was brilliant.
Okay, Charley. Thanks for everything.
See you in New York, mate.
Personally, I think you're a bit of a pussy
going on the plane all the way, but--
-And? How was it? -Oh, it was amazing.
I feel like I was inside National Geographic.
I feel like I am National Geographic.
It just goes on and on and on.
I mean, you know, you start getting bored.
We're just having a great time now. The roads are beautiful.
The accommodation is easy to get.
And before this, it was a luxury just to have clean clothes.
I remember at drama school being at the launderette.
Like, you'd-- I'd eked it out as long as I could, you know,
and waited to the last day possible to go to the launderette.
And I go in with this sack of gray, gray clothes.
I used to wear white jeans, I remember, a lot.
And they would always be, like, kind of, almost black.
I had a skinhead with a long fringe
which was traditionally a girl's kind of skinhead.
So I dyed my head bright red with this long fringe,
and I just looked like a complete shock, you know?
I used to wear leggings, dance-like Lycra leggings
with big Dr. Marten boots and big woolen socks
and silk shirts.
I was a complete state.
I liked it though. I still like it.
I went out yesterday and went
I went shopping. I had a wander about and got some jeans and stuff,
and a new pair of boots 'cause I wanted to get out of the
the kind of endurance bike gear.
I got really tired on the bike this afternoon. Just exhausted.
And I just feel like it's not
a particular late night or--
or certainly not difficult roads to be riding on.
There's no reason for us to be tired because of that.
I think it's just the culmination of the whole trip.
Just finally getting really tired.
I'm dying to get to New York to see my wife.
More than anything, I just can't wait to
have my arms around Eve.
What a treat.
I'm just constantly fiddling around now on the bike
trying to keep myself amused.
But the roads still throw up some surprises.
Beautiful, huh? A little young one.
It's a young one.
He's just munching away. He's gotta be about 15 feet from us?
Didn't know they eat grass.
Support crew have come across some wildlife as well.
-Jimmy! -Don't shout.
Holy shit.
That's not good.
Oh, that means his mother's nearby.
Yeah, so I'm scared now.
-Jim! Come back! -Jim, come back!
I'd forgotten about Charley Lake,
and then suddenly saw it on the GPS, and it said Charley Lake.
And it's a really beautiful lake.
I really love what you've done with it.
Was it your idea to put all the trees over there?
It was, yeah. Just-- I've, you know
-held back on the planning permission. -Yeah.
Most of them don't like me around here because of it,
but, you know.
This is our last two weeks.
We've broken free of everyone, and it's our last--
We've got 15 days before the 28th,
which is when we have to arrive in
Just outside of New York. And then we ride in.
Fifteen days left.
Do you remember when we first started off, and we arrived at, let's say
-Nürburgring? -Yeah.
And we were sitting there just kicking back and thinking about--
We had 100 and something day-- 115 days.
-That's right, 115 days. -15 days.
And now we're sitting here, and we've got 15 days left.
We've been on the road for 100 days.
100 days.
-I mean, that's-- that's a long way. -That's a long time, yeah.
I feel it today as well. I feel every 100 days of it.
My arse, especially.
We've done 389.6 miles today.
It's our first big day in a while, isn't it?
Let's get there and find somewhere to stay.
-And then-- -Stay in Dawson's Crack?
-We'll stay there. -Up Dawson's Crack.
Modern technology!
I got my phone back! I got my phone back.
-Long Way Round Production-- -No.
And my dad's all-- It was nice to speak to him.
He said, "You phone anytime. Two in the morning, it doesn't matter.
So long as we can speak to you."
That's nice, eh?
It is back to reality with a bump,
but, you know, you kind of sort of expect that.
My phone went on last night. I had 28 messages.
And I'd say 20 of them were from my agent
and publicist and--
Just wanna be free. I wanna be on the Road of Bones.
Are you envious of Ewan
because, probably, he'll just walk straight into the next job?
No.
It's just life. I mean, that's just the way--
If I was envious of every actor I knew, I'd--
Mind you, I don't know many actors 'cause I hate them. No.
I hate all them bastards working so much.
I never get the jobs. I could've done those jobs.
I could've done that Star Wars thing much better than him.
And the Moulin Rouge! thing. You know, I'm a good singer, actually.
This is us arriving at the ranch. We met this guy last night.
-Jason? Jason. -Jason.
Jason, we met last night outside our hotel completely by chance,
and he owns this bison ranch, buffalo ranch.
You can see them over there, and he's asked us out this morning
with the promise of riding one of his bison.
-How are you? -Yeah.
Well, you didn't bring your chaps, but I got a pair you can wear.
So, here comes Lucy, so watch your back.
-What do I do? -Come over here. Come over here.
-Hello, Lucy. Beautiful. She's amazing. -And I'll put you up on her back.
-Is she likely to freak out and run away? -No. Get up.
Hello, Lucy.
Look at her Afro. She's got such top hair.
Yeah, it's because she's a buffalo soldier. It's a reggae thing.
-Yeah? Okay. -Yeah.
-Whoa. -Go on then.
-Pretty cool, hey? -It's amazing.
-You want her to go somewhere? -Riding a buffalo, yeah.
Get in between-- Wait.
There's our feed truck there.
Now, Charley will be slightly heavier than I was, okay?
We rode all the way to Magadan from London, right?
All the way across Russia, and we got to Magadan.
And then we flew to Anchorage, and suddenly we're in an American town.
-Yeah. -It took me by surprise.
I think I was imagining Anchorage to be some kind of Wild West, you know?
Horses tied up outside of shops and stuff.
And it wasn't that. And it's now, today, and--
Slowly the two parts of the journey are starting to match up a bit.
You know, by meeting you and speaking about things.
It's the same thing.
It's seeing people in Mongolia working their animals and--
You know what I mean? They're starting to blend now.
'Cause I was worried that it was gonna be like one experience
doing the trip to Magadan and then a completely separate one.
But I hope they're gonna start to match up. Feels like they might.
Jimmy and I are going on this lunatic ride.
I don't know why I'm doing this. I don't really want to do it.
It's made out of wood. They're just wooden seats.
Oh, my God.
-Oh, man. -Oh, fucking Jesus. Fuck.
Fucking hell!
-Whoa! -Oh, my God!
Oh, my-- Jesus.
Oh, bugger!
Back on the safety of my motorcycle
after the terrors of the funfair last night.
Fucking hell.
I just got in an accident. Yeah, on the highway.
All the traffic slowed down, and so I put my hazards on.
Just saw this red car just come up and just--
The car had hit Ewan's panniers, and they hit here and over here.
And then his back wheel rubbed against here.
And the whole front wheel lifted up.
And he landed, and he was going like this all over.
I just thought he's coming off.