I just finished 2 Years on a Bike. Overall I think it was a great dose of wanderlust - a big, hardback book with great print quality. I'd watched the 2-hour long movie on Youtube which was great. My worries about the book having 0 new content were unfounded, there was a lot of excellent extra detail.
Some reviewers noted that the author had maybe "too much" detail around his relationships over the 2 years. I disagreed - while there was a little bit of jealousy on my part that this guy was basically living my dream of biking around and sleeping with various models I think he covered them at an appropriate level without bragging.
The other chief complaint was if he was pure enough in the endeavor. There was plenty of shipping of supplies to the next cities, taking occasional side trips in cars, and long breaks in cosmopolitan cities. I think perhaps some of the folks complaining about that haven't done bikepacking in truly rough terrain over a 2 year period.
There was a lot of honesty about how miserable parts of the trip were, and how by the end he was essentially burned out on natural beauty. When you're stuck in an office for 10 hours at a time it's easy to forget that if you've seen breathtaking mountains continuously for 2 years, by the end you'll just be breathing pretty normally.
Finally from a culture war angle my other concern was that since all the people who get to do this are fucking hippies with trust funds that there'd be a lot of junk in that vein. Not so much! Or at least at a low enough level to be truly benign.
This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a
court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to
optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.
The weekly Culture War threads host the most
controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are
appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy;
if in doubt, post!
Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts.
You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.
Why are you called The Motte?
A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently,
it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey",
originally identified by
philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial
but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens
this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for
the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired
propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."
On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.
New post guidelines
If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it.
A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts
such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a
submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).
Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or
significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
I just finished 2 Years on a Bike. Overall I think it was a great dose of wanderlust - a big, hardback book with great print quality. I'd watched the 2-hour long movie on Youtube which was great. My worries about the book having 0 new content were unfounded, there was a lot of excellent extra detail.
Some reviewers noted that the author had maybe "too much" detail around his relationships over the 2 years. I disagreed - while there was a little bit of jealousy on my part that this guy was basically living my dream of biking around and sleeping with various models I think he covered them at an appropriate level without bragging.
The other chief complaint was if he was pure enough in the endeavor. There was plenty of shipping of supplies to the next cities, taking occasional side trips in cars, and long breaks in cosmopolitan cities. I think perhaps some of the folks complaining about that haven't done bikepacking in truly rough terrain over a 2 year period.
There was a lot of honesty about how miserable parts of the trip were, and how by the end he was essentially burned out on natural beauty. When you're stuck in an office for 10 hours at a time it's easy to forget that if you've seen breathtaking mountains continuously for 2 years, by the end you'll just be breathing pretty normally.
Finally from a culture war angle my other concern was that since all the people who get to do this are fucking hippies with trust funds that there'd be a lot of junk in that vein. Not so much! Or at least at a low enough level to be truly benign.
Recommend it if you can shelve your jealousy.
More options
Context Copy link