Dear Sir,
I’m writing to thank you for enabling me to experience one of the most amazing holidays ever. In July I returned from an awesome climbing holiday around the Eiger in Switzerland. I had jumped at the opportunity to do something hopefully as exciting but different from motorcycling. Why? Well because I was at risk of becoming a biking bore.
Well that objective is now truly stuffed. On my return I read about Ben and Chippy’s trip to Borneo. I’ve been reading Bike since the late 80’s and I know that what is said is not just exaggerated journalistic prose for the masses. I simply had to go. So 6 weeks later and I’m on the plane to Borneo to meet Terry and Bryan. I won’t drone on but how many holidays can claim to tick the following boxes?
• Mind blowing scenery and great weather
• Rain forest
• Wild elephants and crocodiles
• Genuinely friendly natives
• Horse riding on tropical beaches
• Snorkelling and scuba diving on some of the most spectacular sites in the world
• Staying with friends you never knew you had
• Riding with a five times British motorcycle champion
• Being waved and smiled at by everyone from the people high up in the hills, deep in the forests and even the police in the towns
• Oh, and riding on everything from alpine roads to the most challenging gravel and off road sections with next to no traffic (or none that went over 50 miles an hour).
My trip with Borneo Biking adventures went way beyond anything any holiday maker has any right to expect. Whilst Borneo is incredible in so many respects the thing that really made it for me was Terry, Rose, Bryan and their friends who were all so welcoming and generous that it was hard to believe I hadn’t known them for years. Easy said I know but I have had some truly fantastic holidays over the last 20 or so years and met some incredible and generous people but this really was something special.
I lost count of the number of times in two weeks that at the end of a road I stopped and couldn’t speak to Terry or Bryan for ten minutes because I was giggling and gibbering like some kind of loon.
I’m well known for being a quirky and grumpy git so its bordering on the embarrassing to see the manic grins and look of childish excitement in all my several hundred holiday snaps.
All in all I have to say not only a big thank you to all at Borneo Biking Adventures but also to Bike, Ben and Chippy for a great article which got me out there in the first place. I have a feeling I shall be going back.
I’ve had a go at summing it all up for others but words don’t do it justice. This was the best I could come up with;
“Imagine a game of Tomb Raider, an episode of Blue Planet and the Isle of Man TT combined and still it can’t compete with the roads and experiences of Borneo which have clearly been designed by some drug crazed biker or cyber freak gamer. I spent the whole holiday expecting to wake up realising it had all been some incredible dream. My advice is pack a bag, leave a note to your loved ones, tell the boss to stuff it and leave tomorrow, you’ll never regret it.”
Regards
Ian Newcombe
PS Ben, Chippy if you ever find a place/trip that you think that beats this please let me know and I’ll resign from the desk job and emigrate immediately.
