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THE NEWS FROM JUPITER November Let's Meet I've been a bit lazy again. You'll find the reason why below, but first I have to tell you that I am talking and showing film at the Blackhawk Museum on Saturday, November 12th, at 10 am, and I am really sorry to have given such short notice. You can find out more at this website. So now to my excuses. As you may know, we launched a foundation in England in October. The whole UK trip went off beautifully. The launch night at the Coventry museum was an inspiration to me. Wonderful to see so many people take so much trouble to come and show their support for what was really until then just an idea in the heads of five people. Friends came from all over, from France, even from Chile. The auction under the frantically funny hammer of Austin Vince was an evening's entertainment in itself. Really it couldn't have been better. Co-founder Iain Harper has worked his butt off for months and the result is new connections all round - even with the new Triumph firm where for a long time it seemed nobody had heard of me. Iain also chauffered me around the country (and that's a first for me) to make our presence felt at Stanford's in London and Bristol, at Dave Wyndham's CW in Dorchester, and at Touratech in Wales. All brilliant. Normally that would have been enough excitement for the year, but no sooner had I got off the plane back in San Francisco than I had to rush down the coast to a HorizonsUnlimited meeting at Cambria, and another magical night on an open air stage overlooking the Pacific Ocean. So why haven't I been writing about all this before now? Because that wasn't the end of it. Immediately following the HU meeting, my wife finally arrived in the US, 17 months after we were married in Ukraine. So I hope that explains why you haven't heard from me for three weeks. There's much more about all this, if you care to look in the blog on my foundation website. HERE August How I became a foundation Until a few months ago I was just an ordinary bloke, getting on in years, who sometimes rode a bike and tried to find time to tend his garden. Then, quite suddenly, I became a Foundation, the CEO of a More May Day 2011 Eighty Implausible Years Quite how my mother contrived to introduce me to the world on May the First was never explained to me. If it was by accident (and I very much doubt it) it was a happy one. People tend to remember it. When I was young, that meant more presents. These days it gives me a better excuse to have a party. This year we had a good one, saddened only because good old Uncle Sam still hasn't let my wife into the country. But it's an ill wind that blows no good. When she does get here we'll just have to have another one. Meanwhile, here are some pictures: More December 2010 Down among the warthogs It was the warthogs I liked the most - impressive ladies More July 2010 Revisiting myself People keep asking me how I can be riding around on an iTune, and I have to explain that Piaggio, for their own More April 2010 Getting knotted This news is long overdue, but there is so much to tell More March 2010 My other life Why was I able, in my forties, to take four years off to More January 2010 Down Under I've been on a two-week motorcycle tour of New Zealand, More August 2009 Anatomy of an accident We all have accidents of one kind or another from time More

Thirty-five bikers joined me on the final lap, and escorted me back to my starting point at CWMotorcycles in Dorchester, which I left two and a half years earlier. So, how does it feel? Well, I can hardly believe it's over. I have ridden 54,000 miles on this BMW, and at least 5000 more miles on two other bikes.

I've been through 48 different countries, survived two bone-breaking accidents, fallen in love again, and seen what astonishing changes have taken place in the world since I was there last


My first ride around the world ended in 1977. Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine that I would be setting off on that same journey 24 years later.

Then I was already 46 years old. To do it at the age of 70 would have seemed impossible, but that is just what I've been doing.

This new adventure began in January of 2001. It took me the length of Africa, around the Americas, through New Zealand and Australia, and across Asia to Europe.

Why follow the same route that I took before? Because after 25 years I was still haunted by the memories of exotic places and wonderful people I might never see again, but most of all because it was a rare opportunity to see, close up, how the world has changed in a quarter of a century.

What I did not count on, of course, was how much the world would change while I was on the road.

As you follow my journey you will find out what nine-eleven looked like from Brazil, and you will get a different slant on how the new waves of war and terrorism affect the world.

All in all, it has been a stunning experience: always intriguing, not always comfortable, but charged with all manner of insights that have given me, I think, a privileged view of where we are all heading.

For three years I recorded my adventure, in pictures and words, on my web site. Now I have put the whole thing on a CD, and expanded it with a good deal of extra material.

Following it on the web undoubtedly gave it the virtue of immediacy but it is so much easier to read and enjoy on a CD. You will find a wealth of detail that you would have missed.

I think I can safely say that nothing as comprehensive as this has ever been attempted before.

Here are a few sample pages to whet your appetite:

From Colombia | From Egypt | From Kenya From Sudan | From Australia | From Bali
Travel the World with Jupiter, Again! To find out a lot more about the route I took, or about the bike I chose and the equipment I took with me, or how the idea of this adventure evolved, please click on this picture.

Read the Books : Buy the CD : View the film

Here at last is part three of the Jupiter trilogy. Above, the hard back edition published in England in 2007 by Little, Brown. This is available now from the author for $24.95, plus shipping and handling. Please send an email to tsimon@mcn.org so that we can tell you what it will cost to get a signed, dedicated copy sent to you.

Also out now in the USA is the soft-cover edition of Dreaming of Jupiter, in the stores priced at $24.95. We've changed the cover, for the fun of it really. It is in the same format as Jupiter's Travels and Riding High, but it also includes 16 pages of color. You can get it from your favourite book shop, but it will also be available directly from the author, signed and dedicated. Just send an email.

Finally, the film, now available as a DVD. Ted writes: "Normally I would have rejected the idea of filming the journey, because the process is too intrusive, but Manfred Waffender has been a friend for twenty years and I knew he would be sensitive to the spirit of the adventure. This beautiful film covers six episodes of the first leg through Africa. The theme is Memory. It is not like any 'biker movie' you may have seen." You can get it directly from Manfred by following this link. Click here

First of all there was Jupiter's Travels	Then came Riding High	Jupiter Returns on CD (auch auf Deutsch)	Gypsy is on hold!
For 25 years this book has been a favourite for travellers of all kinds, but in the world of motorcycle travel it has been a true phenomenon. This illustrated edition is available at book shops in the USA for $24.95. You can also buy a copy directly from the author, signed and dedicated to you. Click on the cover for more.	The Jupiter journey lasted four years. There were far too many stories for just one book. Riding High tells the rest of the story, and also why it was so difficult, afterwards, to come home. Click on the cover for more. When you've read Jupiter's Travels you'll want to follow it up with Riding High. $19.95 in the USA, also available directly from the author.	Ted Simon repeated the journey, 25 years later (see above). The web site he maintained throughout that 3-year journey is here, on this CD. There are 350 pages, plus close to a thousand pictures which you will never see in print. It works just like a web site, except that on your own computer you can move around at lightning speed. Enjoy it for itself, or as a brilliant accompaniment to the third Jupiter book, Dreaming of Jupiter, which is now available in hard back. Click on the disc for more. Only from Ted Simon, in English and German.	Sadly we have finally run dry of copies, but Ted is reluctant to take it off the page. It's a beautiful cover and one of his favourite books. Maybe, if enough people ask for it, he might find a way to re-publish it. This is the startling, hilarious and sometimes painful account of Ted's 1,500 mile tramp through Eastern Europe, at the time of the war in Bosnia, looking for the influences that shaped his early life, and finding poignant traces of his lost father. Click on the cover picture for more about this much-admired memoir.

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