If you’ve arrived here after watching one of my videos of Lora, my ZX-9R, disappearing along a road through the Scottish countryside, you could quite reasonably assume XploraLora is a motorcycle channel. It isn’t really.

There are certainly going to be plenty of motorcycles involved, because I love them and Lora 💞 is a very important part of all this. But XploraLora isn’t really a motorcycle channel, a mountain biking channel or even a hiking channel. It’s an exploration channel. The method of getting there just changes.

It Started With Wanting to Know What’s Over There

I’ve always had a need to explore. If I see a road I’ve never travelled along, I wonder where it goes. If I’m riding through the forest and notice an old track disappearing between the trees, sooner or later I’m going to start wondering what’s at the other end of it. If I can see a mountain in the distance, I’ll want to know what it’s called and what the view is like from the top.

Sometimes it’s probably better if I don’t investigate these things because my sense of direction isn’t exactly legendary, but that’s never really stopped me. 🌚

I love maps and geography and knowing how places fit together, but looking at somewhere on a map isn’t the same as actually going there. Eventually curiosity gets the better of me and I want to see it for myself. That’s really where XploraLora comes from.

Lora Gets Me Along the Roads

Lora is my 1998 Kawasaki ZX-9R C1 and probably the most conspicuous member of XploraLora. She’s fast, noisy, slightly ridiculous and very precious to me, but the videos I make with her aren’t really about riding around as quickly as possible while a camera records the road ahead. There are plenty of excellent channels doing motorcycle POV rides, but that isn’t what I’m trying to make.

For me the interesting bit is where the motorcycle can take me. A road through Galloway might lead to an old bridge, an abandoned mine, a forest track or a view of some distant mountains that makes me think, “I wonder if I can get up there?”

At that point the motorcycle ride has already started turning into something else.

Sometimes I’ll stop simply because somewhere looks beautiful. I’ll make a coffee, wander around, talk nonsense to the camera and look at the landscape. Other times I’ll park Lora and disappear off on foot. The motorcycle is part of the adventure rather than necessarily being the reason for it.

Liza Goes Where Lora Can’t

Then there’s Liza 💞, my Carrera Fury mountain bike.

Liza changed the possibilities considerably because suddenly all those forest roads and trails I couldn’t explore on Lora became accessible. Unfortunately, giving me access to more tracks also gave me considerably more opportunities to get lost.

I’ve set off on supposedly simple mountain bike rides and ended up following abandoned tracks, pushing through vegetation, crossing boggy ground, finding bridges I didn’t know existed and wondering where on earth I was actually meant to be. And I love it.

I don’t particularly mind if a route turns out to be a dead end. Obviously I’d prefer it if there was a way through, especially after I’ve spent an hour trying to find one, but no time spent exploring somewhere new is really wasted. Even discovering that a track goes absolutely nowhere means I now know where it goes. Nowhere. Useful information. 😆

And Eventually I Run Out of Wheels

There comes a point where neither Lora nor Liza can take me any further, which is generally where the walking boots come out.

Mountains have always fascinated me. I love being among them, looking at them and, when my legs are cooperating, climbing them.

There is something rather wonderful about starting somewhere down in a valley, looking at a summit high above you and knowing that a few hours later you might be standing on it looking back down at where you started.

It doesn’t particularly matter to me whether it’s a famous mountain or some obscure lump that hardly anybody visits. In fact, sometimes I prefer the obscure lump.

Galloway and southern Scotland are full of places like that. Mountains, forests, lochs, burns, old tracks and huge areas where you can spend hours wandering around without seeing very many people at all. That’s my kind of place.

The Landscape Is the Important Bit

The machinery is fun, but ultimately the landscape is the star of XploraLora. Lora, Liza and my walking boots are really just different tools for moving through it.

One adventure might involve a superb motorcycle road. Another might be about finding a forgotten trail through a forest. The next could involve climbing a mountain, flying the drone over a loch or simply sitting on a rock with a coffee wondering why I didn’t bring a spoon again. Sometimes the best moment of an entire day is something I wasn’t looking for at all.

I’ve gone looking for one place and accidentally found somewhere better. I’ve taken wrong turns that led to wonderful views and followed trails simply because I wanted to know where they went. Not knowing exactly what’s going to happen is part of the appeal.

It Isn’t Supposed to Be a Travel Documentary

I’m not trying to make polished television travel programmes either. They’re my adventures as they actually happen, and that means sometimes things go wrong.

I get lost. I forget things. Batteries go flat. Routes disappear. Gates appear where I wasn’t expecting them. The weather changes. I fall over occasionally. Liza gets filthy. Lora needs fixing. I say stupid things and sometimes spend an unreasonable amount of time trying to make a cup of coffee. I could remove all of that and create a much more polished version of events, but I think I’d also remove much of the point.

Exploring isn’t always a sequence of spectacular drone shots accompanied by inspirational music. Sometimes you’re standing ankle-deep in a bog staring at a map thinking, “This definitely looked like a path.” That’s part of the adventure too.

Sometimes I Just Stop and Talk

The channel has gradually become about more than simply showing the places I visit as well.

Sometimes I’ll sit somewhere with a coffee and talk about whatever happens to be going through my head. It might be motorcycles, life, getting older, health, something that’s happened recently or something completely ridiculous.

I’m not particularly interested in pretending to be somebody different when the camera is running. If I’m having a brilliant day, you’ll probably know about it. If I’m struggling, you might know about that too. And if I’ve done something particularly stupid, there’s an extremely good chance you’ll hear me call myself a lemon. Possibly a plank. Sometimes both.

Why Build a Website as Well?

YouTube is brilliant for showing an adventure, but there’s quite a lot that doesn’t naturally fit into a video. That’s one of the reasons I built this website.

The Adventures section lets me go back through my travels and document them properly, including some of the details that would otherwise disappear once a video gets buried among everything else on YouTube.

Where possible you’ll find maps, route information, distances, heights and GPX downloads so you can look at exactly where I’ve been or even use some of the routes for your own adventures.

There are photographs too, along with the story behind each trip and some of the little details that might not have made it into the finished video. Over time I want this site to become a record of all these places and adventures rather than simply a collection of links to YouTube videos.

There Isn’t Really a Destination

I don’t have some grand final destination for XploraLora. I’d like to explore much more of Scotland and eventually travel further afield when circumstances allow, but I don’t think there will ever be a point where I can say I’ve finished. There will always be another road. Another forest track. Another mountain in the distance. Another little line on a map that makes me wonder where it goes.

And probably another occasion where I’ll confidently announce that I know exactly where I am shortly before discovering that I don’t.

That’s really XploraLora.

Motorcycles, mountain bikes, mountains, forests, hiking, photography, coffee and a considerable amount of questionable exploration.

I don’t necessarily know where I’m going. I just want to see what’s there.

You only have one life. Fill it with as many adventures as you can.

Keep Exploring! 💞