Book cover of All the Gear, No Idea: A woman's solo motorcycle journey around the Indian subcontinent

Book description


The author quits her high-flying job in London, orders a classic Indian Enfield Bullet motorbike and goes off for a year on a 17,000 mile circuit of India. She wants adventures, and as a solo traveller, has plenty of them. Follow her on her travels discovering an unknown world of…

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Why read it?

1 author picked All the Gear, No Idea as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

India has always fascinated me, so I was intrigued to read this account of a 30-year-old woman riding 17,000 miles through the sub-continent, alone, on a motorbike. Never having previously ridden a motorbike, she takes a 3-day crash course on how to do so. What could possibly go wrong?

Nonchalantly tackling muddy jungles, deserts, and virtually impassable terrain, frequently breaking down, she muddles through with a mixture of ingenuity, optimism, and the never-failing help of the local people. 

A satisfyingly honest and self-deprecating account of a remarkable achievement by a woman who believed she could, and so she did.

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