Book - Long Way Round, Ewan MacGregor & Charley Boorman

(Originally featured on the 'BBC Collective' website - 29 March 2006)

'The Long Way Round' was a book that passed me by when it was first published. I saw the trailers for the accompanying Sky programme on TV but again it didn't really appeal. Then I bought the DVD for my mum for Christmas and my Uni tutor lent me the book. Now I wish I'd latched onto both incarnations earlier. I decided to read the book first as it was related to my Final Year Project (i.e. travel writing). I was expecting a glossed-over depiction of a round-the-world journey. I couldn't have been more mistaken.

From the outset it is clear that both authors, McGregor in particular, have very personal reasons for undertaking the trip. It seems, even with all the trappings of fame and fortune, a childhood dream is a childhood dream and that's that.

It's very rare that I find a book 'unputdownable' but this came mighty close. It had all the potential to become a boring and sentimental account of how much the two actors missed their wives and blah blah blah. What we get is clearly two friends with a common goal who will seemingly go through hell to achieve it.

The highs and lows are dealt with with equal amounts of emotion and the characters they meet along the way, especially in Eastern Europe's mafia-ridden countries, are described so lucidly it's difficult not to become worried for the writers. A ridiculous thing to say, I know, but it's really that good. Their appreciation of the world around them as they motor east into Russia, Kazakhstan and Mongolia is obvious and they are never too busy to stop and take it all in. Even when their bikes are mired in bogs or in danger of being swept away in raging rivers, they never lose focus of their ultimate goal, to get to the end, to say they'd done it-they'd biked around the world. Despite all the wild animals, the ticks, the gun-toting natives, the bribe-seeking local police, there were those who balanced it all out. The native people who had almost nothing to offer the two strangers but invited them into their humble 'gers' and fed them and gave them shelter, nonetheless. Moments and people who burnt themselves into the authors' memories for obvious reasons.

The more personal aspects are dealt with honestly and surprisingly unguardedly given the people describing them. I can't think of many Hollywood stars who would have put themselves through the ordeal in the first place, let alone consign it to film and put it down in writing, warts and all. These two friends risk life and limb at points and argue daily about admittedly trivial things. But they come out of it with a friendship stronger than before, Boorman actually declaring McGregor 'the brother I never had' at the end of their trip.

As the book and the journey reach their climax, I, like McGregor, didn't want it to end. I knew exaclty how he felt though. All the emotions of ending a trip so personally significant can be so overwhelming it's hard to put them into words but both McGregor and Boorman do sterling jobs here. I can't wait to see if the TV programme matches up to the images they planted in my head.

I spent over a year on the other side of the world a few years ago and am itching to up sticks again in search of more challenging environments, as soon as uni is put to bed. This book did nothing to dissuade me. In fact I might just drop out now and hop on a plane...