The Journey to Me

Travelling solo for more than 33,000 miles motorcycle taught Annette Birkmann to experience the unknown not as fraught with danger but as providing endless opportunities. Every time I have reached a goal in my life, it has been with the expectation that once this goal is achieved, everything will from then on be fine - I will be free, I will be happy. But things seldom work out that way. At the age of thirty-one, Annette left her job as a lawyer in Denmark, sold her belongings, and travelled to Buenos Aires, Argentina, to fulfill a childhood dream: to ride a motorcycle. In Buenos Aires, Annette bought her first motorcycle and after working eight months in a motorcycle workshop, embarked alone on a one-year motorcycle journey through the Americas. However, she quickly discovered that despite moving to another hemisphere, some things remained unchanged. Her problems had come along, and no matter where she was, familiar traits lodged in her inner self required her attention.