an interview with rene cormier about his around the world travel
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8/14/2019 An interview with Rene Cormier about his around the world travel
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ALLINTHEFAMILY BY SANDY BORDEN #188051
An Interview With Rene Cormier:When Friends Become FamilyIT AMAZES ME HOW THIS ADVENTURE
motorcycle community of ours becomes
more of a family than just chance meetings
and run-ins. Taking the time to sit and
share experiences opens us up to new rela-
tionships and an opportunity to increaseour family circle. Our Trio family increased
by three this summer, as Rene Cormier,
wife Colette and son Jacques bunked at
Bordens Boarding House a time or two.
With two boarding locations to serve the
weary traveler, we spent a memorable cou-
ple of weeks with the Cormiers in various
parts of Northern California. What came
out of our times together resulted in a new
honorary batch of aunties and uncles for
Jack and Jacques, and a lovely couple we can
truly call friends.When we first met Rene and Colette, it
was Overland Expo and Colette was
pregnant with their little one, Jacques.
While Colette attempted to find comfort in
a chair behind the authors table, Rene was
out in front, his usual boisterous self. Renes
hand is always outstretched, greeting his
newest fan with a handshake and a
smile, and hugging old friends as if
no time had passed. When we met
up again at Overland Expo , baby
Jacques was five months old and a ball of
chunky, giggly cuteness. I mean, you really
need to see this kid for yourself. Right off,
he reminded Terry and me of Jack when he
was a chunky babe. There was the smile onthis kids face! While Jack and Jacques had
some bonding time, the moms and dads
shared a beer or two, catching up on the
year, getting to know more about each
other. Unfortunately, you dont always get
enough one-on-one time at these events.
Our solution? Seeing as they were making
their way north through California, it was
time for Rene and Colette to experience
some time off the road. Theyd been carry-
ing all of their belongings in truck and
trailer for months on end, and it was timefor them to live in a house for a bit...a real
house. So, for two weeks, our family dou-
bled in size, spending one week near Sacra-
mento and another week in our tiny home
in the Mt. Shasta Forest. It was just what
everyone needed.
Days were spent at our respective
computers. It was funny, really.
With Colette and babe playing
in the next room, Terry, Rene
and I sat at with our laptops,
brains buried in the days tasks. I had to
chuckle when Rene came up for air, looked
around and exclaimed, This is so nice! All
of us working on our computers, getting
work done. I think he enjoyed the camara-
derie. I know I enjoyed having a little one in
the house once again. At night, Jack and
Jacque would play on the back lawn, the
bigger boys swapping stories while Colette
and I prepared a meal and learned more
about each other. What a special person she
is. Actually, theyre both pretty unique in
their stories of growing up in South Africaand Canada.
It wasnt until our final days together that
Rene and I had the opportunity to sit and
chat about the four years he spent traveling
the globe. I guess we were all enjoying our
time together a little too much. Is there
really such a thing? It wasnt an interview,
really, but more of two friends swapping
stories of travel and life decisions, one of us
Jacques and Colette
BMW OWNERS NEWS November 2013
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8/14/2019 An interview with Rene Cormier about his around the world travel
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ALLIN THEFAMILY
with a few more queries than the other.
Enjoy as you are now a part of our conver-
sation on that quiet June afternoon, us
flopped on the couch, the squeal of little
ones in the backyard as they discover thesimple joy of a hose and bucket on a lazy
summer day in California.
As much as I wanted to hear extended
tales beyond his book, The University of
Gravel Roads: Global Lessons from a Four-
Year Motorcycle Adventure, I was more
interested in what spurred his desire to flee
the norm in Canada; what changed him the
most, and who he was upon his return. Did
Rene travel a lot as a child? No, actually.
But, it did spark something in him as well as
his siblings.
There were four kids in the family and we
were sort of like that age group. We took
one trip across Canada towing the trailer
with the station wagon; the full Griswold
experience, which was great fun. I thoroughly
enjoyed that trip. The limited travel we did
spurred a very big wanderlust. Out of the
four children, my eldest sister, was sort of the
stay at home style. My younger brother
worked for Royal Caribbean cruise lines. My
youngest sister has traveled probably the
most out of all of us. So, the last three kids
have a contest for how many countries theyve
visited. But, you cant count the countries you
fly in and transfer. You have to stay overnight
and have a beer. Those are the rules for the
country counting. My little sister I think is
leading us, as she is somewhere near . Im
not far behind and my brother is not far
behind me. Its a fun contest. My parents were
always very encouraging.
Of course, I have to know the answer to the
standard questions, When did you first
start riding motorcycles?
Like a lot of our friends growing up, wealways rode bikes, not legally, as we didnt
have licenses, but wed borrow the bike of kids
down the hall and ride the dirt bike in the
backyard. When we grew up, our house was
just at the end of town, so there were farmers
fields and forests, which was great; so we
could just go out and fart around in those
areas. Then I rode illegally for a while. No
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November 2013BMW OWNERS NEWS
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8/14/2019 An interview with Rene Cormier about his around the world travel
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Of course not, Rene! This is completely
between you and me.
I got my proper license probably in my early
s. It wasnt until I was in my late s that
I could afford a motorcycle of my own. It was
a BMW RGS PD, red and white, big
tank, awesome thing. I sold it to do this big
trip around the world. So, I had that bike and
an GS. I sold both of them to downgrade
to the GS, which was the bike that I was
going to take around the world. I thought it
was a downgrade, but in actual fact it was
the best choice for the trip.
I had to know when was the moment Renedecided to do this around the world trip.
It was when I was deciding I was going to do
a year in South America. This was the initial
trip parameter. In some moment of lucidity
between Washington and Colorado Springs,
I thought, Why am I not thinking bigger?
The decision making went from South Amer-
ica for one year to the world in one year.
Quickly looking at an atlas, I decided it
would be stupid to go that quickly, that fast.
Thats not traveling, thats racing, really.
The money question always seems to follow
the decision to hit the road. Even Terry,
who was quietly sitting in on this conversa-
tion, leaned in to hear how Rene was going
to answer the question with regard to funding
this now multi-year trek around the globe.
I had to sell everything I owned. I had a lit-
tle bit of equity in a house and I had saved a
little bit of money, but I had accumulated a
lot of crap as well. I was amazed. I got
, dollars for the trip. From my inter-net homework, I realized people were travel-
ing for a day, camping. In my little
optimistic brain, I figured if they could do it
for , I could do it for . a day for a
year is ,, so I had enough money for
three years and a bit of money for one-time
expenses. So thats how the trip started three
years around the world.
When did you realize, Oh crap...Im really
doing this!
As soon as I started selling stuff. Its the most
liberating, awesome, terrifying feeling ever,
because you are intentionally jettisoning
your life away from you. You are chipping
away at that base that you have worked so
hard to accumulate. Most people work their
whole lives to build that castle with the moat
around it so their life can survive. Now, you
are blowing it up for something that you
think will be awesome, but you really have no
idea what its going to be.
Oh, the people you meet. Tell me about how
you were received when rolling through
countries.
For the most part, about percent of the
people are mildly amused by what youre
doing. We (I and the motorcycle) have never
had a fuel stop where people wouldnt come
up. With the Iranian visit, everyone wants to
stop and have a cup of tea with you and tellyou that they get BBC and CNN and, by the
way, what our government says in the news is
not what the Iranian people want. That was
repeated half a dozen times. It was interest-
ing to hear.
These are the stories I want to hear. Is it true
that the media in other countries is trying
to scare their residents as much as ours?
Simply put, yes.
Not everyone expects to meet his or her
future spouse while halfway around the
world. Funny enough, Rene is not the first
to tell me the tale of meeting said spouse
while on the other side of the planet. It was
, and Rene had now spent a year off the
road, having returned to Canada to earn
some much needed travel money. He
landed in South Africa in August of
and met Colette three months later.
I met her at a party. She lived in a very beau-
tiful part of South Africa with a lot of great
roads and mountain passes. So, we took the
bike out and went to see how many passes we
could go over, and it turned into a date. That
date turned into another date and another
date, and we were just having a lovely time
together. I knew at that point it was a per-
sonal trip for me. I wanted to be selfish about
this experience and have it entirely for myself.
So we just continued emailing and SMSing
and it was like wow, this relationship isnt
cooling down at all. So I finished that legthrough Africa to Russia and Mongolia. That
was two years. Then I returned to Canada
and flew down to her to figure out what was
going to happen here. Were we going to give
it a go? Were we not? I couldnt have picked
someone to date that lived in a less opportune
place to get to. Its literally on the other side of
the planet from us. If we couldve dug a tun-
nel, it wouldve been great.
ALLIN THEFAMILY
BMW OWNERS NEWS
November 2013
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8/14/2019 An interview with Rene Cormier about his around the world travel
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8/14/2019 An interview with Rene Cormier about his around the world travel
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Im a sucker for before and after stories,
how a life experience can give you fresh
eyes as to how you view your personal bub-ble and life beyond the usual. What was
Rene like before and who is he now?
Now, Im a cheapskate. Im value priced.
Before I left, I was a . I was in the default
world. Heres my vacation; my weekends
start on Friday at : p.m. and end on
Monday at : a.m. That world terrifies me
now. We dont own a home, and we talk
about getting one at some point. But in seri-
ous talks about getting a mortgage, that
weight goes right to my throat and it sits in
my throat. Weve done without it for so long,and its not normal. But, our life is not nor-
mal and our life situation is not normal.
Maybe we get away with not having that. I
dont know if we can or not.
Youve heard of Renes tour company, Rene-
dian Adventures, right? Of course you have!
A little background...the name Renedian
came out of Renes Canada-speak when it
came to certain words. You know which
ones Im referring to aboot, oot, and so
on. During a business meeting, one of
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Renes good friends exclaimed, Renes talk-
ing bloody Renedian again! There you
have it. The moniker became a businessentity that published his book in January
, as well as the company name for his
South African tour group.
was our first South Africa tour, and I
didnt know if it was going to fly or not.
Would people be willing to go to South
Africa? The travel there is quite hectic and an
expensive flight. People are sometimes afraid
of new places and Africa has an added mys-
tery about it. But we had a great first year.
We ran two trips that year and three trips the
next year and five last year with eight as agoal for this year.
Any regrets?
None. Okay, I regret that I didnt have better
language skills.
I have to be honest, this is not the first time
Ive heard this answer. So many travelers I
chat with have the same two regrets more
time and better language skills.
Where are Rene and family now? It was
time to get back to work in South Africa
and time for Colette and Jacques to spend
time with family. Though not looking for-ward to the flight schedule, they couldnt
wait to go home, if only for a brief period of
time. Rene will be back in the States begin-
ning in March of , sharing his tales of
travel at various dealers, spreading the gos-
pel that is adventure motorcycling.
As much as we miss our friends, we know
that our time apart will be short-lived, as
those who travel are destined to cross paths
once again. Jacques will be walking, an
adventure in itself for those in the parental
know, and Jack will be there to help guide
him along. The honorary aunties anduncles will enjoy a cold brew as tales of time
spent apart fill the familiar scene. When
will that be? Who knows, but well be there
eager to catch up all the same. Till next
time... Cheers.
You can read more about Rene Cormier, his
upcoming speaking gigs, and Renedian
Adventures at www.renedian.com. Renes
book, The University of Gravel Roads:
Global Lessons from a Four-Year Motorcycle
Adventure, is available on the website as well.
ALLIN THEFAMILY
BMW OWNERS NEWS
November 2013