Title: Pedalling to Kailash: Cycling Adventures and Misadventures Across the Roof of the World
Author: Graydon Hazenberg
ISBN: 1777593611
About the book:
In the summer of 1998, Graydon Hazenberg set off from Islamabad, Pakistan on a heavily-laden mountain bike, accompanied by his sisters, Audie and Saakje, and their respective partners, Serge and Lucas. The group were pedalling along a long, convoluted route that would lead them eventually to the holiest mountain in Asia, Mount Kailash, located in a remote corner of western Tibet. The journey would take more than three months and test their physical and mental limits, but the author says that it was perhaps the most formative and fulfilling trip that any of them would ever undertake.
Pedalling to Kailash tells the story of this expedition: its highs and (frequent) lows, the landscapes and people they encountered, the cultures they interacted with, and the history that permeated every corner of the terrain. The crossed the highest mountain ranges on earth, where the Hindu Kush, the Himalaya, the Karakoram, the Pamirs and the KunLun mountains collided to form the Roof of the World. The physical challenges were daunting, but in some ways it was the mental challenges of their inner journeys which were harder to overcome.
About the author:
Born in Ottawa and raised in Thunder Bay, Hazenberg studied mathematics, physics and astronomy. After his 1994 win on Jeopardy, he used the proceeds to start travelling the world. Between travels Hazenberg worked as an English teacher, tour guide, software engineer, dive instructor and high school mathematics and science teacher in countries such as France, Switzerland, Egypt, Myanmar, Japan, Chile and Georgia.
Pedalling to Kailash is available in print or Kindle editions on Amazon
Follow the travels of Graydon Hazenberg via his blog Graydon’s Travels: The Ongoing Travel Adventures of a Canadian-Born Global Nomad.
Header images of Graydon Hazenberg’s 1998 trip from Islamabad to Mt. Kailash via Graydon Hazenberg’s Facebook