SOUTH AFRICA: British actors Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman arrive in South Africa after a 15,000-mile motorcycle journey from Scotland

Record ID: 454654

  • Title: SOUTH AFRICA: British actors Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman arrive in South Africa after a 15,000-mile motorcycle journey from Scotland
  • Date: 9th August 2007
  • Summary: MEDIA CONFERENCE (SOUNDBITE) (English) ACTOR CHARLEY BOORMAN SAYING: "Twelve years ago we met and the very, very first conversation we had was about motorbikes and I think I knew Ewan had a bike and I asked him about the bike and I think ever since then it's always been about motorbikes and we ran motorbike race teams together. Any excuse to ride a motorbike really and we just started talking about long journeys and then Ewan came up, he asked me over to his house one day and said listen, I've got this idea. He said, you know, why don't we just go to New York going east and that kind of started it really, didn't it." (SOUNDBITE) (English) ACTOR EWAN McGREGOR SAYING: "I started to do it after movies then taking some long trips across America and Australia and I found it was a nice way to end a film. I find often it gives you a lot of time for reflection on a motorcycle because you're on your own and there's something about the momentum that's very…I mean. It's just something about riding a motorbike, it's difficult to express, how good it is for your soul but anyway, there's something that gives you time for reflection and I found it was a nice way to finish a job and from that we started talking about when our children grow up and leave home, maybe we should leave to ride to Spain or something and then we decided to ride much further than Spain and not to wait till the children grew up and left home." FANS LISTENING (SOUNDBITE) (English) EWAN McGREGOR SAYING: "We went up to Gulu in Uganda to meet some children who had been abducted and taken to fight from the age of seven who'd been seven and eight, these two people that we'd met, had been forced to kill and torture their friends and very often their own families you know it's part of this insane mentality to stop them from trying to run away it's like getting these children to kill their relatives and stuff. Extraordinary, brave young people that we've met who are trying to rebuild their lives after having to have fought and that was very grim." CAMERAMAN (SOUNDBITE) (English) EWAN McGREGOR SAYING: "Certainly, personally speaking we were given some really negative advice from people before we left saying it's very dangerous, that you're risking life and limb by going to these countries and it's not been our experience at all and we've had a very safe enjoyable journey." McGREGOR AND BOORMAN RECEIVE APPLAUSE FROM FANS
  • Embargoed: 24th August 2007 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: South Africa
  • Country: South Africa
  • Topics: Entertainment,Light / Amusing / Unusual / Quirky
  • Reuters ID: LVA2W6XFCLC9YPFAC91IN0H1PJ7M
  • Story Text: The two British actors, Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman set out on a motorcycle journey on May 12 from John O'Groats, Scotland, travelled through Europe and African countries including Libya, Rwanda, Zambia and Namibia before arriving in Cape Town, on the southern coast of South Africa.
    McGregor, who played Obi-Wan Kenobi in the "Star Wars"
    films and starred in "Trainspotting," "Moulin Rouge" and "Down with Love," said the journey - dubbed the "Long Way Down" - had been "fantastic."
    "I'd quite like to turn around and just carry on back again,"
    he said as the pair posed for photographs on the beach against the backdrop of Table Mountain.
    The two actors met on the set of the 1997 film "Serpent's Kiss." The pair bonded over a shared love of motorcycles.
    "I started to do it after movies then taking some long trips across America and Australia and I found it was a nice way to end a film. I find often it gives you a lot of time for reflection on a motorcycle because you're on your own and there's something about the momentum that's very…I mean. It's just something about riding a motorbike, it's difficult to express, good it is for your soul but anyway, there's something that gives you time for reflection and I found it was a nice way to finish a job and from that we started talking about when our children grow up and leave home, maybe we should leave to ride to Spain or something and then we decide to ride much further than Spain and not to wait till the children grew up and left home," McGregor said during a press conference.
    The two previously circumnavigated the world by motorcycle, in 2004, passing through Russia and ending up in New York on a journey televised as the "Long Way Round".
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