Growing up on the East Coast, my wanderlust started young. At 15 I left home to ride freight trains and hitchhike all over North America. My first motorbike was a 1974 Honda CB550, which I bought after hitchhiking to Alaska for a cannery job. Since then I've explored many parts of the world by moto, including places like Africa, Asia, and South/Central America.

When I left home I also dropped out of school. I finished my education later, enrolling first at a junior college (Simon's Rock) and then at Colorado College, where I earned a Bachelor's degree in Economics. After several years in the finance industry, I went back to school again for a graduate degree in business. By the time I finished grad school nobody asked about high school anymore, and my nomadic teenage years were just an interesting campfire story.