Bio stuff...
Robert Downes, author of Planet Backpacker, has backpacked through more than 45 countries, with destinations ranging from the supercities of the Third World to the heart of the American wilderness.
Downes was 54 when he set out to bicycle and backpack around the world in 2007, pursuing a lifelong dream. His itinerary was dictated by a vow to see most of the places he’d always dreamed of: things like Admiral Nelson’s HMS Victory, the temple of Abu Simbel on the border of Sudan, and the beaches of Goa, India. That ‘bucket list’ included cycling across England and down the Danube on a mountain bike, and sailing down the Nile in a felucca with a lateen sail.
To cut costs and savor the world from the bottom up, Downes often stayed in the cheapest digs possible -- including camping, sharing hostels with young backpackers, and rubbing elbows with the locals at native guesthouses.
THE PARALLEL WORLD
The journey was a return to a ‘parallel world’ of adventure travel which Downes calls Planet Backpacker.
“During my earliest travels as a teenager, I became aware that there is an alternative world of gypsy travelers paralleling our own,” Downes says. “You would seldom -- if ever -- meet them in the ordinary world, but as soon as you hit the road, the portals would open, revealing the oddest people, along with young adventurers heading for distant horizons. It’s not a Twilight Zone or a parallel dimension, but an actual world that escapes the notice of those who stay put. It’s an ‘other’ reality.”
Downes feels that his book is singular in that it is based on a travel blog written in roughly 100 internet cafes around the world. “It’s an episodic, day-by-day account of traveling around the world, and to some extent, it mimics the attention deficit disorder of the modern reader in that you can pick it up just about anywhere and find something of interest,” he says. “Each entry in the book tells a small story.”
Downes was inspired by the muse of Jack Kerouac while ‘on the road.’ “Kerouac scribbled notes during his travels around America in the late ‘40s and early ‘50s and then collected them to write ‘On the Road’,” Downes says. “I did much the same, only I used an internet blog along with scraps of paper that I’d scribble on throughout the day in places like Budapest and Bangkok.”
BACKGROUND
Downes is the editor and co-publisher of the alternative Northern Express Weekly in Traverse City, Michigan.
Born in 1952, Downes' earliest years were spent on his family’s farm near Rockford, Michigan. “I remember my grandfather taking me to the chicken coop to see the hens, and the rooster scaring the heck out of me,” he recalls. “It was nearly as big as I was.”
Childhood days were spent in the small town of Greenville, then Grand Rapids and Royal Oak, Michigan. He attended Wayne State University in Detroit, graduating in 1976 with a major in journalism and a minor in photography.
Downes developed a passion for street photography in Detroit’s inner city during his college days, an experience that later proved useful in relating to other cultures around the world.
“Ironically, I became a writer with the idea that the profession would allow me to travel,” he recalls. “But I quickly learned that once you land a writing job, you hold onto it for dear life and don’t travel much of anywhere.”
ALTERNATIVE PRESS
A succession of jobs as a reporter and editor on weekly newspapers led Downes to Traverse City in northern Michigan where he served as a writer on the public relations staff at Munson Medical Center. “I enjoyed writing about the life and death situations people face and those who put themselves on the line to save others.”
He and his best friend George Foster launched the Northern Express in 1991. Participants in the running and triathlon boom of the ‘80s, the partners started the paper to celebrate the recreation lifestyle of northern Michigan.
“Although it was in the middle of a recession, the time seemed right for an alternative newspaper in northern Michigan and we were both bored with our day jobs,” Downes recalls. “We each threw a couple of thousand dollars into the project and the Express took off like a rocket. Unfortunately, the paper didn’t provide either of us with a paycheck for the first five years, so we had to work full-time jobs until it got going.”
An early success came in August, 1994 when Downes and Foster broke the story about the national militia movement, eight months before the Oklahoma City bombing. The four-page report has been cited as the first published account in the nation which grasped the impact and scope of the radical-right paramilitary movement. It earned a national award from the Institute for Alternative Journalism in 1996.
Today, the Northern Express Weekly is northern Michigan’s largest weekly newspaper with a distribution of up to 30,000 copies in 13 counties.
SPECIAL INTERESTS
Through the years, Downes never lost his passion for travel. Trips leading up to his round-the-world venture included the sights of Greece, Peru, China, Europe, Latin America and the wilderness of North America.
As noted in his guitar-playing adventures in Planet Backpacker, Downes is also a songwriter and musician. He heads up The Dawn Patrol dance-rock band on rhythm guitar and lead vocals. He has written close to 200 songs, and also performs as a solo acoustic musician.
Married to Jeannette, who runs a day care in their home, Downes is the step-dad to Nathan and Chloe and the grandfather of four.
Looking ahead, he sees many more destinations on the horizon, including another trip around the world with Jeannette and the possibility of mission work when he retires. “Like Jim Morrison said of this life: ‘No one here gets out alive.’ That’s why you’ve got to go for it while you can.”
