Who is Onion Johnny?

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ONION JOHNNY AFTER 1200K IN 3 1/2 DAYS IN THE PARIS BREST PARIS 2007

How do you define yourself?  I’ll  allow  you three words.  My three words are

FAMILY 

BICYCLES

TOURING 

But first the basics.  My name is Drew Buck, I live in England, and I’m 67 years old, married to Jan for 44 years, and a father of 5 children and 2 grandchildren.

Family 

This is the core of my family, although it’s growing all the time.

Left to right. Lara, Byron, Ashley, Drew, Gorgeous Jan, Heath, son in law Matt and Zena.

More recent additions are Jenny,  Stephanie,  and last but so not least, Daisy and Ivy.

But hey wait a minute,  this is MY blog. If I let you lot in, particularly Daisy and Ivy,  then no one will want to read about an old man on a bike. So clear off and get your own blog.

I want to ride my Bicycle

It all started at age 11 when I was given my first bike (a hand me down ) to cycle to school . My school paid me 10 shillings (50 pence) each term because there was no bus, so Bradley Wiggins eat your heart out, I was a professional cyclist before you were even born.

This necessary introduction to cycling led me to a love affair that has lasted nearly 60 years. My holidays in my teenage years were usually on a bike, often to the continent. Refusing to grow up, in my late teens (40s) I discovered long distance cycling and a beast called the Paris Brest Paris.The PBP is held every 4 years and dates back to 1891. Some 7000 riders come from every continent and pit themselves against riding 1200 kms in just over 3 1/2 days. The normal steed is a modern multi geared carbon fibre bike. My typical bike is usually 100 years with 1 or 2 gears. The 2007 PBP was ridden on a rusty old French bike draped with Onions, hence Onion Johnny.

PBP 2011 on a 111 year old bike.

We’re going where?

Over 40 years ago I had recently graduated and had a super job, I knew it was a good job because a secretary brought me coffee and a chocolate biscuit each morning. The only problem was that no one asked me to work, and so one morning, unexpected even to me, I gave in my notice announcing I was going to Nigeria.

When I arrived home I had to explain to my pretty new wife to pack her bags as we were going on a TOUR. So a month later we left England in our 1938 850cc Morris 8 , and headed to the Sahara dessert (there were no roads back then). Some 2 years later we arrived in Australia after going through countries such as Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia,  Greece, Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. So that was my first big tour and now I’m doing another.

Jan at the local supermarket in the Sahara Desert 1973

Jan making lunch in the Sahara 1973Drew digging the car out of the sand 1973

Street children in Mumbai (Bombay) 1974