Life on Mars — BOWIE BLOG — A BIKE RIDE WITH DAVID BOWIE

Saint Pierre

Bowie and Bullfighting

MEET IGGY

“Every bike needs a good name” says friendly local Yolanda. Introducing Iggy…

BONJOUR FRANCE

My David Bowie bike ride From Ibiza to the Norfolk Broads continues over the Pyrenees from Spain into France.

!Hola surrealism, Hola Figueres¡

After a sun-scorched ride through Catalonia I land in Figueres, the home of Salvador Dali, to explore how his surrealist art influenced and inspired David Bowie, that and got trapped in a tidal wave of old French women at the Dali museum.

Cycling, David Bowie, Life on Mars, Salvador DaliJames BriggsJuly 22, 2021David Bowie, Salvador Dali, Dali, Surrealism, art, Life on Mars, cycling, Figueres, Spain, Music

From Ibiza....

Off the plane into 36 degree heat. One faulty water bottle, 13 miles of motorways and one nervous dehydrated wreck later, I channel Bowie’s early bohemian phase and stumble into La Playa, Ibiza’s original hippy campsite.

IbizaJames BriggsApril 5, 2021From Ibiza to the Norfolk Broads, Life on Mars, David Bowie, Hunky Dory, Cycling, Backpacking, Bike touring, Ibiza, Spain, Balaeric, Camping, Skiffle, Music, Travel, hippy

The mid-life crisis just got real

On 11th September, 2016, aged 36, I did likewise, leaving London to look for the meaning of David Bowie’s Life on Mars? and in doing so, abandoning all sense of reality. On a glorious autumn morning, with the sky as blue as the suit Bowie wore in the song’s video, I loaded up and turned to face the strangest journey I would ever undertake.

David Bowie, Cycling, Cycle touring, Life on Mars, MusicJames BriggsApril 3, 2021David Bowie, Life on Mars, Cycling, Bike touring, Travel, mid life crisis, adventure, freedomComment

It's a god awful small affair

In 1969 David Robert Jones went to the Beckenham Recreation Ground bandstand and sat down to write a song. Life on Mars? would go on to become one of his most iconic songs and one of the greatest of the 20th century. It would also inspire me to cycle one of its lyrics, ‘From Ibiza to the Norfolk Broads.’ The following pictures and diary entries are the story of that trip.