Rocky's Ride
Expedition storytelling through bikepacking
Rocky's Ride
Rocky's Ride
Long-distance journeys through remote landscapes. Usually with a Jack Russell named Rocky in the handlebar basket.
Rocky's Ride is the work of Sean Fraenkel — a South African writer and expedition storyteller who happens to ride a loaded bicycle through some of the most remote country in Africa and beyond. Twenty-five years offshore in oil and gas, fourteen of them as a saturation diver. An adventure cyclist documenting the road as it unfolds.
Rocky is a rescue Jack Russell and a veteran of deserts and mountain escarpments, riding up front in a handlebar basket. He is the heart of this — companion, not gimmick. Some expeditions are shared with him. Some are solo. The thread never changes.
Travel slowly. Pay attention. Earn the story.
About Sean & Rocky →
1,200 km unsupported across the Namib Desert with Rocky in the basket — told three ways: long-form story, practical route guide, and a full Bicycling magazine feature.
Ten days alone across the Northern Cape to the Orange River. 554 km, no phone, no music, no coffee.
An unsupported 1,200 km crossing of the Namib Desert with Rocky, to raise funds for animal welfare.
A loaded-bike traverse through Lesotho's escarpment and high plateau. 344 km, nine days.
1,330 km through Africa's Warm Heart, and everything that complicated it.
Stories carry the narrative; these pages carry the planning. Maps, GPX, and field-tested notes on terrain, water, resupply, and logistics — the detail that matters when you are actually out there.
Raw expedition films from the road — wind, weather, wrong turns and everything in between. Honest stories, exactly as they happened.
Stories, films, route journals and field notes — plus heads-up on upcoming expeditions. Sent when there is something worth sending.
No spam. No fake motivation. Just real stories from the road.
