Berlin, the Dolomites, and the Rides That Stayed With Me
Every once in a while, I find myself thinking back to the first time I ever rode a BMW GS.
It was more than a decade ago, in Berlin, Germany, during my time working for BMW. Back then, travel was part of the job. Sometimes that meant meetings. Sometimes it meant factory visits. And once in a while, it meant moments you didn’t realize were important until years later.
This was one of those moments.
I was in Berlin to visit the BMW Motorrad factory — the place where every GS in the world begins its life. If you’re a motorcycle guy, walking through that building feels a little like stepping inside the blueprint of the machine itself. Frames moving overhead, engines going together piece by piece, everything precise, everything intentional.
But the part I remember most didn’t happen inside the factory.
It happened later… out on the street… on a GS.
And that’s where this story really starts.
The First Ride
The first time you ride a GS, you notice it right away.
It sits tall.
It feels different.
Like the bike expects you to go somewhere farther than you planned.
Berlin turned out to be the perfect place for that first ride. Wide streets, old buildings, layers of history everywhere you looked. The kind of city where you get the feeling that every corner has already seen more than you ever will.
I remember thinking how strange it was that a motorcycle built to cross deserts and mountains felt completely at home rolling through the middle of a European capital.
I didn’t know it at the time, but that ride was the beginning of something that would follow me for years.
Italy, the Dolomites, and the Miles in Between
Not long after that trip to Berlin, I found myself riding again — this time in Italy.
If Berlin felt like history, the Dolomites felt like freedom.
Tight switchbacks climbing into the clouds.
Stone villages that looked like they hadn’t changed in a hundred years.
Roads that seemed like they were designed just for motorcycles.
That’s where the GS really made sense to me.
It wasn’t just transportation.
It wasn’t just a machine.
It was a companion for the kind of travel where the point isn’t how fast you get somewhere…
it’s everything you see along the way.
Some rides stay with you because of the scenery.
Some because of the people you meet.
And some because something shifts inside you while you’re out there, mile after mile, with nothing but the road ahead.
The Dolomites were like that for me.
And looking back now, I can see the line that runs from that first ride in Berlin…
through Italy…
through years of riding…
all the way to the bike sitting in my garage today.
Then and Now
When I think about those trips now, what stands out isn’t just the motorcycle.
It’s the difference between who I was then… and who I am now.
Back then, I traveled because work sent me somewhere.
Now I travel because I want to understand the place I’m in.
The history.
The people.
The stories hiding in plain sight.
That’s a big part of why I started my YouTube channel in the first place.
Not just to show where I go…
but to take people with me.
To slow things down enough to notice the details.
To ask questions.
To stand in a place long enough for it to mean something.
Because the older I get, the more I realize the best parts of travel aren’t the big moments.
They’re the quiet ones.
Why I Named My Bike “The Berlin Bear”
Years after that first ride, when I finally had my own GS, I found myself thinking back to Berlin again.
That first ride.
That first feeling of what the bike was meant to be.
And somewhere along the way, the name just made sense.
I started calling the bike The Berlin Bear.
Partly because of where it all started.
Partly because the GS has always felt a little like that — strong, steady, built to keep moving no matter what’s in front of it.
But mostly because of the way I ride now.
Not fast.
Not reckless.
Slowly.
Intentionally.
Taking the long way whenever I can.
The Berlin Bear doesn’t rush.
It just keeps going.
And the older I get, the more that feels like the right way to travel.
Bringing People Along for the Ride
These days, when I head out on the road, I try to bring people with me.
Not just to show the destination…
but to share the story behind it.
That’s what my channel, Adventures with Duncan, has really become.
A way to keep riding.
A way to keep exploring.
A way to keep telling the stories that started years ago in places like Berlin, Italy, and the Dolomites.
Because sometimes a ride that seemed small at the time turns out to be the one that pointed you in the direction you were meant to go all along.
And for me, that direction started on a GS…
on a street in Berlin…
with a memory that never really went away.
Watch the Video here:
