A traveller from the age of two and a motorcyclist for the last forty odd years.
I first visited Spain in 1983, I felt as if I had come home; one day it will be my home. In the meantime I visit whenever I can.
Every year from 2000 I have ridden to Spain on my Moto Guzzi motorbike. From the beginning, I wanted to share my experiences and love of the country and people. I began by writing articles for the Moto Guzzi magazine 'Gambalunga'. I learnt my craft and developed my writing over the first nine years at which point I brought my writings together in a book; 'Back Roads of Spain'. My new book 'Sketches of Spain' a personal guide to the richness of Spain with thousands of kilometres of routes, sketches, photos and hand drawn maps.
Duncan was born in Wimbledon but at the age of three his family moved to a mixed fruit farm in the middle of 100 acres of Rhodesian bush. An unusual early childhood was spent nearly always barefoot, often with only the company of a younger sister and the African children of farm workers. He spent a lot of time off in the bush learning self-reliance and about the natural world.
Between the mid-60s and mid-70s the family lived a somewhat bohemian existence on a smallholding in Suffolk. Mother teaching and Father an Artist in oils. Duncan hunted rabbits and pheasants for the table and by the age of thirteen occasionally slept out in the hedgerows.
At the age of eighteen he left Bedales School with one and a half ‘A’ levels and a lot of happy experiences. Through family connections he got a job on a sugar-cane farm in Zululand, South Africa.
In the following years he worked at Dressing Props on Feature Film, then as a high-tensile fencer in Scotland. A cabinet-maker in Suffolk and a boat-fitter and engineer in Greece as well as a general carpenter and builder. He became in his own words – “A Jack of all trades”.
In 1980, almost by accident, he took a degree in Visual Art at Aberystwyth University. And in the years after graduation has added Stage and Lighting Designer, Tour Guide and now Writer to his C.V.
He lives in Aberystwyth with his wife, and has a son and two step-children plus five assorted grandchildren.
He has been a motorcyclist since an early age. Every year since 1999 he has travelled in Europe on his Moto Guzzi.