There are press trips, and then there are full-blown international expeditions. When the crew at AETHER Apparel decided to field-test their latest motorcycle gear in June — they opted for the latter. Instead, they set their sights on a grueling 1,000-kilometer off-road trek through Mongolia’s remote Orkhon Valley aboard a fleet of Husqvarna FE450 dual-sports.
Guided by Nomadic Off-Road, Mongolia’s leading off-road adventure outfitter and official Husqvarna partner, the motley crew AETHER assembled was comprised of co-founders Palmer West and Jonah Smith, the company’s director of marketing, legendary photographer David ‘Shadi’ Perez, vehicle designer and racer Alex Earle of Earle Motors, and actors and avid riders Norman Reedus, Bryan Greenberg, and Justin Chatwin. AETHER’s cameraman was there too to follow the riders in a support vehicle with a guide from Nomadic.
Jumping straight into the deep-end and biting off way more than they could chew, the first day called for an ambitious 300-kilometer trek. While Mongolia may be known for its rolling green hills, day one largely consisted of massive stretches of deep, rutted sand. By midday, the brutal terrain had claimed its first casualties. Norman tipped over multiple times, leaving him pretty battered and not long after Bryan begin to have a similar experience.
The first day’s real drama unfolded when AETHER co-founder Palmer West caught a nasty edge in a deep sand trough. The bike entered a violent, 40-mph tank-slapper, launching him over the handlebars directly onto his head. Despite walking away with a textbook concussion, West eventually climbed back into the saddle to finish the final freezing stretch into camp just as the sun dipped below the horizon.
The second day started off with riding into a beautiful valley where they encountered local herders chasing camels on tiny, battered, Chinese-made 125s. It was one of those moments that just perfectly captured the country.
When the crew stopped for fuel in a rural town, a passing driver recognized Reedus and turned around to pull in and get a selfie with him, marking the first of many times The Walking Dead star would be stopped and asked for photos. Co-founder Jonah Smith found it hilarious to insert himself into a great many of these selfies. It’s unclear if Norm or his fans shared the same sentiment. What’s more, for whatever reason, a lot of the locals kept calling Norman “Morgan” which the entire group also found hilarious and opted to refer to him as for the remainder of the trip. Again, it’s unclear if Norm shared the same sentiment.
Once back in the saddle with full tanks, the crew headed through a mountain pass that welcomed them with a sudden storm. Light rain rapidly escalated a heavy downpour before turning into a painful barrage of hail. It was cold, stingy, and a bit miserable, but also somehow surprisingly enjoyable overall. The day ended with breathtaking valley riding, though the group’s only drone crash-landed and immediately burst into flames, ending the trip’s aerial footage budget.
Day three saw the group wake up at the Genghis Khan Retreat — an absolutely stunning UNESCO World Heritage Site. After a few hours of riding, everybody got to enjoy some of the region’s traditional barbecue for lunch: Mongolian lamb cooked with hot stones, sourced from an animal slaughtered just hours prior. The rest of the day brought brutal hill climbs, rocky ledges, and sketchy descents that pushed everyone’s technical skills to the absolute limit. Needless to say, quite a few members of the group went down that day.
Day Four took the riders through 200 kilometers of uncharted territory. The scale of the landscape was staggering, as was its complete and total lack of infrastructure. You’d ride up a mountain in a manner Palmer referred to as “billygoating.” There were no trails, predetermined routes or single tracks, so everyone rode ten bikes wide, rolling for miles and miles shoulder-to-shoulder across the landscape while herds of wild horses and yaks scurried out of the way. Riding motorcycles — especially off-road — offers an immense sense of freedom, but this was completely unparalleled and unlike anything anyone in the crew had ever experienced.
As dusk approached, the group experienced the main point of drama for the day as the horizon vanished and the team rode directly into a massive sandstorm. Visibility plummeted to zero, and everyone attempted to outrun the Dune-like conditions but to no avail. You can only ride so fast when you can barely see your front fender.
While day four was a bit sketchy, day five was flat-out cursed. A few hours after starting, the crew hit a notorious sandy sector known to locals as “The Bermuda Triangle of Mongolia.” Rider after rider went down. Both Palmer and Norman experienced particularly rough crashes that left them with injured shoulders. The crew promptly decided the area was haunted and pinned the throttle toward the next camp.
The final day was what by then felt like a relatively gentle 150-kilometer sprint back to the Nomadic Off-Road hangar where the entire journey started. Despite a concussion, some scrapes and bruised, and some thrashed FE450s with broken bodywork, AETHER’s new riding gear stood up to the 1,000 kilometers of hardcore field-testing.
The next morning the crew all hopped their flight home, but by the end of the trip, the consensus was clear: trips like this are never really about motorcycles. They’re about the people you get to share these experiences with. The crashes, the storms, the breakdowns, the wrong turns, the endless waiting for slower riders, and the ridiculous situations they’d find themselves in are exactly the things they’ll laugh about years from now. The hard days become the stories.
[ Images by Aether ]