Monkey Bike Mafia

Molly Beucher ’08 and her friend Georgia Maguire pulled into one of the last stops of their 500-mile motorbike trip across Morocco feeling like small-town heroes. They had just traversed a mountain pass in a snowstorm, and locals were waving and shouting.

“It was a real Rudy moment,” Beucher says. “Then some guy yelled ‘Fire! Fire!’ and I looked down to see that, sure enough, my bike was probably 30 seconds from erupting in flames.”

Beucher and her bike were both OK — someone rushed over to pour water on the growing flame. The incident was emblematic of the duo’s seven-day journey: Exhilarating, dangerous and helped tremendously by the kindness of strangers.

When Beucher, a screen actor in Los Angeles, pitched the idea of the trek to Maguire, the #MeToo movement was sweeping across Hollywood. Beucher was eager to feel a sense of empowerment and autonomy, and while she had never ridden a motorcycle, she had always been drawn to the independence of two-wheeled travel. People’s surprise at her desire to embark on such a trip without a man added fuel to her fire.

In partnership with Education for All Morocco (EFA), an organization focused on educating girls in remote areas, Beucher and Maguire set off on their 2018 adventure through the desert, mountains and gorges of the North African country.

And they did it all on monkey bikes, which are, essentially, miniature motorcycles. “They just look ridiculous,” Beucher says. “The seat is just over 2 feet off the ground. They are not cross-country bikes. They're take-me-to-the-grocery-store bikes.”