It has been said that electric motorcycles are the future. Now Thomas Tomczyk has proven that future is already here. Tomczyk, a journalist and adventurer, has ridden his Zero S motorcycle from Philadelphia, PA, to Cape Froward, Chile—the very tip of South America. This 27,882 kilometer journey is not only the longest ride on an electric motorcycle in history, but it has more than doubled the previous record.

This epic ride on a production motorcycle designed for city commuting has changed the paradigm of adventuring on an electric motorcycle. “A pioneering, inspiring journey on a Pan American scale,” said Terry Herchner, the first man to ride across the US on an electric motorcycle in 2013. Some of the biggest challenges during the ride came while riding the bike across northern Mexico controlled by drug cartels, navigating the Darien gap on a 110-year-old sail boat, crossing the Bolivian salt lake of Uyuni and finding electricity in the bone-dry Atacama Desert.

While riding this electric bike across the unpaved, rugged terrain was a test to the bike itself, the most difficult parts of the journey was finding places to charge the bike’s nine Kilowatt lithium ion battery. “I’ve charged at most mundane and the most bizarre places: homes, fire stations, libraries, restaurants, gyms, post offices, a Louisiana prison, a Biloxi casino, many remote Patagonia ranches and even an astronomical observatory in the middle of the Atacama desert,” said Tomczyk. “It’s not about just using energy, but about sharing energy and sharing experiences.”

In Peru, Argentina and Chile, Tomczyk rode 4,000 kilometers of the ride with a passenger: his girlfriend Ana Cosenza. They are both producing a six part TV documentary about the ride and its trailer can be seen here or on their

In each of the fourteen countries he visited, Tomczyk filmed people living off-the-grid, energy independent lifestyles. “I met people living in million dollar homes and people charging their homes using one solar panel and a car battery. Taking the human quest for being independent has few limits,” said Tomczyk.

Tomczyk says that the most difficult part of the journey came as he traversed the extremely windy, sparsely populated Argentinean Patagonia. “Many times I would ride over a 100 kilometers without seeing a single home, or even a single place that could offer even the possibility of charging the bike’s batter,” said Tomczyk. “The most challenging part of this electric odyssey came at the very end.”

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