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Beware of spoilers regarding Mad Max: Fury Road.

After they meet the Many Mothers, Furiosa claims they have bikes that could run for 160 days. Somehow, I don't see how bikes could carry so much, but lets assume they could have some trailer on them with supplies or a sidecar or something.

160 days * 8 hours driving * 100 km/h = 128,000km. The circumference of the Earth is about 40,075 KM. So they could go around the world almost 3 times. But Max is sure there is only desert wasteland forever. Surely there can be places on Earth without those savages, some place healthier, maybe green, maybe with clean water. With so much driving range, they could explore anywhere they wanted.

What is the idea of this plot point? Was 160 days a gross overestimation by Furiosa? Is 100km/h over 8h/day too much for them in the desert? Even at only 50km/h, they could go around the world in 160 days.

Are there any explanations on this?

Edit: Despite Dr R Dizzle's great perspective, where 'days' measure distance by walking speed (or something else), Furiosa mentions that the Green Place is "1 long night's journey" away. They ride all night (with some malfunctions) and cross it during the night without noticing. In other words, a day or night's travel really does mean car/motorbike speed for some hours.

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    You're making a lot of assumptions of drivng speed and time. I don't have the details of the exact quote to hand but perhaps you're taking this out of context.
    – Paulie_D
    Oct 11, 2016 at 13:24
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    Possible, of course. Max's quote is this: "Max: Look. It will be a hard day. But I guarantee you that 160 days that way, there is nothing but salt. At least that way we might, together, come across some sort of redemption."
    – BlueMoon93
    Oct 11, 2016 at 13:26
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    @BlueMoon93 The film (and the game tie-in) heavily hints that "the salt" they are driving across is a dried up ocean.
    – Dr R Dizzle
    Oct 11, 2016 at 13:38
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    @BlueMoon93 If the oceans have dried out, it's very unlikely that there is anywhere better. If anything, it reinforces the idea that Immortan Joe's tight grip on the water supply is even more valuable than we already thought.
    – Dr R Dizzle
    Oct 11, 2016 at 13:46
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    I get your point. If not even the oceans held up, then nothing else will, right?
    – BlueMoon93
    Oct 11, 2016 at 13:49

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Being as those on the bikes clearly don't have enough fuel for them to travel for 160 days, I always assumed that "days" was potentially a new way of measuring distance in a post-map, post-GPS world.

For all we know, a day in that context is simply how far you can walk in one day. Obviously, the motorbikes would be travelling a lot quicker than walking speed, so;

Being as the average walking speed is about 5KM/H, and the bikes looks to be travelling at about 50KM/H (a totally rough estimate based on what I remember of the movie), it could be that the group on bikes could travel 160 "days" in just 16 days. This is also a much more realistic (although still very optimistic) idea of how far their fuel might carry them.

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    I had never thought of that. Great idea, makes a lot more sense
    – BlueMoon93
    Oct 11, 2016 at 13:38
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    I doubt it. Why would a culture that revolves around cars measure days in waking distance...
    – cde
    Oct 13, 2016 at 4:24
  • @cde Who says everyones culture revolves around cars? The War Boys themselves quite clearly do, but that says nothing of the people we see begging for water below Morton - i.e. most people still alive.
    – Dr R Dizzle
    Oct 13, 2016 at 7:39
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    Actually, after re-watching the Black & Chrome version, Furiosa mentions that the Green Place is "1 long night's journey" away. They ride all night (with some mal-functions) and cross it during the night without noticing. Even if she didn't remember the distance well, it's strange for her to use 2 different distance scales
    – BlueMoon93
    Dec 12, 2016 at 13:47

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