The Leading Ladies are back!

I had a message earlier this week that my bike, the Leading ladies, after spending 5 or 6 weeks at sea, was about to arrive back in the UK.

It had been raining all week and I wasn’t looking forward to collecting the bike in the rain. However, the weather played ball and I awoke on Thursday morning to a gloriously sunny day – one of the few so far this year.

I was dropped off at the shipping agents yard near Heathrow and a few minutes later my bike was bought outside, still in its crate. I had told the shippers that I wanted to take some pictures of the bike being un-crated and they had duly obliged, with Jim and Steve being ready to take the crate apart. Evidently, the office had told the guys I was going to take some pictures, as they were adorned in some silly hats, ready to be photographed. I did have to laugh!

The crate was very substantial and was bespoke made to fit the bike. The top came off first, having been held by many screws.... There was my bike.....

Next, the sides came off and Jim and Steve posed by the partially dismantled crate....

Finally the structure of the crate was dismantled and after re-fixing the windshield and putting the mirrors back the right way around, I hit the starter button and the bike fired into life, as reliable as ever...

The paperwork was swiftly dealt with and just a short time later I climbed on the bike and rode of down the road. The great feeling of riding that bike came back to me in an instant and it felt really good to lean the bike into corners once more and to use the full power range. I forgot I had left the bike with almost no fuel in the tank, so I hastily had to find a petrol station to refill her.

As I neared my house, Jackie had heard me approach and threw open the front door to snap a picture of the Leading Ladies returning....

Can you tell I was pleased to have the bike back?.......

The Leading Ladies are now in for some special attention. First, the bike is going to have a deep clean to remove the inevitable grime that builds up during a 21,000 mile ride and then it’s off to Warrs, the London based Harley-Davidson dealer for a full check over.

What a great bike! Welcome Home!!!!

I Want One Of These!

Last night on the TV programme 'The Gadget Show', they featured a one wheel, electric, self-balancing scooter. This is called the Ryno. It has gyroscopes to make it self-balancing and the TV presenter was riding it relatively comfortably within just a few minutes. This looks very cool indeed and I want one. It will have a 30 mile range, top speed of 20mph. It looks like a lot of fun.

I found a video on the web that shows what it can do....



I have a nagging doubt though that these would be allowed in the UK. For all sorts of bureaucratic nonsense, Segways are not allowed here and I fear the same fate would happen with the Ryno.

Progress of my Book

Towards the end of my tour of the USA, I decided to write a book about the trip. After I got back to the England and life returned to something approaching reality, I spent the time until Christmas writing one test chapter and investigating alternative publishing routes, book sizes, layouts, fonts, printing costs, book distribution methods and many other things I didn’t know writing and publishing a book.

Each of the 27 states that I visited will have a chapter of its own, plus about another 5 about planning of the tour / other introductory chapters – about 32 in total.

So far, I have written 5 out of that 32 - Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and South Dakota, plus a chapter giving tips about riding in the USA for visitors that Derek Polhill and Chris Luhman kindly helped with. With the help of a guy I used to work with, Brian Bascle, I have the cover and book title all sorted.

My cousins partner, Helen, is editing the book, my brother is doing the laying out of the words and pictures and my son Jeremy is going to draw the maps, so I am sort of keeping it in the family!

However, at this rate, I will take too long to finish writing the book, so I need to speed up somehow.

Having never written a book before, I am finding it quite difficult. To be fair, it is a book of photos supported by words, rather than a book of words that contains just a few pictures, but it is still very hard for me to do. I have always found it hard to concentrate on one thing for a long time, so I keep getting distracted and I find myself doing lots of other things when I should be writing. I am determined however to complete it and I want to finish it all and get it printed and available before the end of the year.

I will post an update in a few weeks time about how I am getting on. For now though, I must get back to writing.....

My Last London Motorcycle Show?

I went to the London Motorcycle Show at the Excel Centre in London’s Docklands a few days ago.

As I walked around I found myself wondering why I went. Sure, I looked at and sat on some of the new bikes like the Yamaha’s Super Tenere, Harley-Davidsons Blackline and the Triumph Tiger. But, I looked at helmets I have seen at every bike show I’ve been to, clothing I don't want, tools I already have and paddock stands I don’t need. I walked past insurance stands that wouldn’t insure one of my bikes and pictures of Motor GP racing I’m not interested in. I only glanced at the dolly birds, who seemed much more tarty than usual. Most shows are essentially the same and although I hate to admit it, after you’ve been to a few, they start to look the same. This one was the like that and even though I took my camera, there were so many people, I didn’t feel like struggling to take pictures of bikes without too many people in the shot. I should imagine if you are thinking of buying a new bike, the chance to sit on a number of your possible alternatives is good. I’m not in that sort of new bike market though.

As I walked around, I was bored of mainly seeing the same old things.

Deciding to try to find something different, I walked around the outside of the show and looked at some of the smaller stands and I noticed a large number of people that specialise in motorbike tours. Either I hadn’t noticed there being so many of these in previous years or their numbers had risen dramatically. I stopped and chatted with a few and they confirmed the number of such companies had gone up a lot in the past few years. Motorcycle touring it seems, is growing.

I have been a some organised tours on European roads in the past and I enjoyed them. Travelling around on such tours bikes with like-minded people is nearly always going to be fun. Of course, the people you do it with can make or break the tour and the riding is generally very good as the tour organisers have normally already planned to be on great roads. What I did notice at the bike show however was the large number of adventure tours to places like Peru, India, Africa and even New Zealand. A few of the guys I spoke to put to put this down to one simple thing – the “Long Way Round/ Down” tv programmes that featured Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman which I guess really introduced us to what is possible in adventure touring. Sure, such tours have been around for a while, but that tv series has really made them popular.

This is the list of touring companies I saw.... quite a few really!.....

Adventure Riding Academy
Adventure Peru Motorcycling
Blazin Bikes
Compass Expeditions
Dust Devils SL
EagleRider
GlobeBusters
HC Travel
Hidden Ireland Motorcycle Tours
Hispania Tours
Kudu Expeditions
M C I Tours
MSL Tours
Nurburg Ring Tours
Paradise Motorcycle Tours NZ Ltd
Pole Position Travel
Toursareus Ltd
Two Wheel Trekkers
VFR - New Zealand

I have decided to give such shows a miss in future and this will be my last London Motorcycle Show. I will go to the smaller and much more fun custom bike shows, where you really see something different in both the bikes and the people, but big general motorbike shows? – probably not. Would I consider going on another organised tour? – to a country where I don’t speak the language – probably yes. Only problem, where.....?

Nathan’s Great Road Trip Video

I was looking at Lucky’s blog, The Great Motorcycle Pizza Tour and I watched a couple of videos he had posted on there. They are so good, I have taken the liberty of also linking to them here on my blog.

These videos are about a young guy called Nathan who on the spur of the moment woke up one day and decided to buy his first motorbike and go on a road trip to Scotland. Oh, I should include that this trip was done mainly in the rain! He hasn’t even got a full motorcycle licence, so he has to display “L” plates to show he is a learner rider. He went to a dealer, bought a 20 year old 125cc Suzuki and went for a 958 mile ride on it, which as he says, "Is not bad for my first trip on the bike". He made two short videos about the trip and posted them on the web.

I have lifted the photo below from Nathans website but I am sure he won’t mind....

The videos will appeal to most people but especially to anyone that had a bike when they were young. They are brilliantly made and Nathan is very good at taking a simple story about a bike ride and telling it very well. Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman watch out!

The videos are well made and no doubt took him a lot of time. Get ready for the bit about the kill switch – it’s a classic!

Keep up the good work Nathan.

The videos are in two parts.....





You can read more about Nathan's trip at www.boyonabike.com

Hogslayer - The Unapproachable Legend

Some of my readers will remember I was lucky enough to be able to go see Jay Leno's private car and bike collection when I was in Los Angeles. This was possible because I happened to meet a TV producer months before in Milwaukee, called Jim Cutting.

It was Jim who very kindly contacted Jay and asked him if I could go see his collection so I owe Jim a big thank you for getting my visit sorted. I know that Jim is making a documentary about a Norton dual-engine drag bike called Hogslayer. Set for completion this year, the production team is looking for any existing material such as film, photographs, publications and video of the dragster and race team for inclusion in the documentary. They also have some sponsorship deals available.

This is the trailer for the documentary....



Here is the full recent press release distributed by the production company....

Hogslayer Documentary in the Final Stretch

“Hogslayer: The Unapproachable Legend” Set for Release in 2011

SLINGER, WIS. (January 31, 2011) – Excitement is building among racing enthusiasts for a new independent documentary about the multi-world champion motorcycle drag racing legend – the Hogslayer. Slated for a 2011 release date, the production company, The Edge Ltd., is accepting additional documentary materials and offering sponsorships on this exciting project.

Hogslayer: The Unapproachable Legend is the true-life story of the dual-engine Norton dragster designed, built and raced by John Gregory and TC Christenson of Sunset Motors in Kenosha, Wis. The documentary chronicles the Sunset Motors Racing Team’s unrivaled innovation and unbridled courage as they faced unyielding challengers throughout the United States and Europe in the 1970’s. The Hogslayer dragster is presently on exhibit at the National Motorcycle Museum in the United Kingdom.

The project is currently being financed and produced independently by The Edge Ltd., however the production company is offering sponsorships to assist with the remaining funding and to share in the premieres and distribution promotion of the documentary. The Edge Ltd. is also offering an open invitation for anyone familiar with the Hogslayer story to submit film, photographs, publications and video of the dragster and race team for inclusion in the documentary. For additional information or to submit materials, contact James Cutting, independent producer, The Edge Ltd., at 262-224-3777 or edgeltd@charter.net.

For the latest Hogslayer news, become fans of the ‘Hogslayer Documentary’ on Facebook.

The Bikes I’ve Owned....

I have owned just five bikes which I guess is not that many really. A few people I know have got that many in their garages now!

Here are the bikes I have owned....

First a Honda C90......

I got my first bike, a Honda C90 in red and white, when I was 16 years old. Looking back now, I think it was a good bike to learn to ride a bike on, as with just 3 gears and no clutch, it was very simple to ride. I read the Honda Cub range has been made continuously since 1958 and is the biggest selling bike of all time with over 60 million sold. Wow, to think mine was one of them! When I first got the bike I thought I was pretty cool.... Okay, I was young and impressionable! I enjoyed the bike and did all the maintenance myself, all self-taught. I passed my bike riding test on this bike.

My next bike was a Yamaha YR5 350cc, in orange....

While riding a Honda with no clutch was easy, the first time I tried to ride this “proper bike”, I realised I didn’t know how to use a clutch. I was probably 17 at the time and I had never driven a car either, so how to operate a clutch was a mystery to me. I learned quickly though, on the tiny forecourt of the bike dealers and on the way home. I did ok as I made the journey without incident, but then immediately took the bike out for a ride and ran out of fuel and not realising the bike had a reserve tank (I was more interested in finding out about girls than reserves), pushed the bike to the nearest petrol station.

I kept that bike for many years and as my only form of transport, rode it everywhere in all weathers. I crashed it a few times due mainly to the stupidity of the other road users. Okay, it was probably my own stupidity and recklessness....

I then went up-market and bought my third used bike, a magnificent Suzuki GT750, known as “the kettle” because it was water cooled with a radiator....

I think I was probably about 21 at the time I got this bike and I kept this bike until I got married and had kids when a car became much more necessary and the bike had to go. I was living and working in London and even though this was meant to be a long-distance touring bike, most of the journeys I did were short, buzzing around London. It was an unusual bike and now very sought after as a collector’s item. I wish I had kept mine.

It was then many many years before I even rode another bike. I was 49 years old and in London one day I was about 30 minutes early for a meeting. I needed to find something to do while I waited, so I went to look in a Harley dealer I knew existed in west London. I hadn’t gone there with the intention of getting a bike, just to have a look. I liked the big, new shiny bikes and wondered if I could ride one after so many years of not riding. I arranged to rent one for 4 days and a few days later I rode away from the dealers on a Road King. I didn’t need 4 days to make my mind up as within about an hour I decided I wanted one and went back to the dealer and ordered my very own Road King ....

I was a born-again biker! I loved being back riding again and soon went on a few long distance trips across Europe. This Road King was the bike I did my tour of the USA on.

I attended a few Harley-Davidson rallies and had seen many of the one-off custom bikes at many shows and decided I wanted one. I had a good idea what I wanted and designed in my mind a long low bike and I found a H-D dealer in Waterford in Ireland that could build just what I wanted.  Thirteen months later I had my own dream bike....

I called the bike Tradewinds and entered it in a custom bikes show in St Tropez in southern France where it won best in class. It has done very well at custom bike shows since and for a custom bike, it has done many miles as I just love riding it. My Road King is my touring bike and my red custom bike is my show-off bike! Harley-Davidson heard about the bike and very kindly wrote about it in one of the HOG magazines and also put it in one of their e-zines

So, I have had just 5 bikes. Not so many really, but I am feeling the urge to get number six.....

The Leading Ladies are coming home!

Good News!

It seems that my black bike, the Leading Ladies, is finally on the way back home.

My regular readers will know that the bike has been held up in US Customs because of a slight problem with the administrative side of how the customs department work. Basically, when the bike was imported in New York, the system US Customs use in NY is electronic and the bike was “released” using their computer system. When it came to exporting the bike from LA, the customs people there said they wanted to see the import paperwork containing the official stamp to demonstrate the bike was imported properly. Well, the customs people in NY said they cannot provide that piece of paper because they deal with everything electronically. It seemed the bike would sit there until this was resolved.

The result was that the bike had to be re-imported (on paper) so that somebody could then produce a piece of paper with the stamp on it. This has now been done and I was sent a copy of the paperwork and the long awaited stamp.

The great news is the bike was then quickly cleared for export by customs. I have heard that the Leading Ladies will be leaving Los Angeles on a ship today and will arrive in about 4 -6 weeks time. Yeah!!!

I Have a Bike Again!

There is still no news about how the paperwork is going to repatriate the Leading Ladies back to the UK. I will follow this up with the shippers today to find out what the current status is.

I did however get my red custom bike back over the weekend. This meant driving a 792 miles round trip in 3 different countries and crossing the Irish Sea on a ferry!

My red bike is now three years old and was in need of a little bit of work, so while I was on my tour of the USA, it went back to Waterford Harley-Davidson in Ireland where is was built. The main thing that needed to be looked at was a starting problem. The bike has a large engine at 1800cc / 110 Cubic inches, and being a v-twin with a lot of compression and a heavy starter motor, the battery was never really big enough to start the bike properly. But, there isn’t room to put a larger battery in the bike, so I have always struggled to start the bike especially when it is really cold.

Waterford H-D therefore took the top of the engine off and installed a decompression system that reduces the compression on the first few turns of the engine thereby needing less power to crank the engine over. It works and the bike is now much easier to start. The twins carbs were tuned and a few paint dings were touched up, along with a few other bits and pieces.

The bike was ready so I drove from home (A on the map below) to Waterford which means heading west across a good deal of southern England, over the Severn Bridge (B), right across Wales where I got a ferry to Ireland and on to Waterford (C)....

I did think about riding the bike back, but only for about 3 nano-seconds as the weather forecast was dreadful with rain and snow forecast. I therefore jumped in my car and took the trailer. This was crossing the Seven Bridge....

Driving onto the ferry....

The ferry was pretty big, so I went outside on the sun-deck (they have got to be kidding calling it that!) and took a few pictures....

Famous across the world for its crystal, Waterford is the fifth largest city in Ireland. Sitting on the River Suir, it’s history can be traced back to 914 AD when the city was founded by Vikings....

I stayed in the Tower Hotel, so-called because it sits opposite Reginald’s Tower, said to be the oldest civic building in Ireland....

I walked around the centre of Waterford and noticed a Merry-Go-Round and Christmas tree in the town square, no doubt both fenced off due to imminent removal post Christmas....

I spend most of the day at Waterford H-D chatting with the guys and some of the customers. The ferry back wasn’t until late at night so I had plenty of time. Lenny the Dealer Principle was on good form and we sat and talked about all sorts of issues for a long time. This is their workshop....

The ferry back across the Irish Sea left late in the evening and docked at one o’clock in the morning. I had to wait until every other car had driven off the ferry as my trailer was too tall to exit without lowering the ramp inside the boat so I could leave by the lorry exit....

It was a long drive home through the night and I was tired when I arrived a 7am. I unloaded the bike later after the sun had come up and finally I had a bike in my garage once again....

All I need now is my Road King back!

2010 Headers

I was looking at Eve's blog, Sunny Side Up and saw that she had collected together all of the header photos used at the top of her blog during 2010. Realising this was a terrific idea, I did what any self-respecting person would do and, I , err, borrowed it.

So, here are my header pictures from 2010.....

Riding Through Spain

For England, we are having a lot of snow at the moment. It is cold. I saw a temperature of -11.5C the other day. Oddly this is almost the same amount in Fahrenheit -11.3F.

My red bike is stuck in Ireland, awaiting the weather to improve so it can be road tested after having some work done on it. The Leading Ladies are still stuck in Los Angeles (update to come later).

Having no bike and having weather that means I cannot ride anyway this is obviously the right time to think about..... a road trip!

I have decided that with a few friends, a ride across Spain is needed. Oh, the warm weather, the mountains, the twisty roads.... it should be terrific.

Here is the route in outline....

My friend Paul who rode with me for two weeks at the beginning of my USA tour has said yes to doing the ride. So has my pal Ian Solley of 7 Ages Custom Motorcycles. Martin and Joanna who I met when riding to Austria a couple of years ago are thinking about joining us. Jackie and the other non-riding partners with fly down and be there when we arrive.

We will get a ferry from Portsmouth to southern England to Santander in northern Spain and then ride on the eastern side of the country all the way to southern Spain, spend a few days at my house there before riding back through Spain on its western side. En route we will be staying in Paradores which are Spanish hotels in Castles, Palaces, Fortresses, Convents, Monasteries and other historic buildings.

I have mapped out the basic route and it looks like being over 2,000 miles.

Roll on summer!

The Leading Ladies are stuck in LA

How about this for bureaucratic nonsense!

It has been a few weeks since I delivered my bike, the “Leading Ladies” to the shipping agent in LA, so a few days ago I enquired about when the bike would be back in the UK. I was told by the shipping agent there is a problem as the US Customs people in LA wanted to see the original import paperwork before they are prepared to release the bike for shipping. However, the US Customs people in New York (where the bike was imported) don’t have any paperwork because they use a totally computer based system, so the NY Customs people cannot supply the paperwork that the LA Customs people want to see. It doesn’t exist.

After lots of going forward and backwards, the customs people in LA have refused to release the bike for export back to the UK until they have the paperwork that does not exist. The only way around this is for the bike to be re-imported into LA so a paper trail can be created and the one piece of paper that satisfies the LA customs people is available.

You would think that the US customs department used a common system across the country, or at least had different systems that respected each other, but no, it seems they just make up the rules locally. In the meantime, my bike still sits in LA until the two different customs teams and the shipper can sort this mess out.

To use a common UK phrase, what a load of bollocks!

Thousand Mile Photos

My regular readers will know that while I was on my tour, I stopped at every thousand miles point on my journey and took a photo looking forward. Most of the time, this meant just stopping, grabbing my point and shoot camera, jumping off my bike and taking a quick picture at the side of the road. I posted each of these, but this morning I collected them together to look at them all. Here they are....

29th June 2010. 1,000 mile point, near Ellsworth, in Maine....

7th July 2010. 2,000 mile point, in Charlestown, Rhode Island....

14th July 2010. 3,000 mile point, near Jeffersonville, in Vermont....

21st July 2010. 4,000 mile point, at Little Erie Beach in Angola, New York....

28th July 2010. 5,000 mile point, in central Milwaukee, Wisconsin....

3rd August 2010. 6,000 mile point, near Pipestone, Minnesota....

8th August 2010. 7,000 mile point, near Oelrichs, South Dakota....

14th August 2010. 8,000 mile point, in Gillette, Wyoming....

18th August 2010. 9,000 mile point, near the Beartooth Pass, Wyoming....

27th August 2010. 10,000 mile point, near Mirror Lake, Utah....

3rd September 2010. 11,000 mile point, at Grand Lake, Colorado....

13th September 2010. 12,000 mile point, near Wetmore, Colorado....

20th September 2010. 13,000 mile point, Dolores, Colorado....

25th September 2010. 14,000 miles point, Clifton, Arizona....

3rd October 2010. 15,000 mile point, Route 66 near Kingman, Arizona....

12th October 2010. 16,000 miles point, near Sedona, Arizona....

15th October 2010. 17,000 miles point, near Moab, Utah....

21st October 2010. 18,000 miles point, near Gunlock, Utah....

27th October 2010. 19,000 miles point, in Yosemite, California....

4th November 2010. 20,000 miles point, near San Simeon, California....

11th November 2010.  21,000 miles point in the Cuyamaca Rancho State Park, California....