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The magic number is.... 57

Today was an easy one. Woke up in the hotel to a breakfast we had to pay extra for. 6 different kinds of break and some fruit. 4 of the kinds were French and the others were just white sliced loafs of slightly different kinds. Not very Spanish. I’ve noticed in my brief observations that the health here is not so good as France. Obesity is taking hold here, there is a lot of overweight people where in France it’s very rare. Driving is ok. The French drive like they just don’t care, the Italians like they’re behind the wheel of a sports car. The Spanish seem to drive ok. When a car has caused me trouble then it’s always turned to be foreign, usually Italian.
We took a slow ride to Barcelona, less than an hour. We seemed able to cruise around 57mph with no trouble. Like yesterday there were warnings about the wind but nothing to worry about at all. The bike just sat herself at 57 and rolled along happily and I was more than happy to let her. I’ve given her a bit of a hard life lately so it was nice to take it easy. Tomorrow we’re just doing the tourist thing in town, we’re off in later to have a look about and eat some food. Nothing heavy and much as I love my bike I need a day out of the saddle.
Everyone is going crazy about the riots at home but a few people seem to have some perspective. I can’t understand a lot of Spanish but it was on the news and they were showing headlines with graphs. Even they were linking unemployment-recession-rioting so why are the people too stupid at home to see it? I’ve never been proud to be English because the population just seems happy to sit back and let the government wipe their shoes on them. Someone I know even said we need to give the police more powers when this riot was sparked by several abuses of police power. Insane.
It’s very strange to hear about news on your doorstep when you’re so far removed from home. My mum was worried about me going away, she feared for my safety. Now the shoe is on the other foot.
We’re planning to go on towards Madrid next and then a slow Pyrenees crossing before a dash towards Eastern Europe. We will see...

What a difference an afternoon makes.

I hate Barcelona. I hate it. We went in for something to eat. We followed signs tot he city centre. We sort of found it, I think but it was just like every other city centre, full of over-priced boutiques with under intelligent people buying them with money they didn’t earn for themselves. We headed off to the seafront to see something a bit more down to earth where two weary travellers with tired bums could eat a hearty meal while watching girls in bikinis... more me than her, that one.
We met an English biker while down a backstreet who asked us through his sweaty helmet for directions to the water. We told him we were lost too. He laughed and told us he’d be driving round for hours... an ominous sign. I managed to find the port with no real difficulty and sure enough we had something to eat and all was well with the world. The food was ok, nothing special but Spain has a charm of its own with amazing heat that still feels refreshing unlike the sweaty miserable sun of Italy.
Finally we headed back to the hotel. Then the thread kind of unravelled and we ended up covering 60 miles trying to escape the evil clutches of Barcelona where every street looks the same. A police woman sent me in totally the wrong direction at one point and I came within a gnats dick of a crash. I was admittedly driving a bit angry by then but we were heading downhill and the light changed to green. I accelerated to carry on and a girl on a scooter just sat there... still sat there, still sat there. I pulled in the brake and locked the front wheel, even with ABS it locked up and skidded all the way. Luckily I somehow managed to steer it just round her and the semi-oblivious tart shrugged and said a half-arsed sorry, little knowing she nearly had an enduro bike where her spine used to be.
All this put a downer on my day but then it’s just degrees of bad. I mean a bad day touring is still a great day in your life. It’s not like my car got written off, the sale of my house fell through, I rowed with my missus or I broke my toe...

We took a quiet ride into Barcelona and spent 5 hours walking around looking for.... anything. In the end we gave up and went home. Actually we did stumble across a nice little market and a few other things that made us smile. One of the best things about the place is the sheer volume of bikes and the diversity. With the climate bikes don't readily rust so there are some great machines dotted about. BMWs are very popular with the F650gs single being a very common sight but I've not seen a Dakar version yet. Big GSs are everywhere and so far I've not seen one with the kind of engine rot that's so common in the UK.
Big news today... I started the bike and noticed a puddle underneath. Water, clean water was pooling under the engine. This worried me greatly. I moved on to the fuel station which was next door and put a tankfull in. I noticed more water pooling in the same spot. I laid the bike down on her side and started looking for where it was coming from. There are no breathers there. My fan had not come on, the bike was barely started. I checked my water level... slightly low but blue from anti-freeze which confused me even more. More confusing still, pure water was leaking out of my sump plug at the opposite end of the bike to the rad.
It turned out that where I had parked was where they spray the garden in the morning with the sprinkler system. It was so hot here the water had simply evaporated but some had pooled in the shady spot under my engine inside my bash plate to roll out when I stood her up. Problem solved with some relief!

Spain is nice. Now let's get the hell out of it.

Good morning world. We're just sitting in the hotel lobby waiting for a burst of energy to get out onto the road. We've changed out minds about Spain. It's a nice country but wasted on the Spanish. They're not a nice people, now I know I'm basing that opinion on a small section of the population of a large place but the ones in Barcelona can piss off as far as I'm concerned. You ask them a question and as soon as they realise they stand to make no money from you they just walk away without another word. The driving is basically ok but they have a habit of wanting to pull off on an exit and so thrashing the crap out of their little rotbox car to pull in front of you first. The French seem oblivious as to the danger they cause like a blinkered horse and the Italians just don't care about anything at all, especially you. Can't put my finger on the attitude here, it's like there's always something to prove but it's not quite that. It's a selfishness to everything that happens here. Always "me first" which you don't see anywhere else on a large scale.
Anyway, expediency is turning us round to head up towards Poland. We're slightly bored with knocking about tourist trap areas and want to see something better so we're heading back. Tonight we're back in Girona (well just outside) and then we're heading over a different crossing of the Pyrenees so we see a bit more scenery and then heading towards Toulouse. It's a shame as the petrol here is finally the same price as at home but the road tolls are crippling. Food is slightly cheaper but has no unique identity of it own where French absolutely does. You can buy a sandwich at a motorway stop in France and it will be really good.
I walked down to the petrol station opposite last night but it was closed. I was lucky enough to see a French lorry driver knocking one out to internet porn. There's an image I just don't need in my head.

Ok, I’ve been on the road for a few days now and have covered a few thousand miles. I built my bike using common sense and logic but not personal experience so what lessons have I learnt and what would I change?
The biggest problems have been the seat and the navigation so far. Several bits have failed but we’ll come to those later. Starting with the seat... the standard unit was lousy. It was a nice seat to look at with a tiny layer of ineffective foam. There was free space between the cover and the foam making me suspect the seat unit was recycled from another bike which is common practice these days, a lot of parts are recycled from the HP2 such as pegs and headlight. In any case it was hell to sit on so I had it fitted with a gel pack. Instant improvement but not a big enough one for the use it’s getting. The seat stylishly tapers to towards the top meaning I’m resting my arse bone on it in only two places instead of spreading the load. This is causing significant pain (discomfort really, I’m just being a drama queen). She is uncomfortable on the rear but not in pain so it’s clearly the way I’m forced to sit on these two ridges. I plan to find out what base this bike uses and see if there’s a way i can modify it with a better, wider seat. Failing that I will rework it to make something decent out of a spare I was generously given by my brother... thanks bruv.
Navigation needs a total rethink. I’m using a map and a GPS which only has details of cities, nothing else. It’s working fine now I’m used to it but getting in and out of cities or finding specific places is proving very difficult. I need to put some more thought into that. What I want to do is build a decent mapping tool. At the back of my mind I want a Dell mini-9 netbook to modify. The Mini-9 was built to be stripped down and modified and has an SSD (Solid State Disk) so no problem with vibrations and lower power consumption. There are touch screen kits available and it can be made water resistant. I have an idea of the monitor up on the dash showing downloaded maps as I drive with open note documents to scroll through as I go. That in concert with the GPS system would be pretty foolproof... Bit of a pipe-dream but that’s my ideal-world solution. A second best would be to have a pocket organiser showing notes I’ve made/downloaded. I have one already so it’s just needing to be waterproofed.
I intend to rework the headlight/dash area of the bike. I made a whole new headlight bracket that handles the HID ballasts and spots. It’s clunky but it works. Even when fitting it I considered it a prototype, a test of material and techniques. My issue is that isn’t as resilient as I would like and doesn’t do everything I want. I mounted the screen to it and it’s exceedingly clunky and the screen has a very slight vibration that makes me wonder how tough it would be in a fall. I am leaning towards twin headlights. Now that would over-load my charging circuit but my headlight is so weak I have to do something to improve on it. So far driving at night has been problematic as a lot of roads have no lights, this will be worse on secondary roads or as I go further towards Asia. My ideal solution would be twin “dominator” headlights in black, wider apart than standard and mounted to an alloy and stainless rally-style cockpit. One would be headlight and dipped, just as standard and the other would be modified to be HID only with decent forward projection. My spots are great but they throw light everywhere (as intended, I figured those more to let people know I was there and to pick up details of signs or rocks on trails which they do brilliantly but the beam pattern is very wide and they’re not helping on unlit roads very much. Great offroad but not s good on an unlit highway and sadly that seems to be an environment I’m dealing with very frequently. I would sandwich a set of LED markers in the middle of the lights so during the day I can power down my headlight clustercompletely and let my charger have a rest. Running late I can use my HID which uses far less power and when i need everything, I have full spread of light. I love the way traditional and HID mix. They’re very different and anyone who says one or other is better is wrong (in my opinion.) You want both together to see everything on an unlit road. That seems to me to be the best solution with the lowest power drain and at the lowest cost output. Sure I could get a plastic fairing but I hate the way they look, I like the pared-down minimalist appearance of my bike. I like the dominator lights (the kind a lot of people call Bandit lights on account of how frequenrtly they’re used on crash damaged Suzuki Bandits, they’re the same overall diameter as standard and fit right on. I hear nothing but good things and although they’re not all that tough they are at least as good as standard. My plastic headlight is already looking very poor and throws next to no light. I can handle that on a G650, just about but can you imagine running that arrangement on a HP2 enduro? Highly unacceptable. BMW should hang their heads in shame.
The new look headlight will be heavy shaped alloy plates which I hope to augment with high-strength stainless steel which will survive any accident and support the entire arrangement. This will also give me a mounting-tree so I will fit my dash low, my GPS high and that still gives me space for other gear. I may still leave my GPS mounted to the bars, it’s given me no problems in that position and is clear and easy to read. This does free up some space high-up for a rolling-road or other mapping equipment. My mind is chewing that over already. I will keep with the screen I have but aim to straighten it up a bit and raise it a few inches, that should give me optimal protection and a good compromise between usefulness and being a sail to catch crosswinds.
The rear tail unit was a disaster. I’ve ridden a few thousand miles with it held on with bungies and cable ties. I will make a better job when I get home. I want to clean up the back end as far as possible. The number plate was somehow sucked into the rear wheel and shattered the mounting points of the Motrax universal tail tidy. Utter piece of crap, I would have been better off mounting it to a banana. In future I will have the plate mounted directly off the tail with the bare-minimum legal requirements and indicators mounted close in, preferable to the alloy rack. LED are tidier and lighter on power but these ones don’t seem very bright. I’ll probably go with “fairing mounts” at the rear to keep it as tidy as possible. Rear indicators are very important travelling in unknown territory so i’ll shop about for the best I can get. I hoped Oxford would be those. They have an air of quality to them and were far from cheap. In fact they’re not as bright as I wanted, not even as bright as the £10 for 4 I bought for a friend’s bike which are far better.
I’m going to simplify and lighten everything. She needs to be lighter. Already the G650x is one of the lightest bikes in their class but I want to save even more weight. I’ve cut a lot of fat off already but the front mudguard is going to have to go. It serves no purpose now I have a high-mount and the tank/bash plate protect from dirt so that’s now redundant. I will go over her and lose anything that is stylish and lacks a function or replace what I can with lighter parts. I made an alloy side panel for the left, it actually saved half the weight over the original plastic part so I’m sure there are other places I can do the same trick. I know it seems odd to add so much weight to the bike for this job then talk about cutting a few ounces but every little makes a difference. So far with the savings on exhaust, etc, I’m about even with the parts I’ve added to a standard weight. That is what I’m aiming at, keeping the weight as low as possible.
The tank (fake tank, airbox cover) is looking rough. I intend to paint it matt black. Simoniz (I think) Tough-black paint is excellent. It is chemical and knock resistant and just about as good as standard paint. I’ll sand down both the side panels and main cover and have the whole reworked in Matt black which will be a touch different and give her an update. I also want to build an alloy rack over the top cover. It doesn’t have to be very good, 2mm alloy will do, it’s just to help locate the tank bag as it slips all over the place and caused us to drop the bike. If I don’t opt to carry the tank bag the mounting will allow me to carry other items with a bungie such as water or a map. Either way that will help to protect the tank in future and save from any more awkward spills. The tank cover is only plastic so I can’t load anything too heavy up there so lightweight alloy will be more than adequate.
I’d like additional luggage points at the sides or at least some kind of radiator protection. There are several engine bars available but they’re costly, heavy and largely redundant. When the bike has been over only the bars touch the ground so all I’m looking for is a slim shield in case of an uneven surface impacting the side. I’m not sure how to achieve this yet but I will also like a flat surface for bungie points. I’d love to be able to mount thin wraps on the front sides to decentralise luggage. This isn’t overly important to me as with only one person the luggage I’m carrying will be fine where it is but spreading the load is good if it can be done right.
I want to move the airhorn slightly. It’s fine now but for more offroad use it will clog and in any case it’s in a vulnerable spot.
I’m glad the bottles are there. When we’ve trailed through the backroads of a national park with 200km between fuel stops I’ve been very happy to have 2litres of emergency fuel on the side. Other than that though, they’re remained empty and redundant. I’m seriously wondering if they’re worth the effort. I have been thinking about using the rack for water and storing just a single bottle of fuel in another spot as I seem to be slightly over the top. My main tank hold 6 litres plus reserve and the front auxiliary tank another 5. I have seen 200 miles on this arrangement with around 50 in reserve. This seems to be enough although when lost in town I’ve got that down to 160 miles. The throttle use offroad and in town is similar so for trail riding i’m realistically expecting the lower end of the range. For larger bikes with a bigger tank I would think that keeping the fuel tank half full and riding with reserve fuel slung low might be a benefit offroad. Riding a Triumph Tiger on trails was a wobbly experience with the mammoth tank slunk to the top of the frame. I’d have been happier with fuel slung lower.
The suspension is working nicely. The bike is handling the conditions well and the handling, while compromised with the load is still safe and predictable. Despite what some people say the standard setup would have done ok if driven below the bikes limitations. The upgrades, while fairly costly have made me a lot happier and made the bike safer and more reliable. If you have £500 to spend, spend it here. A decent shock and spring upgrades are well worth it. If you want to blow some cash then swap out the front forks but those of us in the real world, the way I went is good enough for 99.9% of us and would still be good enough for the rest who aren’t too badly afflicted with boys-and-their-toys-syndrome.
I will probably make an alloy guard to protect the front fuel tank. Not that it really needs it but more to help cover up the obvious fact that it’s there. It’s held up fine, so far but I will probably rework the mounting plate to make it neater slightly. I won’t replace it, just clean it up.I would be happier with some kind of guard over the filler cap to protect the hose but so much of the fuel and electrical system is already exposed that I can’t imagine this will be any additional problem not to have.
I originally wanted and paid for a Gel battery for the slight extra power and durability but on working on the bike I see a standard battery has been fitted during the last service. Otherwise I was happy with the work but I’ll be taking up this issue with the guy and get this sorted out. I know some people like to move the battery but the weight saving is minimal and I already have weight mounted in the low-slung position so there’s really nowhere to move it safely to. I’m happy enough where it is, I just want more durability from it. I may fit hard-wired jump points in case the battery dies but I’m hoping this is over-kill. It’s played up twice and both have been my fault. With wiring routed to the key this should no longer be possible.
I may move the fusebox up to the new main dash and have some kind of warning lights and kill switches. I would like the ability to isolate the ABS system directly from the dash. I know you have the bar button but it’s limited. I would like to simply kill the ABS on dash for extended stop-start trail riding. Similarly I would like to kill the accessories so a slightly upgraded power system may be on the cards. So far I have switches on the bars but they need moving up to the dash, as does the accessory socket.
These are my thoughts so far about building my BMW G650X-country “Adventure.” She’s good now but I want her to be right. I’m learning a lot from this trip and she’s close but we’re not there yet...

Easy like Friday morning.

Not much to report today. My other-half is "not veery wheel" as she says it. That being the case she's upstairs sleeping it off while I was charged with the responsibility of leaving her alone. I took a ride for a couple of hours, nothing special but it was such a relief to get the weight off and just ride my bike again. The scenery here is great. I found a fire-roads but have no idea of the legalities of riding them so I gave in when i found a sign, just in case. Nobody I asked seemed to know either but my impression is that nobody would care one way or another.
We had no luck buying a travel charger to fix her camera so I cut a USB lead and made one using insulating tape and an Iphone adapter. It worked ok and charged her battery enough for a few days. I replaced mine with a very cheap camera which takes pretty poor photos. It will do till I get access to my own bank account, right now I had to leave with an expired bank card so we're running only on the cash we brought which is not ideal.


Universal truths to traveling.
Part 1

Every hotel/motel/hostel will have a bathroom floor made of something impossible to stand up on while wet.

Every road you need to go on will be a one way street blocked against you

Google, maps and GPS will be fine until it really, really matters.

You will come back with half the stuff you went with and the missing stuff will be the stuff you need most. (Camera... tools.... wets....)

If you have it then you won't need it.

The thing you most worry about won't happen but something you never thought of that is far worse probably will.

No amount of preparation can prepare you for something you didn't know you had to prepare for.

Everyone speaks a little bit of English. Just enough to completely misunderstand what the hell you're trying to ask them.

Everyone is an arsehole in a big city.

BMW riders just don't want a conversation with you. Everyone else will be happy to chat.

Taking your partner on the road is a mistake.

You can never carry too much water.

Failure to prepare is preparing to make your life very, very stressful.

You're absolutely right my lord
phase with the BMW drivers ....funnyyyyyyyy

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ADVENTURES LUGGAGE
www.konvoi.ro

The road less traveled

Well she's still not well. I was going to respect her privacy but I figured, what the hell. The reason for this blog is for the people reading it to learn from my mistakes so the fact is, it's her time of the month. She's normally fine with it but maybe a combination of the climate, food and seating position have made this one pretty uncomfortable for her. We were going to camp but we're in a low cost Etap hotel instead and booked into an F1 tomorrow night. Sadly tomorrow is going to be a long day, we're pushing now to Eastern Europe so we're riding from Toulouse to Lyon. Not a big journey but a dull one so a big effort.
Today was a fairly long ride but oh so worth it... From Girona to Toulouse. The GPS and google wanted us to backtrace our steps on the A7 autopista but we both fancied doing something a bit more ambitious. We decided to go inland and cross the Pyrenees a bit further in, almost into Andorra. We didn't know what we were going to find there so we just went to see what would happen. Coming over was great scenery but it was just a motorway so it was all very sanitised. This time we stuck to backroads and it was simply amazing.
We headed off from Girona with a fairly heavy heart. I liked it there and had enjoyed the break. Bareclona was meant to be a rest stop but was awful, really stressful and with her getting ill we took a few days there instead. I'm really glad we did, it's a great little town. Not big enough to get lost in, just easy to find your way about and it had just enough of everything we needed.
We headed out towards Banyola to Olot and onwards from there. It was so nice to get back on the road and even more exciting to be faced with genuinely no idea of what was up ahead. I knew it would be better than the road in, that was all.
The road to Rizolla was ok, nice scenery, lots of farms and fairly easy to navigate. We stopped for directions in Rizolla but it turned out to be Olot and we hadn't got as far as we thought. The mountains were looming large now and I'm poor with heights so it was a slightly anxious time. I know it would have been easy to avoid all this but where's the fun in that?
As we headed in the scenery changed and we started seeing these great little villages and towns with friendly people and great, clean scenery. Everything was so nice, no matter where you looked there was another great view.
We followed a wrong sign and it took us up... and up. The road was narrow, so narrow that two cars would have struggled to pass. At first I had rocks to the side of my lane but on the other side was nothing, no barrier, no boundry, just a drop onto rocks. I was starting to get a little nervous and then the lanes switched sides so the drop was on my side. I ignored it as best I could and focused on the road. That was a good iea in any case as hairpin turns were coming at me like spray off a wet lorry. One lapse of concentration and we were dead. Even she knew it this time and she started clinging on tight. I took a chance to stop at a rare layby on the drop-side of the road and checked a map. I was sure we'd gone wrong. We reconciled to continue in any case but then some push-bikers turned up and confirmed we were on the wrong road so with some relief we turned about and headed down. Now I'm not a nervous guy. I've thrashed an RSV Millie flat-out on a road and took on a gang of a dozen guys once armed only with harsh language but this made me sweat. I'm not good with heights but I'm proud to say I took it like a man but was breathing a sigh of relief when we made it down.
After that we found Rizolla and took a short break. The added benefit of this path was far fewer toll roads so the toll money was spent on chocolate cake and my other half fuelled herself up on that while running about snapping photographs like a thing possessed.
We then headed off. The map was tricky (large scale) and I couldn't make out where the border was but we hadn't made it there yet. Then we started climbing... An ominous sign approached, a yellow BMW GS on my side of the road... he wobbled back to his own side to pass and we carried on. I knew what this meant. We were coming up for a climb into the mountains, nothing else makes a man drive a motorcycle down the wrong lane of a narrow strip. We climbed fast, I watched the signs by the side of the road as they measured off the altitude to around 2km up and the road was still far from the peak of the mountains. I saw a floral tribute to Oliver at the side of the road and briefly imagined our name on one. Then another to David. The hairpins doubled back on themselves and opened out to unimaginably beautiful scenery. There was some traffic about but nothing to stop this being an amazing experience. We couldn't get pics of the really great stuff as there was nowhere to stop but it was an intense experience. We stopped at one pooint and a group of sportsbikes passed us but even they were sticking to the speed limits.
At one point there was horses just wandering around on the lanes as if this wasn't challenging enough. We then passed a field full of them and I knew she wanted pictures so we doubled back. I turned in a small clearing and it was littered with smashed bits of motorcycle screens and fairings where someone had failed to make a turn. Scary stuff to see but everyone up there was behaving and the wind was low so really the danger was mostly perceived. We took our time and I focused on what I was doing. The bike came into her own, the single cylinder engine had braking and torque so the tight corners where under good control. This tight hairpin lane went on for 40 miles! By the end I was just relived to see some flat ground. We pulled into a town, our mid-way destination and we had a coffee. I checked the map and we still had another crossing to get back out of the Pyrenees on the French side! The border was non-existent and signs were vague but tolerable. In France you just keep going until you see a sign that says otherwise. Simple really... until it goes wrong which it frequently does.
The French side was darker, greener and flatter. The road goes round the mountains rather than embracing them. To the French they are an inconvenience, to the Spanish a joy. We followed the directions of a French biker after the signs ran out and he directed us to a long underground tunnel. We had to pay a toll on that but there was nobody about and it occurred to me to just go round the barrier. We didn't but we should have.
Once on the other side we caught the rain or rather it caught us. She put on her wets. Mine are now missing, presumed lost in action. Luckily my gear is meant to be waterproof. The rain hit us hard and slowed our progress significantly. I could feel the belting rain through my armoured gear, each drop registering on my arms and legs. I warned her the bike handled like an excited puppy in the wet with TKC80 tyres so we took it easy. Actually we outran the rain in about 20 mintues and headed into brighter skies. We stopped for a breather and the black clouds began catching us up so we took to the roads again, just keeping ourselves ahead of the rain. We managed to make and hold around 75mph which was quick enough in the wind with the weight we're carrying. We ate the kms pretty fast and were in Toulouse before we knew it. We got caught at another toll gate but we were tired and I just wanted to get there so we sucked down the charges. Toulouse signposts hindered our progress and we saw the same piece of road 5 times but we made it in the end.
Tomorrow will be a dull day, I imagine but we need to make progress. Everything is expensive here so we need to push on.

Universal truth of traveling... supplemental.

Whenever you ask directions, no matter that you're wearing full bike gear, carrying a lid, standing next to a bike, getting off the bike or still on it, people will always ask you, "Are you driving?"

I asked a guy today, the bike in plain view behind me, me fully kitted in bike gear and carrying a lid and he gave me directions to the underground station... Weird...

he probably looked at you and thought your a tramp (bum for the yanks) and needed a dry place to sleep... not really his fault

Cross Country moto... No Challenge

Quite an easy day today. We’re still suffering under the curse of womens issues so instead of a longer drive into Lyon we had a shortened trip into Albi which took roughly an hour. Getting out of Toulouse was pretty straight forward and I was able to follow the signs all the way from one hotel to another. If I’d followed the GPS or google maps I’d probably still be there now...
Anyway, one minor issues was with my front tank. There were marks on the front upper lip where I can only assume the tyre has made contact. I’ve tried to replicate the conditions by jumping it up and down curbs loaded and unloaded and braking as hard as possible but nothing. I’ve marked the front with powder and cannot get the tyre to mark the fresh powder. I can only assume it’s from Barcelona where we braked for our lives behind a scooter, it’s the only full-blooded emergency stop I’ve made. From now on I’ll ride more carefully and keep a close eye on it. When I get back I will look at moving it. I might be able to move it back or down a bit or maybe switch it to mount on the side of the bike (my original idea) so we’ll have a play when i get home. I like the weight where it is but frankly the spot will be fine to mount other heavy gear so nothing is really lost
Ambi is nice. An old town full of French clichés and impressive architecture. The cathedral was open to the public and she went into shutter-bug mode instantly, firing snaps off at everything. We were allowed to just walk in and she observed, quite rightly, “not like England... they want paying for everything...”
We found an old monument bridge and my vertigo oddly flared up. It was only a hundred metres high above water and chances of survival if you were to fall were good. Yesterday chances of survival were less than none but I was fine. I guess irrational fear is not meant to be logical. Nice to know I’m still carrying totally baseless emotional baggage. In any case, I still walked across it and the view was very impressive. People are nice here too. I like France but it’s so damn expensive. Food is now three times the price it was a hundred miles ago. It’s good though, the cooking here is top notch. I want to try a McDonalds at some point to see what they’re like here but we haven’t even seen one.
We had a bit of rain today. The weather forecast says it’s in for tonight and then clears up. Showers by Thursday but we’ll be in another country by then so we’ll see what happens.
My brother has bought a V-strom for touring. He’s coming away with me on the Europe leg of my ride to Asia. It’s going to be a more hard-core trip, we’ll be packing less weight and running cheap. No hotels this time, camping rough. I think it’s the wrong bike, not just for the trip but for him. He tends to get bored with bikes too quickly and I can’t see the Strom getting under his skin and I think he needs to learn to love a bike and keep it long enough to bond with it. I also think that while comfortable it might be a bit too bland and heavy but we’ll see. It’s got more power than i’ve got and his bum won’t be as sore... maybe I’m jealous of that.
I think my bike is perfect for my big trip and the modifications make it just right but there’s other considerations. I use my bike daily at home. I can’t afford to take it off the road for 6 months at a time between trips to prep it. She always needs to be ready. She’ll also be daily used when i arrive in Thailand so I had to consider that too. The only thing I didn’t consider is this Europe trip, 2 up. I didn’t have that in mind when i bought my bike or even when i started the upgrades. The suspension work was just for my own benefit. The upshot is that she’s doing fine but I’m not happy with the extra weight. She’s not designed, built or rebuilt for this. I’m being careful and so far no sign of problems. I wanted the Touratech rear boxes which come with a steel subframe and can handle the weight. The cost was over £1100 and boxes are not ideal off road. My solution was £300. I thought about the 09 rear steel subframe but that was £800 from BMW (I could buy a Honda Dominator for that and just ride it). Again, not worth the cash for the possibility of snapping the subframe which is a slim possibility and I’m already taking precautions against by packing carefully. Power wise... I guess the truth is I could have done with a V-strom. I know there are crazy (American mostly) people on the ADV forum (mostly crazy Americans) who reckon the Strom is a true enduro capable of anything including travelling through time, flying and fighting robot dinosaurs but the truth is that’s a low-slung multi-strada machine with cast wheels that can just about handle some fire-roads. With two up that would have suited me fine. Acutally I looked into possible weight savings of stripping one to the bone and reworking it with better shock and forks but I found the cost prohibitive and still thought the Beemer the better bike (opinion varies).
In any case it’s always exciting to have a new bike on the table so I’m keen to see what he does with it. For my money I’d add HID spotlights straight off, upgrade the horn and look into a sturdier bash-plate. I don’t know much about the suspension but the upgrades I made to mine were well worth the money so I’d look into that. I’d not use plastic boxes, I think they’re too flimsy, especially on unmade roads which we’re planning to use. I’d go with bags and simply bungie them to the racks. Anyway, I’m keen to see what he does.
I find myself looking at the back of bikes now everywhere we go. My partner doesn’t speak English as a first language so sometimes the conversation is a little basic. Being surrounded by foreigners is making me feel even more isolated. I speak a little French but not enough to hold a worthwhile conversation. I find myself hoping to meet some English people, ideally with a bike so we can talk bollocks over a . Maybe that’s why I’m rambling so much in my blogs but hey.... you don’t have to read this crap...