Getting The Bikes
(Excitedly written by Heather)
The Bikes. The rattling collection of ageing Honda rust and bolts that will (hopefully) carry us 10,000 miles clear across a continent and home again. Other wise know as Sir Percy of Clunk and Basil Fawlty. |
| Ross as he bought Sir Percy |
We also wanted bikes that where so fucking stupid and wholly unsuited to the task in hand that people would laugh at us and that we couldn't help but smile at every time we got on them. It also helps that they are so mechanically basic that even us chimps can bash them together with duct tape and a borrowed set of rusty spanners.
And so with minds set and after a few false starts with dodgy Ebay sellers we found a pair we could just about afford; In London, crap.
No bother though in a jiffy flights where booked and socks were packed and off we headed to the capital.
Now you would think that being from Ayr, getting a morning flight from Glasgow Airport (about 40 miles away) would be a simple task, but you underestimate our natural ability to fuck things up. Our 9am morning flight involved us leaving Ayr at 11pm the night before on the last train to Paisley, narrowly avoiding the union pub crawl we promised to be on. All because we are utterly incompetent. This meant arriving in Paisley with all our bulky bike and camping gear 10 hours before our flight just as all the pubs where closing. This meant no pint, no heat and drunks on the street, damn.
After deciding we didn't fancy spending the rest of our lives wandering aimlessly round an airport WHSmith, we set of in the wrong direction in the vain hope of a pub. Nae such luck though and after a lovely wee donner round derelict old churches and depressing looking Uni campuses we stumbled through eerie industrial estates with- and I swear to god we weren't hallucinating- faint and creepy carnival music playing. At this point we decided to back away from the fairies midnight carnival and actually go to the airport, this soon found us in a massive, pitch black field. About then we had the great idea to ignore Google`s suggested route to the airport in favor of this totally legitimate looking short cut under the motorway.
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| See? There's totally a road there |
This it turns out really wasn't a short cut at all, in fact it wasn't really a route at all. Where you would expect there to be a lovely underpass through the motorway there was it turns out nothing but an overgrown garden and a big fence, blast.
Not ones to give up and admit that my stellar sense of direction had failed me we elected to once again say f*ck it and scaled the fence with all our bike and camping gear, and so we found ourselves on the busiest stretch of the M8; by far the largest motorway in Scotland.
Having skipped across the motorway unscathed we now faced another dilemma, how do we get into the actual airport? You see by making our own entrance we had found ourselves in a completely barred to the public, secure compound; complete with cargo and views of refueling planes.
This was not the best situation to have found ourselves in, here we are in a restricted area of an international airport,with black helmets, huge bulging rucksacks and twigs in our hair.
This was not the best situation to have found ourselves in, here we are in a restricted area of an international airport,with black helmets, huge bulging rucksacks and twigs in our hair.
Having donned our best lost, confused tourist expressions we then simply strolled past the bemused airport workers and into the terminal itself, and ordered a celebratory cup of tea and packet of popcorn. Before passing the night in a haze of oppressive heat watching a bootlegged copy of Free Willy.
Several long, hot hours later, after several delays and a missing member of the cabin crew we found ourselves under the overcast skies of Luton Airport. Having practically tackled a completely disinterested member of staff to get her attention and then being utterly confused by the answers to our questions we somehow stumbled onto a bus, and after paying more to travel 10 miles than our flights down had cost us we made it to the train station, where we celebrated with our style with a packet of Percy Pigs and a strawberry milkshake. Yet more money on a train later we where in Hertfordshire and George's house (our first seller). Here lay Percy, shiny and clean and mostly in one piece.
After the customary kicking of tyres the lovely George showed us how semi automatics work before taking us down to to Halfords to buy a set of L plates.
Now the adventures begin.
At this point I should probably mention that Ross had only had his CBT three months, and I have never ridden anything even remotely like a C90, especially not two up, with all our gear on the North Circular; on a bike that seemed determined to kill us. Being unused to a semi automatic I wheelied several times, not a great idea in bumper to bumper traffic, on a bike with several broken spokes on both wheels and rear wheel bearings that made the back wheel wobble like belly dancer being tasered. Despite all that and getting lost several times we made it from Hertfordshire to Canary Wharf as it was getting dark, to pick up our second 90.
This bike was the complete opposite of Percy and the lovely George, as the cherry red, intact bike from the Gumtree add never materialized, and instead out rolled Basil.
Basil has a lot of character, Basil also looks and sounds as if he has lived exposed at the bottom of a garden for the past 10 years; this is evident from the rusty chrome, faded plastics, ripped seat, missing indicators, loose brake pedal, wobbly center stand, broken speedo and faulty display unit, along with a whole host of other problems we were to discover on the road, but I did have one more mirror than Ross so overall a win!
We are the first to admit that we handled buying Basil terribly, we didn't get the address of the seller until hours after we arrived in London, we then arrived at a random street, stressed out of our minds after a careering round London getting lost, and dealing with more traffic than I had ever imagined could fit on a road. Then after listening to the seller moan about being late for a dinner simply popped 50m up the street to confirm the wheels moved, swiftly parted with way more cash than the bike was worth and watched the guy race away.
Basil has a lot of character, Basil also looks and sounds as if he has lived exposed at the bottom of a garden for the past 10 years; this is evident from the rusty chrome, faded plastics, ripped seat, missing indicators, loose brake pedal, wobbly center stand, broken speedo and faulty display unit, along with a whole host of other problems we were to discover on the road, but I did have one more mirror than Ross so overall a win!
We are the first to admit that we handled buying Basil terribly, we didn't get the address of the seller until hours after we arrived in London, we then arrived at a random street, stressed out of our minds after a careering round London getting lost, and dealing with more traffic than I had ever imagined could fit on a road. Then after listening to the seller moan about being late for a dinner simply popped 50m up the street to confirm the wheels moved, swiftly parted with way more cash than the bike was worth and watched the guy race away.
This fact quickly dawned on us 15 minutes later, as we sat in the dark, after a 20 hour day,and with a terrible, awful, basic tool kit from Tesco and a borrowed Haynes manual. We then set about getting our bikes ready for the long trip back to Scotland in a gloomy supermarket car park.
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| Ross learning how to tighten Basil's chain with our Tesco value tool kit |
Escaping London
The road home (From the joyful sunshine perspective of Ross)
Being a couple of country bumpkins, we were shocked when we left the safety of our car park after midnight to find the streets still absolutely hoaching, and I don't mean that there was the odd night bus and taxi, I'm talking about full on stop-start traffic for miles. This gentle, relaxing scene was to be the test yard for my very first go on the C90, with Heather's own hazing taking place on the North Circular a few long hours previous. Heather had the very faint advantage of having ridden an automatic moped before whereas I had only been riding a 125cc motorcycle for a few months. It's safe to say apertures were fully tight and eyes wired and bloodshot during our seemingly endless scamper through the intense, noisy streets.After confirming that we had not, in fact, gone round in circles several times, we finally staggered into the Travel Lodge that was hastily booked back in the comfort of the car park earlier. Stress rose from us like steam as we slumped onto the bed sheets, absolutely destroyed both mentally and physically yet still somehow giddy with the realization that a pair of C90s were sitting right outside!
Sleep passed in a blink and I awoke to find Heather gleefully shoving a sausage roll in my face, urging me to get going.
"Wha...Grgfl...?"
"Ross, we're still in London. We've got a long ride ahead of us."
Great, I thought. No wonder people in this city have nervous breakdowns.
We set out from the Lodge and joyfully kick-started the 90s into life, an action that we were to become very familiar with all too soon. Our grand exit lasted a total of about 200 feet as we realised there was an ironmongers across the road and we really could do with an actual socket set, some bungee cords and a Jerry can to top up the bikes petrol thimbles.
A god-damn hour or so later after much faffing about with trying to secure things to our noble steeds (with awful, horrible impractical bungee cords) we actually set off for real, more eager and grimly determined to escape the hellish travesty of the UK capital. After last night's extreme practise session, I was now used to the clunky way in which the bikes responded, the shudder of switching down a gear, the painful whine before moving from 2nd into 3rd. I was in love. It was at this point that I realised I had forgotten to pack my anti-depressant meds and was beginning to feel the start of the withdrawal symptoms. Shit.
The Long Night Home
The rest of that day passed in a blur of petrol stops and revving the arse out of the Hondas. Despite the long distance ahead of us, it was something of a relief to be out of the city and onto the large stretches of road where you can relax and not worry about the risk of decapitation-by-pizza-deliveryman. I honestly can't remember the route we took or the places we passed, as much of England morphs into one big sprawl when you're fed up and in need of your bed 500 miles North. | |
| Loose spokes marked by tape... |
Heather's C90 did not have a working speedometer, meaning she didn't know how fast she was going (often painfully slow, as being used to her big 650cc she had become unaccustomed to the painful whines all small bikes make when you push them past 30mph) and so at times was crawling along at a maddening 20mph.
As mentioned above the rear left indicator was missing which lead to a few near-misses as she suddenly swerved to take a left turn, forgetting that she had to hand signal.
Meanwhile, despite being remarkably much more cared for, my own bike had a few loose spokes (Read: pretty much all of them). I was wobbling all over the place, as if the axle was made of sponge. It would have been quite a funny if I wasn't fearing for my life.
In spite of this, we continued in a more-or-less efficient manner and got into a great wee groove until The Mighty Thud.
The Mighty Thud, for those wondering, occurred in Something-on-Trent (we can't remember exactly where except that it was incredibly English sounding). We had strapped a jerry can full of petrol to the back of Heather's bike, which managed to work its way loose and slam into the wheel causing the exhaust to, well, fall off.
By fall off I mean the downpipe had broken off, as it was heavily corroded. The entire exhaust was still holding on, thank god. And being a pair of dunderheids we didn't know exactly what had happened, only that the engine was making an alarming sound. We pulled into a nearby Burger King and eventually decided to phone the RAC.
One worried burger later, the man in the van showed up, laughed at us, showed us the exhaust and reassured us that it would make the trip home. Relieved yet annoyed at being knocked out of our rhythm, we set off once more into the night.
We continued for what seemed like eons before pulling into a "24-hour" Tesco somewhere north of Manchester around 4am, desperate for a pee, only to find it was shut. I slept in a trolley while Heather messed about with her chain, before attempting some shut eye herself on the cold unforgiving concrete. An hour or so of non-sleep later, we set off again as dawn began to creep through the landscape.
We lasted a total of about 80 minutes before pulling into a delightful wee B&B somewhere in Yorkshire, which was also shut. With Heather being so tired she nearly crashed her bike we decided to nap under a large sycamore, a much more welcome resting place than the Tesco car park.
Yorkshire is a beautiful place to ride through and despite feeling absolutely lethargic, I began to really enjoy myself.
The landscape eventually gave way to the popular Lake District, which was absolutely heaving with traffic. I found the juxtaposition of the peaceful scenery with the silent mountains and the chaotic roads with the shouting drivers to be grimly amusing. It was also rather unfriendly, as we were to find out. We stopped for a break in a pub called Twa Dogs Inn in Keswick and were met with cold glares and moody tones. We were eventually told to leave the premises after I nodded off on one of the seats, despite having paid for food. Fuck you too, friend.
Our sour experience with the locals over, we were more eager than ever to get out of England. At this point I was undergoing fairly hefty withdrawal pangs and some time was spent pondering whether we should stay the night or just go for it, the latter being our ultimately preferable choice.
We hurried out of the Lake District into the dark and passed through Carlisle without much incident, except for the moment when we nearly knocked over an insane cyclist who had elected to ride down a pitch black country road at two in morning with no lights and zero hi-viz clothing.
The Scottish Border appeared before us and we sighed with relief at signs pointing to Glasgow and Dumfries. Back in a land where Scottish banknotes were accepted and the term "roll 'n' sausage" was not met with befuddled stares, we happily, yet tiredly pushed into the night. There was still around 80 miles to make it back to Heather's flat in Ayr, and we somehow managed to make it in one piece without accidentally performing a wheelie into an oncoming lorry or plummeting into a ditch out of sleep deprivation. We had made it. Now for some actual sleep.
I eventually awoke the next day, hours after Heather had somehow dragged her self off to a morning lecture, to find two strange Hondas sitting outside the flat. Did we really just do that?
As mentioned above the rear left indicator was missing which lead to a few near-misses as she suddenly swerved to take a left turn, forgetting that she had to hand signal.
Meanwhile, despite being remarkably much more cared for, my own bike had a few loose spokes (Read: pretty much all of them). I was wobbling all over the place, as if the axle was made of sponge. It would have been quite a funny if I wasn't fearing for my life.
In spite of this, we continued in a more-or-less efficient manner and got into a great wee groove until The Mighty Thud.
The Mighty Thud, for those wondering, occurred in Something-on-Trent (we can't remember exactly where except that it was incredibly English sounding). We had strapped a jerry can full of petrol to the back of Heather's bike, which managed to work its way loose and slam into the wheel causing the exhaust to, well, fall off.
By fall off I mean the downpipe had broken off, as it was heavily corroded. The entire exhaust was still holding on, thank god. And being a pair of dunderheids we didn't know exactly what had happened, only that the engine was making an alarming sound. We pulled into a nearby Burger King and eventually decided to phone the RAC.
One worried burger later, the man in the van showed up, laughed at us, showed us the exhaust and reassured us that it would make the trip home. Relieved yet annoyed at being knocked out of our rhythm, we set off once more into the night.
A walk through of Basils many issues (vid)
We continued for what seemed like eons before pulling into a "24-hour" Tesco somewhere north of Manchester around 4am, desperate for a pee, only to find it was shut. I slept in a trolley while Heather messed about with her chain, before attempting some shut eye herself on the cold unforgiving concrete. An hour or so of non-sleep later, we set off again as dawn began to creep through the landscape.
We lasted a total of about 80 minutes before pulling into a delightful wee B&B somewhere in Yorkshire, which was also shut. With Heather being so tired she nearly crashed her bike we decided to nap under a large sycamore, a much more welcome resting place than the Tesco car park.
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| She had not |
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| I've had worse beds |
Yorkshire is a beautiful place to ride through and despite feeling absolutely lethargic, I began to really enjoy myself.
The landscape eventually gave way to the popular Lake District, which was absolutely heaving with traffic. I found the juxtaposition of the peaceful scenery with the silent mountains and the chaotic roads with the shouting drivers to be grimly amusing. It was also rather unfriendly, as we were to find out. We stopped for a break in a pub called Twa Dogs Inn in Keswick and were met with cold glares and moody tones. We were eventually told to leave the premises after I nodded off on one of the seats, despite having paid for food. Fuck you too, friend.
Our sour experience with the locals over, we were more eager than ever to get out of England. At this point I was undergoing fairly hefty withdrawal pangs and some time was spent pondering whether we should stay the night or just go for it, the latter being our ultimately preferable choice.
We hurried out of the Lake District into the dark and passed through Carlisle without much incident, except for the moment when we nearly knocked over an insane cyclist who had elected to ride down a pitch black country road at two in morning with no lights and zero hi-viz clothing.
The Scottish Border appeared before us and we sighed with relief at signs pointing to Glasgow and Dumfries. Back in a land where Scottish banknotes were accepted and the term "roll 'n' sausage" was not met with befuddled stares, we happily, yet tiredly pushed into the night. There was still around 80 miles to make it back to Heather's flat in Ayr, and we somehow managed to make it in one piece without accidentally performing a wheelie into an oncoming lorry or plummeting into a ditch out of sleep deprivation. We had made it. Now for some actual sleep.
I eventually awoke the next day, hours after Heather had somehow dragged her self off to a morning lecture, to find two strange Hondas sitting outside the flat. Did we really just do that?
