Cam

Ooh, you beat me! I paid £370 for mine on the Sunday. Ah well.

Well, flew down from Glasgow at lunchtime, booked into hotel, then straight onto NEC. Good time wandering around on my own. (Three kids under ten — you understand) Ended up buying a Schuberth C3 Pro, which was on my 'someday' list, but the price was excellent. Also got some brackets from SW-Motech. Sat on loads of bikes. Honda Africa Twin and Indian Scout were my highlights. Watched Lee Bowers do some tricks, and saw Ricky Vida (YouTube Wildbad Touring dude) and posse wandering about. I have a full day at it tomorrow, but these cocktails I'm currently imbibing MAY cause a delayed start to tomorrow's proceedings. Awesome.

I'll be there on Monday too (and Sunday afternoon). If there's a meet up, count me in!

I had the Varadero. Simply superb. Very capable and, though on the pricier end of the scale, it holds its value very well. I got it as its one of the bigger 125s and I wanted to see if I could handle the size, given I wanted to move up to a big bike in the short term. I have a 45 mile commute each way and it handled it completely fine. When I moved up to a DL650, the proportions were very similar and was happy I'd made that choice. So, recommended!

I got a 125 after my CBT and rode that for 6 months while doing a DAS course in the last two of those months. I did about 2500 miles on it and loved it. Didn't pick up any (obvious) bad habits that weren't ironed out during training. I'd recommend it. Just, but a decent second hand 125 that you'll be able to shift for close to what you paid for it. Others will say go direct to big bike; that's a totally valid thing to do too.

Nope, clearly I missed the date on that one!

I could potentially be up for it depending on actual day. I'll watch this space!

Also Ride-On have a workshop. Been around since the seventies so must be doing something right.

Very cool review. Thanks!

Halfords (and elsewhere) stock anti–fog spray (in the motorcycle section) that seems to work very well. Try that?

Delboy's Garage (YouTube) just did a brake fluids change how to video. Loads of excellent tips in there.

Well said, Arwen. Couldn't agree more. I enjoyed going out on the xj6 but also really enjoyed getting back on my Varadero to get home. Always went the long way …

Did the mod 2 today and passed. Just a couple of minors, so pretty pleased. Great fun taking off the L-plates!

Add me to list of those of us that have just passed Mod 1. Did it yesterday and, though I was pretty nervous, all went fine. Actually, once I got going, everything flowed nicely and the nerves went away. Great buzz to get the handshake at the end! Mod 2 this coming Wednesday.

That feeling when you get held up in traffic and arrive for you lesson just as the instructor and fellow student pull away. Effit.

I ordered my custom earplugs from Ultimate Hearing at the last NEC show. I find they are the only effective plugs for the weird internal shape of my lugholes. I will be going this year as usual - but unsure of day/date. Cool, was looking at their website. Can I ask: how much were they, and were they ready to take away on the same day as the moulds were taken?

I'm looking for a pair of custom fit earplugs and maybe a pair of boots.

Anyone heading along? Tickets went on sale last week and I'm going either first Sunday & Monday, or the Monday & Tuesday.

Perhaps a bit better quality (and a touch pricier), have a look at Richa stuff. I have the Touareg Jacket and Trousers and they are excellent.

The conventional wisdom seems to be that, at some point, you're going to drop the bike. The question then becomes which bike do you want to drop as you get used to lugging all the weight around. I'd expect most folks would say buy the cheaper 125, get used to it, drop it as you do and get it out your system (!!), then move onto the bigger, heavier, harder to manoeuvre bike later on when you have some miles and experience under your belt. Having said all that, you may never drop it and you might be a natural and you might be fine going straight to the big bike.

Great stuff and nice bike (looking at 700gs pics/reviews/vids just now)!

Not so simple... Argyll & Bute: P1 to P7, then S1 to S6 Yeah, same thing. I was talking about which school year, not the name of the year. The question seemed more about the names of the schools … ?

Scotland: "primary school" is 1 to 7, "secondary school" is 8 to 13. Simples.

I have a Caberg Duke and its compatible with Caberg's Bluetooth system, so I assume it'll work with others, though I haven't tried yet. If you do try one, let us know how it goes.

Their latest update is messed up and they're going to make another update soon that fixes the problem, according to an email they sent out a couple of days ago.