curlylegend

Don't you carry waterproofs with you ? I know they're a pain in the arse but a fairly cheap set that you can put on quickly can save you getting soaked. I'm lucky enough to be able to more or less choose my weather but on a longer trip just having the added insurance of a set of waterproofs makes all the difference. When I lived in Scotland and rode every day my main concern was being able to keep dry, hence it was a waxed cotton Belstaff ensemble.

Who on earth are they ? A pop group ? Enlighten me, please ?

I like perseverance !

Just hit him on the head with a hammer. In the morning the result will be the same but your purse will be a lot happier. I speak from experience !

There's no such thing as a NICE bottle of whisky ! It's full of alcohol which is a poison. Get him a nice bottle of mineral water or a good coffee percolator....or both.

Or £4,280.00 Hard to believe any of these bean counting bast*rds !

£3,960.00

Yes, well, it is a bit of an underestimated art, isn't it ? Very useful in situations like dropping your moto....

What's wrong with swearing ? Didn't hold Sir William Connolly back much .....

It's very expensive and very difficult to obtain a licence to be allowed to drive a motorcycle. Similar with a car. Much more expensive and difficult to become licenced to drive a HGV. And flying an aero plane ? Indeed ! And nowadays it is virtually impossible to legally own a firearm. But for the price of a couple of gin and tonics and a line of white powder you're perfectly free to create a serial killing monster. No licence required. Early maintenance is courtesy of the State....

I wonder how many people would vote for a tightening of discipline in schools ? For example bringing back corporal punishment ? Probably loads, but they would all say " But you'll not belt my kid !"

Riding in the rain is just pure shite ! Move to a different country....

They're not bird brains for nothing.....

And how about sheer idiocy, which has no age limits at all ?

At least these people aren't as bad as the scoundrels that used to prey on people on the Scotch Riviera during the Glasgow Fair when Maw, Paw and the weans went Doon the Watter for their annual holiday. These guys used to hang about the promenades clicking cameras at people and persuading them to part with a token deposit of usually half a crown. Then they gave out a card with the address where the photos could be collected from in a couple of days. Which was completely bogus !

Watch out for the photographers on the bends near the top. They have a signboard so you can contact their website, put in the date and approximate time and you'll find yourself featured. Not very expensive, paper photos and/or digital download.

There's a tree near Hadrian's wall that's recently been chopped down. Seems a shame not to get some use out of it ?

I love my Sat Nav ! But by god they can be a pain in the arse sometimes ? But maybe not as bad as standing at a cross roads in the pouring rain with a hurricane blowing, trying to stop a paper map turning itself into either confetti or paper mache.

Talking about Garmin, has anybody had the frustrating experience of trying to update a set of maps from garmin and being told it will take about 10 hours to download ? Have any TomTom users had experiences like this ?

The fact that they've arrested an adult as well seems to indicate more than mindless vandalism. But it was only a tree after all. Plant two more !

In the earlies Eighties a chap called Peter Sellars (no kidding !) was a customer of ours. He had previously been a designer for BMW in Munich and had worked on the design of the E30 3-Series. He had also designed a Modular Motor Cycle Helmet that was just about to go into production in Italy I believe. He was living in the South of Scotland at the time and was riding in to our workshop when he was stopped by a couple of Strathclyde's Finest. A particularly anal one was admiring the helmet he was wearing which was actually the prototype of the one going into production but which hadn't been subjected to UK testing. Hence no BSI kite mark ! He was fined £50.00 at Ayr Sheriff Court. Less than two years later all Strathclyde motorcycle cops were wearing the identical helmet !

I'm one of these awkward characters who just can't get comfortable in a full face helmet. It's not for the want of trying. Over the years I've tried helmets from the cheap and cheerful to the ridiculously expensive. But I've always felt much more comfortable in an open face helmet especially with a short peak to cut out the sun shining in my eyes. Of course, in those days I wore a variety of goggles which were pretty effective. However as I got older my eyesight deteriorated enough to make spec wearing advisable. Now I never got into prescription lensed goggles....I wasn't that rich ! So I got my first full face helmet and it was a revelation being able to wear specs and even hook up speakers to listen to music. But eventually the limited side vision and in those days the crap quality visors put me off. I eventually got a Cromwell Jet open face helmet with five studs which allowed me to fit a single curvature face screen with a short peak sun visor above. This was almost perfect, I could wear my specs and because it was so open there was little problems with misting. I was using a BMW R100 RT at the time with a very effective windshield but on any other bikes the wind noise around the Cromwell was pretty awful. After a gap in my motorcycling for over fifteen years I got back into it and this time I bought an open face helmet with a flip up face shield. These were just coming onto the market in the late Eighties and modular helmets weren't even legal in the UK at that time. But I can't find any way to attach a peak to it ! Sure it's got a flip down darkened screen but that doesn't really do what I want. Try this...... put your helmet on and look down the road in strong sunlight and note what you're seeing. Now just shade your eyes with your hand to simulate a visor and notice just how much better your vision is. With a darkened screen all your doing is reducing ALL light reaching your eyes and you loose a lot of contrast. So what this long ramble is leading up to is, does anyone out there know of a solution to my problem ? Funny answers are acceptable, I do have a sense of humour... P.S. I now live in France, not wet and gloomy Scotland and sunshine is a force to be reckoned with here.

In France, motos are exempt....so far.... from Controle Technique ( MOT) The reasoning I've heard, not official I'm sure, is that Motards look after their machines because if they mess up and neglect them they could end up paying with their lives. Which is a kind of harsh way of getting ignorant sods off the road. But I'm sure it's only a matter of time before France falls into line with most of Europe. Damn, there's money to be made here ! And pardon my ignorance, but what model is that you've got ?

Maybe a bit off topic, but is it true that in Germany a conviction for speeding will only be successful if the automatic camera has recorded an image of the driver ? So I can't figure out how they can prosecute motorcyclists? Helmets and no front number plates ? Maybe they just shoot you ?

Twelve years now and quite settled. I was actually planning a trip to Africa via Spain this year but the bloody plague put a stop to that ! Damn ! You've got your carte de sejours sorted? Not yet. Before this Brexit thing, we were told because we had passeports which clearly stated we were citizens of the European Community we didn't need Cartes de Residence or carte de sejour, particularly as we are retired. But now we've to get some sort of modified carte de residence. Which was fine until the powers that be decided to close the departement until Octobre ! What can you say about French Bureaucracy ? They invented it ! Are you well emplaced in Spain ? You're not one of those crime lords waiting for the door to be kicked in at 3am, are you ? And how's your Spanish ?