Tango

True, Pete. I'd only been abroad once by the time I was 22. It was only when I was in my 30's that I really started travelling a lot more and probably only in the last 10 years that I actually gave living abroad any thought at all!

I wish I still had my Speed Triple, but there was no way that I could get it registered here, so I had to sell it. TBH it probably wouldn't have liked the hot weather and would likely have got me into trouble with the gendarmes! Have any of you parted with a bike for any reason that you wished you hadn't?

I had a colleague at my last job who still lives in the house he was born in Finchley, he's 65 now. I once asked him if he'd ever move and he said probably not. I'm guessing that his house is worth a small fortune now!

From the stats here, it looks like unvaccinated are around 10 times more at risk of ending up in ICU than vaccinated. Likewise here, the number of deaths divided into vaccinated or not are not published.

When I did my apprenticeship and worked in the factory there were some real characters around, but where have they gone? I guess that some of the stuff we used to do or have done to us would get people sacked these days.

My third bike.......must have been around 1977.

I went there a number of years back with a Canadian colleague who stopped over in London for the weekend on his way to Germany. It's definitely very interesting, a good day out.

Shells on the beach at low tide.

Has there ever been a bike that's been offered to you or you've seen for sale that you regretted not buying? One of my mates had a Honda CBX1000 in the mid 1980's and, to save the temptation of riding it whilst he was on a ban, he entrusted it to me to look after for him. Anyway, after a while he needed some money and asked if I wanted to buy it off him. I was skint at the time, so I turned it down and he sold it to another mate for a song! I later wished that I had scraped the money together to buy it. Anyone else?

It's a shame that Covid-19 isn't weeding these fuckers out!

Depends on the rider. I had a couple of mates who I completely trusted and went pillion on their bikes many times quite happily. But then I had another mate who was nearly blind in one eye. He should have worn his glasses when riding, but he couldn't get them on with his lid on. So, his 3D vision was a bit impaired and, coupled with his failure to take into account the extra weight on the bike when taking a pillion, we ended up overshooting several junctions. How we didn't get killed I don't know, but I only went pillion with him the once!

True, I see a number of bigger bikes around, but a lot are GS' or Harleys, with plenty of small dirt bikes around too. The Honda is ok, but I'd like just a few more BHP. Tiger 800 would do me nicely!

I think that 17 years ago I was on a Triumph Trophy 900, which was a bit of a bus TBH. Quite different to the CB500X.

She'll never get ride of the Bonnie, but a smaller bike may get her rolling again. TBH, we went to Narbonne the other week with her driving the car, and, well, she got me put on the insurance so I could drive it! I'm not a good passenger at the best of times, but we had "words"!

I don't get out on the bike at weekends at the moment, my OH has lost her biking mojo at the moment. Plus it's a bit warm to get out, unless we go out early, but weekend mornings are for drinking coffee and eating bacon rolls, so that rules out early starts!

They're awesome articles, really interesting.

Another day, another shopping trip!

Tell the French that they have to do something and they'll oppose it, tell them that they can't have something and they'll fight in the streets to get it.

Interesting, as the official Covid app has stats on the vaccinations and says that 69.1% of the population over 12 years old are fully vaccinated. So, this chart is counting the entire population including kids. I think that the uptake of the vaccination amongst teenagers and 20-30 year olds is pretty poor, which is obviously affecting the figures too.

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1477583795925862&id=413253402358912

Yeah, the guy on the boat had white knuckles trying to push the throttles further forwards!

I once flew between Jersey and Guernsey on one of those TriLander planes one evening in the middle of winter. Those things were like flying in a 1960's cortina! The pilot got in and turned round and asked if everyone was OK. The windows steamed up within minutes of take-off and, because of a cross wind, we flew the distance sideways. We were only a couple of hundred feet above the waves too! An experience that I never wanted to repeat!

I've not been out today, because I had to wait in for a delivery.......which it turns out was supposedly delivered yesterday! So, that's a non-delivery claim going in! Anyway, I should be out on the bike tomorrow morning, hopefully.