I AM BACK AND AS HAPPY AS HAPPY CAN BE. READY TO SWEAR THAT I WILL ONLY TRAVEL ON MY BIKE IN THE FUTURE (that is until I remember that half my trips to France involve bringing my wine back in my large estate car!)
As promised, I have pics. It will come. While it is downloading, I can start telling you a bit...and will go to bed to recover and dream of my "adventure".
All I can do tonight is post the following text which I prepared for Carpe on my blackberry when I was on the ferry on Friday. I hope it is fun to read: [img]style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/rolleyes.gif[/img]
On Friday morning, I left home at 5.30; 90mn before initial schedule. Just couldn't wait and thought I would have more time to enjoy riding through Surrey, west sussex without using motorways.
Nice ride for a start. Then the rain. And more of it until I reach Pease Potage service station and decide to go in hiding. Shame I could not stop before to take a picture of my bike in front of a company named Lighthouse systems. This may have qualified for the Carpe TDM lighthouse project!
There, I drink a coffee and chat with people. I got plenty of time and am delighted to appreciate how kind people can be. They tell you about their bike. Others about how jealous they are and the well rehearsed reasons why they shouldn t have one (according to their mrs).
There is also the nice very white skin mother with her carrot face 16y old daughter on their way to visit grandma in Mansfield. They can't believe that I am a member of the infamous Mansfield pub "bleak house'. A membership given to me for £1 in 1999 to become alibi that this place is not prejudice against the French!
Although under the rain, I was happy when I arrived at Newhaven ferry terminal and found myseld in the middle of a crowd of motorheards; most going to Le Mans, some on bikes and others in non standard cages named sport cars. To be honest my TDM was the only bike worth mentioning (ok strike through the word "honest"). When it comes to cars you had a lotus 7 (catheram)2 ferraris, a Jag E type, a few lotus, Porsche etc ...quite a show. In a 4 h trip, I interrupted the boredom by pretending to need to access aspirin in my panier and was escorted to a tour of the deck!
A noticeable incident happened with a Ducati guy who saw is side stand break and the bike fall when they tight his back! Being an engineer, he gained access to the workshop and welded the thing back together :-) . His mates said that they had already lost a bike which broke down on the way to the ferry. It would not happen with a TDM (I touch wood as I write this).
