Club Members Blog

It was some time ago that I took a magazine to club night and mooted that I was possibly going to run a trip to Birmingham to see "The Classic Bike Show’.

At the next club night, Graham Ingalls had kindly printed off the information for me (thank you Graham for the kind thought). Alec Jay and Graham queried “How are we going to get there?”

I said that I had thought of hiring a minibus and therefore started to look at prices. At this point Alec and Graham said they would come, as did Bernard and Diana, Laurie Richards, Barry Brockman and guest Colin Morgan, and also Brian Selwood (I was surprised that Brian did not settle for meeting us there and riding one of his two-strokes to Birmingham; after all, Brian, we only (!) did 280 miles in total!) Some say that instead of blood he has 2T oil in his veins!

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A Norman two-stroke was my first,
It was by no means classed the worst.
It smoked a bit and barely stopped –
But for me, it was the tops!

I changed the bike for an Ariel 350,
Not too bad and was quite nifty.
A Goldie Clubman followed next –
Was hard to start and left me vexed.

A Tiger 100 took its place
Was very fast and went a pace.
This was changed to a 100 for variation,
A little bit faster – but more vibration!

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I was thinking a while ago of a road trip as compensation for not doing the National Rally this year, and to occupy a week or so while Jane made her recent visit to Kenya. My most radical option was to take a route from Godalming including the Lizard, Land’s End, Dunnet Head, John O’Groats and Lowestoft before returning home – thereby reaching the most southerly, westerly, northerly and easterly points on the mainland.

However, the level of organisation and likely cost involved in this scheme got the better of me, and having decided that in any case this was a bit ambitious in a week and on my own, I started looking at some simpler alternatives (though I would still like to do it sometime). I settled quite happily for a trip to visit my friend John who had recently moved from Stirling area to Aldbar, near Brechin, between Dundee and Aberdeen. This was to be achieved in two days in each direction, using different routes where possible on the return journey and avoiding motorways at all times – to give a sense of travelling in those far-off pre-Mway days. After some hours of route planning there was a decision and with minor machine preparation all was ready.

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