InvictaMoto's On The Road Again!

I am torn.  I can only go to one event over the weekend.  Either Suzuki Day at the Ace Cafe in West London on Sunday. or Oldham Athletic away at Southend United on Saturday.... Which will it be, With all the best will in the world I'd love to go to the Ace Cafe on the Kettle.  But I really like the trip to Southend on the V-Strom for football. Coin toss up?

Amazing. The weather forecast for today was ... Accurate!! Truly. (See earlier post.) Our meeting for the Fifth Sunday was to be the Cliff Top Café at Capel le Ferne, between Folkestone and Dover.  The café is under new management. They smile now when you are ordering. They are also dog friendly, something the previous owner wasn't.  The café is as its name suggests on the cliff top. Some 200 feet below is the railway line between Dover and Folkestone. And the English Channel of course. We had a coffee and bacon sandwich and a chat about things in general before setting off home. The sunshine started to waver. My route back was into Folkestone down the A20. It seems that the 40mph limit is only advisable if you own an Audi A3.... After being tailgated down the hill I decided to come down to the harbour and out along the coast. The sun came out again. Today was "Kate Bush Day" on the harbour arm and there were loads of women of a certain age in red dresses all ...

Today the weather did the opposite to the forecast. Instead of rain in the afternoon it has been ☀️! So rather than slog about on the bus, I went on the bike. I pulled the Kettle out and she started second press on the button. I am sure it would have been first if I had forgotten to depress the choke lever. The bike is lower than the V-Strom and I can get both feet flat on the ground.  Once on the move with the BT46 tyres it steers very quickly. The first time out I tended to oversteer a little until I got used to the balance and steer. So today it was like a dream. Just a short ride to Folkestone Invicta for the football.  After the last longer ride to Gibson's Farm Shop, today was very short.  I decided to put some fuel in to see what mpg I was getting especially after the "spirited" ride the other day. An amazing 38.2mpg..... Maybe as it frees up....

Since the Meldrews' was started way back in 2014 when most of the membership had graduated to other makes of motorcycle from Suzuki, we have traditionally met on the 3rd Sunday of the month at a set venue. The venue changed over the years and once COVID came the toll it took meant that we struggled to get more than two or three turning up. Some have even given up biking. A few of the original members have moved away from the area. We also have some members that have never been to a Sunday but who have some to events and rides-out we have organised in the UK and across the Channel in France and Belgium. Indeed we have a weekend planned for Ypres on 22nd-24th September this year. The hotel in the city centre already booked.  In fact we have three rooms booked with booking.com and so far only four going for seven beds! More on this later I expect. So, in addition to the 3rd Sunday we started to have another special run day on the 5th Sunday. It doesn't happen all that often and we...

  A pre-season friendly for the  Sid Burvill Trophy. Played between two neighbouring clubs for many years. With Claire being out in the car it's going to be down to the weather. I would normally ride the ride and park up outside the ground, but with the V-Strom off the road I am left with the Kettle. And the forecast isn't good... So I could use my free bus pass and see what that brings!  Scary! The home ground is about 4 miles from home and one bus takes 39 minutes with a longish walk and the two-bus journey takes 55 minutes but lands me right outside the ground.... It's going to be weather dependent!

The Motorcycle Action Group (MAG) has launched a survey to gather  opinion on motorcycle parking charges.  Many local authorities are  looking to introduce charging for motorcycle parking bays despite the  provision being sub-standard.  MAG is searching for the best possible  outcome for riders. Free motorcycle parking has traditionally been the norm in the UK.  Recently there have been increasing numbers of local authorities making  moves to introduce motorcycle parking charges.  These plans often propose entirely disproportionate and unreasonable charges and meet  great resistance from riders. MAG argues that increasing attempts to disincentives'  car use in  congested city centres is being applied illogically to motorcycle  parking.  Motorcycles help reduce congestion and emissions and should be encouraged. The fact remains, however, that motorcycle parking options are  sub-standard and rarely provide for the...

What's wrong? A couple of issues that we'd like them to look at: Hinge bolt missing from the habitation door. The centre piece of the awning extra rafter fell out when we can to use it! The driver's door window blind has a broken tab. Plus of course, we need to have the damage to the back bumper looked at.  One side was my fault. Despite the reversing camera I managed to bump into a hedge on the left rear.  Crack!  And the bumper was cracked. And the other side. When we came to look at the back to the van in France, we noticed that the bumper, previously repaired, had been hit again. This time not by me! The bumper was marked with black paint or rubber as was the corner seam above it for about 6 inches! Of course, whoever had driven off. So tomorrow it's booked into JC Leisure to look and hopefully fix the warranty problems, and they seem mintor (!) and look at the bumpers. Repair or replace?

On my ride yesterday one of these came loose and when I touched the badge in the garage it made a leap to freedom!   Of course.  No mater how much stuff I pulled out. Could I find the little bugger!  Of course not.  As they are rusty and it is necessary to ensure that the bike is better than when it came out of the factory in 1976, I have to source new ones. One pain of being excommunicated from the Sect. Having my GT750 badge ceremoniously removed. So I located the part number on Robinson's Suzuki Parts list. They are still available.  Only £4.32 each. I managed to find a seller on eBay that had then at only (!) £3.19 each! Wow. Do I feel better now knowing that every eye will check the bike over and see the new bolts!  :)

With Vera Strom off the road due to the MoT running out and Suzi Triplo having a flat battery and also too much alloy to keep polished, they haven't been out for a while. So today Suzi went out for a short ride after a few days with the battery on charge. So my final odometer readings are: These will get updated on the Kilometerfresser website later tonight. With rain 🌧️ forecast for the next few days the chances of getting out is remote. The next competition starts next Tuesday.  Go Suzi. Go Vera!

Today I discovered that the V-Strom MoT ran out yesterday.  I had forgotten about it until I saw a "memory" come up on Facebook when I was there "today" last year. I quickly checked and it ran out at midnight last night. I called the shop that usually does it for me and they are swamped with jobs and can't do it until August 2nd.  That effectively means that Vera is laid up now for a week as it is illegal to ride without a test certificate. Darnit.  I had been thinking of a short eide to Folkestone on Saturday for the Invicta versus Hythe Town pre-season friendly football (soccer to my US chums) game. So that's not going to happen,

After almost a week on the battery charger, on and off not continuously, I decided as it was actually dry today, to pop it back in and press the "go" button. Immediate success. It took four stabs of the button with the choke down and she burbled into life. It's 39 years since I brought her home from the Suzuki dealers in Hanwell, West London. That burble and the odd pop and rattle is music to my ears. I got togged up and set off for a short ride around. By the time I'd got on the main rode I had to switch the tap to "RES". The tank took £20 or 13.9 litres to fill to the top.  Then I was off, Folkestone, Hawkinge then down to Gibson's Farm Shop at Wingham. Letting her run in a sweet spot around 50mph on the speedometer. On the short bit of the M20 I did run her up to 70. Smoothly in top gear just opening the throttle gently. She had a rest whilst I was inside buying cherries 🍒. These are from their own orchard and £2.99 a punnet a...

I had set our sights on a longer trip next year once the Arsenal had secured victory in the (English) Premier League and my final game as a season ticket holder is on May 4th 2024. To make it worthwhile it needs to be three weeks or so. Those sights were influenced by some Youtubers and bloggers I follow on er.. Youtube and the WWW. One of those led me to look at the  Grand Tour of Switzerland . Although  I do like to be beside the seaside ... I love the mountains almost as much. Over the years we have ticked off quite a few of the passes in the Alps on my motorcycles, but never in the car and certainly not in the motorhome. I had even started to plan a route down there using non-toll motorways to the Swiss border near Basel, and then non motorway routes once across the border. The first part of the route would be through France, Belgium, Luxembourg and then Germany. No tolls but free to use motorways. And then it all came crashing down . Many of the passes I was hoping to go ...

Six days to go until the end of the 2023 competition.  With so few miles under both bikes wheels this year,  I expect that if I have remained in the top 100 there will have been a miracle.   Since buying the motorhome last year many of my weekends have been taken up with family stuff, football and going away in the Moho. As a result I am doing less and less riding of either of the bikes.  I feel guilty. I love riding my bikes and since I retired I thought that I'd actually be riding more not less! It's got to the point that after spending a decent amount of money getting the Kettle back up and running, that it hasn't been used at all this year! I don't want to see it rotting away in the garage again!  Claire wants to sell it.  Who to?  It's not a finished project and I have owned it for 39 years!  It's part of me. The guilt just builds and builds. Whilst the moho is in storage we aren't using it. it's school holidays and we don't like campsit...

The Motorcycle Action Group (MAG) is continuing its successful series of  Fight Motorcycle Theft meetings.  Having confirmed attendance by Kate  Green, Deputy Mayor of Greater Manchester, MAG announces the next in the  series of meetings will be held on Thursday 21st September. The Greater Manchester Police (GMP) area consistently sees one of the  worst performances for motorcycle theft in the UK.  In 2022 Police  National Computer (PNC) data showed 1180 motorcycle thefts.  This is  known to be below the actual reported motorcycle theft figures, and  demonstrates a 10% increase compared to the previous year.  The GMP area  recorded the fourth highest number of motorcycle thefts of all police  force areas. The Fight Motorcycle Theft meeting will follow the same format as  previous meetings covering Kent, West Midlands and Hertfordshire police.    The Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime, along with a senior of...

You can never be without a RidgeMonkey when camping. We already have two of the flatter fry-pans but when Claire saw this pan style one on a vlog she had to have one.  And here it is. It can be used as a pan, and it can also be used as a frying pan. Good value for money. Works really well.

As I mentioned a couple of days ago, I have been thinking about where to go once we are across the Channel on the timetable amended P&O Ferry. I had been hoping we would have been changed to go on the new ferry on the Dover-Calais-Dover route. called Pioneer. Then today another email. This one saying we are still on the 1005am but the boat has changed from Pioneer to Spirit of France. Except I didn't know we were on Pioneer in the first place. Anyway.... One we bump into France at the Port of Calais it will be around noon before we disembark. First stop Picard at Coquelles to stock up on  dogador  for Reggie. We have a bigger freezer now and maybe we can get enough to last him the entire fortnight. He has around 160g of meat with every meal and this means that for every 500g pack there are just over 3 meals to the pack. We are away 15 days or 30 meals away. Or (9.6!) 10 packs! Even though  dogador  is listed on the Picard website, it seems very few stores sell it...

Okay, the bike hasn't been used much this year. Other commitments and of course, weather.  So it was still has a little surprise when even with the power pack (that can start a 2 litre diesel car!) there was nothing but a click. As I no longer have a battery charger I was a little stuck. The battery is a Motobatt and usually it's very good at keeping the charge levels up.  First stop was to pop into Halford's and Argos online to see that they have. I don't have any power in the garage and so I had to opt for one that I can use in the house. I opted for a 4amp charger and picked it up for £22.  It's cheap but seems to have decent reviews though. Once the battery was out of the bike I had it set up on the table in the conservatory.  I had expected, according to the instructions, that the needle would be way over the right and as the battery charges it would swing to the left. It started off in the middle. It's been on now for only about and hour as has moved sligh...

Although my brother racks up the miles on his BMW with super long tours around Europe with his mate Patrick tagging along behind - a sort of motorcycling Don Quixote and Sancho Panza - we have been getting away for a MotoGP trip every few years since about 2011.  The last time was in 2022 when we went to Aragon.  Neill and Patrick! I let him lead, does that mean I become Sancho too? On the Vimy trip we were joined by Phil Hingert, another ex-SOC committee member and also a BMW rider.  So we are looking at a trip to the Netherlands for the Assen MotoGP.  The Three Amigos! Neill, Phil and me! More once we have secured the tickets in November sometime!

Signed up for this to give me a year's warranty after having Vera Vstrom serviced in May.  I missed the message from Simon at Robinson's on Monday. There was no missed call or message reminder. He called today and said he'd left a message. All sorted. Something free!!!

Best laid plans of Mice and men etc... I booked the crossing on P&O for after 11am so that we didn't need to get up at the crack of dawn to get the last packing (fridge etc) before the short drive to Dover Eastern Docks. So I was a little miffed today to get an email telling me that due to  operational reasons  the sailing time has been shifted to 10.05am. Over an hour earlier than booked.  Bummocks , as someone that might read this would say! It does mean of course when we eventually bump into France at the Port of Calais we will be over an hour earlier there as well. All being good. Of course our first stop, as it has been on the last three trips across in 2022/23, will be at Picard to get Reggie some dog food - Dogador. As we have a larger freezer in the 175 we need maybe to buy a little more than usual so that we don't run out. he really doesn't get on with tinned stuff.... We should be into the low season again once in September and so the ACSI card will come in ...

Well, that lockdown fad didn't last all that long.  The IS-10 was my father in laws and was used pretty unsuccessfully to take photos on my wedding day - October 7th 2000. As it was inside the church the lighting was pretty poor and it was raining and dull outside.  Still. It was all we had to hand as we couldn't really afford a professional! So for my lockdown project I managed to find some film online. With the digital revolution film has become very expensive and processing has kept pace!  I have a few places I can use. Once lockdown three was over I fell back into the "why bother with the hassle" mode and reverted back to use using on eof the many digital cameras I have to hand. Maybe it's time to finish off the film I have in the Olympus and then remove the batteries and consign it to the loft... The OM10 lockdown project is pretty much the same as above.  When you are used to the full auto exposure of the digital cameras, then the manual focussing and exposu...

The National League season 2023/24 kicks off on Saturday 5th August.    Oldham Athletic have been drawn against Southend United at Roots Hall in Essex. Unfortunately, it will need a miracle to play the game. Southend are in the same position that Oldham were for years until they were bought by Frank Rothwell and his family. https://theathletic.com/3459807/2022/07/30/oldham-takeover-frank-rothwell/ They have failed to pay their staff including the players and reports are that they have not played any of the pre-season friendlies and that they may even be unable to fulfill their fixtures in future. So it looks doubtful the game will go ahead.  I am certainly not paying for a ticket unless they can guarantee the game will go ahead. https://www.echo-news.co.uk/sport/23631040.southend-united-players-halt-pre-season-training/ https://www.southendunited.co.uk/news/2023/june/club-update/#:~:text=On%20the%2017th%20May,Court%20to%20unfreeze%20the%20account. So it l...

It's been quite a while since the Meldrews' had a trip away, just a weekend across in France or Belgium.   We (The Royal We?) used to go to the Bikers Loft. I only actually went the once as it seemed to clash with other commitments. That was on the Rocket and back in 2015!  The others in our informal group that we call the Meldrews' have been more often. You can read about my trip to the Loft here . So when one of the members suggested we have another look at a weekend away I didn't get to involved as the first two weeks in September I am away with Claire and the dog in France in the motorhome. I gave some dates when I am not away or at football.  The weekend 22nd to 24th September popped out at me.  It's the North London Derby at the Emirates, but we have already agreed that it will be one of Phil's games so I am free. I like the idea of being well away as I would want to watch and I prefer to wait until I know the score. Yes. Live football sometimes sucks! Ov...

I was having a problem with these posts as Blogger kept saying the "inbox" was full despite not having any clue where the inbox for the blog might be and how to check! So I had to copy and paste from the other family level blog site. Awaycation Autumn 2023 - Where? With all the planning for the Awaycation in the Summer all sorted, It's just a matter of getting the van from storage and a little cleaning, then going on the trip. It seems that the sealant that Elddis use on the body is especially sticky and gets dirty really quickly. So, we need to give it the once over before we set off in about 11 days. By InvictaMoto - 27.05.2023 Awaycation Autumn 2023 - Where? After a fortnight in France and over 2000 miles done, we began to think that maybe when we go away in September we'd cover fewer miles next time. So it seems we will stay in France. Despite all the tales of woe in UK, France is no longer a cheap destination for holidays. Basic foods in supermarkets are higher i...

I bought the vinyl version of this back in late 1974.  My former brother in law, Alan, suggested it would be better than some of the stuff we were listening to at the time. I was already a fan of Santana and so it wasn't that great stretch of the mind to try something a little different. And it is different. I recently bought it again, this time on the more sterile media of  a CD. It sounds as good as it did then.   Would anyone believe it that this was recorded 50 years ago?

 Not all that secure when you check to see if it is on and this is what you see.

Disaster. After my volunteering on Thursday I brought Tyrone home. Claire brought Reggie out and we met on the driveway outside the door. All seemed perfect. Both dogs seemed okay. Sniffing. Tail wagging.  We had a walk along the canal together. Everything seemed perfect. Until we got home and into the back garden. Reggie, luckily still on a short lead, growled and lunged to bite Tyrone. He went mad. Really angry. Even in the house as we calmed a frightened Tyrone he kept at it... We decided to save Tyrone any further worry and took him back to the foster. It's disappointing but safer that Reggie stays in a one dog household and Tyrone is still looking for a new forever home. 

I know. Never buy anything advertised on Facebook especially when it is a "sponsored" link. Facebook will sell any old shite as long as they can pocket a handful of cash for the advert.... But I have been looking at recycling the Tassimo pods. It was the same when we had Dolce Gusto. Loads of plastic but our local recycling doesn't take either. So I saw these pods. Or rather pod. The body of it is quite large and depending on the cup size you want there are different tops with the bar codes that tell the Bosch machine how much water to heat and push through. I went for the largest size lid at 220ml.  The price was £14.99. A tad expensive but reusable for ever I guess. I opted to look at their website rather than the FB link. The package came quickly. The box includes the pod shell and the lid, plus a small spoon for the coffee. We have been using some Italian coffee ground for machines that friends gave us. To get a good cup that tastes strong as we like, it does need the...