On the Road Again!

What a turn out at this month's Meldrews Sunday at Jo's Café at Brookland in Kent. Sadly I had to go in the car. The V-Strom is Sorned* and on top of that I am still in the post hospital "no riding" period. This turnout was the best for a long time. * SORN - Statutory Off Road Notice. Vehicles with this registration shouldn't be used on public roads.

The idea was meet around 10, have breakfast and then take a ride around. Casually past the Biker Pics guy nearby.  The 10 bit worked. We sat talking until 1pm. Then went home!! In the end another 20+ miles on the clock. Now Vera has 388 since the mot. Only 2 less than the entire previous year.... Follow me on my trip ‘Jo-s’ at https://www.polarsteps.com/PaulDevall/20622173-jo-s?s=f596a882-77c3-45eb-80fc-4f7e61d90715

Confident that Suzi would start I got my gear together and pulled her out of the garage. The first outing of the year was about 3 miles to the petrol station the other day. At the moment as soon as fuel is seen to be available dive in and buy it! Today for Meldrews' we decided to meet at the old regular meeting place at the Blue and White café at Smeeth on the A20. From there the destination was Winchelsea Beach Cafe. Cal led and as I am still running in the new engine I was restricting myself to 3500rpm. We meandered across the marsh and downs eventually popping out at Appledore, then through Rye. The bikers parking was about half full. We had breakfast. Quite a long wait but with all those caravans on sites it was to be expected that it would be full or approaching full.  Once finished we were off westwards. Me leading. I missed the right turn to Pett Village and we ended up almost in Hastings before turning back onto the A259. Through Rye where by now the bikers' par...

Not the intended or traditional Sunday, but a few of us went out for breakfast at the Blue & White Café. I took Vera instead of the Kettle. Not a bad ride up there and back across country. More miles in the clock!!!

After what has been a few weeks that could be described as "summer" the weather has turned into distinctly early spring weather. Low temperatures and rain.  The rain heavy at times and also with the odd hailstorm mixed in. The Greta supporters claim it's "global warming". The other side say "it is bollocks".  As I have no degrees in climatology I have no idea. Then again Greta also has no degree either. So today I wore the FT jacket over a t-shirt. A wool v-neck jumper went in the left pannier with a Triumph waterproof jacket and my Held overtrousers. It was another test day for my new Hood K7 jeans. They have been worn once before. They are quite tight and I am hoping they will "give" the more they are worn. Pepé started first push of the button. Not bad since it has only been used on the road once since November. That was last week when I had my MoT.  It was case of getting used to new tighter jeans. I guess inches have got smaller over the...

An early start. Definitely. I guessed that Pepé wouldn't start without an infusion of electricity. I was of course right. Without dbPower he is d e a d. Looks like  new battery in the new year. Maybe one of the Motobatt "big yellers" like I had on the GS a while back. Plenty of cranking amps. Anyway, the miles to empty gauge showed 1. By the time I got to the first meeting point it was up to 81. Remember this. The ride across the top of the Marsh was done slowly. There are so many leaves on the road. On the edges, and down the middle where they have been thrown by cars and trucks. It is very easy to come a cropper!  At the bottom of Knole Hill in Aldington I set the Yamaha My Ride app running, then headed to the meeting place.  To my surprise the app worked!  Only short but at least it worked. The phone was upright in my inside jacket pocket. I will reveal  the stats later.  It was slippery underfoot remember! From Hamstreet we (Iah J, Paul R and Cal) and m...

This coming Sunday is our monthly Meldrew's breakfast meeting.  The plan is to meet a little earlier than usual and head over to the Waterside Cafe near Hawkhurst for an arrival at about 1030am. As the weather has turned decidedly winter-like recently the run is weather dependent.  If it's too shitty we'll go the old HQ at the Blue and White Cafe in Mersham on the A20.. I plotted a route on MyRouteApp and it looks like a 59 minute ride across country.  The quickest route is to go along the coast to Rye and then turn northwards but we have a part-way meet in Hamstreet.  Putting a waypoint in actually knocks four miles off but also increases the time but only by a few minutes. I need to get the LS2 Bluetooth charged up and connected to TomTom.  I will also try and see it the "Yamaha My Ride" app will work this time on my phone.  I made the changes that their tech support suggested and have yet to try it out. Fingers crossed it's not pissing down or worse, fr...

So it's Meldrews Sunday again. Whether it is the time of year but there were only two of us out.  And we were separated. We decided on The 2-Stroke Cafe at Greatstone. It was closed.  I checked on FB and they had posted on Friday that it was closed for a leaking roof.  Cal headed off to another cafe and I went to another one as I didn't know where he was going.  I gave the Yamaha My Ride app a chance and it finally worked. Okay. A two mile ride in a virtual straight line shouldn't have taxed it.  After coffee at the "End of the Line" cafe at Dungeness Light Railway station I set off for home. I tried the app again.  After a longer ride I expected to see a full journey. No.  As it had done last time I tested it and it effed again. Packing up after less than a mile and a half.  I'll give it one more go...  Update 21/10/19 Posted a question on the play store and the developers replied and suggested making some changes to the phone setup and batt...

Today a short ride out to the  Blue & White Café  to meet Cal and Ian G from the Meldrews for breakfast.  Afterwards I had a short ride around Ashford and the back across country and home. I hadn't intended the Tour D'Ashford but I was in the wrong lane and a guy in an Audi stopped me changing. When I say stopped he almost ran into the back of the car in front to block me from slipping in front of him.....  Rather than give the wanker the opportunity to think he had won I went a different way. A warm day and hopefully the start of another attempt at summer.

Another Sunday and another Meldrews Sunday breakfast. This time we were meeting further north to give the more northerly members a shorter ride. So it was the turn of Gibson's Farm Shop.  It's only about twenty miles for me. The countryside through Sene Valley and Elham Valley is rolling downs dotted with sheep and vineyards on the south facing slopes  The downs here are chalk just like the famous Champagne hills to the south in France. Sadly the sun brings out all kinds of pests. The biggest is cyclistese lycracladious.  They can be found either individually or most commonly in large groups. And it is these that annoy everyone, whether in a car or riding a motorcycle. The arrogance level is through the roof. It's almost impossible to measure but it is evident as soon as you close on them. That aside. The weather was warm and sunny and with us now officially in Spring riding is so much better. Breakfast and chat over it was time to get back home. Almost the same route bac...

This Sunday is Meldrews' Sunday.  The current debate is where to meet this time. I expect by Sunday we'll be more concerned with the weather forecast.   That they have had snow in the north-east, some 350 miles north of us here in the south-east of England, that seems to have paralysed the newspapers and forecasters. The public just get on with life. " Beast from the East " they cry.  The winds are from the north though and incredibly that's where the Arctic is. So we might expect cold winds. So it looks as though we need to wrap up warmer, it is January after all, and then see what happens on Sunday.

This Sunday is Meldrews' Sunday.  The current debate is where to meet this time. I expect by Sunday we'll be more concerned with the weather forecast.   That they have had snow in the north-east, some 350 miles north of us in the south-east, seems to have paralysed the newspapers and forecasters. "Beast from the East" they cry.  The winds are from the north though and incredibly that's where the Arctic is. So we might expect cold winds. So it looks as though we need to wrap up warmer, it is January after all, and then see what happens on Sunday.

Another short run out to the Meldrews meeting at the Blue & White Cafe at Smeeth.  As expected after a lay off and the weather turning very autumnal (and wet) during the week,  Pepe refused to start once the dials had done their flicker to check there was a semblance of battery power left. Out came the dbPower unit and it was "boost-time".  I had charged it but since its last use it was only down to 98%! It took a few goes to get the big-boy running and I left him in the garage ticking over as I got my gear on.  It was a little chilly but once started he runs perfectly. In the end there were five of us there for an assortment of breakfast and bacon sandwiches.  I decided to ride a longer way home via New Romney to give the bike a few miles under the tyres.  Once outside the cafe of course it was boost-time and then we were off. Down the A20, then Bad Munstereffel Way and home via Brenzett and the wide open roads across the edge of the marsh.  ...

OMG! It's a month since I last got out on Pepé. So as expected with some damp days and nights the battery needed a jolt from the dbPower unit. It's a nice sunny morning so I got the Triumph Steve McQueen jacket out. It's definitely a three season jacket. I always remove the zip-in liners as they tend to be sweat inducing quilted nylon. Another reason is that despite the body being XXL, the arms are still S or even M. Narrow tubes that my old man's arms find a tight fit. If you are a gym bunny and have muscles that bulge like The Rock, then look elsewhere. The jacket has metal zips and snap fasteners. I do love that. It's short enough not to touch the tank with the bottom snapper. It also has two zippered vents along the collar bone and a huge zipped vent across the shoulders. Not that they were needed today. There are plenty of pockets. Two snap fastened ones on the chest, left and right, a zippered pocket on the left chest to. Two lower pockets, both zipped.  Th...

With Assen cancelled  it's off to the Blue and White for breakfast with the other members of The Meldrews.   Maybe a little ride around to get the glaze off the rear tyre?

Yep today. A milder weekend than of late with minus temperatures overnight being burned off by the early sun. One again Pepé needed to be boosted by dbpower unit! I chose a more roundabout way to the meet as I wanted to avoid the smaller country lanes that may still be slippy and debris strewn after many days of rain and the occasional snow storm. Breakfasts and chat were good as usual. Only four of us as others working or at the London Bike Show. Then time to ride back home. This time on the back roads.  Most of them dried up a bit but a lot in the shade still a bit slippery and the potholes! Big enough to take out a tyre. Luckily didn't hit one. So another forty miles completed. Today, I wore my old Belstaff Hypora gloves. Still waterproof and warm in low temperatures.  No frost bitten fingers today.

The weather has been quite wintery of late. That's to be expected as we are more than a fortnight into February. So after an afternoon walking the dog down by the sea in bright sunshine I booted the bike. It needed the dbpower unit to get it started. I togged up and set off. Just a 25 mile run along the coast towards the sun thst seemed to set a bit too quickly and then it was freezing. Body okay buy my fingertips were frozen.  Nice to get out though.  Tomorrow is Meldrews' Sunday.

Then it must be Meldrews' Sunday. Usually we meet at the Blue & White Café at Smeeth on the A20.  We have been meeting there practically since it re-opened with Superbike racer Leon Camier's mum at the helm. But it is getting busier and busier on a Sunday morning, not with bikers, who seem to have started to to back to the Airport Cafe, but with "normals" and their kids. Biker life has always been a little adult and we aren't the axe chucking mob, just blokes of an age that like to have a breakfast and chew the fat in an adult way without feeling that some bullethead might be offended on behalf of his kids or his delicate wife.  It's not that we use the f-word all that often, but like any group, we have people that are drawn together for their love of bike and biking from across the spectrum. We have all shades of political views but it rarely comes up as a subject. So this Sunday we tried the County Members pub in Lympne Village.  Lympne has a claim to fa...

Another shortish ride out today. It was Meldrews Sunday and also father's day so we had a reduced turnout. Still there were four of us in a pretty deserted Blue and White café. After a chat about their trips last weekend we went our own ways.  I headed back home via a loop across the downs on some roads that seemed new to me. Following signposts I must have ridden further than expected.  With temperatures hovering about 28°C it was great to be wearing my Joe Rocket vented mesh jacket. Stopped however. It was far too hot in Kevlar lined combats. Still nice to be out and about on the bike. My next outing might very well be a ride to work day on Tuesday. Why Tuesday? It's the only day my boss won't be there!!!

The last two weekends were crossed off as potential bike runs out as we were on holiday in France and in the car. With such a log gap between rides I begin to feel guilty. Since I stopped commuting on two wheels I haven't even become a regular and fair weather rider. So when I saw on facebook that some Meldrews were having a breakfast run to thr Blue and White I decided to go.  Otherwise I was going for an aimless ride across the marsh. Yesterday I found a bottle of cleaner in the garage I had forgotten I had. The petrol/gas tank was a little dirty. A few squirts of this magic no water needed elixir and a rub over with a microfibre cloth and it was super shiny. So I hauled Pepé out of the garage and headed to the café. Egg sandwich for me. After an hour of chat we went our separate ways. Mine was to Tesco to fill up after the ride to Wimbledon a month ago! Tesco to Tesco was 160.2 miles. I was dreading filling the tank but was surprised at at an average cruising speed of 75mph (cou...