28th July 2015
Written on the rolling waves.

Amid calls from a son for moral advice and plumbers arriving to investigate our failing boiler, I climbed into my armoured clothing and set off on the bike for this trip to France. Moving was so slow in Cambridge, first down Mill Road then along to Trumpington Street then finally onto the A10 where it started to lightly rain, then down to the M25 anti-clockwise interrupted by a call to fill up with petrol somewhere near ghastly Uxbridge, my willingness to risk reduced by my last experience of calling out the RAC on the side of the same orbital road because Bertha was always optimistic about petrol, then tailbacks finally leaving the orbit and heading off toward Portsmouth only to get stuck into another jam. I arrived in Portsmouth with only a stop to get fuel and a to much two bars of a triple Bounty bar standing next to the pump. Over three hours riding and tiring. Arriving here though, as usual, on a bike you get your own lane right to the front of hundreds of cars in line. One other man on a bike who was very nervous about parking up. The men here just tied our two bikes to the railing with some old rope, we both picked up something more substantial and did our own fixing, lingering anxiously, mind you I am glad now, two hours into the all night trip and there is some pitching and yawing I’m unaccustomed to in my trips to date. We sat and chatted while our cabins were cleaned. He learned to ride even more recently than I did, got the licence that limits riders to small bikes but ignored that and just bought a big bike anyway!

I’ve just returned to my swaying cabin from the restaurant (I didn’t fancy the cafe with its hoards of children) where I remembered that the French enjoy food unlike the Germans and I wondered if this could be the key to a successful holiday, weather permitting as always. Feeling rather over full not helped by the swaying opening and closing the door to my bathroom like a ghostly hand is moving it, bringing back pseudo memories of my childhood trips on the Harwich to Holland ferry where I was always sick. Always? Perhaps just once.

So tomorrow I head in a direction I approximately know. I have forgotten to write down which campsites I go to on each night. I have GPS coordinates of each but I don’t know which order I have booked them. Pitching and yawing.

Tomorrow I leave for my ninth motorcycle trip. I’m heading down to South(ish) west France, to the Dordogne, camping for the most part (apart from two nights at a friend’s house in La rochelle). Since my last trip to the Black Forrest, I have a new bike, new luggage, a new GPS (I bought it with the bike), new bluetooth headset and even new prescription sun glasses non polarising – so I can read the GPS screen. What could possibly go wrong? Well, the weather for one thing. I ought to publish the dates I go camping so that everyone else can make a point of staying at home. Its blustery and raining on and off today and some sailings from Portsmouth have been cancelled today due to bad weather.
This clever little map makes it all look so calm:

Still, supplies have been renewed, the bags are packed,

oil and fuel strapped on the back of one pannier, a litre of vodka on the other, trying to travel a bit lighter this time, so the huge Redverz tent is staying at home in the cupboard and my faithful Vango tent is coming along. A great hair cut (instead of last minute dental work) too.

Today I attempted the scenic route over to Ipswich to see my old friend Andrew Vass who is unwell. I am getting to know the bike but the Navigator V GPS is beyond me at the moment and I am thwarted in its use. For a start it does not talk nicely to my ageing bluetooth earphones (new ones on order), so a typical instruction is, ‘at the roundabout [loud hiss]’. Second, it clearly has a polarised screen because when I put my polarising prescription sunglasses on, the screen instantly turns blank. To see anything on it I have to tilt my head through at least 45 degrees. Finally I don’t understand how Basecamp routes turn into anything you are obliged to follow on the GPS. At junctions it shows you any number of optional turnings simultaneously and even a BMW GS can’t go in more than one direction at a time.

On the way back, I resorted to putting in the names of towns I remembered were on the route back and ended up with a beautiful sunny evening ride avoiding all main roads, absolutely ideal. The trip was 61 miles out and 59 coming back – strange.