I started planning my summer’s motorcycle trip about a month ago – but now, even over the past 7 days, everything has changed and its not clear now how possible any travel will be by late July which is when I plan to leave. Initially I wanted to explore one of the TETs and decided on riding across the Netherlands to the start of the German TET. I read that much of it, strangely, is on sealed roads so it seemed like a good introduction, heading over to Poland where I have been intrigued to dip my toe. But I felt a little unenthusiastic about it and rethought. I started by asking myself what makes a good bike trip: this is what it is – its actually very clear.
1. good weather; it need not be hot and sunny but needs to be at least not raining

2. Nice places to stay, almost more than the actual riding. This is nice small campsites, tent only ideally, could be adult only which adds something civilised to the atmosphere. Need to check out Germany for these. I know they are to be found in France.    After one evening’s research Germany does not seem promising for these kinds of sites – like the ones I found and stayed at in France.

3. Some lovely small local roads to ride – need not be mountain passes. Getting there on motorways is fine and unavoidable. 
So having checked the weather across Germany, summer is quite a wet time of year and there is more rain in the South East down in Bavaria than in the north which is surprising so no clear steer here.
I am so glad I asked myself those three questions because I quickly, hastily maybe, decided to go to Spain and try to find and explore a small part of the TET there. I booked a crossing on Brittany Ferries last night (it was last night when I first wrote this) – not easy to line up the different sailing dates of the ferries as some some sailings appeared to be fully booked already and it is excruciatingly expensive. It looked like £680 but then I realised I had collapsed the trip down to only 6 nights away so I amended the booking back up to 11 nights in Spain. That shot the price up to an eye watering £788. I was feeling that I’d made a mistake but on reading just briefly some online discussion about TET Spain I am suddenly hugely excited. I’ve done the right thing to not go to northern Germany. I looked at one German campsite, recommended by a UK camping outfit but it was ghastly – I could see on Google Earth right next to a sewage plant and with terrible reviews – the owners spend all day smoking at the bar with the permanent residents. That, unfairly, put me off the whole country’s campsites. I have to say that I have never found a campsite in Germany as nice as those in France and possibly Spain. 
So – I need to do some heavy preparation for TET Spain – its good to have such a focus. One of the things I do will be to buy bifocal sunglasses to read my GPS! Why didn’t I think of it before? Another is recommended tyres.
Just downloaded an OSM for Garmin from here: http://garmin.openstreetmap.nl/

That was then, this is now. Brittany Ferries seems to have cancelled most if not all of its sailings and Spain is experiencing the worst Covid19 death rate in Europe apart from Italy. So it seems uncertain that it will be advisable to travel there by late July. If not I will probably, like many other people, decide to stay in the UK and try my new lightweight set up here.

I’m returning to London after a day at Motorcycle Live at the NEC Birmingham. Though I’ve turned up at the similar show in the Excel Centre in east London for quite a few years, this is the first time I’ve been to the larger event. These are always minor treats to look forward to in the winter months. I can imagine if it was held in July I probably would not bother to go. That said, for me the main pull is the chance to throw a leg across some new motorcycles, usually of bikes I would never buy like a Ducati Panigale, but this year some that I am in the market for, or rather will be next year. People do come away in droves from these events, with large carrier bags of gear bought at slight discount at the show, but I rarely do because the kind of equipment I decide I want (after painstaking research) is usually a little out of the mainstream to be hanging up in the racks of Infinity or other retailers – like the Klim Forecast rain gear which had to be imported from the Netherlands.

But back to the bikes. For a while I have been curious about getting a second bike, something far smaller than the 1200gs.

And last year’s travels in northern Spain on accidental tracks and the more deliberate gravel road of the Bardenas Reales made me a bit more interested in the idea of off road riding. You realise there is a biking subculture of ‘light is right’ exiles from the large adventure bike community. Suddenly those ever-heavier bikes with huge aluminium panniers seem less cool and desirable. Light is right has its own market niche of course with apparel, soft luggage, preferred GPS models and bikes of course that seem to keep turning up on websites and YouTube. I made a shortlist of three: a Honda 450L, KTM 690 Enduro R and Husqvana 701.

I had ruled out the Honda because, though it got some glowing reviews and inspired some rhyming couplets from Austin Vince (who was there in Birmingham in his overalls with his own muddy Honda – I’ve thought of things I wish I had asked him about), its range, its price of over £9000 plus the seat height (930cms) ruled it out for me.

The KTM catches my imagination. It seems capable, and popular among those doing long trips with off road stretches. The Huqvana was at the show but it was intimidating and flashy. I could not imagine being seen with that bike. I would want the earth to open and swallow me up whenever I parked it. The KTM was extremely nice though tall – I’d want it lowered I think. I spent a lot of time sitting on it, looking closely at it and photographing various parts. But the surprise was the Honda which was a lower ride, with a slightly more comfortable seat than the KTM, though on paper, taller. I will look at its spec again when I get home. But compared to the gs – and to the Royal Enfield Himalayan which I also tried and was captivated by (it is completely unintimidating and costs less than £5000, you perch on top of these bikes, rather than sit in them. (Not to mention the BMW 310GS which I sat on and feels good but is a little boring).

Also the larger KTM790, more of a conventional adventure bike, is lower-seated and much more comfortable. I’m not sure what scope there is for after-market customisation with the Enfield. There is a huge industry aimed specifically at customising or adventurising the KTM690 – which makes it much more of a fun option. I also tried the much talked about Yamaha Tenere 700 but found it bulky and more like a heavy adventure bike than the lightweight agile off-road gem it is meant to be.

Also in the light is right department was the small Mosko Moto stall with some of their soft saddle and tank bags mounted, in a nice bit of marketing, on extremely dirty bikes. Touratech don’t seem to turn up at these events any more. I am not sure why. I always used to look forward to their latest catalogue. Now I keep my old copy safely – its the last one with pictures of Herbert and Ramona Schwartz.

One of my minor Saturday treats when I lived in Cambridge was to walk up to one of the city’s bookshops and browse through maps of places I planned to or dreamed about travelling to on my motorcycle, opening them out on the floor or struggling with their folds in some other way. Now in London I have the amazing Stanfords map shop. I preferred its old shop but the new place still sells the same maps.

One of those little dreams that won’t go away is of riding to Russia. And to Lake Baikal in particular. Its just north of Mongolia if you don’t know. Basically it is about 10,000k by road from London. Hmmm. Maybe the idea was planted by watching the Long Way Round videos in the days after I passed my motorcycle test but plenty of other motorcycle-riders have been that way both before and after LWR, including the unsung hero Pavlin, a Bulgarian YouTube blogger who rides a Yamaha XT 660, completely fearlessly.

So when will I do this? After I leave my current job for sure as it is a long trip.

In the mean time, I have plans for next summer. Where can I start? Maybe by displaying the maps I bought on Saturday (both for my dream and for 2020).

My riding in Spain back in the summer ignited the joys and frustrations of some riding down gravel roads and other tracks – both by choice and by accident. To cut a long story short, I realised that losing some weight, not from my body, but from the choice of bike and what I carry, was a priority. Pursuing ‘light is right’ on Google leads you quickly to the symbiotic Trans European Trails and AdventureSpec, a supplier of clothing and other trail-type merch. Riding a motorcycle on tracks and trails is not without controversy, even when legal. Walkers, dog owners, horse riders and others don’t like it. And I can completely understand it. Motorcycle riders seems to have forgotten how intimidating and even aggressive, speed and noisy motorbikes can seem to everyone else who is not riding them. Luckily, to fit in with my conflict-avoiding character, I understand that the ‘trails’ across Germany (where I feel at home genetically) are all paved (I know – it seems a contradiction). And there is a route from the Netherlands, across the north of Germany, over to Poland, a country I want to visit out of curiosity and a vague sense that my ancestry on my mother’s side is from there. So that is my plan for Summer 2020. I want to camp again but to slim down so that I can travel without a top box. That’s the first step to much lighter future travel.