Welcome To Bikes And Travels...
...It's about bikes... and travels... mostly on bikes!
Spring has sprung, now we have a few months of warm pleasant rain to enjoy after the cold and miserable rain of winter.
What excitement and adventures will this year bring?
What's New?
Same Peninsula Different Language
It's time to leave the beauty of Riano and head into the "Yellow Country". There's potholes and Ren making an ass of himself. Nothing new then.
Feeling Lucky In Riano
Gird your loins dear readers - Sharon and Ren are accidentally having another "really good day". There's a glitch in The Matrix, buy a lottery ticket, this is a one time only special deal. Normal misery will return soon surely.
Form Dole To A Hole That's Closed
Things don't go quite as planned for Upt' today but don't panic - all's well that ends well.
The Wonder That Is Riano
What started out as a good day turns into a really good day. There is of course a mishap and some moaning, otherwise so far so good. What's the catch, there's gotta be a catch.
Off The Ferry And Into The Affray
It's all waiting and chaos, confusion and queueing - and that's just getting off the ferry. Despite being in Spain the evening has a very English feel with an English friend.
From Coal To Dole
These notes from the road provide a concise review of Upt's first 4 days of his European excursion. He makes it all sound so easy!
Upt's Autumn Bimble 2024
Title page for Upt' North's tale of executive level adventure through Europe.
Hereford And Home
A brief note on the last couple of days of this short trip and Ren is reflecting on just how much countryside there is out there.
Distant Memories
Ian Douglas heads a long ways back down memory lane, sharing a few flashbacks that seem oddly familiar. Hard times and/or halcyon days.
Onto The Ferry
Ren takes a simple short trip and turns it into an unnecessarily arduous ride to the ferry. Then all the Dynamic Muppets have to do is get on the ferry. Should be easy - right?
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Latest Posts
Feeling Lucky In Riano
Ren - The Ed¹ said :-
Saw this on FaceAche this morning. Taken from the path to the big swing. Lufferly, but probably not the best for motorcycling.
18/12/2024 08:15:33 UTC
Same Peninsula Different Language
Ren - The Ed¹ said :-
nab301 - you can clearly see the amount of crap I already have on the bike, but alas I did not have with me my Stetson nor my Colt 45. Thinking on - having a Colt 45 while passing through security and customs for the ferry might be considered "unwise".
Well done Upt', you managed to get the piccy up there. We'll make a techie out of you yet. There are indeed some fabulously twisty roads in Spain and Portugal, it is worth remembering there's a lot of flat and a lot of straight roads there too, depends where you are. Fear not bend lovers - there are some very bendy roads to come in the exciting future episodes...
17/12/2024 18:52:47 UTC
Same Peninsula Different Language
Upt'North ¹ said :-
If the piccie appears twice Ed please delete, I've had a malfunction, it's me age you know.
17/12/2024 16:55:10 UTC
Same Peninsula Different Language
Upt'North ¹ said :-
Well I never, I never knew there was two thank you'se in Portuguese. This site is an edumication.
I have ridden those roads south of the Picos Ed me Lad, and yes, they're pretty straight, dusty and dry.
The roads are actually a lot nicer, sort of South of Bilbao, which we found out when forced off the Picos by the weather a couple of years ago. They're still dry, straight (in the main) and dusty though.
I'll post a piccie if I can find one Ed, although I've never experienced roads that bad with pot holes in Portugal/Spain.
Dry is underrated.
Upt.
17/12/2024 16:49:52 UTC
Same Peninsula Different Language
nab301 said :-
Obrigado Ren for keeping us updated! , I was expecting to see a photo of you with a cowboy hat and a six shooter...
Nigel
17/12/2024 10:11:23 UTC
Feeling Lucky In Riano
Ren - The Ed¹ said :-
Don't spoil the illusion KiwiJeff!! Missy the Maid will not be at all pleased being caught out looking after Sharon and I - her parents think she's a student at an American Ivy League university. Then there's Dillon the Driver, he's supposed to be on an expedition through The Andes not driving a Winnibago through Spain. We do occasionally sleep in the tent mind, if the weather's nice.
Here's our regular transport and accommodation.
16/12/2024 08:09:39 UTC
Feeling Lucky In Riano
KiwiJeff said :-
Upt', while Ren provides us with pictures of his minimalist camping approach to touring he is actually followed around by a support crew a la Ewan and Charley, I have the photographic evidence below! and that is just the morning cup of tea!
16/12/2024 04:52:37 UTC
Feeling Lucky In Riano
Upt'North ¹ said :-
You're not wrong fella, you're not wrong.
Only did it because folks are visiting and getting in and out could have been a bit mucky for em.
New tyre fitted Saturday morning.
All good.
15/12/2024 15:50:39 UTC
Feeling Lucky In Riano
Ian Soady¹ said :-
That'll teach you to wash it.....
14/12/2024 12:07:25 UTC
Feeling Lucky In Riano
Ren - The Ed¹ said :-
So you're feeling particularly unlucky today eh Upt'? You have my heartfelt sympathy regarding the puncture. We can send people to the moon (subject to finances), dive the deepest ocean (subject to not using homemade submarines), and split the atom (not necessarily the best thing mankind has done) - we still ride around on glorified balloons.
13/12/2024 20:55:33 UTC
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Latest Repair-Chat
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Ian Soady¹ said :-
Yes I used that method on some fairing lugs for the Tiger and it seemed to work well. To avoid confusion, bread soda is often known as bicarbonate of soda, sodium bicarbonate or raising powder. I suspect any fine grained powder would do the job.
16/12/2024 15:42:12 UTC
nab301 said :-
I've had some success with smaller repairs recently on the likes of an indicator lamp housing that had been snapped off ,using the superglue and bread soda method,
Nigel
16/12/2024 14:37:39 UTC
Ian Soady¹ said :-
Looks great Glyn.
11/12/2024 10:12:07 UTC
Ren - The Ed¹ said :-
Glyn - I would never recommend spending money - unless it's someone else's money then I'm really good at that. I figure my point is that the notion of knitting a cracked panel back together with hot bits of metal seems well established. For the less imaginative there's off the shelf solutions, for you there's bits of copper and a soldering iron.
As per usual your finished homework appears up to scratch. Carry on...
11/12/2024 08:49:53 UTC
Glyn said :-
Here it is, primered but not top coated. The masking tape is still on the hinges. There’s a bit more flatting required and a larger repair in the middle of the panel to be completed. This actual repair is on the underside of the panel and not easy to see when fitted but still has to be acceptable.
11/12/2024 07:32:11 UTC
Glyn said :-
Are you advocating the expenditure of funds Ed? Shame on you, my method costs nothing but a bit of scrap copper pipe and some electricity. Interesting tool that though and I’m sure it works just fine. Finished panel pictures to follow but these repairs do take up a lot of time.
11/12/2024 07:24:29 UTC
Ren - The Ed¹ said :-
It ain't purdy when we see it like the picture - we need to see the finished product Glyn. I've seen advertised these "plastic welding kits" that heat up little metal "W"s and you knit the crack with them, similar to your solution.
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/195045414066...
09/12/2024 08:11:24 UTC
Glyn said :-
In the picture you can see the stitches melted in, there’s no filler applied yet. The stitches are about .3mm below the surface.
08/12/2024 19:34:22 UTC
Glyn said :-
Yes Ian, the scrim tape is on the inside and, apart from a V cut in the crack, it’s bonded to the surface. The stitch bars are melted below the outer surface and so makes sanding with a block easier. Simply fill in the holes and it’s easy to see when the surface is flat.
08/12/2024 19:18:48 UTC
Ian Soady¹ said :-
Excellent tip Glyn, although of limited use to me as my bikes have very little plastic on them!
That repair looks as thoug it's on the outside - I assume the scrim tape you mention is on the inside. I would have thought the reverse might be better then you could sand the tape / JB weld off for refinishing.
08/12/2024 10:27:06 UTC
Latest Chit-Chat
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nab301 said :-
Winter would be great if it wasn't for wintery things... my recently returned to the road Enfield Bullet after a year long sabbatical. It was shiny a few days before this photo
Nigel
21/12/2024 11:06:11 UTC
Ren - The Ed¹ said :-
Urgh ROD - and that's a big detour especially in bad weather. As for cleaning the bikes - don't bother they only get dirty again.
10/12/2024 07:47:57 UTC
ROD¹ said :-
Using the bike can be challenging at this time of year. I managed to ride through three flooded roads before finding an impassable flooded road with an abandoned car stuck with water over its wheels. At this point I re-traced my route and had to take a 17 mile detour to find a suitable bridge across the valley.
It's still wet today, but the forecast is better for this week. The bikes are in a desperate need of a clean.
09/12/2024 16:44:38 UTC
Ren - The Ed¹ said :-
"I'm sure the motorbikes are all locked in the shed." - I enjoyed a pleasant ride from Horwich to St Helens between 0930 and 1030, then another pleasant ride around St Helens, Warrington and Prescot around 1300. It was a tad blustery in places and there was a lot of windfall, particularly on quieter back lanes. Storm Darragh was pretty rough and there's still quite a lot of properties without power, but my ride was nowhere near as scary as the 80 miles night time ride in HEAVY rain last Wednesday evening. It was so wet even the Germanic Executive Transportation Systems (GETS, ie Audi BMW Merc) had slowed down to 30mph.
Still, not as scary as a redback biting my derriere.
09/12/2024 09:33:04 UTC
KiwiJeff said :-
The spider on the R1 was harmless just scary big, today's spider was quite small but extremely nasty and some people need anti-venom if bitten, while most people just suffer a lot and it hurts. Discovered just before sitting on the outside furniture with my morning coffee! As Upt' commented, pays to check under seats including toilet seats for Red Backs before sitting down! Be relaxing to get back to NZ and not have to check if something in the backyard or garden isn't trying to kill you when you venture outside! NZ motorcyclists had a very bad morning today 3 dead and two seriously injured in one accident and another dead in a motorcycle only accident in same area. The first accident with multiple fatalities was a club ride with a head on with a car going the other way. Sobering reading. 40 degrees two days ago very hot. I see even Liverpool getting knocked around in your current Storm Darragh with trees down in Queens Drive around the corner from where my wife's grandparents used to live. Stay safe and warm everybody I'm sure the motorbikes are all locked in the shed.
07/12/2024 11:03:48 UTC
Ren - The Ed¹ said :-
Having seen these "squatty potty"s in France I've often pondered how people cope in their dotage, or when they're injured in some manner.
I'm told that they're better for the human digestive tract and allegedly offer a more natural position to allow easier evacuation. I have no idea how true this is but I can understand the thinking.
Smashing great super marvellous. Until you've done your knee in or had a dizzy spell or pulled a thigh muscle. Or you're old and frail or otherwise infirm. I'd like to hope there are "medical aids" available for such situations otherwise as Ian so politely put it - things could get messy, very messy.
Is this motorcycle related? Of course, I've been injured on occasion when motorcycling and I wonder how I'd have got on if I were french.
30/11/2024 13:56:25 UTC
Ian Soady¹ said :-
Try using one when yopu have a hip replacement on one side and a knee replacement on the other. The results can be very messy.......
30/11/2024 10:22:56 UTC
Upt'North ¹ said :-
No it really isn't.
29/11/2024 22:54:04 UTC
Rev. Mick. said :-
I've just had a few weeks of squat toilets and I must say it is really how we should do our business. It supposed to be really good for you, and it does save on all that waste of paper.
However one morning following an extremely physically draining day the previous day. I really needed to use the toilet, like NOW!
My legs were so stiff it was touch and go wether I would actually get into a full squat in time.
It must be said while there was no accidents on the way down getting back up was as challenging
29/11/2024 19:30:46 UTC
nab301 said :-
Upt , if one has time to read the Beano whilst performing certain body functions might one suggest consuming more fibre , it'll move things along more quickly
Nigel
29/11/2024 15:34:14 UTC
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