Los Endos...

By virtue of the fact that it is now the Friday following our arrival home, one might accurately presume that this post isn't exactly 'breaking news'. However, this blog had a start and lots of middle so it's fitting to provide an end, and as the fat lady has well and truly let her best song rip as well as having packed up her frock and gone back to the day job, this post is now well overdue.

 

Friday's ride back from Nancy, the longest of the trip, was sunny all of the way which was handy as the worst traffic on the worst road in 3000 miles, also known as the M1, made the latter part of our marathon a realisation of why we go abroad. The car park that was the M1 on Friday afternoon did allow us some filtering fun and we made it to the A50 while all the four-wheeled traffic was standing still miles back.

Each trip we have done has been different in its own way and this year's has been equally unique. The people, the places, the roads, the hotels, bars and restaurants, as well as the personnel involved have again made this trip a special time for a bunch of disparate blokes from Ashbourne ('desperate' wouldn't be such a bad description either to be fair). Memorable moments this time have to include... a bouncing tank bag near Reims, a fab lunchtime bar stop in the Marne valley,

No caption required...

Reidy table dancing in Nice, a certain someone hugging a bollard shortly after that, the wonderful roads through Tuscany, the Coliseum to the Vatican and the ride back to the Via Veneto in Rome all on a Saturday afternoon, everything about Florence, Brian - top bloke throughout, meeting the Red Lion Bikers groupies in Lake Garda, two blokes in a van, a man called Richard with a megaphone in Como, the Davos pass and a pair of bike boots filled with water.... to name but a few.

With a bit of luck, we might get to do it all again next year. Where to? Who knows, but stay tuned and thanks for reading. C

The Ponte Vecchio, Florence

St Moritz, en route to Davos

On board the channel tunnel

Joey impresses a local lady

Rich... over here!

The four horsemen of the apocalypse visit the Vatican

Five brill bikes... and a Ducati

Now Andy... this won't hurt... much

Neil can't find his beer

Rock n roll doesn't get much worse than this

The Barnes Wallis tank bag

Missing...

Our penultimate day on this year's tour began with shocking news that Tony had disappeared (the more astute of you might recall that this has happened once before). Not initially perturbed, we sat outside in the Zurich sunshine and enjoyed breakfast while planning a route to Nancy in France. Only upon checking out did we realise that Tony's disappearance might have more sinister connotations. Alien abduction isn't any more common in Switzerland than elsewhere apparently but it was clear that this is what had happened here. All that was left behind was a pair of used pants which were giving off a strange vapour and a screwed up note from a hotel maid in Florence suggesting that she doesn't get paid nearly enough to clear up whatever mess Tony had left. Probably toothpaste in the sink or somesuch.

Fearing a similar fate, we hotfooted it from Zurich riding a much less boring route than expected back in to France (after the Alps of the day before, anything would seem second best by comparison). Arriving in Nancy in 30 degrees and astonishingly all as one we spent a sultry evening enjoying all that Nancy's Irish bar had to offer and also scored our first Indian of the trip.

Friday will be our last day away. Bruges is a nice place but even we know when enough is enough and 550 miles to Ashbourne is within range. We depart at 7am...

 

Switzerland... a bit hilly but has a good kebab shop

We waved good bye to our friends from Ashbourne on Wednesday morning... or rather we would
have done if we could have been bothered to get up but, nevertheless, it had been good to see them and as a gesture of our appreciation we gave them Brian, a bit like an Arabian gentleman giving you his favourite camel when you have called in for tea. We hope they will take care of him, feed him regularly and let him play with lady Brians as and when possible.

Having dried the tears of farewell from our eyes... we left Como for what would turn out to be the best biking day of the trip. We planned the route to Zurich to take in the Davos pass, and after lunch in St Moritz which is also a very pleasant place (Richard couldn't resist taking a quick peek in

the LV shop and was later found salivating over a nice Gucci handbag in the shop next door... how many handbags does a man need for heaven's sake?) we headed higher into the mountains and as the photos show even in June there is plenty of snow. Helped by a crystal clear day, the views were astounding and the ride around some very tight bends mixed with long sweeping corners made for a cracking afternoon.

Zurich is a very appealing city and boasted all the things we look for within a few yards of our hotel. Unfortunately for Zurich, we were all largely beer-ed, restaurant-ed, kebab shop-ed and museum-ed out. A shame really but further evidence that the trip is taking its toll.

Having become an overnight internet sensation, Brian is seen here with some of his adoring fans

 

Lakes...

As has become customary on our European trips, we spend a night relaxing by the beautiful shores of Lake Garda where we can forget the noise, sweat and grime of our day on the road and unwind with a nice meal and a glass of wine or two.

Monday was certainly a day of two halves. The trip there from Florence in the worst rain most of us have ridden in was interrupted when Brian, enraged upon finding out that the local Police despite dressing like strange ice-cream men don't actually carry or sell cans of lager, went on strike and was recovered by George and Joey. The rest of the journey found lightening skies and on arrival in Desenzano del Garda we spent the evening with the RLB Groupies who had flown in the day before. A baker's dozen from Ashbourne all together in Italy. Good effort chaps.

We awoke on Tuesday to a few sore heads, due mainly to the party animal James Filer who
really knows how to let his hair down, so to speak. The ride to Lake Como though relatively short provided more stunning mountain scenery and some very challenging roads (many of the lanes high up in the hills get little or no traffic and therefore receive virtually no maintenance... literally as we found out). Lunch by yet another lake preceded an easy run into Como hastened by Tony being late for an appointment with the toilet.

Lake Como, like Garda, is very beautiful and is an easy place to relax in. What is noticeable at this point is that we are all absolutely worn out. All the fresh air and concentration required to ride these bendy roads is taking its toll. Because of this, and

that the Groupies were flying back early next morning, I am almost ashamed to say that an early night was had by all. Well, it would have been but for an unusual ritual emanating from Andy, Brian and Carpet Mark's room late evening. Much banging kept us all awake and next morning Mark's bike boots appeared to be completely filled with water. Odd.

Tip for the day... don't ever let Richard near a megaphone. It is rumoured that with such a piece of equipment in hand he was heard by every person within 5 miles of Como leading a resounding rendition of 'God Save the Queen'.

Florence... top place, daft name

It is said that when those Medici people set up shop in Florence seven hundred years ago they probably thought that the Tuscan countryside was not bad but the whole area could do with a town to complement the rural landscape. What they played a large role in creating is a wonderful city, jam packed with sculpture and boasting one of the world's top art galleries.

This trip has been largely unique in that the usual mishaps, disasters and general chaos which have been a mainstay of previous tours have been unusually lacking. Our days on the bikes still rarely go to plan but the machines themselves are behaving perfectly and we are even doing less U-turns and unplanned visits to primary schools than before. The ride to Florence was typical of this and after a couple of hours progressing at pace through Umbria we legged it along the Autopista for the last 100 miles.

Talentless 'live in Florence'

You might expect that on a balmy June evening in Florence you would find us admiring the Palazzo Vecchio or casting a considered eye over Michelangelo's 'David' perhaps. You would, however, be wrong. In the latest leg of what appears to be our tour of Italan Hard Rock Cafés, we spent the evening listening not to a baroque quintet but to Van Morrison, the odd bit of Metallica and of course lots of other music most people have forgotten about. The live band were lacking mainly in talent though not enthusiasm.

On Monday we head not for the first time to Desenzano on Lake Garda where we expect to be joined by Red Lion Biker groupies... Mark, Neil (on temporary release by kind permission of Ali), Rob and James will be with us for the Italian Lakes and we look forward to their contributions to the kitty.

Red Lion Bikers nearly have tea with Pope...

It was said that a week is a long time in politics. I can tell you from experience that two nights in Rome seems like a fortnight at least. For a start, our stay included such vagaries of the weather as torrents running down the Roman streets and torrents running from our foreheads in thirty degrees but a few hours later. Rome is a very special city. History is everywhere, literally.

Friday evening saw us take a stroll to the Trevi Fountain which was crawling with tourists. You only have to see it to understand why. After almost certainly the worst Chinese ever, we retired to Harry's Bar on the Via Veneto, former patrons of which include Sophia Loren, Matt Damon, Kate Winslet, Jack Nicholson and now one Shaun 'Digger' Halliwell. Posh place but only just up from the hotel and they actually let us in.

Many of you will be surprised to hear that we are quite a cultured group and with that in mind on Saturday

afternoon we went en mass to the Coliseum which is one of those sights few words will describe. Whilst there, a chap selling 1 euro Coliseum souvenirs, a Mr L Looky, told us that if we gave him some money he could arrange for us to have tea with the Pope. Oddly, when we got to the Vatican the man on the gate said he'd never heard of Mr Looky and that anyway the Pope always pops down to the launderette on a Saturday afternoon, Sundays being somewhat busy. Not downhearted at this news, we looked in awe around St Peter's Square which was our second wordly wonder in three hours.

Saturday evening was a quiet one and any suggestion you may have heard to the contrary is mostly false.

Somewhat fatigued after all that culture the previous day, Sunday morning found us in a reflective mood whilst looking forward to the ride north to Florence. Heading out of the city we rode right through the middle of a military parade which, fortunately for us, had just finished. Personally, I found Rome to be absolutely stunning and would recommend anyone to come here.

Wet...

The sadists amongst you will be pleased to know that on Thursday it rained... a lot. La Spezia proved to be a damp squib the previous night and even Digger played a joker (this is when a member of the group declines the evening's entertainment usually for some paltry reason like fatigue or a need for some 'personal space'... which usually means staying in to wash one's hair) so for once we were all reasonably fresh as proverbial daisies. Wet gear was donned from the off as Tuscany seemed determined to deposit huge quantities of the wet stuff upon us and what promised to be the best riding day of the trip initially seemed doomed. For those of you who have the sense to avoid motorcycles, riding in the wet isn't fun. Inevitably, we split up and discovered that there are at least half a dozen different ways of getting from the coast to Siena. But as with most who persevere, we were rewarded later in the day with better weather, so much so that for some of us the afternoon was spent making the most of the wonderful roads we first experienced last year. The road up to Volterra, and down again, is not only a fab biking road, it also boasts some of the best scenery you can imagine. Blooming marvellous.

Siena is a beautiful place and despite less than perfect weather the Piazza del Campo is still a spectacular setting. However, reverting to type, we later found ourselves in an Irish bar... Andy was helped into a taxi on his way to an early bath, George and Jo got lost walking home, the pub nearly ran out of Jager and Richard lost his phone but then the chamber maid found it under his bed the next morning. Just a normal Thursday night out.

It is said that the road to hell is paved with good intentions... well, the road to Rome is littered with them after today's ride. We tried really hard to leave and arrive together but turned up at the hotel on the Via Veneto in the usual dribs and drabs. All seemed to

take different routes into the Eternal City even including a detour round an Ikea car park. Earlier, lunch at Bolsena which is next to a very large formerly volcanic lake was pleasant if not a bit windy.

We are now encamped in Rome for two nights in order to let a few numb backsides recover from 1500 biking miles to date.

Carpet finds a more suitable bike

Brian takes a wee steadier

Men wait for library to open

George and Joey hear that there's free beer down Siena way

Blimey, this is a long one...

As we arrive in La Spezia (about which my first impression was mistakenly unfavourable... we were though

following a dust cart which stunk of rotten fish on the way in) it's about jolly time that I brought you up to date with the tour so far.

Monday saw us depart Dijon in fair weather and lunch was pegged at Lake Annecy, well known to Brian as he's been there at least half a dozen times before. Not well known to Brian however is the way there, or even where those naughty French people hid their 250 square kilometre lake when we were trying to find it. It is a very picturesque place though and we enjoyed lunch sat in some 25 degrees of warmth, a marked contrast to the first couple of days. The gentle ride into Grenoble took between fifty-five minutes and two and a half hours depending on who you were and whether you have any clue whatsoever which way is south.  That evening passed in a remarkably civilised fashion and we almost spent some time planning the route to Nice. Good news... the Support Van manned by George and Joey arrived this evening (though quite what they are supporting is anyone's guess) and also our very own waif and stray, 'two pants' Tony.

Having failed to plan the route to Nice, we spent the usual half hour on Tuesday morning trying to work out which way to go and inevitably we lost each other, though even we expected it to take longer than one corner and a set of traffic lights. Having been lured into believing that we couldn't possibly encounter any bad weather, it threw it down shortly after leaving Grenoble and resembling seven giant condoms on motorbikes we made our way further south along roads which even had it been dry would not have overly impressed. What we didn't expect was the delight which followed our morning travails in the form of a dry afternoon and some fantastic bendy roads which took us through some spectacular gorges and one especially nice village, St Andre-les-Alpes, where we found a very accommodating bar lady willing to let us in her pub.

Previous visits to Nice have tended to show that it can be a bit of a messy night out. Tuesday night was definitely a messy night out. We found ourselves at Wayne's Bar, a live music bar/restaurant of some fame in Nice which we liked so much we stayed half the night. Dancing (loosely speaking) on the tables is encouraged so we did and the evening then degenerated into a type of drunken Olympics... most popular events included Bollard Hugging (as shown...) the Basement Dive (the idea of this event is to walk along the street and then fall or dive into someone's cellar, isn't it Andy?) and that old crowd-pleaser, Falling Over For No Apparent Reason (top athlete in this event was undoubtedly Richard).

You might be less than surprised to learn that Wednesday morning's ride which took us into Monte Carlo was a bit slower than usual. The Monaco GP was held at the weekend and we took the chance for a spin around the circuit though not as you might imagine as these are public roads and rather crowded. We were overtaken eight times by teenage girls on scooters. As Nice had done for any desire to go whizzing around mountain roads today, we headed to La Spezia on the Mediterranean coast motorway, only to hear later in the day that 'wrecker' Reid had been at it again... this time reversing his Honda into a car in Monaco. Brian is now on Interpol's most wanted list and most of Europe's insurance companies are offering a bounty on his head.

Assuming La Spezia doesn't chew us up and spit us out like Nice did last night we head for Siena on the morrow... I hope they haven't got any bollards there.