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TLDR- Not a lot to see here, you’re better off reading the Baja thread, thats what I’m doing next ? This ride report is the most lacking you’ll likely ever see under ‘Ride Report’s but its not my fault honest.. well maybe it is but I feel innocent. The day started well, I pulled the blinds to see the sun shining through the window and even though my inadequate phone doesn’t show it in the pic I can easily see Wales across the water, even the wind turbines slowly turning. This is unheard of early morn because even on the sunniest days the sea mist takes time to clear and holds the temp down, often until midday. Not sure about the ‘pano’ setting on the phone, it seems to make the central focal point of the photo the cesspit, so here you go a pic of the top of the cesspit, you’re welcome. I checked the forecast and it was very promising. Skiving is now firmly on the cards. This type of weather which I love always gives me grief on the attire front because in the sun its lovely and warm, out of the sun its still only 6 degrees. Taking into account the wind chill on the motorway I plumb for the subzero skimobile suit- not a wise choice ? Mr Slowly says he’s going to come along and we decide to turn it in to a test run for the longer days in the saddle on the LEJOG trip end of May. Seeing how long it takes before aches turn fun into pain, what the timings of preemptive breaks will be, getting Mr SCM familiar with using sat nav while riding, figuring out what works when we ride together over longer distances and any bike changes that might be needed. Easy peasy. Whacked together a chunky chilli in the slow cooker so the ingrates dont bother me at lunch time because “Im hunnnngreee” made a large flask of tea n some sarnies and feeling like some multi tasking genius who’s won the lottery we head off to the Wye Valley. But priorities n all that so first a wee dap up the motorway for breakfast at Lockside. Not biker breakfast prices but to hell with it, this is the first time we’ve eaten out in over a year. If you’re ever in Bristol and want to flash the cash on your brekky this is the place to go. Odd location but classy enough to serve Bloody Mary’s with your fry up! This is where my ride report goes down the pan. I review the helmet cam footage eagerly anticipating something worth of seeing only to discover that in-spite of spending a lifetime deciding its optimum positioning (skyline perfectly horizontal, what I’m looking at dead centre of the frame, helmet encroachment minimised) I hadn’t realised just how not upright I am on the bike so I have a lot of footage of tarmac and my speedo (which is not something I can post on a public forum ?). It just doesn’t adjust up or down. A schoolboy error maybe but they dont mention that in their sodding fitting video on youtube! We head over the bridge where I do my best impression of a flip top lid in the hope of getting at least one bit of footage to put on here but in the interests of not closing the bridge with an accident only a complete moron would cause I give up. I’m navigating quite badly and miss both opportunities to make it onto the A466. Where we went next is a mystery to me but it was sunny and felt great to be over the bridge again at last so who cares. Stop to rejig the sat nav and have a great ride over to Usk, then Monmouth and back down through the Wye Valley before heading over to Frome until the sun refused to reappear from behind the clouds and we headed home again. Ooh exciting a pic at the petrol station cos my husband is enamoured with his new helmet- me not so much but of course I said its lovely! ? The only ride report worthy pic taken from the “ABSOLUTELY NO PARKING, you will be clamped” sign just before Tintern Abbey. The risks I take for you ? The cloud cover that refused to break just outside Bath despite the ‘sunny all day’ forecast ? And home again. A little icing on the cake to discover the miniature weeping Cherry Blossom tree we planted last November for one of our dogs burial (yes we were that sad about it) has against the odds grown and already produced its first little blossom. Distance- not that far 150 miles but a lot of B roads which is exactly what LEJOG will consist of and out for about for 7 hours. A good first long ride together celebrated with beer and chunky chilli. All in all an excellent skive. A bonus item- while we were fuelling up I watched Mr SCM automatically stop talking and his eyes swivelling about as soon as he heard a motorbike engine, long gone are the days of him saying to me “you’re not listening are you?”.... because he is now too ... gone man, solid gone... ? Dunno why this pics here twice, tried removing it but it wont let me.. TECH SUPPORT HELP.....

I do now regret having the gender realignment because I used to be a hot chick myself ?

Is now a good time to mention the PM I sent to Clive that day?

The trans sibierien, Vladivostok - Moscow has been my dream trip since I was about 6. originally wanted to do the train ride but once I got riding I've wanted to do it by bike. The dream is not dead, but it gets a litle less likely with each passing season and then I came across some aussi dude who rode it as part of Sydney to London, alone, at 70 something and the lights go back on... more realistically, I have a fully planned route for a trip visiting all the capital cities of the schengen area. 21 cities 30 days 10900km +/- 3500€ budget 'soon as I can sell a child or 2 ... ?

I remember a phil donahue show in the 70's, a girl took drugs to be a "boy", it worked. Problem was she got the same male pattern baldness her father had. I cried through the whole show. ?

It’s a Welsh thing.

The official announcement has now gone out on the Town Hall FB page...... The literal translation is "You're fucked for at least two weeks".

Say it like that and it sounds French. ?

Expect more pics of the fucking reservoir!

The State of Colorado has officially ended all restrictions as of Friday (tomorrow). Bars, restaurants are now allowed to go full 100% occupancy (many have already done that). No masks required outdoors and most indoor places aren't asking for them to be on either. So, for the time being anyway, it appears to be over for us. Some local, lefty type communities (Boulder) might have local restrictions in place though.

South America is next on the horizon. I've done the top half of the Americas, time for the bottom. Also, Mongolia is right there at, or near the top of the list! Followed a fellow named Oisin Hughes, on ADVRIDER, when he rode around the world. Mongolia he had the most bike issues, but fell in love with the people. Ever since, that's been the place I've wanted to see the most.

Had a 98 Road King Classic. It was a Harley in the truest sense - rear brake better than front, suspension was so-so. But, the paint and chrome were excellent! (seriously). I love my R18, however. There is a quality that BMW imbibes in all their products that isnt really matched by other bike makers. Not that the others are falling apart. Go ahead and throw out the recall slings, or failed final drive comments. I've never not been taken care of by the mother ship. That being said, i've signed up to test the Harley BMW (Pan American) come late may, at Lake Elsinore. I'm wondering if i should ride my BMW Harley there ?

A couple of shots from a ride out on Sunday with some of the other old farts from around here. Terrible I know but I couldn’t be arsed with a ride report. Must make more of an effort next time. ?

This bike IS a pleasure without the guilt. I have ridden the XC and the XE. Actually prefered the taller version. ( I might put a video on of the day, my friend Barbara came from the UK for a visit so I got a Scrambler for 2 days and she rode the Speed Triple, that she prefered to her Monster S4R. Not sure, we talk non stop, will bore you to death!!! ) It is a joy to ride, does not feel like a 1200cc engine and is very nimble. The noise is great and its, to me at least, kind of funny to seat SO high!! Of course on the motorway, at 90mph it was like being a window cleaner working on the shard!! The leg thing is very true, my leg was literally burned, it had a blister... But to be honest, who cares about having a right leg when one can look that cool! Absolutely loved it and if I had the money, it would be my choice for the Yin to the Speed Triple Yang. The Scrambler is a naked bike on stilts!! Triumph in Portugal... Triumph was always a niche brand here, favoured by very specific ( and very few ) guys that were more into historic motorcycle brands and also was preferred by a certain type of snob that wanted to be different from the type of snob that had BMWs. In a country were Honda was the choice of 70% of people, European brands were only for specific people, snobs, and I belong to the Triumph snob group!! You have to see that bikes in Portugal were ( I think still are ) classified as a luxury item, so as I later found out, the idea of a Triumph being for working class men, here was abhorrent! So, a very small market and a group of snobbish people has caused that the Brand was always miss represented and miss handled here. Eventually we ended up with the current scenario where the Importer is in Madrid, for Spain and Portugal, cares very little with the Portuguese side of things and the dealer in Portugal ( there is only ONE dealer here, with 3 shops ) has triumph as an add-on to Harley, his main business that existed before he became Triumph dealership. The motivation of the staff at triumph is next to none, many don't know Triumphs or understand them, even now that they are almost as bland and soulless as all others thanks to "focus groups" ( my personal view, not trying to convince anyone! ) and they don't really have much love for Triumphs. The organization is that of a typical Southern European enterprise with many lunch breaks and coffee breaks and holidays and bank holidays. Parts are non-existent and have to be ordered for the Galaxy far, far away that is Spain... In turn they have to get them for the other ( even further away ) Galaxy that is the UK... And has we know they are not made in that Galaxy anymore, they come form another Universe, China and Thailand!!! Probably stuck in the Sues Canal right now!!! Before they arrive in Lisbon they have many miles and many layers of taxes... So the radiator for my Speed Triple is 395 pounds, plus VAT in the UK and 790 euros, plus VAT, in Lisbon!! Because of "Hipster-ism" and metro-sexuality, the Bonneville found itself "discovered" in these shores and is the most sold Triumph! Hurray for slow beards and checkered shirts saving the dealership form ruin! They sold TWO Speed Triples in 1 year, maybe 10 Street Triples and quite a few Tigers 900, but all together not even half of the Bonnevilles. In 2018 Triumph sold in Portugal 232 bikes, large majority Bonnies. I have loved Triumph since I can remember, I love history and motorcycles, and Triumph is super rich in history and instilling character in their machines.. The Speed Triple had me at hello, literally!! I was a member of the Portuguese Triumph Owners Club before I moved to the UK and in the UK I was head of Jack Lilleys Rat Pack for a while plus always very involved with all things Triumph there I even won the award of "Chattiest Triumph Owner" in the whole country ( picture attached!) , so it is with sadness I agree totally with @Pedro, it is not good to have a Triumph in Portugal... Difficult to buy ( if you want any model other then the ones they have in the showroom already or need finance ), impossible to service due to staff incompetence and unavailability of parts and God help us if we drop the bike and need replacing parts!! Of course everything is super expensive...

Id rather not remember ?

And that does look proper badass!

A prime chance to try google maps in search of some of those great gravel roads.

Not possible! There's only one road out in each direction......no roads cross from one point to another. In fact the only roads are actually shown on the map in darker green.

They stopped selling spam in the 1970’s... I lie they didn’t but they should’ve ?

Boundaries of the town perimeters Bob. The star shows where I am......so about 3 miles east, 3 miles south, 10 miles west, and about 25 miles north. The blue bit in the map is the reservoir that you've seen in the past.......and you'll be seeing again soon.

I was looking for Spam Spam Spam and eggs... ?

Its still hard not to spit your tea out at those prices ? My snowmobile suit went down a storm there ... not ?

That sounds a like a great bunch to ride with. What an excellent evolution. Its hard to accommodate such a varied group of riders and keep everyone happy. The hardcore want the hardcore stuff and the not so hardcore dont want to hold others up or appear soft! I went on a trip with a bunch of randoms (24 people in total) and I started off skill wise somewhere around the middle of the pack, all well and good I thought, a nice comfortable place to be, then they started dropping like flies (down to 12) and I was at the bottom along with a couple of others, its strange how it can effect you so fair play to anyone on that trip who kept going with off road gods like that making it look easy! The group of randoms left standing that I went with are keen to do something else and I can see it might develop into something along the lines of what you’ve described but Covid shut it down before it got going so now who knows. I’d still quite like it to happen though! Good to hear about the iPhone camera, due an upgrade in May and they say the 12pro max camera is excellent, it has different lenses and you can control shutter speed n all that malarkey. Cors I dont actually know how to manipulate any of these variables to take a good pic but I’d like to learn to take much better pictures and if I can do it without having to carry an extra camera thats even better!

Nice Ride report. I remember when 'Lockside' was a transport cafe for rag-arsed truckers like myself. You'd have spat your tea out at those prices

@Tym....."Hold My Beer". Nice one Caroline.......you've lost your Ride Report virginity at last! Unusual to see roads in Wales that are not wet.......and some of those skies don't look too clever. And going out when it's 6C.......that's hardcore shit!

Great report, i loved reading the menu that was cool!

I had pipes like that on my 1990 Sportster. ?

With or without clothes?

Dont let the fact all the hot chicks now ride the dman things sway any opinions i might have had about that hammered together hunk of, great bike! ?

The sad part is @Skippy knows what a HUGE fan of his bike i am and i only get little tid bits of satisfaction by seeing so few pics of such a GREAT bike in action.

Kick started the Tomos, ok that hurt...took a spin, made it into second gear, came home...my inside's dont like bumps yet. Hay, its a ride report. Dint say it was a good one... ?

I've already heard real-life reviews (a few) on the Harley GS and for the most part, people like it. More power than my GS, at about the same weight. The only complaint is the front end look, but then we like the GS front end ?

Good effort ... but must try harder next time please .

Bit strange calling a helmet "Breaker"

Unless youre lucky enough to have reverse or find yourself in the position of always being able to ride in and ride out its the inevitable pushing them about that does you in. Having said that I met three Aussie women who all rode Harley road glides (370+kg) when they were at home. I asked them about having to move them and they said they dont, theyre just careful where they park! If youre “careful where you park” in England you’d never get parked! The joys of living in wide open spaces ay!

You had a Fat Boy on top of you then?

They feel perfectly manageable in real life, even when stopped.

So nobody has any idea about where they'd like to ride? You reckon we need to change the name of the site to www.adventurecasuals.com @Tym?

Dunno know but he looks like a laugh. You’re gonna tell me he’s some freaky paedo now aren’t you?! ?

Have a good week everyone. ?

A sunny forest ride. ?

Llyn Brianne ?

It's official! Perimetral lockdown starts tomorrow for at least 14 days!

Up to 80......Perimetral Lockdown expected to be announced today!