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Proper Hooliganism....

Sincerest condolences Pedro..... he'll be waiting for you on the other side.

Make Costa,s last morning a good one.

I'm so sorry to hear that Pedro, I just hope you have a great last few hours together

So you got twelve inches last night?

Got another 12" last night. Fun! I shovel the steps and decks on the house myself and a contractor does our driveway as it's about 160 feet long - too long to shovel by hand. They charge $80 per snow - not a flat rate. Last year, when it snowed 61" in a day, they charged double that amount as they had to bring in extra equipment to do it. Ends up costing anywhere from $2,500 to $3,500 per year usually. Looks cool, too.... In addition to that, I volunteer at our local school and shovel the steps and walkways there. It's kinda fun in a weird way. We get there at 0400 on snowy days and shovel for about 3 hours to get all of the steps done before school. It's good exercise, too.

Not trying to put you off but the western Sahara.......no no no ...GO just throw yourself into the culture, learn some French and even a bit of Arabic........and take loads of pics it's a tad samey samey

Sorry to hear that, it’s heartbreaking to go through. Make his last day a really happy one for him.

Hard choice but you have to do what’s right for them, sorry to hear this.

2025 Honda Hornet 750 New headlight... It looks kinda weird.

Luv early 50's GMC's....step-side long bed....not too common. 8-lug spindles...3/4 or 1 ton chassis. Sweet truck...

Won't be able to sit down for a week.

I am very sorry to read that. My thoughts are with you and your family.

Such a clean example of a Wombat....

My F650 did 200,000 miles before it needed a 6 week service..They don't make um like that any more. The lad had it 4 years and thrashed it very day. When i traded it in on a new bike i got more money than it cost me to buy 10 year before...That will never happen on a modern BM Have a great time and stay safe. Lyn.

Another clean Wombat...

McGrath's YZ...

Ahhh ya pussy! I'm weird in that I get up around that time most days anyway - so it's not a bother for me. It's gotta be done before the school opens for the day though. Place has a shitload of steps as , like everything else here, it's on the side of the mountain ...

Luv seeing these race @ the VMX races....

so sorry pedro

You really do live on a top of a mountain...lol ...just curious Eric how do you deal with this crazy amount of snow ? Are you doing the chore yourself or are you using a snow removal contractor ? If so ...how much do the charge for season ? I currently have 5 of my neighbors on the list for snow removal...I charge them 250 up front and another 250 on Feb 1 ...basically only covers the fuel and maybe a minor mechanical breack that's about it...

Just finished the rear facing camera for the tractor...have to say I'm pleased with the result...it's a yakry 27...HD with night vision...wired the monitor directly to the ignition switch and the camera is powered off a 12 cigarette lighter outlet...was gonna for the weekend but I just couldn't help myself...lol.

Good evening The title sounds a lot grander than the actual trip. I made a very brief introduction, funnily enough in the introduction thread so I wont drone on here about myself. I have a trip planned (very loose plan) where I will be setting off from my home in Lancashire, travelling down the country eventually to Newhaven to catch the ferry to Dieppe. The only solid plan I have is the Ferry is booked and I have also booked a cheap hotel on the Dieppe side for the first night, other than that I'm following my nose and camping where possible. My ultimate destination is Morocco, and I dearly want to sample the Western Sahara , if only to say I have been there, I don't wish to cross it at this point in time (thats another trip). So I have been busy lately, the bike is serviced and deemed fit for purpose (for now) although she is an old girl i think together we can meander along and see some of the the world. The bike is a 2002 BMW F650GS all standard apart from some Heed crash bars, some bark busters, better footpegs and a higher screen. It has genuine BMW hard panniers and top box and along with a large dry bag I think I will have sufficent room to carry my necessary tools and spares along with my camping kit. In the next few days my kit should be finalised so i will then set the rear shock to suit the extra weight and I will be ready to head off. My planned departure date is the 16th of Nov with my ferry leaving Newhaven on the 18th at 11am. I'm planning on visiting my brother in Bedfordshire before the ferry hence the early set off date. Then its across to Dieppe, stay that night in a cheap hotel and set off properly on the 19th and see where I end up. I'm expecting wet weather in both France and Spain but I'm still determined to camp where possible. My route will take in some of the better roads France/Spain and Portugal have to offer so I will be avoiding motorways. I want to spend Christmas in Sagres in Portugal so that give me a plenty of time to get there. Then in the new year, hopefully new years day I want to cross over to Morocco and make my way down to the Western Sahara. My return route has yet to be decided but at the moment I'm thinking of getting back to Spain and turn right following the coast up towards Barcelona but as I say its all a very loose plan. Although I'm not taking a laptop nor a video camera I try record some bits on my mobile if only for my own enjoyment and I hope to be able to update this thread from time to time. I have taken advice from here already and plan to get a vodafone top up cars for europe and Inwi for Morocco so at least I have some data to use for updates. Like everyone i like decent riding kit but to buy a textile jacket and pants some of them were more expensive than my bike. I have now gotten the kit I feel works, I've done 2700 miles in it and it worked for me, it has layers to keep me warm and the textile jacket has a removable liner to cool things down if required. This may be a controversial decision but I have chosen to wear biking jeans above textile trousers, mainly because of comfort, I tend to overheat easily and textile trousers just make me sweat. But along with my mix and match clothing I have invested in a set of Scott waterproofs, I have used these a few times in torrential rain and can vouch I stayed dry underneath. Two pairs of gloves, one waterproof ,one lighter pair more suited to drier weather. As for boots, well I invested in a pair of Altberg Clubman boots back in 2011 and they are still going strong so they are coming along for the ride, I cannot recommend Altberg highly enough, the boots have been excellent.( I'm not being paid for any of these recommendations, I'm just passing on my thoughts). That's about it for now, a lot of writing about a trip I have not done yet but I hope to update things as I go along, if anyone sees an aging F650GS with an equally aging bloke give me a shout or say hello. Speak soon Dermot.

It is Colorado.

Or you could go full batty.

The 04:00 start sounds worse than shovelling for 3 hours

Ah well mine is not run in yet, as its only done 40k (fingers crossed). I'm fairly sure whatever happens will be an adventure, this time next week I will be on my way, firstly to see my Brother in Bedfordshire, then head for the ferry on the 18th.

I'm sorry to hear that Pedro

Serviced a mates car and chucked the jampot shock in the freezer hoping the cold will doing something with the locked steel ring on the alloy shaft. Wine bottles open, cheers.

Wishing a speedy recovery for Ersilla there Bob.... 20F this morning....just a bit warmer for the next few days....sun's out & I'm not missing the opportunity for another Ride....

Have trouble with my right knee at the mo but that sounds much worse. Get well soon Ersilia.

get on with the house work and cooking then ...bitch

Wife is over the moon, because our next door neighbours have gone away on their Caribbean cruise, 2 weeks of our neighbour not playing (badly) her electric organ, and no dog barking continually. And we are going out! to Asda, because we have almost run out of tea bags, Asda is nowhere as exciting as Baza.

This is funny but completely real. A friend of my brother teaches in a californian university. Two days ago the administration sent out a message to all students saying that the elections might not go as they were expecting, and that emotional support would be provided for free for whoever felt they needed it.

RDC...DaMan!....

Having curry from a teacup was an absolute first and super funny! It's what happens when we travel without previous booking and it was a fun experience! The food was tasty, if a little hot, but had a great yogurt sauce to calm it down.

On our last day, things could have ended on a happier note. Portugal was going through a lot of forest fires, but we still tried to make the best of the morning, at least to give Barbara a glimpse into what northern Portugal has to offer. Packing the bikes at 9:30, not exactly an early start. And getting into it, already in the distance you can see the smoke haze. One hour into it, and an espresso stop. The pace is relentless The views from the top of my favourite Castle, I don't like the smokey air. And the view from our lunch stop, a few delicious and very good value sandwiches made at the local firefighter house bar A couple of hours later, and we stop by the Douro. It was pretty clear that we were going into the deep smoke, so stopped to make a decision on route. Initially, the small road I was going through would take too long, three or four hours to get to Porto while enduring thick smoke was no way to enjoy it. Also, second more direct route took us very close to one of the big fires, I didn't like that idea at all as with heat and wind things quickly turn from adventure into disaster. We would get to Regua and then get on a big motorway, a little bit more distance but safer. Still had to do 45 minutes or an hour to get there, shortly after, what is usually a very scenic typical Douro vineyard view looked like this: The motorway wasn't more pleasant... sometimes with fires illuminating the haze that now was very thick and ever present. I stopped taking pictures, it just wasn't pleasurable. We returned the bikes at around 18:30, and then, instead of going to visit Porto for a night, hoped in my car and drove to Sofia's, almost 300km away. It was not the end of the trip I wanted, and it is heartbreaking as there is talk of a lot of these fires being caused by criminals. Now the weather has changed a little and that area is getting back under control, so all is looking better.

New day, heading to Portugal. We left Potes while it was still a little cold, but sunny enough. Stopped for breakfast and parked next to a very odd looking Land Rover. After a brief stop at a lookout, which was mostly taken over by me having a few work calls and emails, we pointed the bikes towards Portugal. Hopped on a very boring motorway for a little bit, then some main roads, and we made it to the border quite early. We were to spend the night very close to the border, sleep in one of my favourite places and have dinner at my favourite Trasmontano restaurant. I had called and asked for my favourite rice to go along with the usual grilled beef. In the meantime, we made time by showing Barbara a little bit around the area. We got ourselves installed, and walked up to have dinner at an appropriate time. I loved it, didn't disappoint. We made it back to the hotel under an amazing sky, at around 22:30 the full moon lit the clouds from behind, and it looked even better in real life. The reason we stayed here was partly because it wasn't too far away from the Picos da Europa, but also because Northern Portugal was plagued with a natural disaster in the form of forest fires. The air was very smokey, the country was in panic, and we wanted to see if that got a little bit resolved before venturing farther on. That was left for tomorrow.

In the morning, the outside of our hotel was full of bikes ready to go out, most of them to one way or the other catch a ferry in Santander or Bilbao, returning back home to the UK. We get on the motorway for a bit, then onto smaller roads heading through a particularly ugly part of Spain into the Picos da Europa. Every small town seemed desolate and sad, might be just me but those small villages and towns in that area suck the life out of you. We stopped for a coffee and some breakfast in the form of toast or whatever. No chance of that, nothing to eat whatsoever, in a cafe , they had coffee, coffee with milk, and all sorts of spirits. We had a pretty horrible coffee and left. Eventually, making it to the start of our third mountain range in this trip, after the Alps and the Pyrenees. The weather had given us a little bit of a hint of rain, and a few sprinkles, so the waterproofs were partially on. The cold in the Spanish plains also made it easy to want to put them on, but now that the pace had slowed we were much more comfortable. A stop in a village where we slept last year on our way to England, to plan things and figure out a place to sleep that night. After a little, we found our bearing. @Sofia remembered a viewing point where we were riding past, so we stopped there, there were a few big birds there, which were very interesting to see but kind of hidden by the clouds. It's still very cool to see vultures and eagles up in the air not very far away from you. Didn't get any nice pictures of them, though. Our final stop, to book a place for the night. We were ready to stop, so it only took 15 or 20 minutes to get there, a nice little apartment a few minutes from the little town of Potes. We left the luggage and went to Potes to buy groceries to cook dinner and eat "at home". Potes looks very quaint and cute in the pictures, but was really a busy tourist trap. Most shops were for souvenirs, most cafes were horrible, we had a little walk around, sat in a cafe for a while and then gave up and went away. Back home, Sofia and Barbara talked to our Dutch neighbors for a while, while I caught up with work. That night we ate some portobello mushroom linguine, drank some below average spanish wine, and went to be a little tired.

We got up to a cold morning, the cars (not covered like the bikes were) were starting to get a bit of a frosty look to them. To prevent the girls having to ride around on the soft gravel, I maneuvered the Honda NC750X (@JustaPor) onto the front of the house, these are cool little bikes and the frunk is an addictive thing to have on a bike. Again, I'll post my opinion on them later on, same as on the 1250GS. We slept on the outskirts of Lourdes, and first thing was heading up the Pyrenees to the Col D'Aubisque, from South to North, half way up the mountain @Sofia stopped to see a honey stall. The owner was a very nice elderly man whose hives were just in sight behind the stall. Sadly the honey was all packed in plastic containers with lids that pop off, however tempting it would have been to bring honey from such a cool location, you could see the potential for a big mess if one of those lids pops off mid trip. Going up the Col de Soulor And a stop at the Col D'Aubisque for a coffee. When I was here last week it was not sunny at all, there were hardly any bikes coming up and bikers basquing in the sun, but it didn't look any less pretty in the rain. A bunch of british bikers turned up, and didn't say hello back to the girls even though they did greet them in English. Having a portuguese plate Barbara was obviously in disguise, but I really don't understand why some brits do that, we had the same in Yorkshire last year. Anyway, it was glorious up there. A little more than an hour after, we stop for lunch in a little village, having spotted a small grocery shop. Couldn't be any more french, that, I had a nice jambon beurre, and we sat outside watching France happening. A guy bought his baguette for lunch, and 10 minutes after came back for a bottle of red wine, his Citroen CX15 having clearly endured a pretty hard existence so far. It was a lovely place to stop. I guided the small group via a small roads through very green valleys, and then up the mountains that I had previously seen through deep fog and under rain. Strike a pose: And just like that, we were down the mountains and onto the Spanish side of the Basque country. We rode to Pamplona for the night, and stayed in a hotel in the outskirts of town. In hindsight, we should have looked for something near the centre as that would have allowed us to walk out in search of a nice place to eat, Pamplona must have plenty. Instead, we ate in the hotel's restaurant, they advertised it as a special restaurant but it turned out to be very mediocre, a true disappointment. I did my best to impersonate a Bond villain, while sat in an armchair. Next day, onto the Picos da Europa.

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