Rendőrség – Could I outrun them?

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I think it is fair to say that I could have outrun the Hungarian Civil Guard members who were laying in wait on the back roads near Szekszard in Tolna but even I knew better… as I traveled further east the one striking observation I have is that Policemen’s hats get bigger, I mean the cap size, enormous, like some overhanging sunshade. The car was lovely and in fairness so were they – more interested in the bike and my passport than anything else and seeing as I responded to the request for “papers please” with the correct documents they let me go. With a parting wave i noticed the lack of door trims and the fact that the boot was held shut with a bit of string and a bungee – least I could have done is given them a rocstrap…

Papers Please

What makes a classic?

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Sometimes it is the first bike you had, sometimes it the one you did a special trip on or the one you made another personal connection with, sometimes it is a bike you lusted after as a youth. I have always loved the angular style and square ‘in your face’ engine of the old and original K Series bikes from BMW. I found this, an unpainted aluminum tanked, 1989/90 K75C in Berlin this week… The bike was propped up under an industrial unit balcony, being protected from the worst of the winter elements, and after almost 30 years it looked like it would have coughed into life. From memory and new, it would have had about 70bhp so not much chance of me getting a (read ‘another’ German) speeding ticket, even if I had persuaded the owner to part with the flying brick…

K75 C

A Clockwise Scandinavian Loop

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This year I am returning to one of my favourite biking destinations and will be spending late summer riding north to Scandinavia. Leaving the UK, riding up through Denmark and into Sweden via the Frederikshavn ferry and avoiding the popular and contested fjords and spending time island hoping skirting the Barents Sea exploring the Atlantic Wall. Having been to NorthCape in previous trips I am pushing further east and am planning to skirt south on the Finnish Swedish border riding the east coast of the Gulf of Bothnia and picking up a ferry from Helsinki into Tallinn and south through Poland to meet friends in Krackow and then stopping in Lienz to re-ride the Großglockner before riding home via Macon – planning will be on the fly, as in past years all I have arranged is a return Le Shuttle and one night in St Omer – excited already…

2017 In Planning