So, it was some kind of decided that I had to go and see my godson, and his mom and dad at some point, and as I anyway haven’t been to Scotland (that is outside Edinburgh) why not take the bike and spend some time in the highlands.
There was a few places I wanted to see;
- Applecross, which is mostly due to Monty Halls’ Great Escape, and the famous road going across the mountain
- John O’Groats, which is mainly due to Ewan & Charley
- The west coast, as it’s supposed to be stunning.
After the silly question; “where to go” on ukgser.com, and getting a few hints, reading a couple of ride reports, and playing around with Roadtrip to plan a route, which would take me to the places I wanted to see I booked the tunnel. Right there is always something which goes wrong, and I had to postpone my depature a few days, and ended up taking the ferry from IJmuiden (Amsterdam) to Newcastle.
Day 1 (Sep ‘8) -- 87km
Rotterdam -- IJmuiden (Port)
Nothing special except for the normal unpleasantness of driving on the highways in Holland.
Day 2 (Sep 9) -- 699km (incl. ferry)
Newcastle -- Edinburgh
Right, so this thing about riding on the left side… what is that about, oooohhhh shit it real… well hey I can do this, roundabout what the f… I hope I figure out how to do this or I’ll be dead shortly.
Finally found a main road of off to north it went, still with a bit of wobbling, but I got as far as the Scottish border.
And finally to Edinburgh. Someone forgot to tell me that parking in that City is kind of a mess, but got the beast put a side, and hey we are here, and no scratches!….
Day 3,4 (Sep 10,11) -- 0km
Edinburgh
Just hanging around, walking, pub’s and photos
Day 5 (Sep 12) -- 226km (from noon)
Edinburgh -- Fort William
I did pass through Stirling, and yes I did think about the castle, but could not really be bothered to stop, maybe next time. Otherwise not a bad day, except that getting used to this ‘left side thing’ seams to be more difficult than I expected.
Day 6 (Sep 13) -- 347km
Fort William -- Applecross (via Skye)
Up not too early, and off the the ferry to Skye, got to the ferry and a very nice gentleman asked if I was there for the ferry to Skye, and very politely told me that there might not be enough space…. turned out to be fine
45 minutes later I was on Skye. There have always (in my memory) been a lot of talk about Skye, the black mountains, etc, etc, I am sorry to say that I was a bit disappointed, but it was nice though, like the back mountains.
Off Skye using the bridge, hummm, almost as fun as a slice of bread (yo, me from Denmark, we know how to do big bridges:-)), and it seams that now the fun really started -- welcome to vacation driving.. hummm relaxed not really but fun it was.
Now lots of people have talked about that famous road going to Applecross, and as one have to have as much fun in life as possible why not.
Now there are limits to my likings of silly roads, I have to admit that this was kind of on the edge of being mad, but the view towards Skye was awesome.
I had kind of hoped that it would be possible to get a room at the Inn, but no such luck. Ended up at the camping in one of the hut’s -- which by accident I shared with a personality who snorred like I don’t know what.
The good thing about that was that I ran in to another tosser by the name Gary -- which made the whole thing worth while.
Day 7 (Sep 14) -- 313km
Applecross -- Lower Badcall
Up early after having slept 3 hours, note to one self; next time bring tent!.
Sunset at Applecross can give a nice opportunity for a great photo or two
Now roads are small, winding, and in some cases right on the edge to the sea, and in many cases 200ft up, and no railing to stop one from taking a plunge into the sea, but it’s the “small” rocks which stops one from trying to see if it’s possible.
So driving north from Applecross, I did my best to find every little road possible, and was mostly successful as there isn’t much else.
The view was in many cases quite amazing
Found this really neat small hotel, which for ~£90 servered both dinner and breakfast, the dinner was something which could make me go back -- the best I’ve had for years.
Day 8 (Sep 15) -- 331km
Lower Badcall -- Wick
Off fairly early, which in my world is before 9am.. and that is only while I’m on vacation.
Up north there is lots of nothing, and ruins.
Followed the wee small roads (one of them was B871) a bit south (ran in to Gary again!), and then back up to the road going to John O’Groats, well now I was there why not to got the most northenly point of Scotland which is Dunnet Head (I didn’t know that either -- but there was a sign).
Coming up next John O’Groats, which by the way closes down 5pm in the afternoon….
Still wonder why Ewan & Charley got to the idea of starting Long Way Down from there and no Dunnet Head… guess we’ll never know.
Ended up staying at a not too pleasent (but cheap Hotel in Wick -- £40 incl. dinner and breakfeast)
Day 9 (Sep 16) -- 383km
Wick -- Carrbridge
Lock Ness here we come, well I was in for a disappointment, but why not go explorer the small roads..
One can find some stunning views even down “south”.
Ended up staying in a B&B in Carbridge -- the owner had to point out that they did not have single rooms, and a double would be expensive; £30….
Ended up sitting in the local Pub getting fairly drunk talking to some Irish bus drivers… not a bad way to end a day….
Day 10 (Sep 17) -- 453km
Carrbridge -- Edinburgh
Yet even more small roads around the different distilleries, didn’t stop at one, until I got to Dalwhinnie, and this is where one find out that there is a bad thing to bikes -- not enough room for all the bottles one wants to buy at a distillery. Ended up getting 4 small bottles instead, which is not too bad at all -- more things to try.
Also by accident ran in to another tosser (Tunip), I can’t really say where as I was utterly lost at that point. Funny enough Tunip was one of the people who had something to say about where to go in Scotland when I asked around.
Ended up in Edinburgh, where well, that is a completely different story.
Day 11 (Sep 18) -- 825km
Edinburgh -- Calais
Imagine, getting woken up by a 21 months old baby… not good at all.
Right Calais here we come (or as far as possible), that was the plan.
First off to Lancashire to see some friends, took the small roads down from Edinburgh, got on the motorway, and off I went.
Got kind of delayed in Lancashire, and did not really get away until 7pm, and still had to get my head around thing thing of driving on the left side on motorways -- in England (a bit different from Scotland).
Got to Birmingham where the signs started to give indications of major road work around London (M25 is supposed to be the longest parking in the world), well it was going fine, so I decided to continue….
Got around London, and then suddenly there was Folkestone, where I figured out it’s the exit before the Euro Tunnel where the hotel(s) are.. and the next train was in ~40 minutes, so why not (the time at that point was 1.12am -- UK time)….
And on top of the long, and tedious ride… so I got the check in, I asked to get my departure date changed, they asked for my ticket, handed over my reservation, they asked for the ticket, I told them that they had that, they told me that without an outbound ticket the return ticket is invalid…. ended up getting a new return ticket….. grrrr…..
Finally got on the train, booorrrrriiinnnngggg
Got to Calais, went to the Ibis, asked for a room (local time 3.10am), and did not have any problems sleeping.
Day 12 (Sep 19) -- 311km
Calais -- Rotterdam
Got up around 9am, went to Tescos in the shopping mall to see if I could get some tea -- now way, they only deal in alcohol -- oh well…
Almost an uneventful ride home, except for the shitty Dutch drivers….
There have to be more silly things to do out there, but this might be one of them…
In 16 days from April 9th to April 24th I drove 7.676km just for the sake of doing so.
Day 1 -- 305km (Rotterdam to Calais)
Meeting up with the guys
Day 2 -- 1514km (Calais to Spain, somewhere between San Sebastian and Bilbao)
Rain, rain and even more rain
Day 3 -- 2623km (From hummm, to Algeciras)
I’ve never been this cold before in my life (that is my thinking), and if that Spanish friend whom I “used” to have, would be here I would smack her bottom. It was -0.5c in the mountains, and I was still in moist cloth from yesterday, my gloves are not moist, they are wet!!!
We lost Andy in Madrid… awesome roads (when it’s warm)
Dom came off on A92 at exit 182… I got off the bike, made sure that he was alive (scary), called 112 who put me on hold!!, luckily there was a Spanish truck driver who stopped, and he was kind enough to deal with emergency service (he left when the police came, and I never got his name to thank him). The other bunch came after us and stopped. Funny thing is that Jeremy more than once asked me if I was ok, which I was not -- but was able to write witness report. After more than an hour they finally flew Dom to Malaga.
We continued towards Algeciras, and I was having this discussion with myself regarding riding a bike…. keeping it
Day 4 -- 2654km (Algecira to Fes(Morocco))
We are in Morocco!!, cool, that is Border was interesting, got a photo, which could have landed me in jail (no good). Roads are either crap or grate depending one whom you are -- I would not do this on anything but enduro bikes, but there are people here on HD’s (silly sods).
Just for the record, driving in Fes is not fun!
Day 5 -- 3442km (Fes to Marrakesh)
Intersting, lack of Gas! -- someone decided that they would go on strike, and now there is no gas to be found. Got to Marrakesh, where is a lot easier to drive than in in Fes.
Day 6 -- 3668km (Marrakesh to Quarzazate)
Crossed the Atlas, cool!! in some way like the Alpes, but not really. Still looking for fuel, meet Tim Cullis who was at Bikershome, Peter the owner is also nice (Dutch), would liked to have stayed there.
Found a hotel (maroc -- www.hotellavalleemaroc.com) which was nice and cheap (lack of beer).
Day 7 -- 3894km (Quarzazate to Marrakesh)
Due to lack of fuel we have to turn around -- I was really low, and was not happy about the whole thing, would have preferred to stay a couple of days until fuel would arrive -- but noooo, everyone had to go on. Got gas from Scuba-Sparky, and when we found a gas station which had gas, I only had to fill in 17 liters, I really hate that onboard computer which does not know what it’s talking about.
We are now officially Souk Riders, went through the Souk of Marrakesh (tracklog), don’t think I want to do that again….
A small video which shows that it actually can be done:
Day 8 -- 4546km (Marrakesh to Algeciras)
Motorway, motorway…. someone went right instead of left, and we then took the ferry from Ceuta, back in Europe/Spain, warm water, nice food, tomorrow is farewell day.
Day 9 -- 4688km (Algeciras to Malaga)
Breakup day, followed the cost to Malaga, lots of concrete, so this is the “sun coast” everyone is talking about, well you can have it.
Saw Dom at the hospital, meet his wife (Janet) who is a nice and unhappy about the whole thing.
I don’t like Ibis hotels, and this is one is not any better or any worse than the rest.
Day 10 -- 4724km (Malaga)
Had a low speed off, arrrghhhh…..
Meet some nice people coming back from Morocco, nice evening….
Day 11 -- 4866 (Malaga to Gibraltar)
Hummm, it’s a rock…
Oil is coming out of the shaft…. called BMW they arrange for a pick up, which will deliver it to BMW in Algeciras tomorrow (great… not!)
Hotel stinks (Bristol), nice people, but it’s run down, and someone should paint and clean it.
Day 12 -- 5010km (Algeciras to Malaga)
First estimate 3 -- 5 days, after an hour or two I was told that I could pick it up at 6pm (in Spain that is 6.45pm). It was a seal at the end of the gearbox, happy that it was fixed.
Back in Malaga, at the Ibis…
Day 13 -- 5284 (Malaga to Granada)
Offroad, “should have turned left … ” thing, tough and scary as most of the time I had a drop of a few hundred feet (if not more) less than 2 meter from me, riding on boulders, etc. Belly pan on the bike go a smacking…
Arrived in Granada, 2 nights at ‘Hostal Nuevas Naciones’… pew, they have hot water….
Day 14 -- 0km (Granada)
Playing tourist, saw the Jewish quarter, Alhambra, nice food, etc….
Day 15 -- 6352km (Granada to north of the French/Spanish border)
Long day, first cold, then hot, then even hotter -- the air around Barcelona was killing me, talking about air pollution….
Day 16 -- 7676km (north of the French/Spanish border -- Rotterdam)
Even longer day, passed Millau Viaduct, nice, but too tired to appreciate it. Did lane splitting around Paris, with panniers on -- silly me.
Arrived home, and I can still sit down…..
If you want to see photos of this then here they are
I always talk about this thing I really want to do, which is travel the world, specifically on the back of a bike (that is motorbike). I think that while writing this, most of my family and friends would give a great deal of money for me to actually do it so that I finally would shut up (or that they would be happy to see go away for a few years)
I just by accident stumped over a blog by a guy not too far from my hometown in Denmark, who actually have done what I would like to do…..
This guy Paul Randa Jensen, is from 1944 and circumvented the globe, and still is talking about doing Oz….. man how I would like to do that….
Reading this (from spiegel.de/international), I understand that some people have come up with a “great” idea. They want to make away with trafic signs…
Reading this, make we wonder if the people makeing these decisions actually driver car, motorbike, bicycles, or just walk. Most people who move around in the trafic tend to ignore trafic signs in the first place, do they actually think that removing them will help!!
Living in a country where most indicators (you know the flashing things which will tell other people that you intend to leave the road, or change lane) are broken (even on new cars), this will not really help.
But it will probably save them some money on the budges, which will then be spend on mending people in hospitals instead, but that is a diffrent budget.
Also reading that Makkinga (some please in the Dutch province of Western Frisia) have done this, is kind of scarry.. But the worst part is that they will replace the tarmac with cobblestones instead is frightening; that will cause some broken bones for motorbike riders – these thing are slippery when they are wet, and it will cause acidents. But who cares it’s only a motorbike rider… praise to stupidity
The absolutly worst thing I know when I venture out on the Dutch roads is tailgating. First I drive a motorbike, and if you don’t know it – these things can both out accelerate almost anything, and on a strait out break anything (that is if you’re not driving a car which cost more that most houses).
So if I’m driving at 120km/h and have a car 5 – 10 meters behind me I get nervous, as I know that if I break hard there is a chance that I’ll end up in the hospital.
The other week I was told that in some US states you are at fault if you hit someone from behind, no matter what the reason was (well there might be reason why you would not be). I think that we would see less accidents caused by tailgating if that would be the law in this wonderfull flat country.
So what would make one drive 2550km (aprox. 1700 of these in pissing rain), cross 3 countries, I don’t know how many mountains, etc. on a motorbike?
Well Triump Motorcycles German decided to throw a small party in Austria which included a bit of drinking, eating, bike driving, sleeping (and I suppose that other thing which cannot be mentioned also happend). This small party is/was called Triumph Tridays, and with a bit of luck it will happen again next year.
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The highlight was a group drive to the Grossglockner (which I’m told is the highest mountain in Austria), the group I was in was lucky – we did not have snow, but that did not stop the rain (every kind of it which exist….)…
What else, except for food, beer, and … oh, yes Kevin Carmichael was there to show us mortals how to drive a bike (he is actually quite good, and a nice feller).
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For me the road home too me over some more mountains to Zurich, Switzerland, and then up through Germany, still in rain;-)
