RIDING BLIND

A couple of weeks ago, a combination of a hurry, a wet leaf and a pothole resulted in my coming off a bicycle and hitting the ground with, according to the maths, about a metric ton of force. Mostly, I landed on my left hand. Shockingly, I didn’t actually break anything. But the hand is finally the same size and colour as its counterpart, so I went riding on the bike that has an engine. This may have been a mistake, because the left hand, as every biker knows, is the clutch hand.

Now, Harley has lightened their clutches over the past few years, but they’re not exactly featherweight. Every gear change was blindingly painful. And I mean blindingly. This is not an advisable state in which to ride when there’s already a) holiday traffic, b) wet roads and c) bright sunlight to contend with.

However, that impromptu physio session now complete without accident (although I must have been hell to be stuck behind), it will hopefully get easier again. And since it's winter, less bright, too, which should help the blinding factor.

HOGSURFING

Recently, there have been a lot of rainy days, and windy days. Whether you call it climate change or not, there’s been some seriously foul weather, at least for riding. So naturally, on the first dry day, I took the bike for a spin.
Well, surf.
Well, aquaplane. Blindly.

The roads were still soaked, and while the sun was shining, it was shining on water, so the glare was intense. And while most of the diesel had been washed off the road by the ongoing downpours, there’s always new diesel being spilled. The end result is that rather than riding, tires gripping the asphalt, one ends up surfing, tires sliding and gliding over the pretty rainbows of the sun/diesel/water mixture, while one squints frantically through the glare to find and follow any dry (or dryer) ribbon one can.

The trick, of course, is to ease off the throttle a bit and follow, as far as possible, the section of road best dried by the heat of passing traffic. This cuts down filtering options, but all road paint is slippery as oil when wet anyway, so that’s not necessarily a bad thing for one’s health.

The autumnal hillsides are beautiful, though, all green and red and gold and vermillion in the clear light. Having to slow down a touch to safely surf the roads has its advantages.

SUMMER'S END

There’s a fair amount of pick-your-own when it comes to when the seasons change. You can go astronomical, official, linguistic, academic or – well – natural. And summer, according to nature, is over. I noticed this on the last ride, when I could smell sweetgrass (I had no idea it grew in this country, but you learn something new every day) in the fields, and hay drying in bales, and the acrid damp of the first bonfire of the autumn. The leaves, too, are turning yellow and brown and falling – although in some cases, I’m prepared to believe they just got parched in the last heatwave. 

Summer’s signature of lavender fields, barbecues and mown grass has dissipated, and no matter the weather, the message is clear. As far as the plants and the environment are concerned, it is now autumn. Summer, regardless of calendars, stars or even Celtic terminology, is at its end.

MS ADVENTURES

Of course, I am entirely pro women on two wheels. I still remember many years ago stopping to admire a lady in knee-high heeled boots threading a red Ducati through London rush hour like the bike weighed nothing and the traffic was simply so many roadworks cones. I more recently got stuck in roadworks alongside a lady on a Brixton BX125, a bike I’d never seen before. very nice! It’s a new bike, but very much in retro cafe racer style. We had a brief mutual admiration society before we could move on.
And when I came back to my bike after a coffee stop, she was getting chatted up by a bus full of senior citizens. She’s a beautiful machine and attracts a lot of attention, but it’s more often from men or other bikers. This time, the attention was from women, and even more so when they realised she’s mine.
The more we can get women onto bikes and into biking, the better.

ACTS OF GOD

Where I grew up and first learned to drive, there was a weird little piece of legislation that said accidents that occurred while sneezing were acts of God and therefore not covered by almost any insurance. Luckily for me, hay fever wasn’t a problem there. It is, however, a problem where I live now, and I have frequently sneezed, veered a bit, recovered and wondered what the situation would be should I one day veer into something while sneezing. Are hay fever-induced incidents covered by any insurance anywhere? Or are such things a convenient loophole for insurers not to pay? And has anyone ever stopped to work out how many accidents do occur, on a global or national, annual or monthly basis, because someone sneezed?

'TIS THE SEASON

Every summer, just when the schools break up and the roads get crowded with people trying to get away, there is invariably a sudden sprouting of roadworks on all major routes. Currently the M4 has about a 5-junction run of them, the M25, A24, A272, A205, A243 and A3 all have their share, and minor urban B-roads also have their share of pipework, resurfacing and other excuses to cause traffic jams and slipping/ skidding in hot weather. 

And lately, we have had hot weather. Which means, with an air-cooled engine, the odds of overheating increase exponentially. Thus far, I’ve manged to avoid that, thanks to very nice cars making me space to filter, but it’s come close. 

Why those who schedule such things as resurfacing and pipe-maintenance work invariably choose summer as the very best time to do it, I do not know. I can only think they don’t drive and certainly don’t ride...

REFUELLING

Some things go together. Bikes and coffee, winter Sunday rides and pub roasts, clear skies and a full tank... You get the picture. 
Between life in general and lousy weather on weekends, I haven't managed to ride much lately, so I was in almost as desperate a need of a ride as the bike by the time the skies and my schedule cleared. Sometimes the best way to refuel my battery is a good ride. I'm really not that different from my bike.  
As usual after a hiatus, the engine growled and yawned for a bit before waking up properly, then purred very happily all the way to a coffee shop I'd passed previously, but never tried. It had looked promising, so I made a mental note and luckily managed to remember that. It's not a massively long ride, so is great for winter runs or busy-life runs, when you really need a break from everything but can't afford to take a very long one. 
Southdown Coffee and Wine in Brockham off the A25 has paved parking - no slippery gravel here - and the coffee is good. I can recommend the pastries, too. The staff are friendly, and wished me a safe ride when I left. Places with pro-biker staff and good coffee are to be treasured. And frequented, in the most literal sense of the word, so as to help to keep them in business.

WINGING IT

Last summer, there was a lot of media attention on the decline of insert-insect-of-choice. Part of the proposed solution was to allow kerbs and islands to grow a little longer, to be mini-meadows. This has certainly had an effect on winged life, as well as being really pretty to ride past, or be stuck in traffic beside. My visor is dead-bug-central far more often than last summer. I even hit a butterfly on the motorway – which hasn’t ever happened to me before. 

In mainland Europe, you get poppies and company growing right up to the road in some places, so close that a bird can fly out of a hedge and straight into my arm. I’m not sure who was more stunned when this happened – me or it - and the same question occurred as the pretty butterfly wings plastered themselves to my headlight.

PICKING UP THE PIECE(S)

They say that there are only two types of bike. The ones that have been dropped, and the ones that haven't been dropped yet. Which is why it's always a good idea to be sure you can pick up the bike you're riding if you should, somehow, drop it. Given what bikes weigh in relation to many bikers (especially ones like me), this can look like a tall order. 

England has had a lot of rain lately, but it paused for the weekend, at least in my region. So, of course, I went riding, I parked up, kicked out my stand, which slid on a mud patch, recoiled in horror at the sliminess and folded itself back up. Of course, I was already leaning the bike onto it at this point, so the bike went over in slow, controlled stages. I got free easily enough, but was then faced with the task of picking it up again. 

Heavy sigh, about a tenth of the weight of the bike (which is 700lbs, give or take accessories, so many times the weight of me).  

Now, while I have never had to pick up this bike before, I do know the technique, so crouched down, with my back against the seat, gripped the chassis to either side and put my legs into it. This would have been easier with less mud or grippier boots, but you never get ideal conditions for these things. The key is to use the biggest muscles - legs - to do the work for you. 

The bike has a small paint chip on the edge of the foot board and some cement mortar residue on the engine case. Plus, of course, the ubiquitous and iniquitous mud. That is the sum total of its trauma. My hamstrings, on the other hand, have yet to forgive me. 

SPRING CLEAN

The clean, soft, freshly laundered air, all warming up and pollen-filled. April showers might bring forth may flowers, but they also bring forth mud and insects. So I spent an hour or so de-dead bugging the bike, and cleaning off all the dirt splatters, getting into all the little nooks and crannies with soap, cloth and polish, checking for rust and pitting, trying to take a good 2 years off the bike’s apparent age. 

Once all was shining and clean, of course I went riding. On country roads liable to contain insects and mud. But I’d heard about a pub called the Grumpy Mole, not far off the A25 near Dorking, and with a name like that, how could I not try it?

The staff aren’t grumpy, I’ll give them that, and the food is good. But these country pubs seem to be obsessed with gravelled parking, and on a bike, that’s skid central. 

At least the Grumpy Mole’s parking is fairly flat. I had to do gravel on an incline when I was still on L-plates, and the experience left me unenthusiastic for any kind of repeat. 

ICE BREAKER

 On one of those deceptive days – when the sun shines with no warmth and the air is Icy, I parked up by an older gentleman who was keen to have a chat about the bike, while I warmed my hands by the engine. Like most bikers, I’m always happy to chat about my wheels. And I’ve found, especially when travelling, it’s the perfect ice-breaker, whatever the weather. From the border police laughing at the sight of 2 drenched women on 2 equally soaked Harleys in northern Italy, to the various waiters, diners, bartenders and hoteliers across Europe who have shared fantastic local knowledge with me – because the bike gave us all a non-offensive conversational opener, no matter the language barriers. 
Of course, it helps that I'm  quite happy to ask for, and take, directions. 

SECOND CHANCE SALOON

Once upon a time, there was a pub in the Surrey Hills. It was a lovely pub, in an old mill-house in a little village. (The Gomshall Mill). It had good food, good service, reasonable prices and nice parking. Then it changed hands. 

The new management changed the menu to include nothing I could eat, upped the prices, and somehow managed to degrade the service. I ceased to visit. 

But recently, I was checking options in that part of the world and a new, more interesting (to me, anyway) menu popped up. Hmm. The pub appeared to have changed hands again.

Was it worth another visit?

I took myself down there, pleased to discover the parking has been resurfaced since last I was there, and the service is again friendly and efficient. 

The food is also back to standard, and while not the cheapest, at least it again feels worth its price-tag. Except the coffee, which is a weak point. Literally.

I’m glad I can reinstate it to my mental list of nice pubs on pleasant roads. 

SPRING INTO WINTER

It’s that variable time of year, when the weather vacillates between winter and spring quite arbitrarily. And it’s this time of year when the different kinds of cold are most clearly defined. 

There’s the biting cold, with the lazy wind that goes straight through all barriers rather than around, and freezes your blood in your veins. You spasm with the pain of it as it thaws again and starts to flow, and wonder why you came out.

There’s the damp, clammy cold of winter mists and fogs and freezing rain, that permeates everything and chills the bone marrow and refuses to shift, the kind that keeps you too cold to shiver. You clench your teeth in your helmet and hope your eyes don't freeze solid. 

There’s the sharp, clear cold that nips at exposed skin but stops short at thermal layering. The kind of cold that goes with bright skies and freshly coloured landscapes, as if the world is newly painted, freshly minted. 

The kind of cold that makes you gratefully curl your fingers around your coffee cup, thankful they’re not completely numb, although they tingle at the added heat. The kind of cold that's perfect for a winter-spring ride, layers deep past daffodils. 

CHARGE = DISTANCE/ TIME?

Recently, the question I've been asking is: does is matter more how far you ride or how long you ride in order to recharge your battery fully from a cold start? 
And there doesn’t seem to be an answer, just an endless debate. Currently, this is a riddle that weighs on my mind, because, thank you so very much, I have no intention of having to pay for another new battery anytime soon. 
Clearly my mid-winter arctic-weather runs were not far nor frequent enough, hence the recent back and forth with the mechanics, which has ruled out one of my favourite winter pubs. It didn’t used to be a problem – but I moved a lot closer to it than I thought I had (getting out of London takes the same inordinate amount of time regardless of distance to periphery, apparently) – so now, what used to be a long enough run for a full recharge, is clearly not.

ON A MISTY MOISTY MORNING

While the bike was being serviced, the steering lock key got a little damaged, and ceased to fit the lock. I called the workshop. They said fine, they’d replace my key, but they needed me to bring them the old one to pull the correct serial number off it to order the right new one.

Thus it was that on a misty, foggy morning, I was heading off blindly to sort this out. I do mean blindly, because the mist was fogging everything up – glasses, visor, general visibility. And unlike more usual condensation, mist is not dispelled by movement. It just swirls and resettles and causes further condensation and lack of visibility. 

The only remedy other than constantly wiping lenses/ visors is to open the visor, pull the glasses down to the end of your nose and peer over the top of them, like a stereotype of a disapproving librarian. 

Also, winter mist is surprisingly penetrative and very cold as it seeps through into your bones. Coffee is the recommended treatment here, preferably served in a cup you can lace your fingers around until you can feel them again.

UNSURE STARTS

It’s an apparently immutable law of motorcycling that your bike will always pick the least convenient moment to decide it’s not going to start. For example, when it’s due for a service and you need to ride it down to the workshop, it decides that this is a good time for the battery to die (having been drained by a very cold snap and lack of activity in bad weather). So: Call workshop, explain why bike will not be attending its appointment, and arrange for collection at a later (and thoroughly inopportune) date. 

Await call to say it’s all sorted. 

Receive call to say you need a new battery. Really? After it wouldn’t start so you had to come and fetch it? What a shock to learn the battery’s unrevivable! I mean, seriously. It’s nice that they call me to tell me the expensive bits in advance, but that particular cost was kind of already a given….