A West Country Rideout

Here are a few photos of the X9OC rideout Laurie and I went on yesterday.
The first is some of us gathering at the Motorway Services before riding to Avebury in Wiltshire, the starting-point.
There will probably be more at some point.
As you can see, the weather was rather dismal but it didn't rain properly - it was very cold, though.
Laurie followed in her car - it was very windy the day before and discretion proved the better part of valour for her.
I'm the rider in the camo trousers - they're Kevlar-lined.
The White Horse is the one at Westbury.
The group was 1 X9, 1 Silverwing and 4 big Burgers. There should have been four or five more but they had to drop out for various reasons.
The Ride itself was about 100 miles although I did 490 door to door.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/62156469@N00/sets/72157627851754408/

Nice! thanks for posting.

Bob

Nice photos Mike! For 10 years I used to live in this part of the country in Salisbury!

Can I ask you about your Honda Leg deflectors: Did you fit them yourself, and if so, was it an easy job? And finally, do they make a big difference to keeping warmer in the winter months?

Cheers!

SteVe

Hi Mike... great photos... you sure do ride with a lot of gray haired old men. Oh, I forgot, the guy in the camo pants is gray haired as well.

I would have loved riding with you. (My hair is almost totally gray now). Pretty country. Is that typical for the area? I also noticed that the sign in the couple of photos had English words. I expected to see Dutch or French or German.

Fascinating to learn about other cultures. Being from a rural part of Arkansas I have been exposed to very little "Culture" of any kind. We do have clean bathrooms though.

Great

Thanks, everyone.
I take no credit for the pictures, just for nicking them!

Steve: my dealer fitted the leg-deflectors prior to my collecting it.
They do make a difference, not least in stopping flapping of the trouser-legs.
My sister and brother-in-law live in Salisbury - I know it quite well. Avebury is one of my favourite places, especially the Henge Shop.

I think the group was all 60 or over bar the photographer.
It only goes to show that a) maxiscooters are the business and b) they keep us young.

One of the best things about England is that the enormous variety of countryside is contained in a relatively small area.
I guess one of the marvels of the US is the huge areas - prairies, Rockies and so on which stretch seemingly for ever.
In England one can see plains, hills, valleys and rolling countryside in one rideout - we did just over 100 miles.

There are quite a few lines of chalk hills, called Downs, and the landscape is similar round them all.
They more-or-less run E - W; North Downs, South Downs, Berkshire Downs, Malborough Downs are the most well-know (probably) and have White Horses and other creatures carved in them, some ancient, some more modern.
Along the tops of some are ancient trackways which strech for many miles - people still walk them today.*
Salisbury Plain, where Avebury is, is littered with ancient Burial Mounds, Standing Stones (Avebury and Stonehenge in particular) and such like, a fascinating part of the world.
Also we touched on the Mendip Hills, a limestone range, where the landscape is very beautiful and quite similar, too.
I could go on......!

* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ridgeway

Opalsboy wrote:

I also noticed that the sign in the couple of photos had English words. I expected to see Dutch or French or German.

Opalsboy, I don't think you realised MikeO was riding in the South West of England. Had there been a different outcome to the 2WW you may have expected to see some signs in German!

Cheers,

Thanks - I missed that.
Indeed, my rideout included a two-way trip on the Cross-Channel ferries - a 90 minute passage.
On the way out I was on the new super-ferry again - it'll carry 1000 cars and if the car-lanes painted on the deck were laid end to end they'd stretch for 2.6 KMs.
It's huge!

Thanks Mike. We get so much of our information from movies and television, it is nice to see the countryside through your eyes. Even if the people do ride on the wrong side. :lol!:

Thanks Tar... Yep... I thought Mike was riding in Belgium. Being that the ride was in ENGLAND, it makes sense to see the English signs.... I think Mike was trying to trick an old country boy and it worked. Probably just shows my lack of knowing what places look like in the world without chicken houses and pine trees. I need to get out more. Thank you guys for sharing the world with someone that will probably never go to these places that you post pictures of. We do have more in common that just the love of our scoots.

That explains the cloudy skies too. Very nice day for a ride. The flat lands favored Kansas here in the states.

Mike, do they allow scoots/MC to use the tunnel between the England and France? Not that I would want to do that, but it might be something on a bucket list somewhere.

Opalsboy wrote:

Mike, do they allow scoots/MC to use the tunnel between the England and France? Not that I would want to do that, but it might be something on a bucket list somewhere.

Laurie here. Yes, there are special trains for freight, cars, bikes, etc that run through the tunnel to France. It only takes half an hour and is my preferred route to France. The ferries take longer.

Thanks, Gary.
One day I'll ride in the States - I love just to sit and let the Silverwing carry me along. All too soon here we come to the place where we have to turn off the highway....but I like riding whatever.

Yes, bikes use the Tunnel - all vehicles and passengers are carried through on special trains. The cars and bikes travel on double-deck carriages while coaches and high vehicles have special carriages which have no second floor.
Freight travels on different trains with a carriage for the drivers.
It's not my preferred crossing because: there's nowhere to sit - bikes have to be on the side-stand.
There's no view.
It's usually more expensive than the boat.
Bikes are usually last on and off.

More liable to delay.
Advantages: it's quick - only 30 mins.

It's a fantastic thing, though.

Here's a link - the picture of the bikes shows it in one of the coach carriages - we get tucked in anywhere although never on the upper deck - the ramps are very steep!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Channel_Tunnel

Sorry Mike - I hijacked your thread !!

Laurie

Laurie... don't worry, you are a lot prettier that Mike.
You both sure taught me something. I thought that vehicles just drove through the tunnel like they do tunnels here. I did not realize that ALL vehicles are carried on "trains". That tunnel is an engineering marvel. I saw a special about its construction years ago. I didn't catch the non driving item. I thought that vehicles just drove the tunnel.

Maybe someday there will be a tunnel from the US to Europe. Don't want to say it is impossible.

Many years ago I was helping clear out the house of my first wife's grandmothers that had died. She had an old set of encyclopedias and I happened to pick up the "A" volume. I opened it to the aviation section and read about the planes of the day. Aviation was very new(the books were published in the mid 20s) and two winged aircraft were the "NEW' items. I read where for future development they were going to construct floating fuel stations at intervals across the Atlantic ocean to allow trans oceanic crossing. No one ever imagined that planes would be able to fly that far without being refueled.

Is OK, Laurie.

I was reading on line about the Bristol Freighters converted to carry cars across the Channel - Silver City Airways.
Worth a Google.

Great pics Mike, (even if you never took em.) Looks like a good ride for all.

MikeO wrote:

Salisbury Plain, where Avebury is, is littered with ancient Burial Mounds, Standing Stones (Avebury and Stonehenge in particular) and such like.

Mike, your forgetting the hundreds of tons of ordinance thrown at it every year by the Military. Salisbury Plain is also very well known for being a massive military training area.

Thanks, Doug.
Yes, I spent several years accompanying another school's School Journeys to Swanage - visits to the Tank Museum and Lulworth Castle were regular events.

Was this the article you were reading?

http://www.go-faster.com/SS100.html

Not scooters but should be of interest to some riders out there.

(I'm going to create a separate thread for this)

Cheers,