Aren't bikes great?; long trip report...

The intention had been to go to a rally in Ziri, Slovenia with a few
others but for various reasons that didn't happen. Work's been pretty
tough and I needed a break so I went on my own.

I suppose I should have spent a little time preparing the bike (K1100LT)
and probably packing. As it was I spent 15 minutes chucking stuff in
the side cases and top box and then noted that it was towards the bottom
of the window for oil.

Left the UK on Weds evening and stayed in Calais (F1, it's a bed)
chatted with a few French and Germans on the way back from the IOM. The
Germans had their bikes on trailers- saw a lot of this, why do they do
this???

Thursday was Calais to Ingolstadt (nr Munich) where I camped. All fine
except the journey was about 11 hours and almost 600 miles, there was an
awful traffic queue (close to 20km) due to the A6 being shut in Germany.
I've never read my GPS manual and didn't realise that I should simply
press the button marked 'detour'. you live and learn. Campsite fine
except for the mosquitos/midges. Fuckers.

Friday was Ingolstadt to well... somewhere. I thought I'd just head
south and see how it went. Along the way I thought I'd like to see the
Croation coast... as I later found out did many Slovenians. The
motorway towards Senf etc was solid just after Ljubljanska. After 20
minutes of filtering and watching the other carriageway I got pissed off
and turned around and headed for Zagreb. Ended up getting my GPS to
select a hotel. Zagreb looked well, like the curates egg; some nice old
buildings and a generally agreeable state of scruffy disrepair but also
a lot of crap new buildings. Not sure I'd go back in a hurry but it was
good enough. A longish day of about 9 hours riding in heat. Took my
gloves off which helped.

Saturday was from Zagreb to Ziri (never gone from a place starting with
Z to a place starting with Z before). About 125 miles. Went to the
rally site and thought, this is going to be bloody boring when I found
it almost impossible to get a beer due to language issues (why don't
they speak German... it's almost Austria...) Then a little voice said
'you're not that far from Prague. Every year at the Elefant we talked
about going to Prague. This year I did. But not from the Elefant. Long
journey. Thank God I didn't get stopped in Austria (close to double the
posted limit for a couple of hours...) Anyway got to Prague at about
10pm. 11 hours riding and about 650 miles. The border between Austria
and Czech feels like a real border. At some point in this journey I
put my gloves back on; when I stopped to fuel they got hotter and
hotter. I've sunburnt them. Bollocks.

Sunday I was a little fatigued and fancied an easier day, so I just
headed for Metz. About 450 miles and 6 hours.

And today I did Metz to my home.

All in all, enjoyable but tiring. In total somewhere around 2,800
miles. The BMW ran faultlessly. I did end up putting about 1/2 a litre
of oil in it.

Rather expensive because of the fuel and the hotel in Prague (try
arriving on a saturday night on a whim...).

Would do it again but might maybe plan a route next time.

Am certainly planning to do either Greece or Turkey this year for my
summer holiday; just got to work out whether to take the 1100 or the
XT660.

 

On 14/06/2010 21:07, wrote:

Snipped..

Lucky bastard.

Nige

 

*twitch*

 

Well, you say this *now* but it's no fecking use when I'm in the UK.
Pointing and grunting and then saying " A beer, ein bier, un(e?)
pression (obviously spelt incorrectly) eventually worked. But just the
once.

 

Three days holiday. The joys of being a permie... with 35 days leave
this year.

 

Oddly enough that's the extent of my liguistic ability in those parts

 

As many days as I like.

The joys of being EKS, again.

 

wrote in

next time, enter Croatia from the west - south from Trieste, into
Slovenia then towards Pula. Istrian coast road is interesting but very
bumpy. New road from Pula to Zagreb through the mountains is excellent.

silly sod - I always take some factor 30 sun screen for biking that far
south

see above

 

On 14 June, 21:07, wrote:

Andreja didn't find you then? She was looking out for you
Looking at the facebook photo's you didn't miss much.

 

Yes... I could have done with that. I've got tanned hands now, well that
part which wasn't covered by my bike jacket's cuffs.

 

Well I was there for about an hour and it seemed about the same as last
year to be honest. But, no, didn't see anyone I recognised. Mind you I
was sober this time...

 

Close, and would normally work, but...

<pedant>
In Croatia it'd be 'dva piva, molim'.

Slovenian is 'dva piva, prosim'.
</pedant>

Either way, getting 2 beers means less trips to the bar if you're on your
own.

 

It seems a life-time ago.

"... the tall one, with the beanie."