Germany Trip September 2015

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Germany Trip September 2015

Postby T.Murphy aka Tim » Wed Sep 30, 2015 1:42 pm

Finally!
Middle of August and Ramo points out he has a few days off at the end of the month so what we gonna do?
I’ve been promising to go back to Germany with no success the last 2 years and so it was suggested we try it.

A quick “plan” was put together, some of it around my own small experience from the past and some of it from info gleaned off the GS Forum, including accomodation and even discounted Ferry prices from an ex Police Rider who has a business account with P&O Ferries.
....and so it was, on Monday afternoon, September 31st,

.......
1 ready for the off.jpg




DAY 1.


I set off on the Bird to meet Ramo and his Bird at the Services on the M180 on the way to Hull. A 5 minute torrential thunderstorm just east of the A1 ensured that my waterproofs which were packed in my panniers, stayed nice and dry.
Onwards to Hull, where we filled up to the brim before boarding. Not for price reasons, just so we can get the hell as far away from Zeebrugge in the morning, before needing fuel again.

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An "exciting" hour spent queuing!

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A pleasant evening was spent on board

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including “setting” up my Sena “proper”. All working perfect now. Bike to bike, phone, music, sat nav, oh yes, nothing can go wrong now!

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Our plan was to ride to, and spend the first night at Cochem or thereabouts, next day ride down to B500 staying near the southern end in a village called Seebach, returning on the 3rd day to Adenau, to the ‘Ring, before heading to the ferry on Friday. Accomodation booked no problem heh heh and cheap compared to “home”. About 250 miles a day it was going to work out at.
Woke to a dullish morning and was soon on the motorway east across Belgium. Sena saved my bacon exiting the ferry port when I battled with the wrong way round on a roundabout or two and then we were away. Up into top gear and a steady 3 figure speed across country. That is until the drizzle started, fine at first and then slightly heavier.

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Our speed decreased steadily as the spray got worse and strangely the speed of the BMW Estates was inversely proportional to ours!
Well, we finally got off the motorway, at a place called Eupen, where we stopped for fuel and a coffee. By now it was pissing down and once parked outside Maccy D’s we thought that now was a good time to put our waterproofs on ! My one and only attempt at French resulted in being served a coffee and a tea rather than the small fekkin coffee I asked for.
Once south out of Eupen we were in “proper” foreign lands climbing up into forest towards Monschau. Stopped for a coffee but fook all open!.

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Here we got on the 258 road. This is an cracking road that takes us all the way to the Nurburgring. The rain was easing up all the time and by the time we stopped at our first proper cafe in Blankenheim
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.... things had dried out nicely . Just fantastic empty riding roads all the way.

We arrived at the Nurburgring at about 4 in the afternoon, just in time to watch some of the Racing School “learner drivers” go about their business LOL,

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The cloud was still too low for us to see the Nurburg Castle up on high.
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before dropping down into Adenau for a coffee.

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Time to “crack on” from here, the last leg of the day to Cochem and Klotten down on the Moselle river. I’ve ridden this rode several times and know what to expect..but it still amazed me as we let the Birds stretch their wings. Oh what a lovely sweeping fast road, and that last drop down into Cochem again had me giggling out loud and “ooooh, fekkin ‘ell” out loud.

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At the bottom, we immediately did an “aj”, turning round and honing it back up, stopping for a look and then hooning it back down. A beautiful late Summer’s evening saw us pootling up through Cochem ( I didn’t realise how beautiful a place it is until now as we'd never ridden up through the town in the past) to Klotten , just 2 kms up the road.
Over the railway crossing and the hotel is bang next to it!

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We’d heard the hotel was biker friendly , and so it was. The lady booking us in refused to show us to our room....”not until you have sat down and drunk your complimentary beer that we always give our biker guests” ! The bikes were parked in what looks like an old dance hall annexed to the side of the Hotel. The double doors were opened and in we rode to be met with about 20 other parked up bikes.


This “garage” had a drying room, full tool set, cleaning equipment, karcher, you name it they had it. What a set up.
Three beers later and it was up to our room where we quickly freshened up. Myself and Ramo had a very romantic evening, walking the village, having a few beers and a meal at a quiet bar, before retiring for the night games.

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.. All through the night the sound of the freight trains and occasional passenger trains that passed underneath our open window muffled Ramos moans and occasional scream of pleasure, bloody fantastic! What a beautiful area this is. Can't wait for tomoz. About 240 miles today.
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Re: Germany Trip Sptember 2015

Postby Cyclops » Thu Oct 01, 2015 1:40 pm

Get on with it slacker :mrgreen: :ride)
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Re: Germany Trip Sptember 2015

Postby Cyclops » Sun Oct 04, 2015 9:41 pm

a master class in how to do a ride report :notworthy)

Pictures are pretty awesome too. :thumbsup)
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Re: Germany Trip Sptember 2015

Postby jono49 » Thu Oct 08, 2015 10:58 pm

you facetious bastid Ian lol lol lol
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Re: Germany Trip Sptember 2015

Postby barsteward » Thu Oct 08, 2015 11:44 pm

I'm in awe :mrgreen:

fookin paper hat springs to mind. screwy

Think the only "master class" is going riding to Kostas at the same time , in the same parking spot, with the same riding gear, meeting the same people and regurgitating the same shite. :roll) :thumbsup)
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Re: Germany Trip Sptember 2015

Postby T.Murphy aka Tim » Fri Oct 09, 2015 1:44 am

barsteward wrote:
Think the only "master class" is me logging into Ixxra year after year , in the same "parking spot", meeting the same people and regurgitating the same shite. :roll) :thumbsup)


Oh sweet irony ya Todmorden faggot. Ya really couldnt mek it up could ya. duh

lol
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Re: Germany Trip Sptember 2015

Postby barsteward » Fri Oct 09, 2015 9:39 am

T.Murphy wrote:
barsteward wrote:
Think the only "master class" is me logging into Ixxra year after year , in the same "parking spot", meeting the same people and regurgitating the same shite. :roll) :thumbsup)


Oh sweet irony ya Todmorden faggot. Ya really couldnt mek it up could ya. duh

lol


I'll have you know, I went to Glasson Dock last week, yes you heard, Glasson Dock! lol :thumbsup)
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Re: Germany Trip Sptember 2015

Postby Cyclops » Fri Oct 09, 2015 9:40 am

Fook me Tim

War and peace was written in less time :mrgreen:




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Re: Germany Trip Sptember 2015

Postby barsteward » Fri Oct 09, 2015 1:32 pm

Cyclops wrote:Fook me Tim

War and peace was written in less time :mrgreen:




Coooooooont.

The fookin needlework on the Bayeux Tapestry was completed in less time Ian, yer right though e's a Cooooooont :thumbsup)
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Re: Germany Trip Sptember 2015

Postby Akuji » Fri Oct 09, 2015 4:41 pm

Feckin Tam-o-shanker :mrgreen:
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Re: Germany Trip September 2015

Postby T.Murphy aka Tim » Fri Nov 13, 2015 1:05 pm

Finally got my arse into gear so the OP has been updated today. I WILL finish it. :P
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Re: Germany Trip September 2015

Postby barsteward » Fri Nov 13, 2015 5:06 pm

Not before time :roll)
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Re: Germany Trip September 2015

Postby bodmin » Sun Nov 15, 2015 12:19 am

Glad you had a good trip. Have to make sure we can meet up next time :thumbsup) .
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Those that count, and those that can't...

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Re: Germany Trip September 2015

Postby Mister Majestik » Mon Nov 16, 2015 7:38 pm

Very good

looks like a gay time was had by all :wink)
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Re: Germany Trip September 2015

Postby T.Murphy aka Tim » Wed Nov 18, 2015 9:40 pm

Day 2.
Lovely continental breakfast set us up for the days riding and a gorgeous morning it was too. Bikes out from the "garage",


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a loosen up on the resident demonstrator bike

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and its away we go.
Away for 10.00 and refuelled in Cochem we headed down the Moselle , a lovely fast sweeping road alongside the river that a good few of us will remember from the past, stopping at that lovely cafe at Alf for, yep, apple strudel and fresh fook off cream with coffee.

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By now it was getting bloody warm. A quick check at the Michelin maps I’d invested in, not that I doubted my Garmin, oh no and it was off we jolly well go. From here it was all new roads and country for me, but not to worry as I had meticulously plotted 2 routes for the first 2 days, not worrying about the 3rd as we could improvise our return to the Ring and Adenau.
South and over the bridge over the Moselle where it all got very steep and twisty and outrageous. After the first turn off on the other side of the bridge my garmin informed me that I was “off-route” “Ha” I said, “no I am fekkin not..look I’m still on the purple line” Further up the hill the purple line started to move away from my bike icon. “You fekkin twat, how did you fekkin get me off route like that bitch?” her reply “recalculate?” Nope, I know we just have to keep going and just start to wend our way south back onto the route. This worked out fine and we just rode and rode, stopping now and agin to marvel at bthe roads we’d been up, were going on and the ones we couldn’t get to. Absolutely stunning countryside and colours at this time of the year.

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Turned off towards a village for a cafe hunt and met a large bulldozer/dumper coming around the corner in front of me. I stopped. He stopped. I waited a “minute” . So did he. Ramo caught me up and said “Tim, ya on the wrong side of the fekkin road again” Sena saves me again.

From Alf to Gemunden, Simmertal, Meisenheim, Lauterecken, Wolfstein on the 421, 420, 270 and onto Kaiserslautern.Wonderful, wonderful roads. Getting across this Kaiserslautern wasn’t half as bad as expected and then it was a climb back up out of Kaiserslautern onto the “48” road and what a road. We stopped for a brew at the Hotel Johanniskreuz and what looked like a regular bikers haunt too.

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Ramo had a play with his new Garmin 390L, unfortunately we didn't have the route on it cos in a bit it would have helped a LOT!

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A couple of coffees and cake sat out in the glorious sunshine, a study of the Michelin maps and then it was time to move, across over and through mental forest roads down into North East corner of France towards Wissembourg and onto some really beautiful gentle countryside with the Vosges mountains on our right, and lovely gentle but fast sweeping roads through Green Giant and sunflower fields, finally onto the long awaited B500 and across the Rhine. Not the good bit, just a main road to Baden Baden but nevertheless the big road signs with “B500” on them started to get us moist.
It was as we approached the first bridge over part of the Rhine. Glancing at my Garmin I noticed a band of diagonals on the left hand side of the screen. As we rode east, the band got bigger. Then my Garmin informs me that “in 300 metres, you will be riding off-road” WTF? My screen was now filled with diagonals as I slowly realised that for some reason, other than forgetfulness, yes probably fekkwittedness, I hadn’t downloaded some of the relevant map sections needed for this part of fekkin Germany that I had no fekkin idea about !

Not to worry. We can’t possibly get it wrong from here. I had studied the maps at home, knew where to go once on the B500 and where our hotel was for the night. Not a fekkin probelemo.
Through the longest tunnel I’ve ever been in at Baden Baden and out the other side, the road got quieter now as we headed out of Baden Baden and started to gently climb. This is what we’ve been waiting for..the famous bit of the B500, all 30 odd miles of fast, sweeping bends and twisties. We stopped for a breather and a couple of pics before enjoying this road.

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Up we climbed with just one bloody white van to get past, safely ! Then we started dropping down, really tight steep twisties and the road surface was quite bad. “Hmmm, I’m not very impressed with this B500” I thought. . Then my super fine directional intuitiveness warned me that we were riding due east “DUE FEKKIN EAST I TELL YA”. The B500 runs north south basically. NOT due bloody east. Of course my Garmin was as much use as my Blackbird tool kit that I’d left at home in my garage. At some stage coming out of Baden Baden we must’ve missed seeing in big fekk off white letters “B500” that was painted all over the road at regular intervals
We dropped own into a beautiful town crossing the river that ran through it and stopped to take stock. Where the fook were we?

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Click on this next pic to see the poisonous weed in amongst the beautiful flowers.

:wink)

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Gernsbach so it seemed. By now though, time was getting on , we were getting tired and so we didn’t have much time to look around unfortunately.

Ramo’s new Garmin 390L was now put into use. Punching the destination “Pension Williams Hotel, Seebach” could only take us on winding, twisty, fabulous, empty roads in glorious Black Forest countryside.
Heading south and then back across the river we got on the L80b, a small road that climbed and climbed, was totally empty and which the Birds just gobbled up in 3rd all the way. What a fekkin road and what a ride. This got us back across country onto the B500, about half way down it. Never mind we’d had a hoot anyway.
So, finally on the B500, albeit half way down, we set off. Bloody hell what a fast safe road. Mental, wide , fabulous long sweeping bends with great visibility. No sooner had we started to pick up the pace though, that I had to stop. Ramo was by now out of Sena range as I slowed to a halt gawping but tuff, I just had to stop....and take in one of the best views I have ever seen. Those that have ridden this road must know what I’m on about. Views as far west as the eye can see, spectacular.

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Ramo eventually returned, was suitably impressed wiith the view and some friendly Italians did the honours with the camera. Time to get going again and it wasn’t long on the B500 when we came across a right turn to Seebach. This road just got better and better and wasn’t the road to Seebach that I had studied on Mapsource. At the end of a long days riding rather than winding things down , this fabulous empty road , road surface and countryside, rejuvenated us. It was balls out mental stuff again. I asked Ramo on the Sena, were we mistaken and was this still the B500, it was that good, but no, he was sure it wasn’t. We later found out it was an earlier turn off than I had seen on Mapsource, the L86. Just an unbelievable road. But then again, they all are aren’t they.
Getting late , we pulled up outside Pension Williams in the picturesque village of Seebach . it’s a small hotel/guesthouse run by a British couple and recommended by many GS riders. Again, cheap as chips, about £25 each , I had booked this when we first made plans. By now we were both fekked and I said to Ramo fook getting the stuff off the bikes, let’s check in and have ourselves a nice cold beer.

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Into reception and Mr Williams appeared. “Good evening “ said I, “before we get onto formalities, we could really do with a great big fekk off, ice cold beer each please, oh and by the way, I’m Mr Murphy and we have a room for two booked” I smile. He smiles. He frowns. I smile. Ramo smiles. “Room for two? Mr Murphy? Tonight? You sure?”
“Yes, ‘course I’m sure, room for two, Wednesday September 2nd. It’s Wednesday innit?”
Sharp intake of breath

“I don’t think so Mr Murphy. We are fully booked tonight and you’re name.....( flicks through Booking Register) I’m afraid, is not down here. Did you pay a deposit?”
“No, I fekkin didn’t. I offered and was told by ya missus it’d be alright”
“I got an email confirmation”
“Show it me then Murph
“can’t, amot got a signal so can’t get my emails up”
“Hmm, I’ll ring the missus, she’s out at the mo”
After a couple of mins on the phone it was “Sorry Murph, she’s never fooking heard of you, you’ve shit it lad”
I look at Ramo, then Mr Williams, then Ramo. Ramo looks blank, shrugs his shoulders ( I’m getting déjà vu here from past times at the Tan Hill Inn and Clun), then the penny drops...

“Ha ha , ha ha, ya pair of coonts. Ramo’s put you up to this blag hasn’t he? Phoned you up earlier and told you to play along with the old Murphy has fooked up joke eh?”
“Nope”
“Ramo?”
“Nope”
Then the phone rings and after a few yes’s and no’s and yes dear’s and ok’s, Mr Williams sheepishly turns to us and says “I am so sorry, My wife has just remembered your booking and now remembers she failed to transfer it to the poota. This is our first mistake in 8 years and I cannot apologise enough”
Well at least it wasn’t my fault. Nowhere to sleep but not MY fault. A quick ring around and we were redirected to another beautiful guesthouse a hundred yards down the road.


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“Once again, please accept our apologies and as a small gesture here’s a miniature bottle of Seebach Schnapps each”
A poxy miniature I tell you! Ah well, owt’s better than nowt I suppose.
A beautiful late evening walk around the village looking for food came up blank and so a pizza delivery was called for whilst we sat outside supping cold beer from the fridge. Fridge was full of beer and an instruction to help ourselves and just use the honesty sheet to say what we’d had. Love it.

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Cracking end to an absolutely wonderful, full on days riding. About another 250 miles...ish. Doesn't get any better than this ! :ride) :ride)
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Re: Germany Trip September 2015

Postby jono49 » Wed Nov 18, 2015 11:46 pm

More More hurry up!!!!!!!!!! :clap: :clap: :clap:
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Re: Germany Trip September 2015

Postby TRIPPO » Thu Nov 19, 2015 10:58 am

That Black Forest is fooookin awesome ain't it Mr Murphy :notworthy) :notworthy)
There,s only one good ride!!!!!
One that you return home safely from!!!!! Make sure you do!!!!!
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Re: Germany Trip September 2015

Postby Simmo » Thu Nov 19, 2015 6:42 pm

Cracking keep it coming

Think we nay gave stopped at the same place

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Re: Germany Trip September 2015

Postby Oldbull » Thu Nov 19, 2015 7:26 pm

TRIPPO wrote:That Black Forest is fooookin awesome ain't it Mr Murphy :notworthy) :notworthy)



Amen to that Trppo :rockon) :rockon)

fek it, Im going to sort a proper Damm Busters route out for next year, been threatening it since we went with Simmo's club t'other year :notworthy) :notworthy)

Never tire of that riding that country :ride) :ride)
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Re: Germany Trip September 2015

Postby T.Murphy aka Tim » Thu Nov 19, 2015 7:49 pm

Oldbull wrote:
TRIPPO wrote:That Black Forest is fooookin awesome ain't it Mr Murphy :notworthy) :notworthy)



Amen to that Trppo :rockon) :rockon)

fek it, Im going to sort a proper Damm Busters route out for next year, been threatening it since we went with Simmo's club t'other year :notworthy) :notworthy)

Never tire of that riding that country :ride) :ride)



See if someone on Facebook is doing one.

:mrgreen:
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Re: Germany Trip September 2015

Postby T.Murphy aka Tim » Sat Nov 21, 2015 4:30 pm

Day 3 and 4.
Looking out of the bedroom window it was a lovely late Summer’s morning again,

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so started off with “their” standard lovely Continental buffet breakfast. Cold meat selection, eggs boiled and or scrambled, cheeses, fresh bread, fruit, fabulous coffee, Christ we coulda stopped there until lunchtime. But no. Time to get going, another good mileage day today . Ramo came down to the bike absolutely buoyant as he’d managed to become “regular” again and in doing so also lost half a stone.
Again, we set off about 10 and headed lower down onto the B500. Again, roads to die for and a nice fast blatt down to the end of the B500 where it joins the “28”. That’s as far south as we could go as we were riding north all day to Adenau and the Nurburgring. Turning round it was time to give the “whole” famous bit of the B500 a go and yes, what a fabulous fast road. However, at this time of day there was still a bit of traffic including a lorry or two and one campervan that spoiled the flow. Dropping down at the northern edge was fun and which I’m sure would be even better riding up it from the North.
So, that was the B500 eh. Good, but maybe we’d been spoiled on the way down as we both thought we’d ridden better roads than this. Down and back through the tunnel and across the Rhine, where with one or two missed junctions we ended up a bit further north than intended. A bit of guessing and wandering around trying to find “those good roads we came down on” and we finally got into France again and some lovely gentle but pacey roads.

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With my Garmin back in action with the maps that I had actually loaded we had a decent idea of our route although in my excitement I hadn’t actually planned a route back. Thought it’d be just a case of heading north by north west sorta thing. By now we were getting desperate for fuel ( well I was anyrode cos my consumption was a fair bit more than Ramo’s ). A few spurious SatNav petrol stations later and I’m running on fumes until we found Bad Bergzabern, a beautiful town with quite a few cafes. Time to fill up, coffee, cake, chew the cud and watch the world go by . By now it was about 12.30 to 1.00..

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After overdosing on what was probably the best cake and coffee of the trip, we set off and within a few short miles managed to miss the 48 road north. Dunno how, but we just kept heading north looking for a road up and over the mountains on our left. Tried a few roads but always ended up at a dead end a la “aj routing”. Starting to get a bit pissed off we finally got to a town where the sat nav showed a decent road west over the hills. But first we had to negotiate this town, the first we’d actually ridden through. Whilst filtering through a contraflow/traffic lights, some biker pulled alongside us. Kevlar jeans, biking trainers, leather jacket, open face, wrap around shades..a cool dude ha! Oh and what’s the bike? Ahh, a BMW S1000r. Ha! Fekkin boy racer in mid 50’s no doubt
“’Alo”
“orright moosh”
“’Avink a nice time guys?”
“Err, yea , well, we were but we’ve been a bit lost, but we know where we’re going now ta”
“Ver is zat zen?”
“Wll, Nurburgring but before that, over to Kaiseslautern and err, well just fekkin riding really”
“Das ist gut” ( my German language Course was really paying dividends here) “ I vil show you a good vay, follow me”
Hmmm, should we or shouldn’t we...fook it, off we followed. We had a few doubts and nearly bailed out when he took us down some tiny backstreets, back and forth, but over the Senas we decided to carry on a bit. Found out later that he’d taken us that way because the main roads were all up due to a major gas leak. ( shoulda seen Ramos eyes light up)

Before we knew it we were through the town of Neustadt, the birthplace of German democracy according to this chap, and onto good road. This road got better and better, the L499. By fook could this bloke ride, and the BM , well it could have been on fekkin rails. This was another mental ride, with just the rare fast overtake as basically it was empty. On and on this road , seemed never ending until we popped out onto the top at the Hotel Johanniskreuz agin on the 48! Wayheyyyy, we’re back on track. We all pulled in to the car park where we introduced ourselves. The blokes name was Christian and he was just out for a “bimble”.




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We laughed at the ride we’d just had and thanked him for showing it to us. A few more minutes talking bollox and then we said goodbye.
“Just a minute, vich vay are you goink now zen?”
“Err well we were fancying skirting north around Kaiserslautern to a place called Hochspeyer which we’d been recommended but we aint sure now cos of time”
“Ahh, fekk it, I vill take you anuza good vey, follow me”
So we did, and what another blast that was . 48 road to Hochspeyer was a blast and onwards north west, taking in a lot of L roads- no hedges. No dry stone walls, although we did observe and comment that Jono would enjoy the plentiful and forgiving ditches We were all on to keep pace with the German, boy could that Bee Emm handle those sort of roads. He must’ve took us 30 miles north of Kaiseslautern before he pulled in and said he’d have to turn back. What a fabulous “guided tour” that was. Swapped contact details and we were on our way again. More fab roads and eventually we started recognising roads we’d come down 2 days earlier. Great, we’re back on track. I honestly can’t remember if we stopped for a coffee from here on, although we must’ve at some stage.

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With time ticking away we were having a ball and the weather was still brilliant late Summer.

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We eventually got back to the Moselle hitting some brilliant, never ending downward twisties and I don’t think we passed one vehicle in the last hour or two. Bloody ridiculous I tell ya, bloody ridiculous. Filling up at Alf it was a straightforward blast up the valley, a road a lot of us will remember, except me apparently, as half way up I inexplicably turned fekkin left. No problem thought I , I will soon put us back on track! However, I didn’t and we eventually got to the Nurburgring Car Park via a fekkin convoluted route, for 7.05 p.m., just in time to see the last of the exotix stuff leaving the Ring for the day! One Nurgurgring T-shirt later and a couple of pics and it was a drop down into Adenau to the Hotel an der Nordshleife for the night. Unbeknown to me, the owner, Eddie, doesn’t live at the hotel anymore and he was waiting as we pulled in.

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“I sort you vernt cummink and voz ready to go home, but velcom here’s ya key now fekk off and enjoy yasselves”

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Phew! One shower and change later and we’re out and across to the Italian restaurant across the road. Fabulous large proper Italian mean and several large ice cold biers put the icing on a wonderful days riding again.
A good nights sleep followed by another cracking breakfast listening to the racing cars in the background. It was Racing School day again and they were out in force at 8.00 in the morning. A gorgeous morning too. We had a walk up the side of the Ring and spent some time watching and listening to the cars as they raced down from the forest towards the bridge and the hotel. Fekk me, were they fast.

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Well, mid morning and it was time to kit up and head for Zeebrugge. We took the scenic way but by lunchtime the weather had turned to drizzle and with one or two missed turn offs we were on a northward bound dual carriageway which was what we didn’t want. First chance we got we were back onto good roads all the way to Spa where we stopped for coffee overlooking the main drag. Spa is a beautiful place to just sit and chill .....

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which is what we did until an orange coloured car turned off and rolled down behind us to the Radisson Hotel nearby. Fekk me, that was a McLaren. So off I walk just as the “test driver “ in orange overalls and clipboard got out and walked into the hotel.

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Wondering whose it was I took some pics and see on the number plate that is is “Roman’s” The Chelski bloke? What a machine.


Time to go again, this time plotting a nice little off the beaten track road bringing us out onto the E40/42 and a straight blatt to the ferry. After filling up, this went Ok until a slow responding satnav took me off route twice. With a few more picture stops .........

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we lost more time and when we finally jumped onto the slip road for the motorway and realised it was for eastbound fekkin traffic and not west, my arse started to nip up. A mad blast east to the next junction before we could turn around and then it was open the taps and go........until we hit traffic that is, Friday afternoon traffic ! It made Friday traffic in Sheffield pale into insignificance. Fekk me 4 lanes all chokka as we approached Brussels. Then it cleared, ooh thank fook, then it built up and then it stopped. Keeping tabs on each other was getting difficult what with concentrating on what’s ahead, filtering and looking behind. Ramo shouts up to just get going and we’ll see each other at the ferry as we were just slowing each other down as we were.


“O.K” says I and orf I bloody well went. The next couple of hours was the worst and most stressful riding I think I’ve ever done. Losing time and then trying to get it back at ballistic speeds when chance arose, all the time watching the clock, speedo and mileage dropping not quick enough and the fuel gauge droppiing like a stone; it was all very alarming. Aiming for 5.30 last board it really was touch and go and with 25 miles to go my reserve light came on. Oh bollox, 30 miles I have got in the past before running out. If i stop now, I thought, I’m going to lose that much time...”oh fekk, what to do?” carry on regardless I thought and with that I enetered the last couple of mile entrance straights to the port. Just to fekk my head up completely i entered one underpass and came out the other side to the heaviest short downpour I really have seen. Fekk me Betty, I could see us parked at the port for the night, soaking fekkin wet and too fekked to try the tunnel. What a disaster!


Fortune favours the brave however and I arrived at the port entrance kiosk for 5.30. Parked up with a sigh of relief as there was a queue of traffic. The Customs chap told me not to worry as many people were late due to the traffic and boarding would be allowed up to 7! Now he fekkin tells us !
It wasn’t long before Ramo turned up, having been taken under the “wing” of a “local” ‘Wing rider or was it a Pan, whateva, and who proceeded to filter through the motorway traffic at 60+ mph. With lights flashing and arms gesticulating it was like Moses parting the Red Sea according to Ramo.
Crisis over, it was a straightforward board, shower, change and a few cold beers to finish off a brilliant few days.

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One last sting in the tale was waiting for me in the morning though. As I said, my reserve light came on 25 miles out of Zeebrugge so first thing in the morning once on dry land, I needed fuel.
Saturday morning arrived and a straightforward disembark. Straightforward included not losing or misplacing any fookin keys, I might add. Off we set, looking for the first fuel sign. Couple of miles through Hull and my arse is twitching. Ramo in front as we approached a slip road and overpass and my engine spluttered. Another 20 feet and I’d have fooked it, so without further thought I just took the slip road which ran down to a roundabout. Last message to ramo was “I’ve fekked it with fuel” Bottom of slip road and that was it, splutter, dead. With the Gods on my side, I pushed the Bird across the road twenty yards to a Texaco fuel station. – Fekk me what luck.
Fuelled up and off again I soon caught Ramo up and from there it was a blatt on the M180 where we parted company, Steve onto the A1 and me the M18. Home for Saturday lunchtime absolutely fekked.

Never satisfied, we came to the conclusion that mebbe we rode too many miles each day from accommodation to accommodation rather than mebbe stay at one place a bit longer and explore, knowing that we could pack it in for the day whenever we wanted. Mebbe we coulda done with a few more days. Mebbe not, as after 3 days riding hard, and that’s all I think we both wanted to do at the time and woulda kept riding but for fatigue another few days woulda just seen me ligged out in bed/ in the bar/ lookin ‘round. Hmm, that sounds good but it means a longer time from home and consequently major Brownie Point initiative. Ya can’t please all of the people all of the time, only some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time.

Oh yea, before I forget, the miniature Schnapps that Mr Williams at Seebach gave to each of us as a token apology for the booking cock up wasn’t the only thing we got. I received an email from them on the way back, again apologising profusely and also adding that should we venture down that way again and if we chose to book with them again, the first night in the Bridal Suite would be “on da house”

Fekkin result eh. Great end to a truly great thousand mile ride. Ramo, ya a coont.


:ride) :ride) :rockon)
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Its all shite
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T.Murphy aka Tim
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Re: Germany Trip September 2015

Postby bluegas » Sat Nov 21, 2015 8:45 pm

Well, you've sold it to me! Thanks, thoroughly enjoyed reading all that. Ramo, where's your version?
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Re: Germany Trip September 2015

Postby Mister Majestik » Sun Nov 22, 2015 10:31 am

Well this T Murphy is certainly a gifted writer :notworthy) :notworthy) :notworthy) ,

feel as if I've been there meesen :thumbsup) :thumbsup)

think he right though bluerinse,

that Ramo is a reet cooont lol
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Re: Germany Trip September 2015

Postby jono49 » Sun Nov 22, 2015 7:16 pm

Time to renew my passport methinks :thumbsup)
Life is a series of moments!...Let your spare moments be on two wheels...
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