Pleasures & Gadgets

Spent too long today hunting for a biker friendly B & B near St. Malo, on the internet but had enough of that and needed to get out for a while.

It looked like rain was looming but I didn't care, at least I wouldn't get too hot in leathers. I thought about the route from Ripley to Newlands but found myself on the road for Boxhill. The route is varied so I get to enjoy passing the slow traffic past Chessington world of Adventures, have a very quick blat along the bypass towards Leatherhead, then enjoy the bendy bits of the A24, with a final brief blat along the dual carriageway before Rykas, where a browse with a cappucino awaits.

The above photo is of a Bennelli TNT titanium belonging to Colin, who had to collect his bike direct from the factory in Italy. Note the under seat exhaust, in-built heater for hot bums? It's got a 1130 cc engine with 149 bhp and only 25 of this model exist. that's all I remember anyway.

A tall, long-white-haired & bearded wizened, toothless, wizardy-type old chap approached as soon as I drew up at Newlands Corner a little later.
Said his name was 'The Druid of Avebury', (Wiltshire), and that he had just rebuilt the gearbox on this AMF 350 cc Harley from, I think, 1976 and was out to run it in with a whole heap of miles, so popped up to one of his old haunts at Newlands. What a character he was.



Then Gadgetman and Gadgetgirlie turned up on the Trike and soon we headed back to Boxhill where the Trike got a bit of attention.





And Gadgetgirlie acquainted herself with my bike.







Well, there's the oil pressure gauge, voltmeter, fuel gauge, input manifold vacuum gauge, water temperature gauge, and fuel pressure gauge.

The blue red & green illuminated switches on the left are for the cooling fans, fog lights and hazard warning lights.

Below them are the left indicator, ignition, high beam, oil pressure warning and right indicator lights.

The dip stick is for the gearbox oil and the brackets for something missing are for the rear view camera screen, especially useful for overtaking and for use with the half-a-Renault-extra trailer, which also has a camera mounted.

'The Gadgets'? Can't imagine how any friends of ours could possibly think of such a nickname...