The Last Many Miles

I woke up much later than I wanted to, I guess I was still catching up on sleep from the ride up. Quick cup of tea*, strapped my luggage and the fuel can onto the back of the bike and said my goodbyes, Raz was already busy working well before nine.

Like Falkirk, Middlesbrough clearly has seen better times and the evidence of those is in the architecture of some public buildings. I set off to find a petrol station before getting on the motorway and was merrily gawking at a church spire when I realised I'd switched my brain off and was heading straight towards a high curb, followed by a low stone wall. I just managed to miss it, partly by getting my left foot down but I had been milliseconds from having an incredibly stupid low speed lie-down. I managed to safely navigate to the petrol station whilst cursing my gormlessness and felling sorry for my hurting toes.

I'd genuinely like to spend a few more days looking around Middlesbrough and generally the north east of Britain. Like Cornwall it's got a long disappeared industrial heritage which I find fascinating, although in recent years Cornwall has benefitted from the now unavailable European development money and from tourism cash, the latter has brought it's own problems though.

Out of the city and onto the motorway and it feels good to be back on the bike again after 36 hours out of the saddle. I felt relaxed and comfortable despite having 450 miles to do that day with an appointment to make near Mansfield. By the time I'd made the A1(M) I was getting hungry so pulled into a service station for a bacon roll and a coffee.

Whilst eating my breakfast stood next to the bike I saw a pensioner in a Renault drive though a space next to where another woman was stood in the open doorway of her BMW. She lightly scraped the open door, parked up and made to wonder off. The BMW lady politely pointed out that she'd hit her car, despite there being hundreds of empty spaces around and received a torrent of loud abuse in return. Noticing BMW lady had a large chap in the car with her she then backed off whilst loudly claiming to have been threatened. I genuinely don't understand some people, just say sorry and it would have been fine? I gave the BMW couple my number, just in case the pensioner later claimed any damage to her car then wondered inside to off-ballast. They'd both gone by the time I got back, hopefully with no more words having being spoken.

Not long after leaving the services the traffic came to a standstill and I passed the Renault whilst filtering down the middle. At least the missing exhaust gasket was useful, you could see pairs of eyes flicking to wing mirrors wondering what was making that awful din. As I kept going south I saw a few brown tourist signs for places that sounded interesting. Conisbrough and Pontefract Castles, the town of Worksop that I'll always associate with Maid Marion and Her Merry Men, but today I had somewhere to be and little time for sightseeing.

My next stop was just outside a village called Bilsthorpe to meet with a man off the PB-Evo Forum and have a look at an NC30 he was selling. I've really wanted to have a go on one for quite a few years now, I almost bought a tatty NC35 as my first bike but ended up with a much cleaner ZXR400 that I still have. After riding several RC30's and being acutely aware that the ship had long sailed upon me being able to afford one of those I figured there might be a space for an NC30 in the garage once the GPZ had gone elsewhere for the next victim contender to complete the LDU upon. There's a couple of bike related business in the same industrial estate so we wondered over to NRP Exhausts to have a look at an interesting bit of old British Iron he had on the bench, and to ask about fixing a titanium Morowaki exhaust that I've got in the loft. Over in D&M Engineering we looked at a couple of (50's or 60's?) 350cc Honda race bike they were preparing, exquisite little things. But what I was really here to see was Tony's NC30

After sitting on it, starting it up and finishing my tea I agreed to buy it. As time was getting on I popped on my helmet and started the final leg, 325 miles until home. I filled up again outside Mansfield before getting on the M1 and heading south to Donnington Park. No time for a trackday and I'm not sure how well the GPZ would cope. Probably better than I'd expect actually. Past Ashby-del-la Zouch which I always thought was a made up place from Sue Townsends books, onto the M6 with more filtering and then the M5. I stopped near Western-super-Mare for food (well, Mc Donalds) and fuel, and only once more for a wee just past Okehampton.

The next time the little twin fell silent was when I'd pulled up on the drive outside my house. 2001 miles since I left Lands End, or 2035 since I left my house six days earlier. 

 

Not bad little bike, not bad at all.

My son was asleep and the wife out at a yoga class so I paid the babysitter so she could go and once out of my riding gear rolled the bike into the garage. I'd certainly bonded with the bike, as much as you can for a collection of metal and plastic parts. But it's certainly not going to get too comfy in the garage and will be off to another owner in the not too distant future. Probably.

After a hot shower I unpacked my bags and found the little gift from pitstop five I'd been carrying for the last week. I think I deserved the Scotch, plus a can of Atlantic, brewed just up the road seemed like a fitting accompaniment. 

That was quite an adventure. I'm not sure I'd want to do it again, but I'm very glad I did.

 

*Many Sri Lankans do tea somewhat differently to how we usually drink it in the UK. My mum is the exception to this rule, but she has lived in England for over fifty years. For some reason when you have a cuppa over there, they always put in what seems to be like seven spoons of sugar and half a cow's worth of milk. Sometimes even condensed milk. I have no idea why.