Everywhere Virtually

After a good nights rest at the Abercrave Inn everything was looking promising. We had a nice breakfast with a view of the garden and the sun was peaking through the clouds. After breakfast we packed up and got the bike ready for the short ride down the road to TouraTech in Ystradgynlais.

I had pre-ordered stuff on the web a few weeks before and wanted to see TT and also tweak my order a little. The rain clouds appeared once more and the wind started to pick up as I was fitting a rear rack and windscreen extender.

Whilst out there I spotted a familiar face walking over. It was was Nick Plumb. For those that don’t know Nick is a BMW off road instructor, Dakar Rally Rider, Head of TouraTech UK and taught Ewan and Charley a few off road skills for the ‘long Way Round/Down’ series. M thought it was odd that I knew his name already.

She joked that I was now part of the club and that I whenever I met a fellow BMW rider we would start talking a foreign language called ‘Bike’.

We said our goodbyes and got going. I was born in Swansea and it would have been nice to take a look but the weather was closing in and we had to get to Devon.

We hopped onto the M4 and it was immediately apparent that this was not going to be an easy ride. There was a very stiff cross wind coming off the sea and I began to think ahead to what it would be like on the Severn Bridge. The motorway rose up at certain points and I was having great difficulty in fighting the wind.

Eventually we came upon the new Severn Bridge. All the matrix signs were warning of strong winds on the bridge and they were not wrong! There was a 50mph cross wind and the bike was tilted into it an alarming angle. Every once in a while the wind felt like it was taking the front wheel from under us. When we past the large stantions there was a very strong blast. Finally we made it off the bridge and took the motorway towards Bristol. The motorway runs close to the Bristol Channel and is exposed to the full might of the prevailing wind of the Atlantic ocean.

Once we passed Bristol we were greeted with torrential squalls of rain and we ended up laughing over the intercom system because of the ridiculousness of the situation. We could only manage a top speed of 50mph and soon the road markings disappeared under the water. the F800GS performed brilliantly in these hostile conditions.

As we approached Exeter our gear began to fail bit by bit. Despite the Gore Tex doing it’s job the water was finding it’s way into our boots, up our arms, down into our gloves and into our helmets.
We stopped at Exeter services and spent half an hour using the dryers to at least give us some relief before we did the next 20 miles to Totnes.

by 7:30pm we made it to the Cott Inn in Totnes. The bike was now steaming as the rainwater fell on the engine cover. It continued to rain all night but we were now safe and dry and enjoying a drink or two in this 14th century Inn.

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