Everywhere Virtually

My bike is like an ambassador. Today I had to go to the local village of ‘Hale’ on my lunch hour. I sold my Touratech rear rack on ebay and was posting it off.

I had parked my bike on the pavement because the local dolly birds in their Chelsea tractors get in a sweat if you dare to park a bike in a supposed ‘car’ space. So not in the mood for bother, on the pavement the GS went.

I left the post office, crossed the road and got my gear together ready for the off. Out of the corner of my eye I spotted a man making a bee line in my direction. I instinctively knew that he was going to ask about the bike as many have done before him. It usually starts with… “is this like the bike Ewan & Charley went around the world on?” and I say, “No, it’s better than that” and off the conversation goes.

That last paragraph makes me sound a bit jaded with it all but in reality nothing could be further from the truth. I like talking about bikes and adventure travel in particular. As I’m a relative Noob I often learn more from the person I am talking to.

Today was one of those days. The guy turned out to be from Slovakia, was buying a model like mine and was curious to know more about my lowered seat and the farkles I had on board. He also wasn’t aware of all the great forums and websites that are out there so luckily I had a pen and paper on me and I jotted them down. I couldn’t remember my new phone number but gave him my email.

we agreed to continue the conversation over a beer at some point in the future and we had another thing in common in that we both had German speaking girlfriends.

I see today as good karma and who knows it might bode well for my journey through Slovakia later on in the year.

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