Back in the autumn my friend Steve happened upon a flock of sheep and started herding down a country lane with his BMW R1200 GSA…

One Man & His BMW R1200 GSA from everywherevirtually on Vimeo.

Starring Steve Coleman, farmer Giles & Shep

The sheep didn’t like this and sadly later on in the day things got ugly…

Killer Sheep from everywherevirtually on Vimeo.

I have to leave my friend Steve to his fate after he rode his heavy bike into a man trap set up by a gang of Yorkshire sheep.

You have been warned

I was thinking over the weekend how amazing it was to be enjoying the brilliant Travel Event that Touratech had laid on. 12 months ago I was in Italy and beginning to think it would be a good idea  to get my bike license. Little did I think that 12 months later I would be riding through the Brecon beacons on a sunny Saturday morning with Charley Boorman and a bunch of other riders. You have the people that love Charley & Ewan and the people that hate them for whatever reason.

Maybe it’s jealousy, maybe they are trying to be cool by distancing themselves from such popular figures. All I know is that these guys and when I say these guys I include Simon Pavey, Nick Plumb, The Mondo Enduro / Terra Circa boys, Lois Pryce, Ted Simon, Nick sanders and the others that support the adventure biking industry have done an amazing job at attracting people to the world of off road adventure travelling.

To have access to the facilities and people who organise these events and tv shows is brilliant. Imagine taking up jogging and 12 months down the line you find yourself running amongst the nations olympic hopefuls. Or you take up modelling and find yourself on the catwalk with Naomi Campbell et al. It’s that sort of situation. You go from being a viewer and consumer to becoming a participant and it’s a great feeling.

At the same time I did muse to myself that sometimes things don’t change very much. When I was 10 I would go out on a Saturday morning on my silver Raleigh Strika to meet up with my friends who lived around the corner. They had Raleigh Strika’s too but theirs were black. We would ride in formation and I would lead because my bike was the odd one out. Last Saturday I found myself riding the black bike this time in a sea of 1200 GS’s

The next morning I heard aggressive dog barking… every few moments… “woof,woof,woof”. These were nasty dogs, real nasty. I acknowledged the dogs and swiftly returned to my slumber. I should explain that the barking dogs belonged to my phone. It was my morning alarm and I figured I would respond to a rabid barking dog rather than something going bleep bleep. I didn’t. I turned over and continued sleeping.

The next thing I hear was ‘bang, bang, bang’ on the door accompanied by French voices. I was confused I thought I was in Austria? I really was on another planet. It was dark. I thought who on earth is banging on my door at this hour. I then looked at the window. The blind was down. I pulled it up…. bam! Intense sunshine, high in the sky. My first thought was… uh oh! What time is it? It was 11am. I should have been out of the room an hour ago. I hastily informed room service I would be out in 10 minutes. No shower, no shave, Nada. I didn’t like this state of affairs having done a 1000km ride the day before but I was out of time. I didn’t even have time for breakfast but managed to sustain myself with a cereal bar. Looking disheveled I swiftly made my way past the crisp suited individuals standing in reception.

My big yellow bag was still on the bike and I only had to attach the tank bag and sat nav. I had 45 minutes to make my way back to Boulogne and check in. I should add that while it was sunny there was a gale force wind of 60mph + and blustery showers. I had great difficulty keeping the bike in a straight line. Unlike the Devon trip I didn’t have the benefit of an extra passenger for stability.

I made it to Boulogne and for some reason headed for the original Etap hotel thinking that was where the port was located. It wasn’t. I lost another 15 minutes. Eventually I found the port and found myself amongst other BMW GS riders. The guy in front of me was from Lincoln and had ridden from the Alps the previous night like I. His battery failed and he had a morning of sorting out a replacement at BMW in Boulogne.

Another couple on a 1200GS were not particularly friendly or chatty. They had been in the south of France and Paris and looked well rested, fed and clean. They had a northampton plate and London accents and I made a few assumptions and toddled off towards a BMW X-challenge rider. He was from Brighton and was an interesting chap. His wife was driving their support van and they used this to sleep in and store the bike when necessary. He had downscaled from the huge hulking 1200 GS and now preferred the lighter bikes. Our bikes were similar in many ways.

I managed to grab a baguette and a hot chocolate. We got ready to board and were being heckled by some chav’s speaking estuary English in a car beside our lane. I wasn’t paying much attention but when we fired up the engines I did get a small glow of satisfaction that we had drowned out their verbal diarrhoea.

We approached the ship and it was bobbing up and down quite dramatically. The metal deck was soaking wet and the bike heavy. I have short legs and this was going to be a challenge. Up to know I’ve dropped the bike when going slowly and performing tight manoeuvres. This was to be one of those occasions. Dropping the bike now would hold up the loading process and could cause me an injury. I gingerly rode onto the ship and then turned 180 degrees to face towards the back of the ship. The bigger bikes went first and then it was my turn to ride onto the brace that would hold my bike. I managed it without incident and sat on the bike while they clamped it in place. I thought It was falling but it was just the way it had been locked in place. I dismounted and headed up to the main lounge.

I sat with the chap who owned the X-challenge and his wife. We had a long chat about travel and bikes and the state of the sea conditions. The ferry staff were still vacumning up the vomit from the previous run. It looked rough in the harbour and as the Catamaran got under way It became evident that this was going to be a fun ride.

It was rough. People were crying, getting sick, shouting out but amid all of this my stomach was fine. I decided to tuck into my baguette and carried on talking to my new buddies. Just over an hour later we arrived and I made my way down to the car deck. The bikes were still standing which was good but the real challenge was ahead. The ship was pitching up and down. The steel ramp was also moving and was soaking wet. The car deck staff unstrapped the bikes and one guy manhandled the bike off the clamp with me on the bike. That was impressive considering the bike was fully fuelled and loaded. A big burly bloke in blue overalls told me to watch the cross wind as I left the ship. He wasn’t wrong. A classic 1970′s VW campervan drove off and instantaneously it’s sun roof flipped up and tore off. Next to go was a 1200GS and then me. The 1200 with a passenger on board nearly toppled. I focused on the tarmac beyond the ram and went for it.

The wind was very powerful. Reminscent of the day I crossed the Severn bridge in a gale.

I rode out of Dover and took the westerly road up and out of the town towards the M20. The wind was crazy. more than once it blew me off course and I would have stopped if there had been anywhere safe and protected to stop but unlike the rest of the continent there were no rest stops until the Maidstone area.

As I approached the M25 the wind calmed down somewhat and I spent the rest of the journey dodging showers. I saw the ill fated VW camper van again in Warwick services on the M40. Rope and Gaffa tape had saved the day for them.

Despite having 100 miles more to ride the journey felt as if it was over. I did have one more deadline and that was to meet ‘M’ at the airport that evening. I was concerned that the time was getting tight when I realised I hadn’t changed the time on my watch and the bike to UK time. I found I had an extra hour to play with and thus relaxed into a cruise.

I came off the motorway and did the last leg on the back country roads of Cheshire.
I dropped in on my parents around 8pm and it was nice to be back safe and well even if I still hankered after more time on the open road.

I awoke some time around 8am. I spied a drip that had made it’s way from the outer fly sheet to the inside. I naturally poked it and unleashed a waterfall. OK maybe not a waterfall but certainly a steady stream of drips. I was forced to get up or get wet. I emerged from the tent like an ungainly moth emerging from its cocoon. It wasn’t pretty, dignified or graceful.

The air was fresh and everything was covered in dew and the rain from the previous nights thunderstorm. I got showered and shaved and met my English neighbour and his Dutch wife again for some mint tea. I got packed quickly and rode across the road to Aldi Sud for some breakfast and supplies.

By now it was 10am and I was uncertain about where my ultimate destination should be. It was Tuesday and by 10am Wednesday morning I needed to be in Boulogne-Sur-Mer. I was 220 miles behind where I should have been starting. I tapped Boulogne into the Sat Nav and it had an ETA of 11pm. I knew with stops that would increase. Add in the weather and traffic and I could look at adding 3 hours to that ETA.

I decided to go for it. I tapped in Stuttgart as my way point and I spent the next two hours winding my around the Tirol. I crossed the Austrian/German border 3 or 4 times and was awed by the scenery. Eventually I was on the Autobahn and heading North.

By the time I reached Stuttgart the rain had arrived. I put on my waterproof gloves, liner and changed to my clear visor. It was steady, drizzly, fine rain. As Peter Kay say’s. The stuff that soaks you right through, I didn’t have my wind guard fixed to the chin area of my helmet so the rain was finding it’s way up underneath my chin and neck. It was also soaking the padding around my cheeks which was pissing me off.

I rode north past Baden Baden, and towards Strasbourg. By some weird quirk of fate I ended up in the black hole that is St Avold. The same roadworks, the same autoroute/autobahn place name confusion. You just don’t know whether you are in Franec or Germany around there.

I decided to get off the Peage and went cross country. There were quite a few car accidents around which suggested the roads were oily. I pushed on through the northern edge of the Vosges mountains. I happened upon a town called ‘Bitche’. It’s the little humorous moments that keep your spirits going in testing conditions.

I looked at the sat nav and it was trying to send me through Luxembourg and Belgium again. I thought… no way. I just want to get going. I rode through Sarreguemines and then took the E25 towards Metz. By the time I reached Verdun it was getting dark. I made a fuel stop at the Agip and had the chance to use my French which is always a pleasure. I rode on towards Reims and as I did so I spotted the flashes of lighting on the horizon to my right. To my left was the storm I left behind and the moon.

I tapped the sat nav screen and used the compass feature. I was heading due west now. I was glad that I was avoiding the thunderstorm. Then the autoroute curved around to the right. The compass was moving round. west, west north west, north west and ultimately due north. Damn! I was heading straight for the storm.

By now it was after 10pm. I passed Reims and had not met the storm yet. The wind was increasing and I hoped that it would be blown to the East before I met it. I decided to ride towards Amiens. By now it was 2am and as I had predicted I was going to have a very late arrival.

I don’t like riding that late at night. It’s easy to lose concentration, hit an object in the road or worse still, an animal. There were many signs that warned of deer for 18kms.

Eventually the cloud thickened and it started raining. I had my liner on but not my fleece and I was getting cold. Teeth chatteringly cold. I rode through the Somme region and was a little spooked. Here I am at 2am, under an eery moonlight, with the Silhouettes of wind turbines and the knowledge that millions of men died in this area during the great wars. I was also heartened by the fact that I was riding through the area on a German bike and enjoying the benefits of a peaceful and united Europe. Did so many need to die? I’m not so sure. Many of those who fought were naive pawns, youthful and unwilling participants in a war concocted by the elite classes.

The sat nav counted down to Boulogne and I was heartened and reinvigorated. I made a final push on to the port. I had the ETAP hotel in my sights. I arrived at 3am and noticed the car park looked pretty full. In fact… wait a minute… it’s overflowing with cars.

I approached the reception to find a notice on the door. The hotel was full. “Oh”, I thought. I walked back to the bike. It was now after 3am. I contemplated staying up or sleeping outside but the weather was getting worse so I didn’t relish this option. The sat nav said there was another ETAP in the centre of Boulogne! fantastic!

I arrived 15 minutes later. Again the same story. Completely full. This was now becoming a problem. I did a wider search for ETAP’s and I found one in Calais. it was 23km’s away. It would take me half an hour to get there. The wind was now Gale force and as I left the lights of Boulougne the darkness enveloped me once more as a thunderstorm rolled in from the channel. Bolts of lightning were coming down everywhere and I was being pelted with hailstones. This was indeed adventure but at the same time was testing and unpleasant.

I arrived at Etap Calais at 4am. Like a wet dog I approached reception. There was room. It was €49. I didn’t care. If it had been €149 I would have paid. I left the holdall on the bike figuring that if someone was weird enough to steal it in a howling gale at 4am they’d deserve the bag of clothes and wet camping gear.

I got to my room and was now a little hyper. Initially I couldn’t sleep but after 10 minutes of a German cop drama with French subtitles I was in the land of nod ZZZZZZZZ

You may be wondering what the ‘wet’ dry run is all about. It was initially intended to be a dry run for a much bigger European tour on the F800GS. It easy to forget, living in the UK that we are already in Europe. Anyway the 3 day trip to Devon, via Wales was set to be a very wet and windy one.

It started on a Friday afternoon and packing up the bike took longer than anticipated. Lady M was worried about me and was quite upset after I was 30 minutes late. She had bad vibes about the trip and 500 metres from home her gut feeling was correct when I dropped the bike with myself, M and the luggage on it. I pulled up to a junction. Put my left foot down and it was further down than I thought…. gravity took over and we were going down in slow motion.

M sustained a bruised leg, I sustained a bruised palm of my hand and the bike lost the end of it’s clutch lever. Annoying but not a deal breaker. So in the true spirit of adventure I rode back to base and we removed as much excess baggage as possible.

Once we dusted ourselves off we got going again. Our route was to take us along the M56 to Chester, down to Wrexham, Oswestry, Newtown, Builth Wells, Brecon and ultimately Abercraf. Traffic was heavy on the M56 so we peeled off and went cross country for a while.

We made good progress through mid Wales and the scenery and the roads were wonderful. Towards early evening the weather started to close in and we encountered some light rain. At this point I was wishing we hadn’t been quite so ruthless with removing gear. I was getting chilly and the summer gloves were not adequate despite the heated grips.

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In my minds eye I had placed Abercraf at the northern side of the Brecon beacons. In reality it was on the southern side. This meant only one thing. We had to cross them. The Beacons loomed large and the peaks were hidden in ever descending cloud, rain and strong gusting winds. It was by now 10pm and all hope of an evening meal extinguished. The road had no white lines and the place was deserted. It’s a unique landscape that is similar to other UK locations such as the Pennines, Exmoor, Dartmoor, the lake district and the highlands. It can be bleak which in it’s own way has a certain beauty and isolation which is a rare thing on this crowded island.

Finally we came upon the Abercrave Inn. Made famous by Ewan McGreggor and Charley Boorman who ate there during their BMW off road training. The owner and staff were very hospitable but the evenings riding was not over as I was soon to find out. When filling out the guest form I realised I didnt have my wallet. I had that sinking feeling, that draining of blood from the head feeling that you get when something as vital as your wallet is not where it should be.

A few miles back on the road I had shifted about on the bike a bit to alleviate my numb bum and thought it must have fallen out. So I rushed out and hopped back on the bike. I blasted back up towards the Beacons. I scanned the wet, orange illuminated road for anything resembling a wallet. My thoughts becoming ever pessimistic. If it did fall it could have bounced into the undergrowth at the side of the road, or into the ditch, under the hedges.

I forged on, climbing higher towards the mountains and imagined the days ahead without a wallet. How would I get money, new cards, new licence, membership cards etc. etc. I reached the stretch of road where the white lines once more disappeared up into the dark oblivion. I came to a stop and noticed a toad hopping across the road. I did a u-turn around the toad and rode back to Abercraf/Abercrave.

Upon entering the pub car park the main bar man came out to greet me. We found your wallet on the bar! I was astounded and elated. I’m not religious but I did make a promise of £10 to St Anthony if he helped me find my wallet.  A promise is a promise.

As it transpired I had arrived at the bar earlier, removed my wallet on autopilot and placed it on the bar. When I had to fill in the guest form I had flipped the bar mat over so that I could write the form. In doing so I had covered my wallet and in my tired state had not spotted my mistake and went into headless chicken mode.

So I bought the barman a drink, he got me a drink and the kitchen staff made us sandwiches despite it being nearly 11pm. So a big thank you to the Abercrave Inn! I would highly recommend them.

After all that excitement we called it a day and crashed out for the night.

I’m riding home yesterday and I spy a retired couple with their placid black labrador dog walking along the pavement. Picture the soft features of a guide dog. friendly, attentive, intelligent, ready to serve.

I approach and the dog catches sight of me atop my Honda Varadero.

The damn hound goes fucking ballistic. It was if the gates of hell had opened and Lucifer had set forth his rabid, gnawing, snarling, canine beasts.

The owner and his wife had to virtually wrestle their pooch to the ground in order to stop it making a go for me.