After a breakfast full of stress and excitement, we left Lyon at 9 in the morning, thinking that on a Saturday, the autoroute to the south would be OK at that time. Big mistake. It was one solid block of cars, with drivers. French drivers. Some of who will do anything to arrive 1 car earlier at their destination. Overtaking left, right and the middle if they coud get away with it. At Montpellier there was a ‘bouchon’, so from 130 we all jumped on the brakes (well, in a matter of speaking, jumping on a bike is not recommended 🙂 and could only tootle along with 5 km/hr. Even here some people can get on your nerves as they do not accelerate and stop, but are crawling along at less than walking pace, too slow for a motorbike with trailer. And I am not assertive enough to go lane splitting with a fully laden bike and trailer or use the stopping lane as some adventurist riders do. But at Montpellier we could leave the Autoroute and continued our travel along the country roads. Via Dieulefit on towards l’Isles sur Saone.

Of course I missed a turn off so we had to pass through the small village of Saou. And what luck we had: There was a market. Not one of those 13 in a dozen ones with resellers of crapware, but a real rural market with local produce. And, quelle surprise, there was a restaurant: l’Oiseau sur sa Branche. A really nice, authentic place, with great food. Highly recommended.

So after lunch off to the camping La Folie where we found a nice shaded place on the border of a small stream. Next challenge, pitch a new tent. The previous one, the Khyed Biker, was replaced as we were not happy with it. We found the innertent too small, and the front section was draughty as it had a loose ground sheet. Also it has one of those fancy quick erect systems. That looks great and helps to erect the tent, but it can be a pain to fold it up again. So now we have a Coleman Rock Springs 4. Which is a 4 persons tent, so it’s ideal for 2.

The next couple of days were spent cruising the region. And as always, things which are considered a must to see are mediocre, and other parts are stunning. The Mont Ventoux. Famous for the Tour de France. It’s nice and worthwhile if you come from the East. The Western side is so-so. The Gorge du Ventoux has two stars on the Michellin map, but I found it boring. There are some views, but you stay high on the mountain so it’s just another high road. Full of cyclists.

But then we found a rather unknown gorge, the Gorge de Trente Pas, and that was really great. I love riding a small meandering road wetched between two towering rock faces.

Another great road was the section between … and … We did that one that on our way back, so two up and the trailer. The hairpins are tight as a ducks arse. Twice my steering was turned to the max so I had to keep the lot upright with back brake and throttle. Sweating time with a smile.

This was the first trip I used my GoPro HD. It’s installed at the centre of the bike on the Migsel RAM stand. I run it in 720 / 50 fps and record it to a 32 GB memory card. I noticed that it runs out of power before the card is full, even with a double battery setup. I did the editing using iMovie on the iPad. I expected a steep learning curve, but it is surprisingly easy to do. But I strongly recommend to watch some instruction movies on Youtube. Else you spend too much time just looking for actions which are obvious after seeing the movie.

Now I only have to find a legal way to add some decent music.

Riding a motrobike in France is fun. You have the whole gamut of roads: from the wide well maintained autoroutes, via good country roads with its sweeping bends to the narrow single lane mountain roads, where the hairpins are like hairclips and you have to turn your steering to the stops and are leaning heavy on the back brake. Also, riding with the trailer is a breeze, I was amazed how easy I could navigate these narrow twisted roads. But there is a learning curve to climb. Firstly, with 300 kg (wet) the bike is quite heavy by itself. Add two people in riding gear and a fully packed trailer plus some stuff in the side panniers, and you almost double the mass. This means that you have to plan the corners with care so you can take them in one smooth sweep and you try to avoid any need for corrections half way. The small roads are often very bumpy, especially in the mountains. So if you are leaning into a corner with an unven surface, the whole system starts to flex. The first time that happens you think that the whole kaboodle is running out of control, but amazingly, you get through it in one piece. But next time you take the corners a little slower and look out for bumps.

A special mention for some of the road repair jobs they do. One method is to pour asphalt into long, small cracks. You end up with thin lines of pure tar on the road. They can be extremely slippery. The first time I hit one in a corner, my front wheel slipped of the tar until it was stopped on normal road surface. Whoah, that cranks up the old adrenaline pump!

People often complain about the French driving manners, but In general I have no problems with that. In every country you have your quota of dickheads behind the wheel, but overall the riding is OK. The drivers are very attentive compared to Australia: they often leave a gap for you to merge or to enter the roundabout, something unheard off in Western Australia. And if there is a “bouchon” (traffic jam) they go out of their way to let bikes through! With my Beowulf exhausts they can hear me coming up from behind, and I love to see them all moving to the side to let me pass! Same in the city: you can just move to the left of a long line on cars and skip to the front. Love it!

So in all, it has been easy to adjust to the local driving style and I have not encountered anything totally unexpected (yet! 🙂 )

Time for a small trip to the Ardeche.

More piccies at http://is.gd/RXTbzN

We left on Saturday morning via the Autoroute to the South, WITH THE NEW CALSCI WINDSCREEN, YEAH! What a difference that makes. No buffetting and almost total silence at any speed. Now we were 2 up with the trailer and the new screen and I had no problem with any swaying up to 140 km/hr. I did not try to go any faster: the taffic was quite heavy so I just went with the flow.

Just before Valence we left the highway, paid our fee of €3.60 for the use of the tarmac and stopped in Tournon-sur-Rhone for a breakfast. Well, breakfast, that’s a big word for the food they serve here in the morning. It is a country for food lovers, apart from the breakfast. A croisant or a piece of baquette with jam on the side. OK, the croisants can have a great taste, but it’s just fluffy pastry with butter, nothing really substantial. But the quality of he coffee, the ambience of the terrace and the taste of the croisant makes up for it.

So after breakfast we went on our way over the small roads to Les Vans, a small but pleasant looking small town. After some deliberation we decided to stay in that area. So next up was an exciting hour: pitching a new tent, blowing up new airmatrasses and unrolling the new sleeping bags.

The tent, a Khyad Biker, looks great but is not ideal. Firstly the innertent is a bit too small for our decent sized airmatrasses, so they almost touch and there is no space for your snack or nightcap. Secondly it has a loose groundsheet in the outertent. So its bloody draughty and cold in the evening if there is some wind. The sleeping bags are great: down filling with a cotton cover and 210cm long. It took F a very long time to find them. There are an amazing amount of sleeping bags for sale, but our choice of the materials and size seems to be a bit outlandish and only one shop in Holland had the goods.

Next day we went for tour to the North West to Lagogne. The road rises quite high to 1400 metres above sea level, and boy, does it get chilly there: it went down to 8 degrees, With a strong wind blowing and in summer riding gear, brrrrrrrr. Thanks god for the handle bar heaters.

So, this day was for the trip to the Gorge du Ardeche. The books say it is a beautifull road, with stunning views and it’s all green on the Michelin maps. Well, tastes differ. It was OK, but to say it was stunning: not exactly. But the road has nice bends in it so we could enhoy the ride.

The road back was via athe Northern route, a bit boring. So this was a day not so much stunning views, but nice relaxing riding with a damned good lunch in Aigueze.

Packing up was a amazingly quick. The trailer is big enough to take all gear, so you have quite some flexibility to stuff everything into the available space. And I love packing up in the early morning: a bit chilly, dew on the grass and the bike is waiting to be started.

Friday 27 April

Friday evening I arrived in Stansted. The was a long queue at immigration, but to my suprise I was through in 10 minutes. Picked up my luggage and went to the exit, looking for a sign with my name on it. The previous evening I booked a taxi to bring me to Bury St Edmunds. Not a sausage. I had forgotten to write down their telephone number, so I tried to find it using the free PC’s in the arrival hall but failed. So I went to the taxi desk: to Bury St Edmunds is £108 (Easyjet offered me a cheap taxi via their website for £139, go figure). OK, went to the taxi, loaded the luggage, looked for my phone: no phone. Bugger. Looked in my bag, rucksak, nah. Taxi driver phoned the desk if I left it there, while i ran back to the PC’s. And lo and behold, it was lying next to the screen. The woman using the PC assured me that she would have brought it to the lost and found. Good to see that there are still honest people around. So I finally set off to the St. Edmunds Guesthouse: charming, friendly and clean. Dinner in the The Old Cannon, where they brew their own beer. I love these local pubs where they still sell good, honest beer, not this industrial produced stuff.

Saturday 28 April

Saturday morning. To the motorbike shop. I was greeted immediately as “the man form Australia”. The whole shop seemed to bevaware of my existence 🙂 First things first: where is the bike? And there she was is all her glory. Nicely polished, shining and ready to go. The colour is a sparkling dark blue, completely different from the smokey grey I have in Australia, but both have their strong points. Examining the bike shows clearly that the conditions in the UK are a lot harsher than in Australia: there are small patches of blistering of the paint, something I have never seen in Oz. But then again, we do not put salt on the roads in the winter.

Being in the UK, I had to buy some typical UK stuff, like waterproof boots and gloves and a rain suit: the weather was not too good. Dark, grey and rain. After installing the Migsel RAM mount for the GPS I loaded the bike up and set off to pick up the trailer. New bike, new country, rainy: a challenging start. But I found the right road, or at least, the Zumo did, and I was off to E, the trailer man. It required a telephone call to confirm the right place: he has a sign but it is still lying on the kitchen table waiting to be installed (sounds familiar, although in my case it’s still somewhere in the shed). And there she was, the trailer. Nice blue colour, shiney and new. F had ordered a lot of camping equipment in all kind of different European outlets which were all send to this address. So it was like Christmas. Unpacking a lot of boxes and guessing what it was, under the watchful eyes of their daughter 🙂 Together with the things I ordered via E , I had a half full trailer with camping gear and a heap of empty boxes: time to go.

And off I went: new bike with a mono-wheel trailer on a day ful of rain and especially: wind. Via the small roads and then on the M25 to Surrey where I would spent a couple of nights with friends. Advice: if you are suffering from boredom and lack adrenaline in your blood, I can recommend to ride a bike for the first time with a mono-wheel trailer in the wind and rain on the M25: it accelerates your heart rate no-ends. But I arrived safely. God, can bear taste good after a day like this!

Monday 30 April

On Monday morning i set off early to catch the train through the channel tunnel.

The weather gods wanted to make up for the Saturday (and Sunday!) so there was no cloud in the sky to be seen: beautifull. Soaring down the M25, smiling at the poor souls stuck in the contineous traffic queue slowly making their way Northwards, to spent the day in a miserable office. Life is good.

Arriving at the entrance of the channel tunnel. It took some time for the lady to give me the price: £224. HOW MUCH? Price of a single motorbike is £73. So this combination of a bike and a narrow single wheel tailer trailer should cost maximum £146, twice the price of a single bike. She was very sorry, checked twice with the supervisor, but there was nothing she could do: rules are rules (another example that rules should be treated as guidelines, as they never cover all instances). She suggested to try the ferry. So off I went to Dover. Bought a ticket: £83 for the combination. Now we are talking. So I toodle over to the assigned lane with two other bikes, and after 15 minutes we could board. Secured the bike and had a nice relaxing trip to the other side. The bikes were off first and I could open up the gas on the highway. Sunny and a balmy 22 degrees. After an hour the first clouds appeared followed by the occasional sprinkle. But nothing compared to the past two days. At around 5 o’clock I arrrived at Troyes and stopped at the Etap hotel. I will not comment on this hotel, just read tripadvisor (to which I did not have access at that time, but it is was cheap and clean). They have a parking behind the hotel, and the I could park the bike next to my room window.

Troyes itself is a very nice city. The centre is old and has a nice warm atmosphere.

A reasonable supply of small restaurants who all have one big problem: no WiFi. How on earth you can run a public place without offering WiFi is beyond me. Everywhere in the world, in any small establishment they have wifi, but not here in France. The word Luddite comes to mind. But, the food makes up for it. So after the meal I feel positively disposed towards the French again. Time to hit the sack.

Tuesday 1 May

An early rise and I set off on very quiet roads: first of May is a bank holiday in France. The trip to Lyon was uneventful. I noticed that the bike-trailer combination was becoming more stable. On the first day travelling between 60 and 70 m/h the trailer could develop a sway and I had to decelerate to stop it. On the second day I had to ride between 70 and 80 before a sway could develop. Today it was above 80 m/h. Nothing has changed on the bike or with the loading in the trailer, so it might be that the new tyre is getting worn in. A bike-trailer sway has to be very diffiicult to solve. It’s a oscillation of the total system: bike, trailer and the coupling between them. So it depends on the mass and it’s distribution, the wind and how it flows around the bike-trailer combination. Sometimes I can stop the sway developing by squeezing the tank harder with my legs, or leaning on the handlebars, thereby changing the mass coupling or feedback. Also the sway does not appear if there is a sidewind or if I am directly behind a car in the buffetting slipstream. So the windflow around the trailer has to be symetric. This will be a subject of more experiments in the coming months.

So I arrived in Lyon conveniently around lunchtime. I sometimes complain about the complexity of the roads in Perth at the Convention centre, but that is nothing compares to entering Lyon via the autoroute. Even with the Zumo I missed the correct exit, so I took could enjoy the local city roads and I slowly found my way back.

F was waiting for me at the entance of the old city and we proceeded to the appartment. That meant navigating the busy old streets, made of cobblestones and with a holllow slippery centre drain, with a motorbike and trailer.

Riding the cobblestones with a hollow drain in the middle on a motorbike with a monowheel trailer: a sure way to get the adrenaline flowing again! But I made it without dropping the bike (phew)

Wednesday 2 May

One thing we have been working on during the last weeks was to find a parking space. We tried internet and called real estate agents,but it was not so easy. Agents do not answer emails, nor do they call back. Apparently hiring a parking box is low on their list of priorities. The first day I parked in an open air 24 hour guarded carpark. Next day I called the municipal office for an abonnement. But apparently the open air parking was full, and they directed me to another one. So now the bike and trailer are comfortably stored underground on a 7 minute walk from our home. And for everyone who says that French people are unfriendly: next time travel on a motorbike, a sifferent world opens up. Everyone is curious about your travels, asks questions, has advice etc. (of course it helps if you speak French). The motorcycle community is a real family here, on the road every rider greets you, not just with a nod of the head, but raising a hand or, as a pillion, waving. It’s real fun to ride here.

Thursday 3 May

A small trip in the direction of Annecy. There is a good restaurant there, always a sufficient excuse to go. This is the first trip without trailer but with a pillion. Getting out of the city is a challenge: the traffic in Lyon is a real bitch. So is the layout of the intersections. You need 3 pairs of eyes: one for the traffic ahead of you, one to scan for the right direction and one in the back of your head to watch foridiots trying to squeeze in any opening they see. Riding the roads here for the first time is brain overload. But we managed to get onto the highway where I cold open up “unhitched” for the first time. And I immediately realized why I have a CalSci windscreen on my bike in Australia. Because the Yamaha FJR OEM windscreen is, not to put too fine a point on it, crap. My head is buffetted by the wind, regardless of the windscreen position, heigh or low, and often my helmet is just pushed from side to side. F asked me why I was shaking my head. It was the bloody wind! Sometimes the whole bike was swaying. That might explain part of the issues I had with the trailer, the design of the bloody windscreen. Why can’t they put on a decent windscreen on a bike like this? CalSci can design it so why can’t Yamaha, or even better, put calSci screens on it as a standard. Boy, does that make a difference. Another item I missed was my PowerCommander V with Autotune. The engine is running very lean on the factory default settings. But as a consequence the engine is running rather hot and often hesitates. I hate this surging and I consider this a potential safety hazard. You slowly open the throttle, and I mean, really slow, just a minute twist of the wrist, and the bike can jump forward. I had the same problem with my bike in Australia, but it was completely gone after installing the PCV. So next project is to get a PCV.

But the ride to the restaurant was really great after we left the highway, local roads with beautiful views and nice sweeping corners where I could scrape the pegs for the first time: what a feeling! The restaurant was a nice local affair, the entrecote, grilled on a woodfire, was succulent and just done as I like it. Followed by a nice desert and coffee and we were ready to head home.

Next trip will probably be the weekend of the 12th. It is a bit too rainy and cold at the moment (spoiled as we are with the weather in Australia 🙂