The hunt for Vin Diesel...

You may think this to be a somewhat recurring theme but to say there were some bad hangovers on Friday morning is an understatement. This in part may provide an excuse for what happened on the road to Barcelona. With our tour's half-time destination plugged into the satnav we departed Carcassonne bleary eyed and after four nurofen, a pizza and a beer stop in Quillan later we still felt as bad but, being the intrepid explorers we kid ourselves into thinking we are, we continued. Reidy, being the most sociable amongst us and also because his Ducati moped struggles to keep up with the monumental BMWs, had trodden his own path a while before us so it was with the utmost sympathy that we received news that Clarkson had filled the aforementioned bike up not with petrol but with diesel. Numpty. The machine may both sound and run like a tractor but those little Italian combine harvester designers have yet to make their bikes run on derv. Andy managed to empty his tank with the help of the lady behind the petrol station counter and we all sighed a collective relief that we wouldn't be put in the position of having to bail him out again (see Blog entry 'Don't follow us, we're lost too' in case you'd forgotten).

We were all keen to reach the Catalonian capital as after seven days of being in the saddle we were all beginning to resemble Desperate Dan, not only in our gait but in looks also. The hotel receptionist thought it most amusing that five silly Englishmen would play a game of drawing lots to work out who sleeps with who but what she didn't realise is the magnitude of the result of this contest as I have explained previously.

Our first evening in Barcelona passed relatively uneventfully, though after a bit of a route march to find a bar on the beach front we were confronted by the sight of two naturist blokes walking hand in hand along the beach, one sporting a man bag which, to be honest, could have been better placed to preserve the man's dignity. Urrrggh! And before you say it, if it had been two lady naturists doing the same thing we'd have reacted no differently...

Saturday promises a day off, a lie in and a chance to take in the sights... hopefully with clothes on this time

Digger, Pete and the kebab van...

Thursday night saw us take in Carcassonne, a medieval walled city built in the 12th century to fend off the crusading northern French who had deemed their southern compatriots to be heretics because of their cuddly religious views. Our day took us from Andorra through more wonderful mountain roads until we reached the French Pyrenean foothills and lunch in the town of Quillan. Some of our stops do tend to be a little more liquid than they should be and we do do our best to sample as much of the local hospitality as possible. While we enjoyed our lunch, Reidy was accosted by a gentleman who could probably be not unfairly described as the village idiot. In true red lion bikers style Andy was then cojoled into giving the little chap a ride on his Ducati and after those short, sweet few minutes they shared together, which I think meant as much to Andy as to his new little friend, they returned and eventually we managed to get rid of him.

The 35 miles left to Carcassonne passed in a blur as there are moments on our travels when we, as Digger puts it, 'just f***ing nail it' which is a technical term for riding very fast.

The night out in the town seemed to be heading, like most of the others, towards Damp Squib Street until we went to that most French of establishments... the local Irish bar. The place was full of locals and in that unfortunate combination which sometimes occurs, the wine was both cheap and very good and it was 'open mike' night. Not being one to shy away from taking the michael out of oneself, I shall refrain from resisting the temptation to forget what happened next. Let's just put it this way, and there is regrettably video evidence to support it, don't ever let a drunk 43 year old who thinks he can sing but can't and furthermore can neither see the words on the sheet nor remember the tune he's supposed to be singing near a microphone. Apologies to Sting and Oasis...

Now the only problem with drinking too much wine is that it can affect your ability to stand, speak coherently and remember which hotel you're staying in. Reidy and I were lucky and fell straight into a taxi. Digger and Pete weren't so lucky and like the blind leading the blind they spent the next two hours wandering the streets of Carcassonne unable to recall where they were heading. A mobile kebab van eventually proved their salvation as the driver, whom having had a quiet night, gratefully relieved Pete of most of his euros in return for driving the dynamic duo around town in search of their beds. Pete's shorts are now indelibly marked with memories of this experience, he having been the one to sit on the greasy kebab van floor. Lovely. Eventually they made it and at 4am the day was done...

Englishmen bowled over at Lourdes

Experience has shown that certain days on the bikes have something special to offer... Death Valley did it for us all in the USA last year and the ride to Andorra from Biarritz through the Pyrenees will similarly be etched in the little grey cells for a long time. With Pete's remodelled front wheel in need of a bit of a test we left Biarritz for lunch at Lourdes which was a very pleasant run into the foothills through countryside which seems much more appealing on the eye the further south we get. Northern France is ok but is largely flat and featureless. The same cannot be said for the south, however. We stopped for lunch at Lourdes sitting outside in 34C heat which is probably why Tony then did the most unusual thing... Lourdes is the place you go for the healing powers of its thermal spa. We wanted to get Reidy here particularly for a crack at any number of ailments but he'd buggered off earlier in the day. In an act of true good hearted human spirit, and completely out of character, Tony sped off on foot in pursuit of an elderly chap who'd left his wallet on his chair. The old guy, after realising that he wasn't about to get mugged by a sweaty oik in bike leathers, praised the heavens for this display of honesty and kindness and went on his way. What he probably doesn't know is that St Anthony had already had a crafty flick through the contents and had deduced that there weren't enough 50 euro notes in it to be worth keeping.

The ride to Andorra from there was breathtaking, in more ways than one. 150 miles of the tightest mountain roads through completely green deserted ski resorts and witnessing some absolutely stunning scenery. This was as good as it gets on two wheels and by the time we arrived in Andorra having traversed from France into Spain along the way, we were both exhilarated... and knackered. Needless to say, the night out which followed was a shortish one aided by 'closed' signs virtually everywhere by 11pm. 

That boy is nowt but trouble...

Tuesday... Forsooth and hey nonny nonny, we have finally been joined by the miscreant of our brethren, brother Peter.

The reunion was less than romantic, taking place in one of the less attractive service stations along the A63. However, we welcomed Pete back into the fold and we all, as one, set forth for Biarritz. The weather is doing us huge favours and we have yet to see a drop of rain. The trip to Biarritz took us along the coast road, unfortunately the coast was never actually in sight... unlike several industrial estates and huge areas of managed forest. A mere three miles from our destination I narrowly missed riding over a small brick lying in the road, so did Tony. Pete, however, who must have been daydreaming about when the knighthood will come through and if he'll similarly get his own series like his mentor and idol... Lord Sugar, didn't. The brick knackered Pete's wheel and the Honda was left for the night unceremoniously at the side of the road.

Biarritz, like Le Mans and La Rochelle before it, appeared to be closed... either that or there just isn't much going on there. I was kind of expecting it to be the Monte Carlo of the west coast. In fact it was more like Belper but by the sea. A pleasant evening ensued which climaxed when Pete fell asleep on the toilet in the restaurant, well...he had had a long day and true to form the rest of us did nothing but try to get a few incriminating photos and laughed our socks off.

The next morning we managed to get Pete's bike recovered to a Honda dealership in Bayonne and within an hour it was fixed and back on the road. It was a team effort and thanks especially must go to Reidy who went for a leisurely breakfast and then departed on his way to Andorra while we were all out sweating in the morning sun.

Reidy gets his leg over... at last

Surreal circumstances... the life of a blogger can often be both the mundane and extreme. Mine, however, at this moment at 3am in an average French hotel room is to the night time soundtrack of Andy and is really quite unusual...


We've had a belter of a day, after a slightly lacklustre Sunday evening in Le Mans which was definitely ferme rather than ouvre on our evening out. The true spirit of Le Mans is of course at the circuit which hosts the 24 heures du Mans which is where we migrated to first up, a good thing too as we got to ride full pelt down the Mulsanne Straight, a three mile long public road which forms part of the circuit, before parking inside the track for breakfast and a good look round while a test day for superbikes was going on. Glorious sunshine, a burger baguette and a can of lager whilst taking in one of the most famous race tracks on planet earth at 11am on a Monday morning... can you think of anything better to be doing? Oh bugger, Andy stop snoring... i'm trying to be creative here! (if you don't appreciate what i'm going through just click here... zzzzzz...)

The ride to La Rochelle was just fab... 180 miles, only 6 U-turns, a vin rouge lunch in a tiny sun-baked market square half way before an afternoon of pure indulgence through some beautiful, if slightly flat French countryside. As is becoming the custom, we stopped for liquid refreshment at a dusty truck stop where a 5 euro beer compared favourably with the Parisien 11 bucks a pint and as you can see we found that the R1200GS is cosmetically improved by the adornment of two 'pannier pints'. My fave bit of the trip so far followed as we netted the leathers to the back of the bikes and took in the last 50 miles at a steady 90 in t-shirt order.

La Rochelle is a very pretty port town though it is strange how the best pub in town is Irish and that they didn't put on any entertainment for us beyond 11pm. Didn't they know we were coming for heaven's sake?

The word is that we become 5 tomorrow... maybe :) Barring a tsunami in the English Channel, an outbreak of those notorious flying pigs south of Rouen or an urgent phone call from the Balinese Goddess of Plenty, Pete will be with us late morning. About bloody time... pardon mon Francais.

Don't follow us... we're lost too...

So, after all the meticulous planning achieved with the kind of precision even NASA would be proud of, we are finally on our way. Our journey to Paris in beautiful sunshine, however, was more Fred Carno than Neil Armstrong. Our first stop at Toddington saw Reidy's lady box tank bag detach itself from his bike bouncing all his valuables down the M1 sliproad. On arrival in France we did what we do best... we got lost within two miles of leaving the tunnel and were delighted to experience the backstreets of Calais together with a road more resembling a cattle track. After this unintended delay we decided to take the motorway to Paris but neglected to remember that petrol stations are few and far between on the peage roads. The BMWs were running on fresh air when we rolled in to the first Shell station we came across. Andy's Ducati unfortunately had rolled only to the side of the road some 30 miles back when his tank ran dry. In the true spirit of 'all for one and one for all' we left him there until guilt finally took over and Tony, after drawing the short straw, took him a can of juice.

A night out saw an interesting conversation with a German naturist couple and extortionately priced beer. We'll never moan about your prices again Terry.

Sore heads abound on Sunday morning... Le Mans today. Catch y'all later

Zut Alors! Blimey crikey, Pete has to mow grass...

It pains me to inform our devoted followers that at the eleventh minute of the eleventh hour Pete has had to delay his departure with the rest of the chaps due to a need to mow his lawn, he has also neglected to remember an appointment with his nail technician and because Sainsbury's are doing two for one on various vegetables and Mr Kipling cakes this Saturday. We do, of course, fully understand Pete's position and wholeheartedly hope that he enjoys his extra portion of carrots as much as we'll enjoy springtime Parisian hospitality on Saturday afternoon.

Meanwhile, Neil gets to grips with his alter ego...also known as... err... Neil. There seems to be a slight issue with which of the aforementioned 'Neils' is a) able to imbibe the most pints of Pedigree, b) the most fun to spend a night with and c) can most ably turn an Ikea table into an elaborate French rococo Chippendale armoire. So far the concensus is with the £11.99 blow-up version.

Oooh, excitement abounds... we leave in seven hours... we leave behind those we love... and of course Pete who will be joining us in La Rochelle on Tuesday. Also on that day we will be sharing a pint with Barak Obama, doing the 'Bring me sunshine' dance with a resurrected Eric Morcambe and going to a lap dance bar with Gordon Brown who will just so happen to be accompanied by the Dali Lama and Collene Nolan who now apparently appears thrice nightly on 'Asian Babes', Sky channel 950 (Collene... not the Dali Lama, that is).

We take the p**s but sincerely hope that 4 become 5 on Tuesday... we hold our breath.

I am pleased to report that Reidy has secured sponsorship for his panniers by Fisher Price and he belatedly sends out a plea for assistance from anyone prepared to follow him on tour in order to help him lubricate his chain every five miles. Don't all rush at once...

To infinity and beyond... well, from Ashbourne to Barcelona and back again :)

Don't panic!

Can it be that all the waiting, planning (well there hasn't exactly been much of that going on), buying of new bikes to replace other new bikes, buying of countless 'bits' so much so that most of the bikes are now so weighed down that there need be no worry of speeding tickets on this trip, practice rides out and numerous discussions and arm twisting with regard to who's actually going are almost over? Two weeks to go and the boys, in the same way that Wembley finalists nip down to Saville Row to get decked out in bespoke togs, are proud to show off their Tour T-shirts. Hopefully, comfort and practicality will have overcome male pride this year and those of us who really haven't been a Large for some time will feel more comfortable in an XL. I'll let you be the judge of that. I'm grateful to a very talented cartoonist, Mr Simon Goodway, who came up with Capt Mainwaring for me and as you can see I think our point will come across in a typically subtle and understated way when we venture into Monsieur Johnny Foreigner's back yard.

Needless to say but we're all very excited that the tour is almost upon us and at precisely 5am on Saturday 21st May we go forth...