The “Old Duffers Trip” has become and annual tradition and the previous two trips have been to the Isle of Man and Normandie. For this year we decided to go to Ireland and moved the date to June in the hope of getting reasonable weather – a vain hope as it turned out.
The trip video is here :
In previous years we have all used old motorbikes and part of the entertainment has been the ongoing maintenance and running repairs that these machines inevitably require. This had started to impinge on the enjoyment of the trip so we agreed that newer bikes would be allowed for this trip. Unfortunately Keith didn’t get the memo and turned up on his 1970’s Honda 400/4. As he lives in Northern Ireland and had the shortest distance to travel we were hopeful that this wouldn’t be a problem. The reality was somewhat different…
I had the longest distance to cover to get to our destination in Galway, on the West coast of Ireland and set off a few days before the others. I stayed overnight with Alexander in Limoges and dropped off Hebe Dog for her holidays, then on to Le Mans for another overnight stop. I took the ferry from Cherbourg to Dublin, a 20 hour crossing, but with a cabin of my own and calm seas the journey was very comfortable. I then drove across Ireland to Oughterard and stayed in a B&B for a couple of days before checking in to our holiday accommodation.
On arriving at our rental house and meeting up with the other guys we spotted that the oven door was broken, which became the first project to work on. The house was set on the shore of Lough Corrib in a lovely location. The weather was a bit mixed, generally cool and showery but with occasional bouts of sun.
We managed a few outings to interesting places : The landing site of Alcock and Brown’s first transatlantic flight, the site of the transmitter that sent the first communications across from Ireland to America and a trip across a sand causeway to a remote island cut off at high tide.
We took it in turns on kitchen duties, which is always an entertaining part of the trip especially with a malfunctioning oven. We had no real mechanical issues with the modern bikes although Dougie did spend some time investigating an elusive tapping noise on his Honda CRF (later traced to the cam chain tensioner).
Predictably it was Keith’s old Honda that proved the most troublesome. The first issue was a binding front brake – the Honda has a pivoting bracket and the pivot was partially seized. Unfortunately the front brake locked up just as he turned into the gravel drive at our accommodation dumping him and bike on the gravel in front of the house. Apart from dented pride this also resulted in a broken front brake lever and smashed indicator. The brake lever was patched up with jubilee clips as a temporary measure and duct tape sorted out the indicator lens.
The next issue to emerge was the Honda electrics – the charging system stopped working meaning the battery discharged over time and it was touch and go as to whether he would be able to get back before the battery ran out. This required a number of bump starts as there wasn’t enough power to drive the electric starter. We bought a battery charger and that seemed to restore the battery enough for him to get home at the end of the trip.
Having suffered pretty mixed weather on this trip, I suggested the team might like to come to the south of France next year. But this would require everyone having a reliable bike to cover the distance. Keith probably needs to have a clear out of some of his antique machinery and get something more up to date for next year.