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#Post#: 2742--------------------------------------------------
The Mighty Falcone does the Stella Alpina and survives, almost
By: banquo Date: December 20, 2019, 12:10 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
I've always been scathing about vans; trailers, campers and
caravans too. “Why not ride your bike to events?” I would
grumble, as I set up my solitary tent beside my bike, amongst
the forest of four wheelers, at rally after rally. Quite apart
from anything else, 'vanning' doesn't have quite the same ring
to it as motorcycling, but even the strongest of views are
subject to change, and pensioners such as me have to learn to
live with the shame.
I can blame it on my niece, who in a bout of romantic
inconsideration, decided to get married in Portugal the same
weekend as Ali and I should have set off for France. Prepared to
abandon my trip, I had resigned myself to postponing it until a
wedding-less year, but had more than underestimated the tenacity
of a determined Geordie woman with a cunning plan. Before I
could pour myself a conciliatory beer, it was decided for me
that the Mighty Falcone would be whisked off to Italy by van, as
I was impressing the locals with my hirsute sartorial elegance
in Faro. A Ford Transit duly appeared, to add to the stable of
assorted bikes and cars; 11 years old, with over 100,000 on the
clock, and a home-made conversion into sort of a camper, into
which the previous owner had stuffed a couple of trials bikes
for weekends in Northumberland.
Further inspection revealed that shoehorning our pair of lardy
bikes into the available space wasn't an option, so the next few
weeks were spent undoing the conversion, and redoing into
something that might work, having first to remove the fairing
from the Mighty Falcone, as its bulk was just too much. We
discovered that electricity was not a strong point of the
previous owner, the entire conversion having been wired up in
2-core lighting flex, probably rated at no more than 3A, and
certainly considerably less than the 25A required for the 300W
inverter he'd fitted. This 'loom' was held together with various
bits of connector strip and insulating tape, and with not a fuse
in sight. We bought a fusebox, a couple of galvanized chocks
from an outfit in Germany, a triple width ramp off eBay, and
moved the kitchen unit behind the front seats to give full width
rewiring from my copious supplies of junk. After a lot of
faffing about, we finally managed to fit the whole thing
together, just before I Ryanaired myself off to Portugal, and
Ali headed for Brion for a Guzzi rally, with both bikes in the
back. The wedding was great by the way, and there was a power
cut mid-reception, and the only thing left working was the
bar....
By Monday evening, I was back home, with just a day to force the
washing through the machine, and pack up to fly off to Bergamo,
one of those airports which the likes of Ryanair designate as
Milan, but which is nowhere near it. Arriving close to midnight,
my carriage, well Transit, awaits, and we're soon ensconced in
our comfy B&B, to avoid having to unload the bikes in the middle
of the night. It's Italy, it's hot, and the air-conditioning
consists of a half open window, so we're awoken by the ****
crowing at some ungodly hour, and find we're sharing the car
park with a Lamborghini. We hit the road early for Mandello del
Lario, where the bikes are unloaded, and a very welcome cold
beer consumed before we hit town.
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Last time we were there was the 97th Anniversary, and there were
literally thousands of Guzzis returning to their home town, and
goodness knows what 2021 will bring on the centenary.
This time, there are few, and mine won't start. The Mighty
Falcone always starts first kick, so something is clearly wrong:
either that or it's got in a sulk for arriving back to its
birthplace by Ford. Eventually, it does decide to fire up, and
seems to run fine, but I just know it's not right, and it feels
so much like last year, when the coil died at a VMCC rally.:
surely it can't have failed again so soon? I leave it running
for a while, until I'm scolded by the camp site owner into
shutting it off, for the benefit of the other campers.
Understandable perhaps, as I left the stock double decker
silencer at home, and took the lighter but much noisier cocktail
shaker instead, and everyone's tent is full of noise and exhaust
fumes.
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#Post#: 2743--------------------------------------------------
Re: The Mighty Falcone does the Stella Alpina and survives, almo
st
By: banquo Date: December 20, 2019, 12:11 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
We plan a tour on the far side of Lake Como, and head for the
Bellagio ferry, a few miles north along the coast road at
Varenna, stopping for fuel just next to the campsite. The bike
doesn't feel right, working well at full throttle, but misfiring
at lower speeds, and as I de-clutch to make the turn down to the
ferry, the engine dies completely between gears. I am forced to
coast down behind an oblivious Ali, stopping about 20 yards from
the ferry, and having to do the push of shame in front of the
hundreds of tourists thronging the shore, sweat dripping down my
leather-clad body in the mid-day sun, as they gawp in their cool
linen suits and summer dresses. We push both bikes to the side
of the queue, as it makes no sense to add to our woes by
crossing the lake, and get the tools out.
There's a stink of fuel, and it doesn't smell like any petrol
I've ever come across; more like diesel, but the journey from
Mandello confirms it can't be mis-fuelling, as it would have
died long before here. The plug's sooted up, and replacing it
allows the engine to start again, exactly as it did last year
with the coil. After a few minutes running, it begins to misfire
again, and sure enough, the plug's once again sooted up. I
recall last year's futile carburettor dismantling, and decide
not to repeat it. Plug changed again, but this time it won't
start, and emits a huge backfire through the open pipe, which
has the bystanders diving for cover. We have an audience too,
and a small crowd has gathered around the bike, led by an
enthusiastic local who, despite the clearly broken down posture
of the machine, entertains the less indoctrinated viewers with
superlatives on the wonders of the Moto-Guzzi single.
I have a spare copper HT lead in the pannier, and decide to fit
that, in the hope that the ancient Halfords one might have
succumbed to the warm weather. It's far too long, so rather than
cut and have to make a new termination, I wrap it around the
dynamo, and once again, it starts, and this time keeps running.
We decide to make a break for Mandello, before the reluctant
engine changes its mind, scrape the oil off our hands, pull on
gloves and helmets, and head for Menni's place, where perhaps a
spare coil might be located. There's nobody home of course, or
if there is, they're not answering the door to the eccentric
couple from over the water. A sad looking Lodola lies partially
stripped outside, still strapped to the pallet on which it was
delivered several years ago by the look of it, and the grounds
outside are a mass of rusting machinery and old tyres. We decide
to head back to town before all the bike shops are closed, but
on restarting I make something of a breakthrough when I notice
the dash lights dimming almost to nothing as the engine is
turned over on the kick-start. It looks like the battery voltage
is collapsing under load, and even the points closing is enough
to kill the voltage. It's only 16 years old too, having been
relegated to the Falcone some eight years ago, when it started
struggling to churn the Harley over on cold mornings. You just
can't get the quality these days, although perhaps rattling
about in the back of the van was the last straw.
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Surely, getting a battery should be easy enough in Mandello, and
it is, as long as you're not fussy what you get. We try the
garage next door to the campsite, fruitlessly, and then two of
the many shops supplying parts for historic Guzzis, and both can
supply the original spec. battery for an eye watering €130 or
so. The problem is (quite apart from the cost, which would of
course have been only £85 before the Great British Pound became
the peso of Europe) that I don't want a gigantic wet cell
battery. I ask for an AGM battery, but nobody seems to have
heard of them, and although I could easily get one online, I
need one now, and not next week. We're directed towards a
battery shop up the hill, but fail to find it, so give up for
the night, take the obligatory photo outside the factory door,
and then get fed and drunk instead.
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Next morning we're armed with a town map and a hangover, and
while collecting some parts for a couple of Airone, find out
exactly where the battery place is. It's no surprise we didn't
find it, as it looks more like someone's house than a workshop,
and so it is, and it's deserted when we get there. A knock on
the house door rouses the owner from his lunch, and despite our
protestations, he comes down to the workshop so we can explain
the problem.
#Post#: 2744--------------------------------------------------
Re: The Mighty Falcone does the Stella Alpina and survives, almo
st
By: banquo Date: December 20, 2019, 12:12 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
It's very useful when you're travelling with someone who speaks
at least some Italian, as English isn't widely spoken here, but
once again, we're offered the huge wet battery, and once again
we ask for AGM and get nowhere. Eventually, I spot what looks
like a 'dry' battery on one of the oil stained wooden benches.
Small, but probably good enough? Battery man shakes his head
gloomily and says it's too small, but unearths a slightly larger
one that he thinks might do, reluctantly accepting that “lo
stupido Scozzese” will not be diverted. It's a sealed lead-acid,
so it needs filled and charged, but we can collect in a couple
of hours. Cash changes hands, and the die is cast.
That gives us time to wander through the town, and take in a
Gelato down by the shore, the sun continuing to beat down
unrelentingly.
You're never quite sure if you've actually resolved a problem
until you have some miles under your belt, but the new battery
seems to have returned the bike to its normal self, once it's
shoehorned into position, and suitably packed out with the
cardboard box it came in. The terminals are on the wrong side,
but the wires still reach, and the comforting glare from the
headlamp confirms its fully charged condition. We're due at a
friend's house in Ortanella, set high in the hills above the
lake, and Ali suggests this is as good a chance as any to test
the bike, so I follow the Transit back along the lake shore,
exhaust reverberating from the tunnel walls. The road from
Varenna to Esino Lario incorporates a series of 18 hairpins,
gaining some 1,300 feet as it does so, and the view from the
clifftop is simply stunning. I've already stopped once for some
photos, and although we agreed to meet at the top, I pass
multiple junctions on the way, hoping that by choosing what
appears to be the steepest route we will coincide at some point,
as I've no idea where we're going. Ali meanwhile, has stopped at
a viewpoint, and is following my progress by ear, the cocktail
shaker pipe being audible from miles away, as the overstressed
engine thunders up the gradient, although she's only a few
hundred feet away in a vertical direction. There is no respite,
as the road continues unerringly towards the summit, but the
Mighty Falcone takes it in its stride, its low gearing more than
compensating for its meagre power output, until I turn the last
bend and find the Transit parked up by the roadside.
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We take some water, and get talking to an Italian guy with a
nice Guzzi outfit who's interested in the 'foreign' Guzzi, and
then continue upwards, along the cliff edge, a foot high wall
being the only thing that separates us from the sheer drop of
several hundred feet into the forest below. Gulp. I really don't
like heights, and it's a relief when we finally stop climbing,
and reach the grassy plateau where our host lays on cold beer
and an excellent Italian meal. The bike rests under the eaves,
while our host questions with good reason, why it stinks of
petrol.... “Just evaporation from the carburettor.” I mutter
reassuringly, thinking it's the tap leaking again, but as is so
often the case, I'm wrong.
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Despite the July sunshine, we awake to a chill in the thin
mountain air, load the bike into the van, and set off for the
ski resort of Bardonecchia, close to the French border, and set
some 4,000 feet above sea level in the Alps. This
unprepossessing little town, host to the 2006 Winter Olympics,
has been the base for the Stella Alpina Motociclistica
Internazionale, or 'Stella' for short, since 1967, when
organiser, the late Mario Artusio moved it from it's first
location at the Stelvio. This is all new to me, my experience in
off-road riding being confined to those occasions when I left
the tarmac and hit some solid object in the undergrowth, and a
once only trip from Glendevon over the hills to Dollar on my
Triumph Trailblazer, back in 1971, but Ali's an old hand, having
summited on various machines over the years, including that most
inappropriate of off-road machines, a Guzzi Le Mans with
clip-ons and a full Stucchi fairing. The ride was conceived long
before such fripperies as “Adventure Bikes” had been invented,
and it was Mario's vision that the climb would be an opportunity
for ordinary people on ordinary bikes to boldly go where no one
has gone before, or at least where they would never have
considered going.
#Post#: 2745--------------------------------------------------
Re: The Mighty Falcone does the Stella Alpina and survives, almo
st
By: banquo Date: December 20, 2019, 12:13 pm
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There's a 'blessing of the bikes' arranged at a church in town,
an old tradition, and Ali's keen that we get there before it
starts, to meet up with all the others who also have been going
for decades. The van is parked up in a gravelled area bereft of
all facilities, that benefits from the name of Campo Smith in
name alone, and we share our car park beside the river with a
variety of campers, trucks, cars and show wagons, that have
apparently been mothballed for the season. Of course we're very
short of time, and by the time the bikes are extracted from the
van, mirrors reset, etc. we have just a few minutes before we're
supposed to be at the Kirk, so I fire up the now willing
Militare, and follow Ali's R65 in a cloud of white dust and out
onto the town. It's clear pretty soon that we don't know where
we're going, as I trail disconsolately behind, and up a
thankfully deserted one-way street the wrong way. This is
followed by a mad dash through narrow streets until we finally
emerge onto the main drag, a wide and cobbled shopping street
emblazoned with No Entry signs. My leader is unfazed, and
thunders on regardless. I on the other hand, am dissuaded from
following by the several passers by who leap out into the road,
gesticulating wildly at my errant progress, and finally by the
Polizia, heading straight for me in the correct direction in
their Alfa. Attempting some kind of compromise, I keep the
engine running, and as the hill is steep, select first gear, and
walk beside the bike at tickover, studiously ignoring the police
car, and acting the part of an eccentric, motorised pedestrian.
Ali is scathing about my cautious approach when I finally reach
the top of the road, and a welcome two-way street, but we do
manage to locate the Church of St. Hippolytus (the patron saint
of fat mammals perhaps?) just as the service is about to begin.
Being something of an atheist, this goes over my head, but they
do have a translator, who delivers the text in French, German
and English (at least) as well as the native Italian, as this is
indeed an international affair.
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Blessing
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We follow the service with a trial run up one of the many
passes, a series of hairpins slicing the side of the mountain,
punctuated by huge transverse gullies to carry the snow melt off
the hills. Not the sort of thing you would like to hit at
speed... We stop at one of the many tunnels, where the road is
wider, for a panoramic view of the village below, and I feel my
stomach lurching at the sheer drop. It's like sitting in the
Gods at some huge theatre, with Bardonecchia as the stage,
several hundred feet below.
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Of course I have no intention of even attempting the Stella
ascent with the Falcone, and say so as we follow a few beers at
the Station with a 12 course meal, consisting mainly of 10
different ways to serve polenta, in the foothills of the route.
The ride up there was challenging enough, but at least it was
tarmac, and the ride down was even more cautious, in the pitch
dark, with the sure and certain knowledge of the precipitous
drops that suck away the feeble glow from what passes for a
headlight.
The participants are persuasive though, and as Sunday morning
dawns, I find I've agreed to at least take the trip up to base
camp. It can't be that hard, can it, and I'm assured that it
will be just fine. This provides me with the first introduction
to the compulsive lying that characterises all those who ride
the Col du Sommeiller, the Alpine Pass which joins Italy with
neighbouring France, reaching around 10,000 feet as it does so.
The road starts off as tarmac, with a few vicious hairpins, just
to get you in the mood, as we retrace our route to last night's
restaurant, but degrades rapidly as we pass it, firstly into a
fair semblance of a forestry track, but then into a morass of
dust and rocks. It's steep and punctuated with multiple
hairpins, and the water coursing from the Alpine peaks has
washed away the surface, leaving deep, stone-filled transverse
ruts and deep channels running sort of, but not quite, parallel
to where we want to go. I soon get into some kind of a rhythm,
standing on the footrests to take the weight off the rear wheel,
and praying they don't collapse as they did once before, while I
was negotiating a cattle grid in Perthshire, with excruciating
consequences for the nether regions. I learn to avoid the
channels, as they self-steer the bike where they want to go,
rather than where I want to go, but in places there's no choice.
As the ascent continues, the road deteriorates still further,
not helped by the completely insane people who seem to have
decided that travelling up in their hire car might be a good
idea, and are crashing through the rocks, ripping the underside
off their vehicles, and forming mobile barricades to progress..
We're forced to a halt by a particularly stupid and
inconsiderate Mercedes driver, who gets a double dose of
education into the profanities of Scottish and Geordie
vernacular as we finally manage to squeeze past on a tight bend.
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#Post#: 2746--------------------------------------------------
Re: The Mighty Falcone does the Stella Alpina and survives, almo
st
By: banquo Date: December 20, 2019, 12:14 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
It's late in the day, and most start early, when the roadway is
less cut up; the result is not only that the dust and rocks are
much worse, but also that we're meeting a continual stream of
traffic coming the other way. There are far more of them than
there are of us, and as the surface degrades, we find ourselves
forced off the favoured path, and into the more dangerous and
unpredictable areas. I'm in the lead on the Falcone, followed by
Ali, with Mick riding shotgun on his AJP, having so generously
sacrificed his own Stella to help us on our way. After what
seems like forever, with the sweat carving fissures in the caked
dust on our faces, I slew to a halt at a fork in the road. Down,
and to the left, there's a plateau, with dozens of bikes and
tents scattered around a cleared area, and to the right, I can
see the road zig-zagging in a series of hairpins up the side of
a sizeable cliff. “Where now?”, I cough, wishing I'd brought a
dust mask. “Is this base camp?” Of course I don't get a
satisfactory answer, and am urged to take the right fork,
although I later discover that this was indeed the spot where I
had agreed to abandon the climb. The road is becoming a road in
name alone, and the hairpins are lethal, totally blind, and with
gut wrenching vertiginous drops to send the unwary to their
doom. The inside line is impossible, far too steep, so a wide
line needs to be taken, to have some chance of seeing what's
coming the other way, and to ease the gradient to one which the
bikes can manage. The surface is fine white sand, punctuated by
sharp rocks, and all the bikes are white now, with occasional
mud splatters where we have traversed one of the many trickles
of water. I'm forced to stop several times, finding my route
blocked by descending bikes, and in one case a broadsiding quad
bike, moving at insane speed, but he has four wheels to my two,
and I know who would come off worse. About half way up this
switchback, Ali calls it a day. Her R65 is bogged down in the
sand, and we need to stop to extricate it. Having done the route
so many times before, she has nothing to prove. I consider doing
the same, and ask Mick how far it is to 'The Plateau' where I
believe we're trying to go. “Just another couple of bends and
we're there.” he lies, and with that, I'm committed to carrying
on. We meet up with some others from the previous night, on
their way back down, one of whom tells me it's just another ten
minutes to the top, and there's a guy handing out badges to
those who have made it. We manhandle Ali's bike round, no easy
task, and as she heads off back to Base Camp, I fire up the
Guzzi again, and with Mick faithfully holding onto my tail,
continue the long grind up the hill.
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Ali has our bottle of water, and soon my tongue feels like a
leather strap in my mouth, although the Buff does keep some of
the dust from my lungs I hope. One final turn, and suddenly
we're on relatively flat ground, with a gentle slope heading
upwards in an incline that I previously would have thought
steep, but now seems easy. Not so the surface; the fine sand has
all but gone, the stream of downward traffic is unrelenting, and
I'm trying to pick my way through a maze of sharp rocks. By this
time, we must be 8,000 or so feet up, and I'm permanently in
first gear now, but the motor seems unconcerned, with no
altitude sickness, no return of the previous problems, and not
even any indication of overheating. Descending riders shout out
“Eh! Falcone! Bravo!” in surprise at the vision of this unlikely
apparition lumbering up the slope, surely the most inappropriate
motorcycle on the slopes that day, if not the oldest.
#Post#: 2747--------------------------------------------------
Re: The Mighty Falcone does the Stella Alpina and survives, almo
st
By: banquo Date: December 20, 2019, 12:15 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
There is a point in any journey, where no matter how bad it
gets, you just need to keep going, otherwise all the pain and
effort has been for naught. I'm now bouncing from rock to rock,
and very close to going over the precipitous edge. I have
learned to look well ahead, and plan my route well before I get
to the next hazard, but often I'm forced off that choice by
opposing traffic. When the front wheel hits a rock, as it does
often, it kicks the wheel one way or another, and just when I
think I have it under control, the rear wheel hits the same
rock, with completely unpredictable consequences. Twice the
front heads straight for the edge, and twice I somehow manage to
avoid the catastrophic fall. Braking is clearly not an option,
and I discover that opening the throttle seems to stabilise the
bike as well as anything, or maybe it was just luck that
prevented a very rapid and once only descent. I'm in constant
fear of a puncture, or even worse, a rock through the soft alloy
underbelly of the engine; I don't imagine that my recovery cover
extends this far up a mountain. We reach a point where the road
widens on a long sweeping bend, and I pull over for a break.
It's like a moonscape, with piles of white rocks and dark grey
gravel and silt left behind by the melting glaciers. It would
have been a great photo opportunity, but Mick's keen to get on,
so we mount up and continue through the rocks. I can see the
next series of hairpins up and to my right, a repeat of what
we've just been through, but the surface is now indescribably
bad, all the small particles having been washed away by the
melting snows, leaving only a jumble of sharp rocks to pick
through. I'm forced off the 'road' in several places, as there
simply isn't any path through the chaos of stones, and the
forward planning succumbs to instinct and hope alone.
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I recall climbing in the Ochils in my youth, and always
persuading myself that the next ridge was the top, when it
wasn't. It's the same again, each bend leading inexorably to
another, as the snow builds up at the side of the track in huge
drifts until suddenly we're in standing traffic, and the show
stops.
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I manage to park the bike somewhere secure, and realise I'm
completely exhausted, mentally and physically. When I was a kid,
65 year old men were sitting by the fire in their slippers, not
riding unsuitable motorcycles up mountains. I scrape the surface
off a snowdrift, and scoop some of the virgin snow beneath into
my mouth, where it combines with the dust to form a gritty
slurry that I spit out before taking another mouthful, recalling
that unique taste of snow from my childhood. Why does snow have
a taste?
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Summit
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by bancquo
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There's a party atmosphere in the thin air, the sense of
achievement palpable, and the babble of excitement in German,
English and Italian fights with the buzz of two-strokes, as some
adventurous individuals head across the tundra to a steep hill
of gravel, where they attempt, and largely fail, to reach the
summit. Getting back is another obstacle, and several sink
through the softening snow into the bog beneath, to the
amusement of the spectators. Of course the man with the badges
has long gone, so we have only a few pictures to record the
experience.
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Summit snow
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by bancquo
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The stink of fuel from the bike pollutes the clean mountain air,
and I discover that the odd smelling petrol is dripping from the
fuel tap area onto the dynamo. Not evaporation from the
carburettor then... The tap seems tight in its union, and the
hoses are secure, so I effect a repair by stuffing some Kleenex
into the damp area, and hope that will prevent a fiery and
explosive end to the trip.
It's around this point that I realise that the journey is only
half complete, and I still have to find my way back down the
hill. Manhandling the bike 180°, I fire up the motor, and start
the descent, Mick still patiently taking up the rear. It's
terrifying, and, for me, much worse than the ascent, where the
gradient works to slow the bike when required. Even in its
incredibly low first gear, engine braking isn't sufficient to
control the downward progress of the Militare, and I find myself
crawling along, trying to feather the rear brake and avoid
touching the front, while my bowels churn like an overloaded
cement mixer, and the sweat exudes from every pore. Right
hairpins are the worst, as about half way around, all that is in
front of you is the emptiness of free space into which the
slightest error will send bike and rider to oblivion; not ideal
when you suffer from vertigo. Progress is painfully slow and
exhausting in the continuing glare of the summer sun, but
eventually, we find ourselves within site of base camp, a few
hundred feet below us, and stop for a photo shoot by the
spectacular waterfall that borders the route.
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waterfall
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by bancquo
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As we remount, my side stand spring falls off into the dust.
It's not broken, but neither will it stay on, so something has
clearly been bent, and I'm forced to drop the spring into the
pannier and retrieve a couple of tie-wraps to hold the stand up.
As we descend the last series of hairpins to Base Camp, I'm
frozen with fear, each turn presenting a new vision of certain
death, and it's with great relief that we finally reach the
junction.
#Post#: 2748--------------------------------------------------
Re: The Mighty Falcone does the Stella Alpina and survives, almo
st
By: banquo Date: December 20, 2019, 12:16 pm
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I'd agreed to meet Ali here, but it's been so long, that Mick's
sure she'll be sinking a cold beer back in town by now. Although
I consider this entirely likely, I can also visualise only too
well the consequences of heading back down, only to discover she
had indeed stayed behind, so we part company, and Mick heads
down the hill without the burden of Captain Slow, and I trundle
the Falcone down the dusty path, and across a ford onto the
grassy plateau, where I find a spot flat enough to deploy the
centre-stand, and spend a fruitless 10 minutes trying to get the
side-stand spring to stay on, before lashing it back up again.
I can see no sign of Ali, or of her bike, but there are dozens
scattered around, so I spend a futile 20 minutes or so
searching, just to be sure. There's a wooden building like a
Swiss Chalet on the far side of the flat area, and I discover
this is a cafe and shop, where I purchase a can of ice cold
Moretti which is consumed with gusto on the limp back to the
bike, and I feel reinvigorated as I head off for the last leg
down the hill.
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Plateau
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I stop just once, overlooking a dam, and the stunning breach in
the rocks that is the valley back into town, where I meet a
couple from Ukraine, who are just heading up. We swap cameras to
take the obligatory shots, before I take the last leg back into
town, where everyone else has been gathered at the Station,
sinking cold beers for quite some time it seems.
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Dam
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Both bike and I are completely covered in white dust and mud,
but apart from the broken side-stand, and the leaking fuel,
we're pretty much unscathed by the experience, and the bike's
still fit enough to take in the Singles Rally once we get back,
although further investigation reveals that the fuel tank is
split and leaking in three different places, and there's also
significant play in the swinging arm and steering head. Clearly
the ride didn't do it any favours, but bikes are for riding
after all, and there's no adventure leaving them in the garage.
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Filthy 2
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Of course I celebrate the lofty achievement with another cold
beer; not a Stella unfortunately, for this is Italy after all,
but a Moretti to wash down the first and most likely last ascent
of the Stella Alpina on the Mighty Falcone. It seems equally
appropriate.
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Moretti
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on Flickr
It's over these beers that one of our companions reveals that
last year, someone did go over the edge, taking out not only
themselves, but another two bikes from the lower level, and I
reflect that it's a good job they hadn't mentioned that in the
morning...
And that's the point; all this terror and challenge for me is
but a walk in the park to those who have been doing it for
twenty, thirty and forty years. They follow the day's activities
with a few days of 'safaris' up adjoining mountain passes, all
of which look equally tough to me, but they are equally blasé
about these, putting my little adventure into stark perspective
as just another ride up a hill....
The van? Well, I wouldn't have got there without it, so from now
on, vans are just fine by me, and I can live with that. Cheaper
too, with only one fuel cost, and free accommodation if you're
not too fussy where you stay, plus you keep the bikes fresher
for the important bit, and limit the mileage.
Carry on Vanning I say; it reaches the parts old fools on old
bikes can't reach.
#Post#: 2750--------------------------------------------------
Re: The Mighty Falcone does the Stella Alpina and survives, almo
st
By: randall Date: December 21, 2019, 5:58 am
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Banquo,
Thanks for this Fantastic story of an epic adventure and of
other times
Vince
#Post#: 2752--------------------------------------------------
Re: The Mighty Falcone does the Stella Alpina and survives, almo
st
By: Dave Date: December 21, 2019, 4:20 pm
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Terrific adventure, thanks for sharing it
#Post#: 2755--------------------------------------------------
Re: The Mighty Falcone does the Stella Alpina and survives, almo
st
By: Lone Wolf Date: January 16, 2020, 7:28 pm
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Wotcha.
Most excellent.
I've never been one for the camper van and trailer brigade . . .
. . .until it was forced upon me ten years ago.
I can still ride - I can't get in and out of a tent, so the
answer was a camper van and trailer. OK - I refuse to attend
bike rallies with this combination, but I still have the trike
and trailer tent / dog kennel for such occasions.
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