The Irish Tales

The end of the road.
　
There were 10 or 12 of us; I can’t remember clearly now, after this time.
But, we were all riding race-prepped bikes and pumped full of adrenaline on leaving Assen.
And we needed to get to the Hook by 7.30pm.
Why ? Because England were playing Germany in a qualifier for the European Championship and most of us wanted to watch it before we boarded the ferry home.

And so began the most insane ride I’ve ever been on.
Once on the motorway, we were nose to tail, throttles pinned wide open.

But of course, none of us had thought to fill up with fuel first.
Aye, bikers are as dumb as ordinary folk.
For a while, it was the single biggest thrill of my life. The bigger-engined bikes led and sucked the smaller bikes along in their wake.
Gixer Thous, R1s, Blades, Ducatis 996s, Aprilia Thous, Yamaha R6s, Ducatis 748s…we were all there, caught up in the madness.
And of God, what divine madness it was.

Until the first bike coughed, fired again, then coughed and pulled out.
How I avoided the smashing into the Blade just a foot away from me, I’ll never know.
Suddenly we had lost five bikes and the Hook was still 55 clicks away.
It was chaos. The rest of us finally found a service station, as our carbs sucked in the last gasp of petrol.
We sent some bikes back, with litre bottles of petrol and somehow, we all converged again and set off at the same license-losing pace.

Amazingly, we did all arive together in a quiet square, only a click away from the ferry port.
There to find a very nice pub, who were having a karoke night.
We parked up outside and ventured in.
There was a TV screen in the corner, switched off. It was 7.27pm.
One of us, I can’t remember who now, approached the owner with our plea for food, beer and the match.
In one of those rare triumphs of diplomacy, the kareoke was suspended, the TV turned on, delightful fish and chips and lager were provided…we were with friends.

Y’see, the Dutch hate the Germans as much as we do and they were more than happy to oblige, bless them.
England won 5-1 and every goal was greeted with massive cheers by Dutch and English alike. It was the most splendid evening.
Much later, very tired and slightly pissed, our cortege of bikes trickled down to the port and attempted to board the ferry.
Where, for some reason, we all exchanged passports and pretended to be who we weren’t.
I believe I had The Crow’s and he had Scott’s and…well.
Faced with 12 hyper-active bikers, the Customs Official simply sighed and waved us all on board.
Where, after one last whisky, we hit the cabins, exhausted.
We docked at 6am but slept in until about 8am, when they cleared us off.

All except one : me.
Late as always, I untied my bike and headed up the ramp.
Except it was the wrong ramp, as I found out when emerging into fresh air, only to find the ramp ended in a huge drop into the sea.
I survived, dear readers. Just.
And so the long road back was nearly over.
As, indeed is this column, I think.
For those who have been regular readers, my thanks.
But Second Life is now turning into Third Life.
And that shouldn’t be inflicted on anyone.
If you have been, thank you for reading.
God bless and goodbye.

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