With motor season approaching there’s new activity on the site and in other areas. One bit of news is that we have a new business partner on our site ! Kenny Simon handles our technical support for our BMW RT but also for other brands and models.Ken has opened a new shop in Den Dolder, in the province of Utrecht and will discuss any work on your motorbike with you. Just click on the picture to check out his website!| Ken is from New York, speaks Dutch and English and is an enthusiastic BMW rider himself! Find his website here!
in the form of some virus, or more likely a False Positive (i.e. a mistake by the anti-virus program), in our previous Wordpress Theme.
So I had to take it off-line and replace the look and feel for now. Sorry!
But don’t worry, I am hard at work to design a new look for the site and we’ll be back soon!
Francois
That’s the problem of having a busy life….. and few customers: no time to update the website. Truth is I posted most of the motor riding news on Facebook and on the BMWST forums, leaving precious little time to update things here. But, riding season is coming closer again here in northern Europe, so lets start posting again.
Nina and I did a lot of riding last Summer and we never had the time to report on those journeys. So I’ll be starting work on that too. I made some 7000 photos and that is part of the problem. Too many to choose from !
On another note, we’re getting ready to get us a company car. right now we’re looking at the Mercedes Viano as the most likely candidate. It will allow us to not only move a trailer with bikes, but also additional luggage and people to/from departure points! Lets hope we can trade the Jeep in……
Our first ‘event’ this year will be the BMW RT ride in Holland on April 25th. Will report on that when the time is there!
Many of us ride through winter months as well, and then it can get REALLY chilly. I did a few rides down to 6 C (that’s around 42 F) and it was alright the first 15 minutes, but after that it starts getting cold quickly.
What better ‘garment’ to wear then but a heated vest of some sort. Trouble is, these things are expensive. My US friends ride with Gerbings stuff and that’s difficult to find here AND expensive.
That’s why I wanted to share a nice site with you, on which I found a Do-It-Yourself heated vest with a complete and very clear building instruction. Maybe something to make over this Summer and be less cold next Winter, eh?
Check out
Well, it is stopping some people. So here is the good news: we have time on our hands to accommodate your travel again, since two US customers have canceled their plans. And that’s the bad news; some folks really are feeling the pinch of these economic woes unfortunately.
And yes, I keep promising to update the site, but like so many of you I am too busy trying to make a living. This has been a bad winter too, in more than one way, so I did hardly do any riding. Bummer !
I can only promise you that I am doing my best to get new conent on the site. We have some really nice travel tales to show that are still waiting in the photos folder of my hard disk. And I’ve been collecting many more interesting internet links too. Now, if only I could find a good system of storing and providing those links. Anybody ?
Wishing you all a great riding season(s) in 2009, in spite of the gloomy and depressing news the media are unloading upn us every day. I tend to just shrug it off and enjoy the days I have…… cheaper petrol helps in doing that ! ;-)
Hi everybody. As you already figured from the absence of much activity here, we are very busy! Busy with the Internet work I do, but also with preparing the 2009 riding season. We did some (delayed) scouting in September and found you some great new roads to discover in the Alps. I’ll be posting a story about the trips later in November.
We also are starting to get the first preliminary bookings for the next season, so if you have any plans to visit Europe next year, then do not wait too long with contacting us ! We hope petrol prices will remain at their current low (yeah, right!) and the Dollar will crawl back a little after the elections (maybe!).
The economic downturn does not have only negative effects. Sure, people may have less money to spend (or less confidence in doing so), but competition will be fiercer, especially in the travel industry, so lodging prices may drop a little too. We’ll keep an eye on it for you of course!
We’re back from yet another Alps Ride and I am now sifting through 2000 photos! I’ll be putting some of them in the Pictures and Stories section over the next weeks! We did some famous and not-so-famous routes, covering the Col de l’Iséran, Col de la Télégraphe, Col du Galibier, Col du Vars, Col des Guérins (ever heard of that one !!??), Col du Festre and the ‘obvious’ one, Col de Bonette !
We visited great routes, such as the Défile de la Sauloix, the route around Lake Serre-Ponçon, parts of the Route Napoléon, the Itiniraire des Villages Perchés and many more.
Used up an entire rear tire on the scruffy pass roads too !
Other news:
- we’re talking to new partners to extend the offering of our riding areas. Think Croatia next to South Africa!
- the rider web hosting service is almost ready….. more soon!
- working with an educational company to cover GPS courses
- ……. and working on changing this web site to something even more flexible this year!
Last but not least, I am in the planning stages for a few customers to take along through Europe next year…. and that of course takes priority over other work!
Hope you had a great riding season so far….. for me the ‘nice and cool’ season starts now…. well, after I get the new rear tire mounted, that is !
Riding our motorcycles is a ’seasonal thing’ for many of us. The bike goes in storage come end of Fall en stays on a charger until March or so. And what better to do in that ‘dark, bikeless period’ then to read and WRITE !?
Since I run a web hosting and design company as well, I figured why not use the skills, contacts and resources to offer cheap websites to bikers, and perhaps even motorbike clubs? Get your own blog and collect your news, ride stories, accessory preferences, travel plans and perhaps even a forum, and maintain it yourself.
All that will be offered for only $ 30 a year…… soon ! Of course you’ll have to learn to ‘manage’ the site a little, but the Wordpress software that we use will make that really easy. And, if you want or need more, you can hire our additional services of course.
Only in Summer we’ll be on the road……. like you will be !
One of the things I hate most is riding in the wet. I’ll do it when needed, but not with actual ‘pleasure’. So for all of you like-minded riders I have added a tiny little picture on the right, showing the overall rain activity in Europe, in miniature. Clock on it and you’ll be taken to the wonderful ‘Meteox site’ with LOTS more information on the weather all around Europe, and in multiple languages.
At least you’ll know whether to bring your rain suit along or not (mine’s always with me).
Did you already lose your pesky little Garmin screwdriver and are now stuck with your Zumo firmly mounted on your bike?
How many times have you cursed the finicky little thing, fumbling for the screw driver on your key chain and wondering why on earth Garmin didn’t make the top at least rotate so you do NOT have to turn your entire key chain to unscrew your Zumo security!!??
I found a solution (thanks to someone on the BMWST forum). Marco Boelis, who lives 12 km’s from my place, can provide you with a replacement screw, one that’s made of stainless steel and one you can turn in and out with YOUR FINGERS!
Throw away the stupid screw driver (unless you REALLY believe that pesky screw wil prevent your unit from being stolen) and order one of Marco’s screws! I’ve put up a special page about it here !