I left Filip, Jef and Peter
for riding into the south direction,
Coblenz, touring in the Eifel
hills , overpassing Luxembourg, then
belgian Ardennes where I also
did some power test and reached also 7000
rev in 5 th and 168 km/hour
on tachy (this is for Aki :)) but no more
because the last 25% of
throttle were giving nothing more (any idea ? I
bet on a non perfect ignition
timing and also carbs diaphragms supple
default)
There, my project was to
visit shortly my sister but she was not
informed before so I found the
house closed. I waited half an hour and
decided to leave at 7.45 pm
!!! from there for the petrol quest ;)
In Belgium I found only "bank
automat" which require special cards (a
bank card woul have been great
but ... may be to simple). So I took the
risk to enter in France and
there was no station at all up to Rethel
where I fall out of petrol after
about 300 km of run. I switched the
reserve on and went into this
town to ask for petrol : nothing at all,
closed or empty. I went also
to the gendarmerie (about 9.00 pm !) and
the didn't welcome me these
bast...saying "this is your problem and we
are busy" (may be there was
some football that night on TV!)
So I did some calculation. Next
city, Reims, was at 40 km. I didn't knew
exactly the reserve capacity
but considering a 7 liter/100 km it usually
burns, I estimated a need of
3 liter to reach Reims. I started an ran
very steady at 3000 rev
(76 km/hour) to keep the comsumption may be at
5 liter/1000. It was full night
and the car drivers were speedind like
hell overpassing me agressively.
Every kilometer done I was waiting for
the engine hesitation announcing
the B.S.
I reached Reims and found
a Carrefour (major mall label in France) 24h
service where only one of the
two units was ok. I did fill the tank with
a special pleasure and found
out it was only 1 liter left inside the
tank !!! My tachy was indicating
350 km since the last full tank filling
which means 6.6 liter/100 km
or 15.15 km/liter for those who like
figures. So I called at home
to inform my family that I was now out of
petrol trouble and just at 200
km from home (but in the night with a
dark helmet shield which is
not really appropriate to give you the best
visibility ...).
I reach home at 12.45 pm !!!
my wife was waiting for me, very happy to
ear that typicall triple sound
indicating that she was recovering his
husband again : home sweet home
moreover sweet wife :) I just get a
smily "you're coming back a
little bit late ..." which was lovely
compare to situation.
Except this petrol trouble, a
rear brake becoming leaky and therefore
not anymore touched :( , front
brake pads singing enough to inform Jeff
where I was behind him when
entering the german curves, some erratic
contacts in the starter button,
a leak of gas at the left exhaust pipe
(but successfully fixed on place),
a burnt blinker lamp and a million of
insects slaughtering,
my XS worked like never !!! It didn't burnt oil
anymore this time (Mobil mineral
15W40 for cars) and this was great for
a 1885 km trip on three days
at about 120 km/hour !!! . I think I still
deserve the first place for
the longer distance in riding for our
european triple meeting (may
be could I get a good ranking in the US
meeting longer distance list
? ) .
This meeting was really successfull
in terms of international friendship
including now our very nice
friend Aki coming from Finland (which is a
little bit farer than U.K ...)
) , german sights, beautifull weather,
new technologies (live webcams)
and also short mechanical sessions
(some for training and some
for broken or failing parts) and the
"Kolossal" german organization.
I would just regret the absence
of british listers. I do call for a
british participation next time
! Otherwise we'll plan to go to you guys
and we'll sing together the
God save the Triple ! (of course after a
couple of beers)
Any americans or australians
are also invited but this is another
distance story !