Modern Vespa

Most excellent!

Tuning into Radio Caroline while I was in Germany last week.

Great if you like Barclay James Harvest.

I've been in Wolfsburg once.

The hotel I ended up staying was this one

https://www.ritzcarlton.com/en/hotels/wfgrz-the-ritz-carlton-wolfsbur

A corner suite.

At the time, this cheered me up....because I was about to stay just in a normal hotel....then because of a series of weird events, ended up here. Way over my normal budget and not actually a place I'd normally even choose to be.

Still, can't complain, there was a cool view to the Autostadt from the bedroom. The only issue was that it was really hard to find your stuff in the labyrinth of rooms in the suite. I'm not used to it.

This was...mayby a bit over 10 years ago now, it's just that your trip brought it all back. In a good way. And it even wasn't my birthday.

I saw that Hotel while walking around the complex.

There were a lot of very high end cars parked out front. Bentley and S4's etc.

It's a shame that the independent VW Museum (that was 30 minutes walk away) had much more interesting stuff in it.

For an official museum that represents the brand there wasn't a lot of history of VW on display.

I was living it up in the Courtyard Marriot a mere walk away.

New personal best of 721km in a day

Not bad, but not good enough!

Back in 1961 I did 621 MILES in a day on my Vespa GS150. Scooting from Johannesburg to Cape Town. Did the remaining 300 miles the next day.

I wasn't born in 1961, but in 1971 I could do multiple forward rolls.

If I tried one now, it would be the last thing I did

Time And Relative Distances In Scootering

Beats my PB by 20km when I travelled from Oxfordshire to Oban on Scotlands West Coast for a Scooter Rally in 1988 on my T5

I'm working on something..............

Mike, that's quite impressive. I hope to put my GS to the task and possibly surpass your record. Thanks for the inspiration!

I can beat that, with two caveats: (1) It was on a GTS 250, and (2) I actually used two different GTS 250s, since I broke the exhaust on my first one.

Still, it was about 800 miles over one day, Seattle to Oakland.

Alive. Home. (Post 184428)

Well done, but your extra speed on a 250 made all the difference. My ride was 4 am to 6 pm - 14 hours riding, only stopping for fuel. My food and drink were in a cooler bag between my feet, and I ate as I was riding.

Went to see my eye doctor today, the charming and vivacious Dr. Gail B. She's the one who, two years ago, yanked out my foggy and faulty natural lenses and refitted me with a set of new non-natural ones that are working damn swell.

All is very good, so I can now stay away from her and her chamber of not-so-bad horrors until next June.

Therefore, I am....'Cheery'.

Parked in an exam room until Dr. Gail pops in to administer a couple dollops of nasty eye drops and then shine all manner of super bright lights in my eyes, I did a bit of photo recording as a form of self entertainment. Wide view, and closeup detail shot.

#1. In a chair, waiting for Dr. Gail after one of her minions made me read, or try to read, a series of increasingly small letter and numbers viewed through a mirror.

#2. After administering eye drops to dilate your eyes, they offer to sell you antidote eye drops that reverse the effects of the dilation drops...for an extra $25. I passed on that and just squinted a lot for a few hours.

#3. One of the diabolical medieval torture devices in Dr. Gail 's exam room.

#4. The fish-eye mirror in the hallway that you had to pass under after your appointment was ended and walked back to the reception area and the building's exit.

4am ... nah thanks.

I was only on the bike for 8.5 hours out of an 11 hour day as I like to explore on foot - it's the whole point of the day out.

And eating while riding (obviously an open face helmet or even no helmet). Yet again hell no. Not a good idea when I was hitting 135 kph (GPS).

Oh yeah, and I had a little bit of gravel of course

Mine was more like 6am to 10pm, with many hours in the middle spent broken down and waiting for a replacement scooter. I don't remember how many actual hours of riding it was. Eating while riding is quite possible, and a necessity during events like Cannonball where you lose time when you stop. You have to be judicious about where and when, though -- I would usually munch on granola while transiting through small towns where I had to slow down or even (spit) stop for traffic signals.

Oh, and modular helmets are your friend. Well, maybe not your friend, but certainly mine.

I do wear a modular. Didn't think of it for eating.

With the chin bar in the closed position, you can get a entire rotisserie chicken and some potatoes and cooked carrots in an XL modular.

Hmmm. I don't think that's quite what I had in mind, but I admire your ability to think outside the box.

In those days (1961) I didn't have a visor and wore goggles. So no problem eating. I remember being on a long straight empty road in the Kalahari semi-desert, sitting on the back of the scooter's dual seat, with a coke in one hand and a sandwich in the other, steering by backside.

When I got to Cape Town my cheeks were brown, forehead and around the eyes white, and nose bright red!

Definitely going to need to see a photo of that.

My early HPE* would require a big oil top up after that. Apparently once i install the malossi cylinder it won't drink anywhere near as much.

* I said early because piaggio did fix this by using different rings after about 1 year. So no need to turn this into "mine doesn't" / "mine does".

Don't do selfies. Anyway, no mobile phones in 1961. My camera was safely stowed in my luggage.

Arrived at the Youth Hotel overlooking Muizenberg, and met a lovely lass there. Took her touring with me all over the Cape Peninsula on my Vespa on that holiday.

I did 1021 miles in 20 hours on my Iron Butt ride.

I used a camelbak for hydration and ate mostly trail mix on the road.

The key is to reduce the time you are stopped as much as possible. It's frustrating how much distance you lose while filling up with gas and using the facilities.

I easily could have continued and done the 1500 mile ride in 36 hours.

I think Bill Dog has done about 10 of them.

But what's the perfect cushion? I've got a skinny boney bum that is unhappy after about 400km and screaming by 600km. I needed rest stops just for my bum.

People seem to like the AirHawk. I haven't used one, so I can't really speak to whether it works well or not.

On my NZ version of the cannonball my arse went numb after 3 days and never bothered me again.

Listed as AU$169. Not in a rush to buy without trying it. Have seen the copies and have been tempted.

This will probably mean diddly squat to you, but it's cheering me up that one of my childhood heroes Mr Benn is also in Venice 🤡🤠🧞🧙‍♂️👨🏻‍🍳👨🏻‍🚀🦜

https://x.com/thebowlerhatman/status/1891578720088952952

If he posts any photos of this power couple you can say got dang i sorta know that feller.

Familiar with that whole setup. My twins were born 13 weeks early and retinopathy of prematurity was an issue. My daughter had laser surgery and a scleral buckle before she was three months old, glasses by eight months. For years we were followed by her ophthalmologist, a super guy. Being in measurement and calibration, going to his office was always like a field day for me. I absolutely loved the drawer of calibrated lenses. Much like the certified gauge pins and blocks I use.

I've done 12 Ironbutts.

The downside of the Airhawk is that it disconnects you from the bike by lifting your ass off the seat.

In the corners you can't really feel any level of compression.

In other news the 1200 started this morning after a 2 week stay in the garage which means that I don't have a battery drain.

You might also consider this one:

Motorcycle Gel Seat Cushion from Born Behind Barz

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07CYMV1KC?ref_=ppx_hzsearch_conn_dt_b_fed_asin_title_1

The genuine Vespa Gel Seat for the GTS300 is easily the most comfortable thing to sit on for hours on end.

The Downtown seat compresses too much over time and ends up feeling like a bench.

[quote="Bill D

The Downtown seat compresses too much over time and ends up feeling like a bench.
[/quote]

That's funny. Most Honda seats start out feeling like a bench and then get better over time.

Yeah, I've often wondered just how Hodna have got the seats wrong on certain bikes.

This.

I've used an Airhawk only on a motorcycle. I can imagine it was developed by someone who rode just straight, long roads. It is not for curvy roads. At least not for me. I can imagine one would feel quite 'loose' in a scooter with an airhawk, not having even a gas tank between the legs to get support from.

Would a hot water bottle, with just air, do the job ?

I tried one of these once. Didn't like it at all for that very reason.

But it was expensive.