Rugby Bikefest

[Millietant]

So, this weekend sees the annual "Bikefest" being held in the town where I live.

The whole town centre is closed off to non-motorcycle traffic, riders are encouraged to "Show" their bikes on the streets, outside cafe's and in the normally pedestrianised areas.

There's a great atmosphere with usually upwards of 2,500 bikes in attendance. I've registered for the "Ride in and Show" - where large groups are escorted in from a meet-up point, by local marshall's (not the police kind!!) and once in the centre, you can just pick a spot, park up and "show" your bike for the day (or just leave the bike and go enjoy the festival for the day  ).

There's all the usual stuff you'd expect, loud live music, beer, food, BS/bench racing, tall tales of trips and tours, trade stands, a funfair, club stands and everything else.  The one thing I'm hoping for is good weather !!!

It's been 3 years since the old girl had a proper deep clean, so I got her up on the bench tonight to give her some new back brake pads and to strip a few rear end bits off for the deep clean. I think I'll take the exhaust off and give it the old "Harpic" treatment before the rear of the bike goes back together and I tackle the front. Fingers crossed I'll get some nice photo's of her over the weekend before she gets all dirty again !!

[Millietant]

Today was a good day. Got the old girl cleaned and polished ready to show at the Bike Fest, turned up to our meeting point on time (to get to the Ride-in early), but then a couple of friends were late and the first arrival couldn't get her FJ 09 (using the US name for you guys) started. She'd arrived well early, used the kill switch to cut the engine but then forgot to switch off the ignition. Half an hour sitting waiting For everyone to arrive and chat before setting off........ and her battery was flat. Those things DO NOT want to bump start - so I quickly went home, brought home my starter-pack and got her going. But, this lost us 20 minutes, which meant we were too late to get into the main street  display areas for the bikes and had to make do with one of the side-street area's. We didn't let Sian live this down all day!

Anywho........ once we got settled, we had a good walk round, saw some nice bikes (and a Couple of not so nice ones !!) , meet up with old friends, made some new friends, sat outside in the sun drinking coffee/tea and generally talked a load of BS along with everyone else .

Sadly, I didn't see another FJ at all (and walked the whole area and all the parking areas), but again the most popular bike I saw by numbers was the FJ 09, in its various UK variants (XSR 900, MT09, Tracer 900 and Tracer 900 GT) and it seems from talking to the owners that that this bike might just be the true successor to the FJ 12 for real-world use?

Here are some pics including a couple of my FJ at home before the ride in any a couple of favourite bikes of the day.

[Millietant]

And a few more from the day - waiting to set off and the scenes in town.

[Millietant]

Aargh- I hate it when I use my phone to post photos using "Additional Options" and they come out all squished!!

[fj1289]

Aargh- I hate it when I use my phone to post photos using "Additional Options" and they come out all squished!!

I just thought Honda had replaced the gold wing with a three wheeled accord!