'93 Blade on a K plate for its salvage value of £2700. Was I interested? It needed a radiator and a fairing after a 20mph drop in London traffic. The insurance companies had fought it out and if I matched the salvage offer it was mine. My Yamaha XJ900 proved fine for touring (see Morocco jaunt, earlier edition), except the fairing was too small but meanwhile the boy-racer in me said, yes please!
Repairs were easy. Fairing was plastic welded (thanks Graham of Plastec, Reading) - a permanent, invisible repair and almost anything can be restored, then sprayed. The rad was replaced by a good secondhand one from Just Blades for £100 instead of the £350 from Mr Honda. A straight clip-on, brake lever and two indicators, and she was ready to run. Total cost £400 instead of £1500 for new!
So on August 8th, 9pm, I put on the tank-bag, bungeed on a rear bag and set off for Portsmouth. Seriously, it was my first ride on the bike and I was all set for France, Spain and Portugal. Would my 44 year old bones cope? The last bike with clip-ons I owned was 23 years ago - a Triton; God don't start on that!
Down the A34 south from Newbury (the dual carriageway bit), it was nicely dark and my first thoughts were, how do you dip these lights? It has a switch mounted above the indicator, which is awkward with clip-ons. Also the indicators don't self cancel. At that moment a Senator whizzed by at 120mph - should I play? No, let's be sensible for once, so I maintained 80 to 90mph, just burbling along at 5000 revs.
Three minutes later, hee, haw, hee, haw. The jam sandwich flew by and nabbed him. Was it my lucky day! On to the boat, head down in a cabin (never reclining seats), I arrive refreshed and only 480 miles to my destination. The crossing, with bike nicely tied down by Brittany Ferries, is ace as you arrive in Brittany at a sensible time and more importantly you can have a long sleep - unlike all the shorter crossings.
The trip through France via Rennes, Nantes, La Rochelle, Saintes, to Bordeaux was boring - the N roads are brilliant, the traffic moves over for big bikes...and SUN! Always fill up at hypermarkets as Frog petrol's now £3.70 a gallon. If you plan a day crossing look for the Formula One hotels to stay in a sterilised room that sleeps three for £17 a night and booking is via a hole in the wall machine, usually with English instructions. You can arrive covered in grime or wet through, sleep three in a bed, whatever, without snooty looks as after 10pm no-one is around, the computer has no morals so have a party.
The Honda proved faultless on its performance. Try 70mph in first, 105mph in second, 135mph in third - I bottled out after that. I saw 150mph once, briefly, but found that the tank bag plus my slightly loose Shoi made warp speeds uncomfortable - besides who wants to play nowadays? Petrol consumption was light, average 50mpg plus, and I cruised at around 90 to 95mph. My wrists didn't suffer at that speed but the legs cramped and so did the bum, every 100 miles a stop was needed.
The bike was so light that it didn't need any effort to ride it - the Yam was a slug in comparison - but the gearbox had room for improvement. I checked the chain, thinking it might be slack but, no, all okay. You never miss a gear, it's very positive but clunks in. I found that the easy way to enjoy the acceleration was to give it a blast through first, second and third then slow down to my cruising speed. Despite the weather, 28 degrees plus, the water temperature remained middling and I arrived at my stop near Lourdes at tea-time.
After a few days respite (back and bum recovered well) my friend arrived on his full power V-Max. He'd crossed from Stuttgart in 14 hours, covering 800 miles in a day. Fool! He arrived in a brilliant thunder storm, with lightning like only the mountains can produce. We left France south of Pau, and nearing Pamplona cut across country to join the main Madrid road south. Spanish roads are superb, petrol's cheap and the currency's one of the few in a worse state than sterling. I can't recommend it too highly. Okay, it may be our VAT that's paying for their road building program - that's a good reason to go over and use them!
We stopped every 100 miles for muscular relief and to fill up the V-Max. It was doing really well on fuel (60mpg) but the tiny tank under the seat had only a small reserve - so plenty of cafe stops to drink cooling liquids. Forget the crap handling reports - it corners fine if you don't bottle out and shut off; then it waggles. First night was at Tordesillas, a double room for £25 (£12.50 each) - why mess with a tent when you can snore and shower in comfort?
Next morning saw us along the last bit of Spain, across the high plain to Zamora, then a yellow road into Portugal. The border on a dam was unmanned, then the road changed. Portugal has two classes of road - main and crap! We foolishly planned the route via the crap ones, heading to Porto. Clip-ons, bad roads and 90 degrees heat gave me a hard time. The Blade was okay, but despite softening the suspension it wasn't designed for 30mph roads made of rubble and cobbles. The countryside was quite pretty, mountainous and arid but with frequent burnt out areas where the forest fires had been.
Portugal's a poor country. Rubbish disposal means dumping all at the roadside, so nice areas weren't. We burbled our way to Peso de Regua along the famous Douro valley, which is a hot version of Loch Ness. Flooded valley, very deep and it runs for miles. A three star hotel hove into view, the word Picina or something like that, so within ten minutes we were booked in, changed and splashing in the pool. A large Super Bock local lager went down a treat and we enjoyed the pool, getting rid of the dust of the day.
That night the famous local wine was tasted (they make Port out of it), a good meal enjoyed and in all the stay cost £25 each. At about 2am the Blade's Spyball alarm went off, because it was bored, I think, and the remote pip from the 4th floor cut it out. Real poseur! Next morning, the V-Max's rear pads were shagged, and after a lot of pointing a bike mechanic changed his plackets for £20.
Then into Porto. Don't bother. The city's industrial and full of road works. So we headed north and stayed in a seaside resort (Povoa de Varzim) that strangely lacked hotels. Apparently the locals all have flats. Big problem on the beach - the local lasses keep their wobbly bits under cover but the Super Bock was still ice cold! Time was running out, so next day we headed north to the Spanish border and stopped for lunch at a cafe.
On returning to the bikes, disaster - no spark on the Blade! Luckily a local biker who spoke English, had a beer with us (actually several, thanks Jose), rang the local dealer who turned up with a breakdown vehicle some four hours later...of course, by then the bike had cooled down and started instantly! We all went to the dealers and the next morning they checked it over and found nothing wrong. I put it down to too much San Miguel.
We left Vigo, apparently home to the Spanish navy, covered in smoke from more forest fires and cruised to Cape Finisterre - that was beautiful, quiet, cheap and had great roads. Like Devon hills only with some sunshine thrown in for free. A mega fish meal, overnight stop in a fishing village pension and we hit the road. Getting faster, around La Coruna and on towards Santander. Brilliant roads, long winding sweepers...then we were passed by a K100 who knew the road. Great, we followed him for some 50 miles at 95-ish and had the best blast of the trip. That was from Baamonde to the coast at St Martin de Mondonedo, the E70/N634, so if you get that way - do it!
The last day we travelled to Santander, around the bay to St Biarritz for a beach bronzy few hours then back up the incredibly boring nearly motorway to Bordeaux. We decided to do the 100 miles in one hour, and would have succeeded had it not been the day of the holiday hordes returning. I survived the trip on the 900 - but anyone want to buy a Fireblade? Fine for local blasts, warp speeds but totally unsuitable for touring, rough roads and low speeds.
Barry Charman