OK, so Paradise 2013 is done and dusted, went looking for you guys on Saturday after the mass ride, had a beer at the Steam and whatever B&B, met some guys looking the worse for wear and lack of sleep but no "Dawgs"!!
Arrived on Friday night at around 8.00pm, the rally camp site had so many cars, bakkies and trailers that there wasn't too much room to pitch a tent, so off to the bottom area, thank goodness I've done a fair amount of off road riding, but on a fully loaded VFR it gets a bit tricky......
Found a flat spot in the middle of the field and what I thought was far enough away from the "Revving Brothers", alas, not far enough! A new thing that stuck it's head out at this rally was to have your Clubs own Marque and Disco. Thanks to the brothers of the "Urban Legends" I think, the really crappy disco music stared to get louder and louder and went on until 5.00 am, no one in the marque, no one dancing, just the DJ with his head phones on, massive speakers facing the outside of the tent pushed to their maximum continuous monotonous computer generated noise!!! Went to speak to the DJ at around 2am, he said he was being paid to gooi, so he gooied, to hell with the rest of the people trying to sleep.
The revving brotheres are like a bunch of neighbour hood dogs, one starts his bike and whacks it, not even letting it warm up and hey, Friday was friggin COLD!! as I was saying, one would start, to be answered by another and another, all playing their own mechanical tune, and to crown it all, the valley echos, that really got the lads pumped. Was thinking at around 3.am, poor person that goes to buy a good low milage bike that gets trailered everywhere, REVVED until it glows, then gets sold to some unsuspecting soul! Might add that some of the bikes weren't even unloaded, just revved on the trailers.......
Saturday dawned cold and damp and me a bit grumpy, COLD showers, really added to the grumpy level!
Mass ride headed off to the local "khasi" to hand a cheque and food hampers to the old people, not much happens economically in Waterval Boven, lots of very poor folk living there. The mayor however, lead the ride in his Black BMW X5 with dark tinted windows so as not to feel the potholes, would not even get out of his car to make a speech at the hand over of the stuff for the oldies. (I'll get banned if I express my opinion of this incident). As usuall, took a few teenagers for a ride around the township, poor VFR kept bottoming out on the ruts and potholes, but I hope they had some fun and a few memories by taking pictures on their phones, even took the local traffic cop lady for a ride.
Saturday night was the night of the battle of the marques, a club from Polokwani had a marque set up on the opposite side of the field to the Urban's Marque. The Sopa Yopa guys know how to lay it on! Big screen TV, tables and chairs, green instant lawn, food and booze a plenty, and a good sound system - hey their music was excellent, but the battle was on as to which DJ could out "LOUD'' the other, (I'm pretty deaf, but the ground vibrated......11.00pm, the Sopa Yopa party stopped, the marque was taken down, the area cleared and then it was quiet - not the other bunch though, they carried on with their NOISE until 3.00am! Once again I reserve my comments. The main hall went flat after the prize giving which was rather paltry this time around, a trailer and a 125 Zongshen and a few other "track days" as give aways. At least Miss Paradise was a biker and attractive......
Bar prices were an ugly R18 for a beer and R90 for 3 Jaegermeisters, the burger stall ran out of burgers, the Vetkoek stall ran out of meat, the que at the German sausage trailer took so long I lost interest and went and open my tin of "emergency bully beef'' so that was supper. The guys camping next to me tried to braai but the wood they bought was so wet that even using a half packet of Blitz and a splash of petrol, they gave up.
Had a good ride back yesterday, even paid all the toll fees! Interesting to note how many cars there were on the road with the token helmet on the back ledge or a leather jacket, and the occupants all sitting in the cage with their "Colours" on, at least that gave me something to chuckle about.
