Lejog day 10 and 11 back to home

 Lejog Days 10 and 11 and  a summary of the trip and my thoughts on the Himalayan.

The penultimate day saw me doing the biggest daily mileage of the trip  - 350 from John O’Grotes to Moffat. The east coast being the dowdy cousin of the oil painting that is the  Scottish west coast. Good roads lots of long straights until Inverness. The Cairngorms provided some interest but I was on the A9 so good for making progress not so for wow factor.

I even stopped at the Falkirk wheel  - no boats and very quiet. Nice restaurant 

The following day  was different again, Moffat to home on the Staffordshire moorlands. About 235 miles ( all done on a tank of fuel with the F flashing for the last 50 miles.) A couple of friends met me on the way back down and from Moffat they were heading back east via the M6 A66 A1….. I took a route back on the ‘logging roads’ of the Scottish borders, the B roads into the Yorkshire Dales and threaded my route into the Peak district them home. Left at 9.45 am and got back at 6.15 pm. My mate had washed his bike and his clothes and packed for another trip we have this weekend …. I rolled Anode into the garage patted the tank and went for a bath ! 

Another stop off at Hebden Bridge to say hello the the Rochdale canal 

I did 2210 miles in 11 days. The average MPH for the trip according the trip A on the dash was 34 MPH so by my calculation 65 hours of riding. Over 11 days that’s just under 201 miles per day average and  6 hours a day riding average ….and for interest the top speed I obtained was 83 mph on the GPS but that was on the A9 in Aviemore  ! 

The bike - for this type of ‘adventure’ it was imho spot on. Nothing broke or needed adjustment. The Tutoro chain oiler was perfect  - turning it up for the 170 mile day in the rain, turning it back down a little the next day. The only issue was the tickover that was a little erratic. I had one day of stalls rolling off for junctions, maybe a dozen times in one day…. other days not once. It’s in for a service in a week or so ( 6,000 mile) so I’ll get them to look at the TPS voltage as others have mentioned that. It just chugged and chugged got lots of interest, took all the weather and road conditions. Gave me great confidence on some of the muckier roads. Only had the ABS active twice, once in Glossop when a car pulled out of a side road, and yesterday when an errant lamb appeared from the undergrowth.

I did take a windshield extender for the motorway trip from home to Penzance on day 1 and I used it again for the A9 350 mile trip on the penultimate day, The rest of the time I took it off and stowed it in the pannier. 

Lomo dry bags front and 40 litre hold-all were spot on. I made coffee from the hotel supplies each day and put it in a flask in the front with snacks and other bits. Clothes in the 40 litre holdall. Only used my tools and spares pannier for waterproofs. 

So my reflections…. yesterday was a great ride home from Moffat. I did it as described above while my friends blasted back on main roads… and there is the thing about this bike. It’s all about the journey as well as the destination. In life we risk blasting through each day to achieve ‘something’ but in doing so disregard the minutes and hours of that day…. I think they call it ‘mindfulness’ or being ‘in the moment’. Well that is what the Himalayan does…. it puts you in the moment you enjoy every beat of the engine, every curve of the road, every open vista, every small country lane….. every everything !!  They say its built like a gun… a bike for all roads and no roads…. they are spot on. Make life the journey not the destination, make life an adventure not a chore, make life worth living.

Final statement I have my Himalayan and my RT. If I could only have one bike…. can you guess which it would be ?