In bright unbroken beams

Saturday, June 25, 2011

12.06. I've been on the ECML lots of times, on Class 91 electrics, HSTs and Voyagers, and today takes the biscuit. It's cramped here in coach B for anyone with long legs and the ride is stiffly sprung and harshly damped, which means my handwriting is all over the place. Mind you, this is the Edinburgh to Newcastle section, which is always slow and bumpy and twisting. I even had to change seat because my booked seat was so tight as to wedge my kneecaps hard up against the one in front. It's also very stuffy in here, in the quiet coach, and not all that quiet. Just passing Morpeth now. My GPS has recorded an average speed of 95.1mph over 107 miles, and 123mph top speed.

I still feel sure I've forgotten to bring something, but I never did make a 'going away' list. I checked with next door for feeding the wee ones, so that's ok at least. The Brompton is wedged into a luggage bay, not as much space as on a Voyager, but it's ok. I slung the lock around it to be safer, but I'm at the power car end so it's less populous on the station platform. I did scout around the back-to-back seats but they're full of bulkheads or too narrow or have boxes marked "Danger" and "Risk of Electrocution" taking up the space. Man, it's really stuffy in here.

Dave says he'll come to this evening ride if he's there in time, so I might at least have some company, though I think everyone probably knows him. It should be fun, though, as I haven't seen Peter since the last time I was at the show. I'm not really sure why I keep going -- I'm not unaware of new bikes, but I also don't need another one (yet), and I don't need more clothes or more tools.

12.25 and Newcastle. At least this time there seems to be a fairly strong forum presence planned, if they hang around for Sunday; I've booked Monday off for travelling home, so I'll be doing that fairly early. It's interesting how you hear the 'whoosh' of the power car as it energises itself before the train moves off. Ok, another 80 miles to go and maybe time for some proper speed! I'm obviously in too deep already, noticing where goods yards used to be, sidings, old embankments ... it's all ever so slightly ridiculous. But it also reminds me of how much our railways have gone to the dogs, and the roads. We'll be into York about 13.30 so there should be plenty of time to get to my hostel and dump some stuff before visiting the museum. I might -- ooh, this train really jerks as it changes gear -- spend a bit of time seeing York more, and maybe see if I can buy a decent case for my telephoto lens.

Heh. There's a Dad in the seat near me who's just been told off by his seven year-old daughter for letting his iPhone start playing music far too loudly. Twice. Lots of disapproving looks, not just from me! 12.38 and Durham, and we still haven't gone more than 123mph. Driver must be conservative today.

Just gone 13.00 and speeding out of Darlington to Northallerton. I've just noticed that the old train shed at Darlington South Junction still has its little turntable.

Sunday, June 26, 2011

14.16. Well then, I had a nice wander around the National Railway Museum yesterday afternoon, once I was installed in the hostel, which took a while. It was really quite busy. I took lots of probably not very good photos, and then walked back to the hostel to get my bike and collect my bikey stuff. I pottered over to the show, and rode up and down, before eventually finding Peter and a bunch of Velovisioners, and then the yACF contingent arrived as well -- all doing the pub ride! I saw Tony and Joan and TJ, and it was good to see them again. Once at the pub I bumped into Charlotte and Julian who somehow hadn't spotted me earlier (I must've been on the wrong bike), plus Kim and Adam and others. Dinner, which was a big veggie burger with chips and coleslaw, took ages as they had so many orders but it was excellent food. I chatted with Peter, Sue, Mr Sue, Dylan, and Dave who'd just arrived. It was beginning to get dark about 21.45 but we didn't set off until gone 22.00, though no problem as I'd brought lights anyway, and rode back into town along the cycle path through Bishopthorpe and over to the racecourse.

It was good catching up with people. I chatted longer with Dylan before creeping back into the hostel without turning on the light. It was a very hot night and I eventually slept only on and off, plus I needed my earplugs which I'd also thoughtfully brought with me. The man in the top bunk was snoring like a trooper, poor guy.

I was up again at 8.15 and had a lovely breakfast of cornflakes, a croissant with peanut butter and some orange juice. I ambled into town for the show and then over to Charlotte and Julian's tent to say hello and have a cup of tea. I never had tea with milk that came out of a squeezy tube before. So it was about 9.30 and already t-shirt and shorts weather, but I'd brought layers with me just in case, because it always rains at York during the show (except the very first time when I went with Liz, and when it tried to thunder and ended up being roasting hot). And so far, it's roasting hot here! I wandered around the trade tents afterwards with Tony who was camped nearby, and we had a long and interesting conversation about everything under the sun. I did buy a second headlight in the end, although the shoes and socks were all in 'common' sizes so there was very little to fit me. After that I was kind of done by about 11.00, but I wandered around some more anyway.

I chatted to Tony, Joan, TJ and Kim in the food tent and then bought a big hotdog for lunch. It came out of a caravan but actually it was very good. Gosh, it's so warm today! They left and I finished my hotdog, then I went back to Tony's tent and met Adam again. While we were chatting there a guy from Edinburgh came over to us -- he wasn't from yACF or any other forum I knew of, but he was interested in my bike because he was tall too. So then I had a longish chat with him! I didn't bring any sunglasses or a hat and the sun is intense. But so far I'm not burned so that's ok. Dave just called so maybe I'll catch up later on. I can see a huge queue for the ice cream van that's parked up a little way from here. I cannot believe the weather -- it was trying to rain when I cycled down to Waverley. Actually I'm feeling a bit heady right now, and I'm not sure what's best to do, but some riding might be better than sitting like a sea lion on the the rocks.

There are lots of Bromptons around, I saw an Easy Racers Ti-Rush, Lee's brought his Fujin, and there's a Greenspeed tandem; then there are Dawes Galaxies, the odd Litespeed and all kinds of tourers. I also met Nick Lobnitz from Carry Freedom, so I spoke to him for a while about the Paper Bicycle. Decent guy, and a good simple bike.

Hmm, it's interesting how it's now mid-afternoon and I've defaulted to writing and sitting by myself. It's not unpleasant, mind you, except for the heat. It's only a shame that the silence is broken by so many little petrol generators for the burger vans.

16.23. Well I wanted good weather and I got it. This afternoon I think the sun's got to me -- the sweat is pouring off me (mmm, nice!) and I'm feeling headachey and wobbly. I took myself to the supermarket down the road to buy bananas and chocolate milk because I remember what A told me two years ago when I was in the same condition ("eat this, and drink a ton of water"). So I've had one and a half bananas -- they're a good size too -- and I've drunk everything in my water bottle, so fingers crossed. The shop was closing at 16.00, which I couldn't believe, so there was no time or presence of mind to buy paracetamol or a towel or a hat. If I'd only brought my Buff I could have soaked it in cold water. And I'm too cheap to buy another Buff, because goodness knows there's enough choice of them here today. I really need a lie down, to be honest. Dave is off somewhere, Tony's in his tent for a siesta and a plunk, and I wish I didn't get so affected by things like this. The chocolate milk is very good, even though it's Tesco and therefore I don't like it.

It's been a mixed day, really, it started nice and people gradually dispersed. I could have wandered around York but I didn't.

17.03 and I'm feeling a bit better, as long as the sun doesn't get too much. I seem to have acquired rather red legs and arms, in a rather typical cyclist manner. It's still so warm! The show is mostly tidying up now. There are rumours abound that this show is going to be the last one, even more so than the one before, and the one before that.

22.00. I spent the early evening with Tony, Kim, Marj and her family at their caravan and was fed cake. Dave came along later on. I talked to them for a while before the family left for town to get a meal; the rest of us talked a bit longer and footered around in the sun ... but I had to get into the shade because I was cooking and I felt pretty rubbish. Tony came over to chat and I suddenly felt ready to cry from the heat and exhaustion. Fortunately I got over it. We finally left about 18.30; Tony and Kim left for their tents and Dave and I went to find something for dinner. I had a quick change into more normal clothes, and thought I was looking a bit red. Just down the road was a take away, so we ordered pizzas (nice and safe, ham and pineapple for me and about the right size). We eventually ate them at the river side, sitting on the wall with my feet dangling. I would've liked to have my feet in the water but it was a bit manky, plus there were lots of ducks and geese to peck at me. We had a long conversation about cycling and trains and stuff.

I'm sitting here on my bed with my Buff finally soaked in cold water and draped over my forehead. Ahhh! So, an interesting day, not the best for heat and health, but ok. At least I can do more night riding now. When I got back to the hostel the others weren't around yet so I put the light on. I am BRIGHT RED. It was never meant to be so sunny or warm -- I had my cotton 3/4s, my long sleeved HH top and my Goretex jacket with me in my bag because I was sure it was going to rain or be cold. Nothing of the sort, just heatstroke. Mmm, I'm trying to finish my chocolate milk before going to bed; feeling hot and full, and my Buff is dripping cold water on me! So to tomorrow, and an easy start.

Monday, June 27, 2011

11.23. I've just caught my train home. The coach is lovely, the weather is lovely, the temperature in here is lovely, everything's lovely. I was expecting a Class 91 electric at 10.32, and I'm actually onboard a Voyager at 11.18 -- running just a touch late. I'm in the quiet coach on this formation, right at the back, with loads and loads of leg room and little Henrietta Brompton is living on the not-busy-at-all rearmost luggage rack.

I went for a wander over to York Minster to get some photographs and to generally enjoy the place. I set off from there for the station about 10.00, and fairly whizzed along the road. I bumped into Tony on the station concourse so we had another long chat! At that point an Australian cyclist turned up, all sunburned nose and scalp, with a Revolution touring bike and a bike bag for his flight. We talked to him for a bit, he left for his airport train, and then we resumed our own, to talk about wildlife photography. It was a nice, final, chance meeting.

I also had a long chat at breakfast time with a couple from Dunoon who'd been at the show as well. He, a teacher, immediately recognised my engineering interests, and they went so far as to offer me a cup of tea and a bed if I was ever over that way and drookit! Otherwise, the hostel itself was quite businessy, in a way, not as homely or bohemian as Oban was, or indeed mad Carole's place. I took some pics of the grand insides before I left and some of the outside. Apart from dying from the heat, it's been not too bad a trip -- but then adventures always suck when you're having them. What I am looking forward to is seeing the wee ones again.

12.33. The train is still running about 45 minutes late. They said it was to do with problems with lineside equipment near Tamworth, and they hinted at further problems. Great! The quiet coach filled up at Newcastle with the Ibiza bunch, all suntans and overly-blonde hair and mobile phones not set to silent. Mind you, there is precious little reception here and the coach (or DVT I suppose) is completely GPS-proof, so I have no idea how fast we're going. The train guard did acknowledge this fact, with a knowing yet weary smile, when I asked him earlier.

Postscript. The journey back to Edinburgh was as quick as it was uneventful, and true to expectations it was raining when I pedalled out of Waverley Station. But after a mile of Princes St and a stop to buy a birthday card the drizzle was no match for my sunburned arms and legs, as I peeled off Goretex for Helly Hansen and then just my t-shirt for the hilly ride homewards. Through the door and after a quick change of clothes I was out again to buy a present for my next door neighbour, then I was lifting kitchen floor tiles to clear up a little reminder that I wasn't the only one who'd felt unwell during the weekend. With the tiles disinfected and hosed down I then set to repairing the bag of cat food which had been sliced open and cut to ribbons by claws unknown, and then retired to the garage to drill holes in Velma the VFR's windscreen to fit a spoiler.

And then with a dinner of huge slabs of lasagne inside me, I had very long, very enjoyable, hot shower. Maps were put away, batteries were recharged and photographs were pored over. And so, happily, to bed.

Fate and skill and chances

Well then.

Over the past few years I wrote at great length with great enthusiasm, but inevitably the naïvety of a beginner turned out to be much of its undoing. Perhaps the story will live on in the minds of those who did read it, before I culled it from these very pages to leave a jarring silence, and perhaps one day I might treat it to a subtle -- or not so subtle -- reworking, even an extension. That its successor behind the scenes is being brought forth oh-so-slowly from my fingers leaves me with the rather bold notion of producing it as a single work rather than by instalment as I did with an earlier work; perhaps it will even see print should someone be mad enough to support it. Not for me is NaNoWriMo, as I seem to have neither the time nor the on-demand ability to crank out material, but I will be plying the lexicon in my own incremental way.

I actually feel bad for shutting everything down for so long and wiping the board clean. I shouldn't have expected too many to be exploring my Are You Sitting Comfortably? page for updates, though that has been my natural receptacle for rekindling my enthusiasm for the written word. I can't keep blaming my accident two years and more ago, and about which I wrote very little, but it destroyed my confidence in many aspects. Those who were here at the time will remember it, and my shoulder mended fine, while my hand mended mostly fine. For several months my guitar playing was badly affected; indeed, my handwriting was affected, with a knuckle joint that even now pops and creaks in a way that it never did before. While I am tearing up the roads, albeit still tentatively, on my motorbike, and tearing up the roads with gusto on the same black bicycle as ever, my writing has come and gone and come again. This time I'm going to write stuff when I feel like it, and when I don't, I shan't; if a piece ends up long, it's because it wanted to be long.

So I guess over the last, hurmmm, two dozen months, I've probably come full circle. Over a summery two weeks in August in 2009 I rode 500 miles across New York and southern Ontario. I saw snakes and hedgehogs and deer. I comprehensively broke, and then mended, parts of my bike. I carried out my own little archeological history investigation. I got lost several times. I climbed over a train while carrying my bike. I discovered I knew more about the CN Tower than the local tour guide. I used a staff bathroom without permission. And worst of all, I caused a statewide shortage of Oreo cookies.

Prologue


A FAMOUS cycle tourist once wrote, "Solitary long-distance travel is addictive". Intrepid touring cyclist might be a more accurate description, sufficient to have written, oh, several books at least and fitting in a ride or two around the world, probably because it was there. My degree of intrepidation had seen me leave Scotland for the far away lands of the seafront on the south coast, once or twice, and even then I'd had a train journey to help me out. I did discover that there not be dragons, just occasional partygoers wearing fluorescent yellow plastic sunglasses, a lot of peeling pale green ironwork, and a shop that sold really excellent chocolate milkshakes. Encountering, at speed, the bicycle lane that kinked alarmingly left and right between the end of a cul-de-sac and a raised flowerbed was possibly the most noteworthy event. Spending the day tootling back and forth from one end of the town to the other, eating paninis and salads, taking an occasional photograph and being very investigative of everything and nothing was my foil to the fact that I was somewhere where I didn't know anyone at all. The problem was, I quickly realised, I wasn't actually enjoying it. So much so in fact that I parked myself somewhere along on the shingle beach, wriggled myself a nice depression in the stones to relax in the sunshine, and wrote about how much I wasn't enjoying it.

Give me thirty years or thereabouts, and hopefully I'll have the rest of it written. In the meantime I'm making plans for the next adventures and quickly realising that I tend to have them faster than I can record them. Last year I took the summer off to go wrenching in my garage, but instead I found myself doing photography and picking brambles along the canal, and not writing very much.

I set the wheels in motion

Doing the rounds of late is yet another meme, with the following rules: Pick up your nearest book and go to page 123. Find the fifth sentence (not the fourth?), and post on your blog the next three (not five?…) sentences. Acknowledge who tagged you, and then tag five more people. Thus:

And where were the new maps I had been promised? Here were the same crude line-drawn maps I had made myself, on my computer, back in 1996. And why was the section title, "White Man, Where You Going?" (a quote from an African in the story) changed to "White Man, Where Are You Going?"

from Roadshow: Landscape with Drums, A Concert Tour by Motorcycle by Neil Peart.

Considering the last and spectacularly unsuccessful time I tried following on an Internet meme—with only one person, Emma, actually responding in kind—I'm not going to point my finger at anyone this time.

It's not entirely coincidental that Peart's book was the nearest to hand, especially since it's my current read, and well worth it. But this past week I've been ultra-focussed, to the point where I've not read my book, I've not listened to the radio, I've watched barely any television, written next to no e-mails, and done no cycling. I was across town all week doing my Direct Access motorbike training.

A couple of weeks before, I had taken the morning off work and bussed it into town to take my motorbike theory test, for which I had been revising at full-tilt. Back when I was learning to drive a car, the theory test was quite a new thing and it was done like any regular exam with a paper booklet and 35 multiple choice questions. I disposed of that one in ten minutes. This time around it's all gone modern and hi-tech with 50 questions followed by 14 video clips of developing hazards, all done via a computer touchscreen or clicking the mouse. I disposed of the questions efficiently once more, and comprehensively passed the hazard perception. I scored lower than I expected though, possibly because I'm so switched on to road behaviour that sometimes I spotted hazards too early for the computer software's "identification period". Early is good; late might mean an expensive crash, or worse. With certificate in hand I bussed it over to the motorbike training school for an hour's basic riding assessment, a session where would-be students can get a feel for sitting on a bike, working the controls and performing some very basic manoeuvres. The learner bikes were very small and I was perched on the seat without much difficulty, save for my knees which were somewhere around the top of the petrol tank! Of course, I'd been thinking about learning for some time and with my brother and Dad already bike riders, and armed with half a dozen magazines, I was familiar with how it worked. I'd even sat myself in my bedroom, helmet and gloves on, making 'yin yin' noises and imagining how to work the throttle and change gear. On the day, it came together reasonably quickly. I was ok balancing the bike although the tarmac training area was a bit bumpy with some small stones which threw the front wheel a little bit, and I was grabbing the clutch lever and front brake lever sometimes instead of using my right foot and right hand. But the hour was enough to convince me that I felt I had what it would take to do the proper training, and with that I bussed it back to work.

So on Monday, with a week's leave in hand, I drove down to the training school to start the process; I wasn't going to take the bus again after the disastrous journey across town to my work which had left me about to be sick, and unwell for the next three days. There were four of us on the first day, all ready to sit our Compulsory Basic Training, which is the legal minimum to riding on the road. It was a succession of lectures, covering everything from How It Works, to why alcohol might be a bad thing, to what helmet to wear, and bike riding in the yard. Starting and stopping, doing U-turns, riding a figure of eight around traffic cones, learning how to indicate and look on the approach to junctions, where the blindspots were and how to check them. In the afternoon it was our first venture onto the roads and into the local housing area where the roads were quiet. It turned out that only one other student, Al, was doing the whole five days in one go and I struck up a good rapport with him. Riding in convoy with the instructor sometimes at the lead, sometimes in the middle, sometimes tailing us, and all the while in radio contact with us, it was both fun and incredibly tiring. Three of us already had driving licences and were fairly road-savvy but all of us were beginners. At the end, I was informed that I had passed my CBT and was ready to move forwards. I left the school in the evening feeling very tired and I still had to go shopping before having tea.

Coming back the next day I was a feeling more relaxed, safe in the knowledge that I wasn't starting from scratch now and knowing I could work the bike without falling off or crashing into cars. There were two ladies joining Al and me that day, both of whom had obviously done some riding before, and it was a nice change from being in amongst big muckle guys with stubbly faces. The instructors suggested I ride one of the newer, slightly taller learner bikes, still 125cc and only about 13hp, but as I quickly discovered when doing some circuits and manoeuvres in the yard, better balanced and smoother to ride, and generally a bit nicer all round. So with Fred, our cheerful, chain-smoking instructor in the pack, we headed out onto the roads again to try mixing it in traffic. You have to jump in, if not at the deep end then somewhere around the middle, each day in order to progress to test standard within a week, and the middle of town was definitely a deep end! We encountered potholes, roundabouts, cobbles, bad drivers, buses, roadworks and traffic lights, probably all before lunchtime. One problem I was having time and again was forgetting to switch off my indicators after a turn; on a motorbike they aren't self-cancelling. We also visited a petrol station to refuel, went back into town a second time and explored some of the eastern side of Edinburgh and out towards Musselburgh to see the new Driving Standards Agency building and training ground - our potential destination. Both Al and I noted at the end of the day how less tired we felt, and we had done a lot of riding. If I'd had the presence of mind, I might have noted the odometer reading to see just how far.

Day three was another deep end: the big bikes. Direct Access is an intensive route to obtaining one's unlimited licence and involves riding a machine over 500cc with more than about 35hp, and on which one sits the test. Along with the scary powerful bikes, we had a new instructor, Matt, whose attitude I liked a lot. Still jovial, but slightly harder-edged and very committed to getting the best out of us. It was a day of exploring the various routes that we might find ourselves riding on the test and taking the bikes on faster roads. We'd already been up to 50mph on the learner bikes and that had been a shock - the windblast, the sheer exposure - and now we had to practice 60-70mph on bikes which accelerated. Again we practiced U-turns, both on foot and riding, emergency stops (now 'controlled stops') and hill starts, and took the bikes through mid-afternoon clag ups. To my frustration I was still leaving my indicators on, while Al wasn't, but in my favour I seemed to be a little happier turning in the road than he was.

I had another shock on Thursday when I was told that I was going to be riding a bigger again bike, a Yamaha FZ6: 600cc and 98hp...! Apparently one of the fleet had become damaged and wasn't available, and when I asked if it was simply luck of the draw, both Tricia and Matt told me that in their opinion I had the greater potential for a bike like that. They were also considering using them as the big bikes for the training and I was the guinea pig. So as well as having a big black bike to ride, they wanted my feedback afterwards on whether the machine would be suitable. Having gone from two cylinders to four, from carburettors to fuel injection, and small disc brakes to big ones, the bike felt huge underneath me. But it was a spine-tingling and satisfying huge, with my knees hugging the fat petrol tank. I practiced again in the yard before we went out for the day, feeling the clutch bite and trying out the brakes and seeing how the bike felt in tight turns. And then it was onto the roads and more of the same exploration of back roads and changing speed limits, and a few blasts up and down and into the city. When I wound on throttle, the bike built up speed almost recklessly and I had no trouble keeping up with the other traffic. Our route for the morning was as much experience of all kinds of roads as an excuse to stop by all the motorcycle shops in Edinburgh, most of which I'd visited before as a prospective biker. It was during our ride back to the training school, heading through the middle of the city just after lunchtime, that "all the dominoes have just fallen into place." As I led Matt and Al, picking our way along Royal Park Terrace between all the parked cars, I caught up a car waiting for an oncoming car. I'd simply slowed right down, ready to stop, but the car moved off and I carried on to the next roundabout and onwards. I'd thought little of it at the time but Matt thought differently. "That was some of the best slow speed riding I've ever seen from a student! You were going about an inch a second, no foot down, no brake light!" And Al was similarly pleased for me, saying that he could see why they'd put me on the bigger bike rather than him. I had the biggest grin on my face that evening.

We had both been making solid progress through the week and Matt was honest in his appraisal of our riding, saying we were both well skilled already and thinking much more about where we placed our bikes on the road and much less about operating them. I had developed a slight tendency to grab too much throttle while using the clutch, but at least I wasn't leaving my indicators on anymore. During a motorbike test one is allowed up to three of any specific type of minor fault: hesitating, missing an observation or whatever, to a maximum of 16 faults; leaving indicators on too long, especially if one has later passed a side road, means an instant failure. There were some tricks we could use to remember that sort of thing; saying to oneself, such as "indicator, indicator, indicator, indicator", or more forcefully, "I'm an idiot, I'm an idiot, I'm an idiot"; Al's preferred mantra was "Bastard, bastard, bastard". I invented no such phrase, preferring to periodically glance at the handy green flashing lamp on the handlebars. On the black bike it was easy to spot. And on day five, all the nerves appeared. I'd had a look on my map to find out where the Test Centre was located, because I know some parts of Edinburgh and its environs rather less well than others. I had also looked at the published test route itineraries from the DSA to get an appreciation of what roads might be involved, out of any of the ten possible routes. We spent the morning doing more manoeuvres, more roundabouts, studying the speed limits on certain roads and the timings of bus lanes, then headed back to the training school for lunch. Al wasn't hungry at all, and I could only manage one sandwich and half a biscuit. It had been a monotone, dull sort of morning but the weather was brightening and warming up so I drank some water and fiddled with the vents on my helmet for more airflow. Before long, it was time for us to ride to the Test Centre; Matt and I left our bikes in the little parking bay while Al, whose test was first, parked next to the gargantuan white Honda Pan European of the examiner. I hovered around to refresh my mind on how to check tyre tread depths and oil levels while Matt took my counterpart into the breach, reappearing after a little while. Since the test takes about 40 minutes altogether, we rode back to the school to collect another student who was sitting the test for his A2 Restricted licence, and then rode back once more. I parked my bike next to the big Honda which had obviously only just arrived back, and we waited for Al to come out. I was feeling terribly jumpy, and doing my best to stand stock still and concentrate on taking deep slow breaths. When the door of the Test Centre opened, I saw Al emerge and just from his body language immediately suspected the worst, his head hanging ever so slightly and his walk measured and unhurried. "Sorry guys", was all he said for a while.

Matt took the driving report sheet from Al and cast an eye over the ticks; "You only had five faults, and then it was the indicators." Al replied, "When I heard the guy say, 'Pull up at the side of the road whenever it's safe to do so, and switch off the ignition.', I knew I'd messed up." He was bitterly disappointed, that he had let down Matt and me, and himself. "Oh, Al..." I said and I put my arm around him.

But he brightened up after a few minutes, saying that he hadn't lost anything, and would take another test as soon as he could. Time was getting on, I was getting quite warm in my heavy jacket, and it was my turn to face the music. Al gave me a big 'riding buddy' handshake and said simply, "Go for it." I quickly discovered that the Test Centre was completely custom designed to accommodate the different needs of car drivers and motorcyclists; while the waiting room for the former was full of upholstered seats and nice carpets, the room for us was air-conditioned (because of our need for warm, armoured clothes), and it had plastic chairs and a linoleum floor (because we might be sopping wet). Steve the Pan European came in, all six foot four of him, he smiled and shook my hand, and we spent a couple of minutes going through the paperwork of my driving licence and CBT certificate. I put on my intercom and helmet, and we headed out into the sunshine.

He asked me a couple of questions about maintenance, which I answered easily enough, and then he reviewed how he would tell me which direction to go. If he said nothing, I was to simply ride straight on; otherwise, do what he asked. So I kicked the bike into first gear and into my test. The traffic was fairly heavy, being mid-afternoon and the route taking me into Musselburgh's back roads, most of which I knew well by now. I did my U-turn on foot, rueing the weight of my bike and my lack of arm strength, and then rode the bike around again. I did my controlled stop, remembering what Matt had suggested about using the powerful back brake only a fraction and letting the front brake do the work. We rode out of town through some more housing streets, with which I wasn't familar at all (arguably a good thing for staying alert), doing my hill start on the A6124, and into the 60mph section where I happily grabbed some throttle to show I wasn't afraid of 'making progress'. I became confused at one point after a roundabout because for some reason I didn't know what the speed limit was; I thought back to the previous road and decided that since I hadn't remembered seeing a sign, it must still be 60mph. I hedged my bets at just over 40mph for a few seconds and then opened up. Then it was a left turn onto the A1 and a brief blast at 70mph in fairly light traffic. And before long I was back on Newhailes Road and heading for the Test Centre. "Don't worry, it's just a bike ride and it'll be over before you know it", Tricia and Matt told me earlier, and it was true. I'd been concentrating hard and most of the riding we had done during the week had been fairly extended sessions. Just as I turned into the Test Centre's side road, and switching off my indicator, I was confronted by a large white van, parked in my lane. I did my left mirror, right mirror, right shoulder check and moved out to avoid it, and realised my indicator was still flashing. I hastily hit the centre button to cancel it and hoped I hadn't blown my chances right at the very end.

In fact, while I was fairly confident of my riding during the past half an hour, I was sure I'd made the fatal mistake just as Al had done, and I quietly stomped back into the building. I was also very warm and was grateful for the cool air inside. Steve the Pan European came in a moment later and took my intercom while I pulled off my helmet and caught my breath. We sat down, and he asked me to wait a moment while he finished off the driving report. As he glanced up, I tensed my stomach muscles and waited for the result. He smiled, saying "I'm pleased to tell you you've passed." I signed the paperwork for him to exchange my licence for one with the extra qualification, he passed me a magazine and a DVD for new riders, shook my hand and wished me well.

Then the moment started to sink in, and I left the building to rejoin Matt, who was waiting with the younger student, alongside the bikes. "I see a magazine there!" he exclaimed, and I held it up and smiled. He took a look at my results, and noted that I'd only been marked on four minor faults, one of which was hesitation, on which I remember being marked down when I sat my car driving test, and which I'd been really trying to improve over the past few days. I waited with the bikes while he went back inside with the student, and I looked over the results for myself. Fortunately my armoured jacket has a large back pocket which was just large enough for the magazine and DVD and envelopes and things I'd been given. Matt returned, and said Al was waiting back at the school. So we had a quick blast back along the roads and I trundled through the gate, giving Al a big thumbs up; he smiled and returned the gesture. Once off the bike I stood for a moment, just standing and gathering my wits, and he came over and gave me a great big hug. There had never been any doubt in his mind really.

Matt was dead pleased, too. He'd been wearing his lucky boots, and we talked about some of the riding we'd done over the week, how impressed he'd been with our progress, mine in particular. Somehow I think that'll be one story he'll be using with future students.

And there's another thing. This past week I've had a lot to take in and a lot to demonstrate, and I've had an absolutely fantastic time. I was very wary of the male banter at first, but I let my guard down and joined in, and before I knew it I was poking fun at them in return and having a load of fun. Quite honestly, it's been one of the best weeks of my life, and my friend Jo has been a great support; she certainly knows a thing or two about bikes.

And what now? Now I get to fire up my very own motorbike and take it across town to the training school to say thank you.