A Boys Own Adventure riding a motorbike through Africa – so says the byline.
When Jonny Bealby set out on his African Odyssey by motorcycle he was already an experienced motorcycle traveller. I tell you that because he was not someone looking for their first real motorcycle adventure but rather an ordinary chap who had been to a few places around the world on a motorcycle already and this trip to Africa was to help dispel a particular demon in his personal life that he was having trouble dealing with, namely the early death of his fiancee whilst they were travelling in Kashmir a couple of years before.
Jonny decided he wanted the journey to challenge him as much as anything to try and cast off the shadow that had blighted his life as a result of this personal tragedy, but he also had no desire for the journey to be easy.
Aside from anything else this trip is not your typical North to South of Africa, challenging though that [Read more →]
There has been a bit of a hoohar lately because certain police forces – Sussex, Nottinghamshire and Lincolnshire – have started offering advice to motorcyclists on how to be better seen and to this end two out of the three of them are handing out hi-viz motorcycle gear.
The justification for handing out this gear is apparently to cut motorcycle accidents by making us easier to see.
Hmmm, what do we think to that?
On the surface of it, and probably to non-motorcycling folk, it probably seems like a jolly good idea. If they [Read more →]
The Motorcycle Industry Association (MCI) had a meeting with the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills this week aimed at gaining more recognition and support from the UK government for the motorcycle industry.
Even though motorcycles represent only 1% of the road traffic in the UK, the industry that supports that has a much larger role to play in the country’s economy. The 2010 industrial assessment found that the motorcycle industry has net sales in excess of £5billion and employs 62,000 people in over 5,700 companies. Plus it contributes £1billion in taxes to the Exchequer each year.
On this basis the MCI are looking for commitment and support from the Government, rather than exclusion, from benefits such as the scrappage scheme and business support programmes that have been available to the car sector.
In addition the MCI pointed out the other benefits of motorcycles as a contributing part of the automotive sector in helping improve the overall transport structure in the UK and helping the Government to meet its own targets.
Motorcycles are congestion beating
Motorcycles are less polluting than cars on average CO2 emissions of 110g/km compared to 158g/km for cars
Motorcycles are a cost effective mode of transport
The industry delegation was led by Tara Glen, MCI’s Chairman who was supported by Steve Kenward, MCI’s CEO, and Craig Carey-Clinch. Mr Kenward said; ” We are very positive about the outcome of this meeting and are looking forward to working with the Government to create proper recognition for the motorcycle industry.”Motorcycles and scooters have an important role to play in transport policy as well as making a very notable financial contribution to Britain. Now is the time to readdress the balance and bring equality to the automotive sector.”
Lets hope that this is not just Government hot air and that we might actually see some support for the motorcycling sector in the country in the future.
I always read, or watch stories on the TV, with disbelief that people are still getting scammed on eBay.
I’ve come to the conclusion that whatever it is the person concerned is buying is such a bargain that they take their brain out in the interest of securing this bargain.
There is a programme on TV at the moment called Hustle. One of their often repeated lines is “You cannot con an honest man”. Now, I am not suggesting that these people who are getting conned are criminals themselves but there is something in most of us that likes to get a bargain and there maybe an element of dishonesty in that.
In last weeks MCN was a guy who tried to buy a Bimota and got scammed and ended up losing all his money. He is a bit of a collector of rare machines and recognised that the £2500 asking price was an absolute bargain.
First mistake was when he contacted the guy and got the message ‘I’m working away at the moment etc…’ He admits himself he should have walked away at that point, but the £2500 Bimota kept him locked in and this is what the scammer relies on.
We went after a couple of motorbikes advertised in a magazine a couple of months ago, they were a bargain price, but when we got an email very similar to the one this chap described alarm bells rang and we didn’t pursue it. So it is not just eBay where these scammers hang out.
Then scam part two. The guy received what appeared to be official looking papers from eBay protecting him – clever – and thinking that he couldn’t lose his money sent a bank transfer.
Now aside from sending a bank transfer without seeing the motorbike, which is just plain stupid after thinking there might have been something dodgy with the email correspondence, you would check the validity of the paperwork with eBay wouldn’t you?
Anyhow as you might guess there is not a happy ending to this story, the money was transferred, the motorcycle never arrived and the chap’s bank traced the money transfer to Romania.
So, put your brains back in folks. If it seems too good to be true, it probably is. Don’t part with money until you’ve seen the motorbike. Arrange to pay cash when the motorbike is delivered. Do HP checks etc.
People are able to seize Ebay accounts without the owner of that account being aware of it mainly because the owner clicked on a link in a scam email from Ebay. Don’t do that either. If you think what the email says might be true there is an easy way to find out – log in to your account in the normal way, not via the link in the email.
Don’t make it so easy for these scammers, please.
A Boys Own Adventure riding a motorbike through Africa – so says the byline.