[DarkStarCBR]

Thought you guys might like to read this. I wrote it up for a post on Visordown...

See all the pictures here...
Just got back from a fantastic weeks riding the best roads I have ever seen!
This is the story of 2 guys, 2 11 year old Fireblades & over 3500 miles through 3 countries in 8 days

Day 1: Sat August 19th
Early start, 5am jump up quick shower and dressed. Pack the last few bits onto the bike and wait for Ian to arrive. He get's there at 6 and we pose for a departure photo, then hit the road. 70 odd miles to Dover so we put our heads down and get it done. The boat leaves at 8 and we get there with plenty of time to spare. No problems loading up, we find ourselves a nice spot and get the coffee's in. Spend the 2 hours poring over the map and programming in our route for the day. The boat docks at Dunkirk and we depart without a problem.
We started out, the sun is shining, France is looking as beautiful as I remembered, life is good!

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After about 50 miles I start to notice a knocking noise from my bike, oh no not already FFS!!! The knocking very quickly turned to a screeching grinding noise and I pulled up. After an hour or so messing around with the front brakes (I had just changed them) I took it up the road without my lid on & notice the noise was coming from the back not the front D'OH! 2 mins later we had identified the rear disk had practically fallen off! The noise I could hear was one of the disk bolts grinding its way through the calliper hanger. Another 5 mins later and it was fixed and ready to start out again.
In the time messing with the bike the beautiful blue sky had turned menacing black the the heavens opened..... It fooking pissed down!!!
On the road again, another 50ish miles covered now very wet. Im following Ian and notice him messing around with something on his bike, he pulled up.... Here we go again.... His steering damper had managed to shake itself off. Bolt it back on and start out again, only to stop another mile down the road. This time he cant move his steering at all. Out with the tools again and rip off the damper completely & attach to the bike else ware with tie clips. Jobs a good'un & back on the road. Still raining though )-: We push on. By now its getting towards 6pm so we call it a day. Find a camp site in Laon, book in and pitch up camp, feeling very deflated at only managing a grand total of about 250k. We pop into town to grab some food and head back to camp for a couple of beers and some sleep.

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Queue the first of many nutty Dutch people we met..... Really nice guy, we ponced a few fags off him earlier on in the evening. He wonders down the path towards our camp, bit of idle chitchat about the bikes, then he pulls out a little spliff, has a toke and passed it to Ian RESULT!!! Anyway after a couple more of his little j's he asks us if we want some, Hell yeah!!! So he wonders off and comes back 10 mins later with a little baggie for us prob about an 1\8th, he wouldn't hear of us giving him any money, wished us his best, made us promise not to ride after smoking and disappeared. Well all of a sudden we were on a high again... After our bad first day it really cheered us up!!! That little baggie lasted us all week.... What a top guy, he really made our week lol.
We originally planned to cross France via back roads, after the first day we changed this plan.

Day 2: Sun August 20th
Ian wouldn't get up in the morning so by the time we had packed up and got ready to leave it was 11... After the poor show on the first day we decided to blow out crossing France by back roads and headed for the toll roads. Not much to say about the day really as we just kept our heads down and soaked up the miles, we stopped every 100 or so for fuel and fag brakes and we just kept on going.... By about 8pm we were totally ****ed, we had done around 600k and were very tired and hungry. We were aiming for Grenoble but didn't quite make it that far so we took an exit for Lyon. Now trying to find a campsite around Lyon would be like trying to find one in London, not gonna happen. We pissed around searching until about 11pm... We passed an open Mc D's and stopped in for something to eat, boy what a great royal with cheese.....
So we finished up and got back on the bikes, city riding at night usually isn't a problem however I had a fully black race visor on and Ian's bike has a daytime only mot due to its lack of lights so we were riding side by side, him using the lights from my bike and me blind with my visor open. We get a couple of miles down the road and spot a Fomula1 motel. Fcuk it, we booked in €28 for a double room for 1 night.... Sold! It was very small and very hot but clean at least. Quick spliffy (thanks again crazy Dutch dude) and we crashed out.

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Day 3: Monday August 21st

First day in the hills.
We spent the day riding from Lyon to Grenoble via a mountain pass listed in GPS, more like a big hill really. Nice views at the top, stopped for a drink and a natter with some locals then headed back down the other side of the hill. IMO this was one of the best road all week, quite tight sweeping turns, mile after mile after mile, great tarmac, what a ride!!!

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We got to Grenoble in the late afternoon and headed for a camp site. We called it Mosquito ally, within seconds of removing my jacket I had 2 of the bastards tucking into me.

Day 4: Tuesday August 22nd - To the Alps!

No messing around today, got up and out by 10:30 and set out into the Alps. WOW is all I can say, fantastic! I found it really weird riding in the Alps for the first day, the contrast between the heights, stunning views over a shear drop gave me the heeby's lol.

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We found ourselves on the Col du Lautaret , a fantastic, very fast road, we loved it, in fact we loved it so much we kept going, going, going all the way into Switzerland! Didn't even notice crossing the border lol. Stopped for a quick couple of pics and headed back into France.

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That afternoon we took on the mighty Col du Galibier! It splits from the Lautaret at the start and climbs up and up and up to the top of a mountain. Very scary road to ride, only 1 cars width most of it, with nothing to stop your fall should you get to close to the edge & very bumpy as well. The bikes were running like crap due to the thin air by the time we got to the top but boy was it worth it, the views were truly awesome!

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The rest of the day we spent mostly looking for a camp site, there was one at each end of the Col du Lautaret so we ended up doing that road at least twice each way that day. We decided on a camp site in Briançon, looked really nice, mountains all around, beautiful! Pitched up in the corner away from everyone and set in for a quiet evening. Well that didn't last. About an hour after we had set up the French ****ing A-Team rolled in, 4 x big quad bikes, 5 x big 4 x 4's and parked all around us. These were the only rude people we met all week, wankers wouldn't even say hello, they were ****ing banging and crashing until 10:30 that night and up doing it again at 6 the next morning. I was seriously pissed and complained to the site manager, who after a bit of bartering gave me half price for the night. Let me tell you, if your planning to camp in the Alp's your gonna need a good sleeping bag, not the Tesco's family bumper camping pack one that I had with me, feck was it cold that night!

Day 5: Wednesday 23rd August

Hummm not good start to the day, apart from **** all sleep I woke with a nasty case of the shits, and generally didn't feel too clever!
My tyres were well bald by now and I wasn't very happy at the thought of giving it loads up the mountains on them. So we decided to have an easy day and head back into Grenoble to find some tyres. I had called my old man the day before and asked him to Google bike tyre shops in the area, he had given the name of a shop and an address so we loaded it into the gps and hit the road. We were a couple of hundred k's away though mountain roads so it took a couple of hours.
Found the shop, found they couldn't do me a 16" front so went to a near by Honda dealer, who couldn't do me one either. So we went back to the good folks at Daffy Moto to have a rear fitted anyway (the rear was much worse than the front) 45 mins and the job was done.

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We were both really tired so we decided to call it a day and find a camp site, headed up the hill from Grenoble & what a hill it turned out to be fanbloodytastic road, about 30k long. Brought us to the best site we had stayed in so far. Beautiful it was, mountains all around & no A-Team in sight! Slept quite well but was fecking cold again, thanks Tesco's!

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[DarkStarCBR]

Day 6: Thursday 24th August - Last day in the Alps

Felt much better when I woke up, no sign of the nasty's I had the day before. We actually managed to get up and out by 11. Our plan was just to ride as much of the Alps as we could. So we left camp and headed for Les alps Deux, it was long old ride but the 12k road up the mountain was fecking awesome!

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Got to the top and was taken back by the views. I learned to ski here so was very interesting to see it in the summer.

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Instead of going back down the road we came up, we found a little road near the top that took us around the crest of the mountain and back down the other side, mile after mile of awesome descending roads and we were back in the valley. I should know the name of this road as it on the tour route but alas I don't. It crawled back and forth along the valleys between many mountains and was absolutely beautiful. We pass a sign for Valmeinier which was the resort I stayed at on my first ski trip, so I said lets check it out, back up we went....

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Another great road, quick stop for a photo and headed back down onto the previous valley road. We followed this road for about 50k when it finally started to climb again. Up & up we went, and colder and colder it got. When we eventually reached the top we saw the sign Col du Glandon!

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It was seriously high, but we couldn't see anything as the clouds were bowling over the top, we were blind and freezing! Put jumpers on and headed down the other side. It was a gruelling decent! By the time we got to the bottom I could hardly pull the break, my wrists we fecking killing!!!
So we stopped for a snack and fuel, and waved goodbye to Les Alps!
We jumped on the toll road over to Albertville, turned out to be a very nice little town. Found a camp site that was pretty much deserted and pitched up for the night. We walking into town for some dinner and a couple of drinks and got back to the site about 10:30 ready for bed. It had been the most gruelling day by far!

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Day 7: Friday 25th August

Not much to say about this day really, it was all heads down and soak up the miles back across France. We did about 450k that day and ended up in lovely little town called Troyes.
Found a camp site and pitched up. We were in a space next to a Dutch couple, said Hiya etc and went to grab some grub from the site pizza place. Well it turned into the best night we had. The Dutch couple soon joined us for a few Desperados at the bar and the evening had begun. After the rest of the people cleared out it was just us 4 and the family of one of the workers there. Think it was a birthday. Before long a guitar had appeared and the sing-along started. Then a flute appeared, then bugger me if a little French woman didn't pull out an accordion. They were going for it, Ello ello style for about an hour before we called it a night. Really had a good crack!

Day 8: Saturday 26th August

Again not much to say really, did the final leg of the journey. Another 480k's or there about and were back in Dunkirk. Follow GPS for a campsite and I kid you not, this was the worst campsite in France. It was right next to a nuclear power station! I could see the plumbs off steam from where my tent was. It was like a chav city of caravans and fcuked up looking people. And northerners,, Oooo it luvle ere, Ooooo yeahtis luvle! We got to bed & up and out sharpish, the fact we had to be there was bad enough without hanging around!

Day 9: Sunday 27th August - BOOOOOO Home time

Really this is the end of the story..... We were on the 10am boat so we packed up camp and headed to the ferry. Everything was perfectly on time and trouble free.
Was home by midday.