Welcome to the wet coast, welcome to paradise!

Allright, here I go again, right?

More over-the-top exaggeration. NOT!

I am privileged to be staying, for the next few days, at the Fairmont Pacific Rim on the waterfront in Vancouver.  Simply my favourite hotel.  Full stop.  Nothing to add.

What could make this better, you ask?

How about picking up a kick-ass Kymco Frost 200cc fuel-injected scooter five minutes from the airport courtesy of Bobskoot's good friend and Kymco dealer Gary Lee of Rideawaymotors.com.  Add to that providing my colleague who flew in from Calgary a motorcade style escort to the hotel.  She in her rock-star Lincoln Continental blacked-out window limo.  Me riding on the white Kymco providing imaginary cover.  With the snow-capped mountains as a backdrop. Wow!

Then, after check-in and a late lunch (at least based on Montreal time), I came downstairs to park the Kymco in the hotel garage (no charge for the scoot, another plus of the scooter lifestyle, my friends - the valet gods at the Fairmont invited me to scoot by the lift gates in the garage, because that's what the head valet does on her scooter!), and what do I find?

This gem parked outside.  A Vespa LX with a custom side-car rig:

And here's my ride, safely parked in the spotless underground garage.

Stay-tuned, cause there is more to come... A LOT MORE!

PS: for celebrity watchers, Sir Richard Branson was dining at ORU tonight.  That makes two of us.  The cool factor just won't quit.  I am loving this.

Hot Grips Update

The fine weather is finally here and my heated grips are no longer getting the use they were getting in the past couple of months.

First off, I have to say that heated grips are a fantastic investment.  I have ridden is some very cold weather and the heated grips have made all the difference in the world.  Not once did I end my commute with persistent chill in my fingers.

Secondly, when the weather was at its coldest, running the grips on high was more than sufficient to ward off the cold and keep the ride nice and comfortable.

Finally, the LX150's electrical system has proven itself more than capable of handling the grips.  I have had no battery or electrical issues whatsoever.

If you use your Vespa to commute for any kind of distance (my commute is approximately 30 kilometers or 20 miles each way), and if you find yourself suffering from chilled fingers or hands, you should seriously consider installing heated grips, or having them installed by your dealer.

Everything you need to do the installation yourself is available on my project report. 

Wocket in your Pocket Challenge

Trobairitz posted an interesting challenge.  A show & tell challenge of jacket and pants pocket contents.

For some reason, this challenge really appeals to me.

So here goes:

Left jacket pocket: Ear plugs in their container.  Blue suede Yarmulka from a Bar Mitzvah a few years ago, that turns out to save me from helmet hair.  No I'm not religious, and not even Jewish, though my wife and kids are.  I'm hoping that, should there be a God, he or she won't take offense. Micro-fibre lens cleaning cloth.

Right jacket pocket:  Ignition key on an Inukshuk buckskin key ring.  The ignition key, thanks to Jimh of allmotorcyclekeys.com, is keyed to my topcase as well.  Vespa keychain my daughter bought me in Rome, with a second ignition key; a key to a miniature set of handcuffs that is a keychain I used to use for my Miata, since sold; the key to my helmet cable lock; an electric-garage-door opener; and a key to a Kryptonite lock that I never use but still carry in the Vespa pet carrier.  Office keys, with a Swiss+Tech Utili-Key Stainless Steel 6-in-1 Multi Tool.  Interestingly, that Utili-Key has never been spotted by airport security.  Micro-fibre lens cleaning cloth. 

Inside jacket breast pocket: Slim wallet with Vespa registration and insurance slips.

Left pocket of my riding pants: Wallet with driver's license and the usual assortment of ID and credit cards.  Leather business card case.  Fisher Bullet Space Pen.

Right pocket of my riding pants: Mountain Equipment Coop Turtle Turbo LED flashlight with a miniature carabiner double clip. Loose bills and change if I'm carrying any.

I carry micro-fibre lens cleaning cloths in each jacket pocket because I wear glasses and they get used - a lot.

Thanks Trobairitz, that was fun, and it satisfied the very small urge that I was harboring to post my pocket contents on the very interesting (apparently only to guys) everyday-carry.com blog.

If you're curious what others are carrying, check out Trobairitz's blog.

Wheelers and Dealers

 Dealers

When my wheels need servicing, I'm no wrencher.

Vespa electrician, maybe. Read my gear posts and judge for yourself. But expert mechanic? Don't count on me. I don't count on me either.

My Italian beauty needed new shoes. Aren't all Italian beauties in perpetual need of new shoes? New fluids were also called for, and I wanted someone with a discerning mechanical eye and nose to match to check up on the transmission and drive train.

That means a visit to Canada's number one Vespa dealership. Alex Berthiaume & Fils.

You might think "What hyperbole! He's going to the biggest Vespa dealer in Canada to have his Vespa looked after".

Let's table the evidence and you can be judge and jury.

First off, there's the 2011 Vespa Canada dealer-of-the-year plaque in the showroom.

Begs the question, doesn't it: do all Vespa dealers in Canada sport that plaque?

I call the sales manager as my first witness.

Me: "Sur votre site internet ça dit que vous êtes le plus important concessionnaire Vespa au Canada... C'est tu une farce, ou c'est vrai?"

Sales Mgr.: "Ben r'garde derrière toi, s'ul mur!" Points to the plaque.


Me: "Ben oui... ça veux-tu dire que vous êtes le plus grand, ou juste le plus gentil?"

Anonymous reader: "Objection! Badgering the witness."

Me: "But your honor, I'm in cross!"

Another, more reasonable, anonymous reader: "Overruled.  The witness will answer."

Sales Mgr.: Looking pensive for a moment, probably dredging sales data. "R'garde on a vendu 150 Vespas c't'année.  Les autres concessionnaires sont chanceux d'en vendre 40."

Me: "C'est bon ça! Comme ça vous en vendez le plus au Canada?"

Anonymous reader: "Objection! Now he's leading the witness."

Me: "Your honor, still in cross..."

The other, more reasonable, anonymous reader: "Overruled.  The witness will answer."

Sales Mgr.: "C'est sûr! C'est pour ça qu'y nous ont donné la plaque!" Looking at me like I'm a little thick.  It's not the first time I've cross-examined a witness, and it's not the first time I've gotten that look.

I rest my case.

Still, your skepticism is justified.  What are the odds, that in just two weeks I would be having a chat, on the shop floor, with the largest Vespa dealer in the US (Vespa Sherman Oaks), and the largest Vespa dealer in Canada (Alex Berthiaume & Fils).

I said this before, truth is stranger than fiction.

Wheelers
 
Alex Berthiaume & Fils, the largest Vespa dealer in Canada, is two-and-a-half miles from my office.

Getting there on two wheels with a Vespa is a piece of cake, and that makes me a wheeler.  A nice leisurely ride through Montreal's Plateau borough, along picturesque Duluth street over to Lafontaine Parc, then a few blocks north on De La Roche Street. Presto!

The eagle-eyed nit-pickers among you will notice that's not the Google route in the map above.  Google may be efficient, but it has no soul.  My route is more direct, and prettier.

Once one drops one's bike off, how does one get back to the office?

Silly question! On two wheels of course!

No I didn't steal a bike.  Shame on you!

I pulled my bicycle helmet out of the topcase and strolled over to a BIXI stand just down the street on the corner, popped in my founding member's smart key, and off I went, merrily pedaling back to the office.  20 minutes and a little huffing and puffing later, I drop off the BIXI bike at the stand at Stanley and de Maisonneuve, and five minutes later I'm sitting at my desk.

A task that was happily repeated when my Italian beauty was ready to be picked up.

Speaking of wheels, after I paid up, the aforesaid sales manager cunningly invited me to take a Vespa GTS 300 Super for a spin around the block.  Yikes!!!! or to update that expression OMG!!!  What a sweet bike!  Breathtaking acceleration, nice weight, incredibly well balanced, surefooted, superb silky brakes, nice throaty purr from the motor... and I could go on!  And that's just from a spin around the block.

I'm working on stuff that I'll deserve to be rewarded for, this I know.  And there's a semi-gloss titanium grey 300 in the showroom with my drool on it... Time to put this thread to bed.

California dreaming

 But it's no dream.

I drove the Pacific Coast Highway back in  1997.  We rented a car and drove the coast from San Francisco south to Carmel.

Last week I got to drive the PCH from Los Angeles to Santa Barbara.

The PCH is such an iconic drive: Malibu, Topanga Canyon, Ventura.  Names that resonate with me as quintessential California places since I was old enough to watch TV.

In 1997 I didn't have a video camera handy to record that drive of a lifetime.  You only make that mistake once.  This time, I had my GoPro.  For those familiar with the area, the video starts just before Deer Creek Road and continues approximately 4 miles or so northward, ending just before the PCH turns inland towards Oxnard.

Don't mistake that expression on my face as less than 100% happy.

It's the look of someone trying to direct and produce a video with one hand and half a brain, and use the other hand and half-brain to drive a Volvo S-60 at 65 mph.

The only thing that could have improved my PCH experience would have been to ride it on my Vespa.

Maybe one day.... one more California dream.

iTravel, iBlog, iLike!

Finally I have found a digital travel solution that really works well in the confines of the airline economy seat.

It's the Apple iPad with an Apple wireless keyboard.

You can actually type in comfort, and without worrying that the thoughtless oaf in the seat in front of you will recline and crush your laptop screen.

When you factor in the wonder of in-flight WIFI, priceless.

When the flight attendant announced that our flight had WIFI, a ripple of oohs! and aahs! greeted the news.

You have to ditch your laptop and try this.

With the right combination of apps (think Pages, Goodreader, Penultimate, and Dropbox) you can be productive with a fraction of the weight and bulk.

Happy (digital) travels!

Visiting L.A. has its perks!

There are many MVers I would love to meet. It's no small task since there are so very few of them where I live.

So far, going out of my way today to meet David (SDG) at Vespa Sherman Oaks, I've scored two MVers. Meeting David was a big deal for me. I got a 5 cent tour of the shop, some Vespa swag (thank you David), and the opportunity to chat with a fellow addict.

The only regret I have is that the Vespa that Bill Dog rode coast to coast in the 2012 scooter Cannonball rally, that I was hoping to be able to snap a picture of, was off-site due to a space shortage in the shop.

Thank you David for being such a gracious host.

Misty

I am thankful that our fickle weather often plays dress-up with the landscape.

The mother nature we know is a little girl with a favorite doll, and lots and lots of outfits, accessories, and baubles.

Morning mist was the gauzy veil for Wednesday's commute.

When you interrupt your commute to snap a few pictures it sets a nice tone for the rest of the day.

Rainy, misty, overcast days can be wonderful occasions to seek a slower, more contemplative pace.  An opportunity to delve into subjects fit for deeper study and thoughtful deliberation.

Expressway leg

Two years ago I didn't have the skills I have now, and I didn't venture onto expressways much.

My first outing was early on a Sunday morning in June when there was no traffic.  I wanted to see how fast my Vespa was capable of going.  I got up to about 88 km/h and didn't have the nerve to pass the truck ahead of me that was doing 80 km/h.

A QPP cruiser sitting on the next on-ramp and alert for speeders pulled me over then, mistaking my bike for a 50cc model. As if a 50cc bike could manage 80 km/h, which is what I was doing sitting behind the truck when he pulled me over. He sent me on my way after verifying that my Vespa had more than the 125cc displacement engine legally required for expressway use. He asked me where it was written on the bike. When I showed him, he apologized for pulling me over. Nice cop. Lucky for me, because the speed limit on that particular expressway is only 70 km/h.

The Vespa LX150 is a great bike.

With a top speed that I now know is approximately 105 km/h, it is competent on expressways. At least it is on Montreal expressways.

This morning I had an errand to run to pick up a part for my Mazda Miata.

I sold the car on the weekend to dear friends.  I had to sell it because now that I have the Vespa, I no longer drive the Miata.  A car needs exercise.  It's in better hands now.

In prepping the car, I attempted to remove the radio to extract a cassette that became jammed in the player three years ago.

The prudent thing to do would have been to Google the instructions for disassembling the dashboard. I figured I could figure it out. Trust my instincts.

My instincts suck, and I destroyed the central panel because I failed to spot two critical screws and when I tugged on the assumption that there were clips and pressure fittings, the plastic shattered.

This morning I picked up a brand new panel.

The Mazda dealer sits in the epicentre of construction for Montreal's new McGill Super Hospital. I determined that the best, most efficient way to get there was to take the expressway - Autoroute 20, from Valois bay in Pointe Claire to the St-Jacques street exit.

The sweeping on-ramp at Valois bay gave me trouble the first time I took it last season. I struggled with it because I hadn't yet learned the art of counter steering.  If you don't countersteer your arc through the curve begins to travel wide.  Fortunately I sloughed of some speed and re-jigged the direction.  Had I attempted to steer more to the right in the direction I was intending to go, I might have lost control.

Thanks to David Hough's Proficient Motorcycling, that ramp is a piece of cake now.

Wide open throttle all the way.  Counter steering (applying pressure to the handlebars opposite to the direction of the curve) allows the bike to reduce the radius of its arc, therefore turning tighter, but without any reduction of acceleration.  The result is a greater angle of lean. Newer riders think that they lean the bike by leaning their bodies.  In fact it's all the effect of counter steering.  You can ride perfectly upright, and control the lean entirely with the pressure applied to the handlebars.  It's amazing.

On this particular morning the SUV in front of me spoiled the fun by traveling too slowly.

Here's what that expressway leg looked like on Monday morning during my commute.

Mini

 Every time I see one it shocks me.

My Vespa LX150 dwarfs, dominates, towers over, the real Mini.

Those new Minis are huge, hulking, massive, imposing cars, unworthy of the name.

It's a wonder that two real people can fit inside a real Mini.  You'd expect that they wouldn't have doors.  That there would be a gaping hole in the roof in which to perch, hunkered down to reach the steering wheel, like a too-big kid in a too-small pedal car.

But then I guess that the modern Vespa is to the vintage Vespa, what the modern Mini is to the original.

GoPro: Take II

Bobskoot is a man of many talents.

I have a lot to learn from Bob.

I believe Bob to be a GoPro wizard.  A wizard not just in the usual technical sense, but in the best possible sense, the artistic sense.

I am a beginner, a dilettante, a mouse in the corner of the Wizard's lair.

Trying to learn I am, as Bob, Yoda to my Luke, tosses me hints.  "Thirty degrees left".  "Fat Gecko". 'Stealth; excellent pictures, makes it does'.

That last bit paraphrases Bob's advice, though now I can't locate the comment.  Did I delete it in an iPhone clumsy moment?  Did I imagine Bob's advice?  Or is Bob whispering in my inner ear from the other quadrant of the planet by some wizardly means?  No... no... now I'm getting carried away. And yet...

I am struggling with the angle advice.  I think that I'm intoxicated with the view in which my Vespa and I waste a third of the frame while the sights are neglected.  Definitely not Jeddi material.  And I didn't quite take the Fat Gecko advice literally either.  I concluded that the GoPro suction mount was functionally equivalent to the Fat Gecko mount.  Call it a slightly rebellious riff on the Master's injunction.

I need to hone the craft because there are missions looming.

I won't be attacking any Death Stars, but my GoPro is going to be my mini-Lucas, with my iPhone as my R2D2, when I bag more big bridges this riding season.

Here's a practice run.  Let me know how I'm doing.

PS: Want to see GoPro in action? Check out the incredibly cool thread on Modern Vespa as the Cannonballers wrap up their run across the US south, San Diego bound.

Patching

 Here's a how-to of a different kind, but definitely a vital scooter / moto related skill.

Yes, sewing patches.

There is a technique to sewing on patches that makes the job fairly simple so that anyone can do it, and do it well.

Here's how to do it.

First the obvious, decide where you want the patch.

Once you know that, it helps to use a few straight pins to pin the patch to the fabric.

Since most patches have a black border, you should probably use black thread.  If the border is not black, use thread that matches the patch border.

Next once the needle is threaded, stitch the thread from front to back through the patch border.

Now, fold the patch back a little and stitch the thread through the fabric.  All you are doing it inserting needle just inside the outer layer of the garment's fabric and right back out, and just behind where the edge of the patch will sit. Those stiches in the garment fabric won't show, and they don't need to be symmetrical, or neat, or tidy.  As long as they sit back from the edge of the patch they'll be fine.  The stitches that matter are those that are back and forth through the patch border.

Next, stitch the thread through the patch border, this time from the back to the front.  Position your stitch about one sixteenth of an inch away from where the first stitch went through the border.

Now repeat those steps going around the edge of the patch until all the edges are sewn.  Then keep going to overlap the beginning and end of your stitching by at least half an inch or so.

With each stich, lie the patch down flat against the fabric and smooth the patch and fabric out, to make sure that your sewing is not binding anywhere.

As you sew along, you'll see that there is a little slack in the last two or three stitches that makes the job easy to do.

And there you have it.

If the patch border is very tight, using pliers to push and pull the needle through beats trying to use a thimble.

Unexpected

 

Washington DC, at least the small portion of it that lies within the confines of the Four Seasons Hotel, is full of "type-A" folks of both genders.

These people, when they aren't actively involved in VERY IMPORTANT MEETINGS, wander about the hallways, gardens, terraces, and patios with their smart devices glued to their faces having VERY IMPORTANT CONVERSATIONS.

They show tremendous respect for each other's turf, and in the garden adjoining the hotel, seemed to have each developed a 50 foot privacy radius in which they paced, intent on their VERY IMPORTANT CONVERSATION.

 I decided to take a five minute break in the garden to get some much needed fresh air and sunshine.

This was how I came to observe this somewhat peculiar behavior.

Imagine my surprise when I found this idyllic watercourse making its way to the Potomac right there in the hotel's garden.

I think you'll be bound to agree that it looks like it was lifted straight out of rural England.  The very antithesis of yammering yuppies on Blackberries and iPhones.

On a wing and a prayer

 My preferred transportation is my Vespa, by a wide margin.

Today the destination was Washington DC. The Vespa wasn't an option.

Yet there was quite a rare treat in store.  Transportation was courtesy of the aeronautical equivalent of a Vespa, in this case a Beechcraft 9 passenger King Air.

The cross-winds at Dulles were ferocious.  Being able to see out of the cockpit windows and the side windows simultaneously during the landing was a treat, and made counter steering the Vespa at full throttle on a curving expressway ramp seem quite tame by comparison.

The plane seemed headed straight for the runway, but was gyrating on its axis by what seemed to be 15 to 20 degrees to the left then to the same extent to the right.  Turbulence was simultaneously tossing us up and down like a toy.

The amazing thing was that the plane touched down light as a feather, with no wrenching at all.  Seeing all the left-right rotation in the split-seconds before the plane touched down made that smooth landing all the more improbable and remarkable.  I guess that gets chalked up to the pilot's skill.

All things considered, I didn't miss the scoot commute today.

Rick's Ride A:H

As a result of a Blogger / iPad glitch, this post devoted to Rick's ride self-destructed.

If you've already read this post and have come back, only to find that it's not quite what you saw the first time around, that's because it's not.

Rick Snyder set out on April 22, 2012 on the Scooter Cannonball run.  You will find numerous links to the 2012 Cannonball towards the bottom of the links on the right side of the page.

I exchanged some correspondence with Rick before his great adventure and I told him I'd be sharing the fun vicariously through Rick.

One way I did that was, like hundreds of others, was to compulsively visit the Official Cannonball thread on ModernVespa.com.

Another way was to follow Rick's progress on the followride.com website that tracked the Cannonballers in real time.  I took a number of snapshots of Rick's epic ride which you will find below.

Perhaps Rick will one day provide some context for these screen shots.

In the meantime you can visit the ModernVespa thread and read Rick's posts.  His MV username is Scuterbrau.  There was quite a bit of drama as Rick stuck to Bill Dog like glue as Bill did battle not only with the epic ride, but more importantly with a raging staph infection in his left hand that ultimately led to emergency surgery and intravenous antibiotics on arrival at destination in San Diego.

It's a riveting true real-time story of human resilience in the face of adversity.

So here, without further editorial comment are the snapshots of Rick's ride.  Hopefully there won't be any further Blogger glitches interfering with this post.

A: April 22, 2012 at 10:30 a.m.:

B: April 22, 2012 at 6:45 p.m.:

C: April 23, 2012 at 12:37 p.m.:

D: April 23, 2012 at 6:07 p.m.:

E: April 24, 2012 at 3:57 p.m.:

F: April 25, 2012 at 6:27 p.m.:

G: April 28, 2012 at 4:07 p.m.:

H: April 30, 2012 at 11:03 a.m.: