Montreal

This city has charm. Its charm runs deep. It has layers and textures. Montreal is a city of facets and contrasts.

It is old, and it is new.

It's French, and it's English, and Italian, and Portuguese. It is Greek, and Vietnamese. Chinese and German. It's proudly Jewish, and Catholic, Muslim and Hindu.

Montreal lives underground, and on a mountain. It's surrounded by water in the middle of a vast plain. Far inland, yet with an ocean port.

It can be steamy and hot, or bitterly cold.

It has passion, and culture runs very deep. It is strident, and gentle; boisterous, yet with dignity to spare.

Montreal loves food, and food loves Montreal.

Montreal strolls, it rides bikes. Traffic never stops. It gets around. Once or twice a year cars scream at hundreds of miles an hour, in Montreal.

We work hard, and play hard. We ski and we sail. Politics and controversy are a way of life here. We are discrete. Possessions and social standing are rarely a topic of conversation.

It's hard to be indifferent here. Over-stimulation is a risk.

So it's nice to shift gears sometimes. To coast into one of the city's layers, stop for a moment. Sit in the sun. Savour a rich impossibly perfect café au lait and croissant, leaf through a morning paper. Listen to children chatting as they make their way along the sidewalk.

Croissanterie Figaro is one of Montreal's Parisian oases. Fifteen minutes from the skyscrapers, yet a world away.

Ten minutes here lasts all day.

PS: I returned a few days later to indulge again.

Raising the roof, again

It's one of those semi-rare events, when the Blogger stats break another level.  For months on end the graphic box stays the same, and then signs loom of a coming change of ceiling.  For a few weeks I wonder 'will it, or won't it'.

Well, the bubble was set to burst, with less than a day's pageviews before the ceiling would pop up, and I couldn't just let it go unnoticed.  Without a pic, it just didn't happen.

Stats-guy, with his latest stick-figure exploit, helps to provide context.

He started his trek way back in January 2012.

He reappeared back at the end of March 2012 and we didn't see him again until...

... we caught up with him two years later, again in March, earlier this year.

And now here he is again, helping to raise the roof once more.

I need to take some drawing lessons from fellow blogger Stephanie Yue, because this little game of mine is only barely workable now. Stats-guy keeps shrinking.  Next time he shows up, he'll be a fly speck.

Tokens of appreciation

A while back Bob reached out to me. "iPhone 5 Vespa cases,  $10, do you want one? - Bob".

That's Bob.

If I were in a teasing mood, I'd accuse him of trying to even the score.  Although the truth is, the match is already so heavily tilted in Bob's favour, that I have only the faintest hope of catching up.

He sent along evidence of his find.

'I'll be in Vancouver on August 18' I told him. "I'll be out east on August 18" he replied.  Ha! Wouldn't you know.

A couple of days ago Canada Post delivered the case to me in one piece. The box it came in was mashed, but Bob explained that he mashed it. Apparently if you pre-mash the mail for them, Canada Post gives you a discount on the postage.  I suppose they see it as a win-win. Less tedious time-consuming work for them, so they split the savings with the sender.  Quite thoughtful. And delivering it in one piece, now that's a nice touch.

When I'm at work in a meeting, sipping coffee and checking my mail, people will know I'm a Vespa groupie for sure.

But wait, there's more.

I dropped in to Vespa Montreal on my lunch hour to browse and chew the fat with Paul Brunette the sales director.

Paul and all the staff were sporting Vespa Montreal T-shirts, and beaming smiles.  Good things and good vibes are happening there for sure.

I was wrapping up my visit when Paul asked if I had a Vespa Montreal T.   When I answered that I didn't, he promptly offered me one.

I really appreciate these tokens of appreciation.  They may be tokens, but the appreciation I know is very sincere, and it is truly nice to be appreciated. There's not enough of that going around in the world.

I think I'll tear a page from Sonja's book and indulge in a little bilingualism.

PS: Apologies to Paul, I managed to confuse his family name. Sorry Paul!

---------------------------------------------------------------

C'est bien la première fois que j'écris un mot de Français ici, vous l'aurez constaté j'en suis certain.

J'écris en Anglais car c'est la meilleure façon d'atteindre le but que je me suis fixé il y a maintenant quatre ans: de retourner la faveur pour tous les conseils venant d'un peu partout via internet, conseils dont j'ai eu le bénéfice à l'époque que je me proposais, bien témérèrement, de voyager quotidiennement au bouleau en Vespa.

Vespa Montréal, et particulièrement Paul Brunette, ont figure de proue dans la réalisation de ce rêve. Sans les conseils de Paul et sa patience en souffrant très gentillement toutes les questions de néophite que je lui posais jadis dans la boutique Vespa de la rue St-Laurent (depuis disparue), je doute fort que j'aurais pu aboutir où je suis rendu aujourd'hui. Tant d'aventures, tant de nouveaux amis, tant de voyages, tant de bonheur, tous insoupçonnés au point de départ.

J'espère que mes lecteurs français n'ont pas trop de peine à suivre mes exploits, et à profiter de mes conseils.

Un grand merci à vous, et continuons de profiter de ce très bel été et de belles randonnées sur nos jolies bêtes italiennes.

PS: Mes sincères excuses à Paul, j'ai commis l'erreur inexcusable de lui avoir donné un nom de famille autre que le sien.  Il devait s'intérroger sur l'identité de sa sosie.

Making an impression

All life is ephemeral.

Here today, gone tomorrow.

Billions of men and women, many more billions of house pets, have come and gone.

Most of us leave traces in our wake. We live on for three or four generations in the memories of our loved ones and descendants.

One hundred years after our passing is my best estimate of the time it takes for the memory of us to dim to the faintest trace; to be barely discernible; perhaps only perceptible to the committed genealogists, and only if we are blessed to have one of those lunatic arborists in our extended family.

Of course there are exceptions.

There are those among us who have dared to be truly vile specimens in their lifetime. Their memory lives on for a while longer, in infamy, like the Boston strangler, or Jack the Ripper. Some particularly despicable miscreants, Caligula to call out an odious example, can persist in our collective memory for century upon century.

Those who, by dint of their singular will and charisma, have become towering political figures and commanded legions of us in their lifetime, conquering millions more, whether for good or ill, have clawed their way into the history books where their memory seems to be safe, if not for eternity, then at least for thousands of years. The Pharaohs come easily to mind.

But say, for instance, that subjugation, tyranny, and, to put it more simply, murder on an industrial scale, is not your thing.

What can simple, ordinary, loving, caring humans do to strive for immortality?

When an interviewer asked Woody Allen how he might achieve immortality, he replied “I don't want to achieve immortality through my work; I want to achieve immortality through not dying. I don't want to live on in the hearts of my countrymen; I want to live on in my apartment.”

Well this, dear reader, is your lucky day.

The secret for good people who strive to be remembered, is art.

Artists live on. Their memory is safe for as long as their art survives.

Authors live on as long as their words are remembered: Mark Twain, Charles Dickens, Shakespeare,  Julius Caesar, Aristotle (OK, yes it's true, Julius did murder hundreds of thousands of his contemporaries, but, in his defence, it was more acceptable back in his day, and his memory lives more potently because of his writings - "... veni, vidi, vici!" - how poetic and succinct!).  These are the examples that come easily to mind without the aid of Google or Siri.

But if you really want to leave an impression, forget dancing, acting, or singing.  Nobody remembers those artists for very long.  Quick, name a hit tune from the 900s, 1100s, or even the 1460s (and I don't mean AM radio frequencies)?  See?

To achieve relative immortality, you've got to make a good impression. By that I mean, make a mark. Like a scratch, or a dent, or a chip, or a smear. Now we're talking the real deal.

Those who became serial smearers have left their mark: Picasso, Monet, Vermeer, Da Vinci, Tintoretto, and those graffiti taggers who defaced the caves of Lasceaux.

The scratchers, chippers, and denters may, just may, have done better: Hank Moore, Alex Caldwell, Louis Tiffany, Fred Remington, Augie Rodin, Bernini, Donatello (no, not the Ninja Turtle, the sculptor dude), and Alex of Antioch, to name a few.

Those who dared to cross platforms, to smear and to chip or tinker, just may be eternally immortal, like Leonardo (no, not Di Caprio or the Ninja Turtle, Da Vinci) and Michelangelo.

Don't get me started on the mudders, all those boys and girls who threw pots. They are among the oldest denters.  The more famous ones both dented and smeared.  In fact, it's the potters (no, not Harry) who really made their mark.

Makers' marks (no, not the bourbon). Don't believe me? Go no further than any episode of the Antiques Roadshow.

So what's a moto blogger to do to live on in popular memory?

We are artists. That's a decent start.

It's much too soon to tell how long our words and photos will persist. But there is definitely more than faint hope. Bits and bytes might just, in spite of their fragile nature ("my computer crashed!?!?!? I lost everything!?!?!"), be the cockroaches of all art media, virtually impossible to eradicate. Folks who suffer as victims of embarrassing content on the internet, have to resort to the highest courts to have the offending data expunged.

That said, there may be no substitute for making or leaving a mark.

I'm hedging my bets.

As a moto blogger I have made the bold move. I am a cross-platform artist. I have left a mark (many marks actually, truth be told). And now I'm recording it (them) right here, in this blog.

 

There, done.

Well at least it's a start.

Stop laughing.

The Vespa Effect

You have to ride a Vespa GTS to learn this.

A Vespa on an expressway doubtless causes some drivers I pass to check their dashboard.

What!?!? Did I just get passed by a scooter???  Did I stall? Run out of gas? Am I in neutral?

Scooters on an expressway are still very much a novelty here.  Some drivers probably wonder how I can pedal my 'moped' so damn fast.

But that's only part of the Vespa Effect.  That aspect of the Vespa Effect can only be imagined.

You don't get to appreciate the other entertaining aspect of the Vespa Effect until you share the road with a motorcycle.  Correction, a sportbike.

Harleys and other cruisers are pretty cool.  Dual-sportsters with the whole Paris-Dakar look, are also very cool.  They find the time to wave.

Guys on sportbikes however behave quite differently and the Vespa Effect behaviour is obvious, characteristic, and too often predictable.

Consider this guy (If you want to skip right to the point and save yourself three minutes of my commute, go to the 3'15" mark).

In no time, this happens (again, to skip to the point, go to the 0'35" mark).

Bye-bye-birdie.

I wonder if I ruined his commute?

Mine was just fine, thanks very much.

Down the expressway a ways, I figured I had time and shifted to the slow route.  Here's what that looked like right to the office, at which point my GoPro remote died.  Otherwise I would have filmed all the way to my underground parking spot.


PS: GoPro video beats iPhone video on YouTube every time. By a country mile. For those blessed with a short memory, see the previous post.

PPS: There's a view of our shot tower in its context beginning at the 2'32" mark in the third video.

Two speeds, many modes

I'm blessed with a commute that offers many permutations and combinations.

I've got the beeline: a high speed straight line shot downtown.  There is no charm, nothing to admire about this route, other than the occasional art work on high, when the sun is playing in the clouds.  It's a crisp way to travel on two wheels: alert, extremely focused, drifting around seams and patches left by constant construction.

The opposite is the meandering coastal route.  The route hugs the lake and then branches off about midway and follows the Lachine Canal downtown.

The difference is about twenty minutes, depending on the traffic on the expressway.

Sometimes I'll split the difference.  Start out on the meandering slow route to contemplate the meaning of life and my place in the universe.  When it dawns on me that I have places to be and people to meet, I shift gears and hop on the highway.

Here's a glimpse, a very poor glimpse, of what that looks like.  All I had was my iPhone.  Google did the rest of the damage on the upload.

I'm almost embarrassed to offer the evidence.  But from a forensic point of view, it does the job.

Ride to the land of fire

It's time once more to share some correspondence with a reader.  I think you'll find this interesting.  I know I do.  I've edited it only to correct typos from our fat-fingered typing, and to add links to make the references easy to follow.

Ralph writes:

I have been viewing your blog now for couple of months.

You have a very clear and unique prose style that makes for easy and enjoyable reading. Plus you do an excellent job in describing changes, additions and upgrades.

I would like your opinion on my consideration of riding a Vespa to Tierra del Fuego, Argentina.

This is not a new or novel idea as it has been done a number of times from what I can determine. The Germans have been running around South America on their high powered motorcycles.

I have read the following publications:

• Odyssey to Ushuaia, Andres Carlstein
• Old Man on a Bike, Simon Gandolfi,
• Dreaming of Jupiter, Jupiter's Travels, Ted Simon
• Anxiety across the Americas, Bill Dwyer

What Vespa would you recommend for such a trip? I noted your recent experience on the Vespa three wheeler. Is that one for such a trip?

I have been riding a 1996 Vespa for years and now have more than a hundred thousand miles on it. I changed the original engine for a  LML unit that has an electronic ignition system as an upgrade.

Any comments or feed back on this email?

Thanks,

Ralph

___________________________________

Hi Ralph,

Thanks for the kind words.

A trip like that is truly an adventure. I don't have any experience with that sort of tour, but I have read accounts of long distance touring on Vespas.

If it were me, I'd choose the Vespa you've got, or something similar. Vintage Vespas or their more modern counterparts like the P200, have the advantage of being much simpler machines mechanically, and parts are more readily available.

I've read accounts of riders who have gone that route and those that rode motorcycles went for something light and mechanically simple like a Kawasaki KLR or a Honda XR or another relatively simple dual-sport bike.

With any of the modern Vespas you'll need to change tires and belts for a trip of that length, and you are unlikely to find the parts you'll need in many places in Mexico, or Central or South America.

The vintage Vespas are similar in terms of being a) very reliable and b) relatively simple to work on. Check out the Cannonball links on the right side of my blog page. If you go to the official Scooter Cannonball page, you'll find the blogs of some of the vintage Vespa and Stella riders.  See if you can get in touch with some of them. Riders of two-stroke scooters have basically rebuilt their vintage bikes in their motel rooms on more than one occasion.

My other advice is to join the Modernvespa.com forum, and go to the Not-so-Modern discussion group. That's where all the vintage Vespa owners hang out. You'll get excellent advice there.  You'll find links to the ModernVespa Cannonball threads for 2014, 2012 and 2010 in the sidebar.

Also check out Ken Wilson's Cross Egypt Challenge page in my links in the sidebar.

Finally, there are some South Africans who have ridden from Cape Town to Dublin. See capetowntodublinbyscooter2013.blogspot.com.

On their blog they list the reasons for selecting their scooters (4 speed manual, two stroke, LML scooters). One word of caution though, read the official 2014 Cannonball thread on ModernVespa. There is a link to the thread on my blog. Someone in the 2014 Cannonball was riding a Stella (LMLs are marketed in the US as Stellas) and I think they ran into some issues.

If you could reliably get parts for a modern 4 stroke CVT fuel injected Vespa along your route, my recommendation would be the Vespa LX150. It's been as reliable as the day is long. That said, you'll have a hard time finding parts, and changing the rear tire will be a colossal pain: a) because you have to take the exhaust off first (not easy) and b) because it's a tubeless tire and breaking the bead will be a chore all by itself. The LML, or Stella, or Vespa P200 have split rims, and the rear and front tire are interchangeable, plus you can carry a spare.

The Vespa P200 will do a maximum of 120 kph (75 mph) which should be plenty on the roads you'll be traveling.

Finally, I strongly suggest that for that kind of trip you get a Spot Messenger satellite transponder beacon. That will allow your loved ones and support team to track your travels, plus you get included search and rescue if you buy the search and rescue insurance. All told it's not that expensive and the peace of mind to know you can call for help literally anywhere on the planet even where there is no cell coverage is priceless.

Last but not least, with your permission I'd really like to post this e-mail exchange on my blog, but I won't do it without your permission. I don't need to mention names, I usually just say "a reader asks".

Whichever way you decide to go, please keep in touch. Also, If I were you, I'd start blogging about it now.

Oh... one more thing. If you decide to use a Vespa, a) raise money for charity, and b) get in touch with Piaggio, they might find a place in the Vespa museum for your scoot when you're done.

Regards,

d.

___________________________________

Greetings Dave,

Thank you for your comments and suggestions on my possible trip to the end of the Earth on a Vespa. 

As usual, you covered the subject in a very thorough and complete manner addressing some of serious considerations for a trip of this length and nature.

I think your comments should be made available to other people that follow your Blog so I have no problem with you releasing this and my original message to you.

As I indicated, I am at this point still in the stage of investigating all the problems and situations that I may encounter if I go forward with this idea. Should I make the go head decision after further discovery work I will get back to you on this. 

In the meantime continue with your excellent blog as I am sure there are a lot of other scooter riders who benefit from it and your descriptive writing style.

Best regards,

Ralph

PS: My longest trip to date have been Cleveland, Ohio to Buffalo, New York. Not much distance in comparison to the ultimate trip I am looking at.

___________________________________

Bradley Timm added:

Good day David.

Once again, a very insightful read. I was glad to see you made mention of the CapeTown-to-Dublin ride by my scooter friends here in South Africa.

We rode regularly under the "Scooter Addicts" banner both before and after their long ride.

I was devastated to hear when I was in Paris last month that Chris (the guy in the red T-Shirt on the first picture) has gone blind as a result of a virus he picked up in middle Africa somewhere. I am still in regular contact with him, but his riding days are over.

Maybe an additional consideration is ensuring updated anti-viral shots/injections (and other prophelactics) relevant to countries being toured.

Keep up the interesting blog.

Regards

Bradley

___________________________________

Hi Bradley,

How tragic.

We often think the modern world is a playground. It's sobering to hear that someone has paid so dear a price for venturing on a road trip.

Regards,

d.

___________________________________