Land of rain and motorcycling heaven...

As I suspected, Wales was excellent over these last two days.

A very meandering, mostly B road ride up to Aberystwyth, via Dolgellau and Machynlleth and numerous minor routes. Quite a few cycling groups out on Sunday with cars queued behind them. No problem for me on the V Strom with just the topbox and my mate on his R1100RT with extra-wide panniers and top box in case he needed to buy a nice kitchen sink whilst we were there!

20mph limits made villages peaceful and allowed a good look at gardens as we trundled through. Not a problem at all on a modern, fi, bike but I'm not sure I'd like it on a Goldie.

Sunday does bring out the morons though. Easily spotted by their ridiculously loud pipes and Darwin-award-qualifying overtaking manoeuvres combined with complete disregard for speed limits. When I say complete disregard I don't mean 10 or 20mph over the limit on an overtake... I'm thinking 100mph+ in groups of four or five at a time overtaking on double whites and solid hatchings approaching junctions and causing other drivers to compensate for their idiocy by taking evasive action or ceding a right of way to allow them to live a little longer.

Today was a different world. Very few bikes, a lot of rain and much care needed on some of the minor road surfaces. On the other hand 'A' road progress swift and secure with not much traffic.

A lovely couple of days of riding: many cyclists: no problem; many cars: one loud, fast prat hundreds of others no problem: Sunday motorcyclists: a significant number were a bloody liability and I wish they were all arrested and their bikes crushed.

The V Strom is extraordinary: comfortable for the taller man, good weather protection and fast enough for swift overtaking although I did learn not to do whole rows of cars like I would on a litre+ bike. Smooth, with a flat torque curve and 70mpg on the way up. The return, on faster roads and with a bit more urgency to outrun the rain - much more wide open throttle and lower gear use and many sharp overtakes plus rapid acceleration away from stationary - returned a much reduced 68.5mpg! It's as ugly as sin and has plenty of fancy electronics but what a bike to ride: it floats over the road.