Monday evening, we got back from a long weekend of camping and motorcycle riding in Luxemburg. And a great weekend it was!
No scary adventures, this time. Just great weather, lovely scenery, and good company.
I've said it before: Luxemburg is bikers' paradise. Lovely roads and cheap petrol, what more could one want?
And we were so lucky with the weather, too.
As we left on Friday afternoon, it was OK; had a drop or three of rain on the way, but mostly it felt like we'd just missed a shower by fifteen minutes or so. Everything still wet, but no rain in sight.
We arrived after dark to find our friends around a blazing campfire, so we quickly put up our tent and then made our supper by the fire.
The next day, we all had breakfast in the sun, with tiny white clouds chasing each other in slow-motion across a bright blue sky. We were camping in a meadow on the banks of a brook or small river, the water as clear as glass. All around us the birds were singing their little heads off.
It was a great day for a ride. So stoneshop and I went off together. We had some shopping to do since the night had been colder than we'd expected, so we wanted to get some cheap fleece blankets, and a legging or some long johns for me to wear during the night. When I got up to pee early in the morning, all the bikes had ice on them.

We had a lovely ride. There's nothing quite like the ever-shifting view from a bike, in a landscape full of hills such as this one; every second, something new comes into view. You'll be rolling down into the valleys, through the cool, dark woods, and then back up a mountainside again; as the road twists and turns and winds itself around the mountains, you'll see old farmhouses next to brooks, houses painted blue or yellow, and every now and then a castle overlooking the valley. The grass is a bright, translucent green and dotted with spring flowers in yellow and white. You can actually smell all the different crops on the fields, and the pine trees. Like the view, the smells are constantly changing. And the air feels cooler as you're passing under the trees, then warmer as you're climbing up a hillside again, feeling like you're getting so close to the deep blue sky you could reach out and touch it. The bike itself sounds like it's having a good time, purring along like a happy cat.
It's impossible to experience all of this and not be put in a good mood; in fact, it all made me want to smile and wave at everyone we met. All other bikers seemed to feel the same, since they greeted one another as if to say: Hi, isn't this great? Are you having as much fun as I am?

Stoneshop taped a small digital video camera to his helmet and tried to shoot some nice footage while riding; it turned out he'd mainly managed to get a nice view of the bike's instrument panel. The camera obviously hadn't been directed at quite the correct angle. Next up, he taped it to the bike and this yielded much better results. Coming very soon, to a web page near you!

The only thing I wasn't very happy about was the fact that my bike's gear shift pedal had come loose (again). This wasn't easy to fix, as it was the axle itself, that it was attached to, that had worn so much you couldn't screw the pedal on tight enough for it to stay put.
So the next day, we tried to get it fixed in a quick and dirty way: by having it welded on. Unfortunately, this was Sunday so we couldn't find anyone willing and able to do it. Eventually, I ended up going back to the camp site to read, sit around in the sun and drink some wine (oh, what hardship!) while Stoneshop rode around a bit more and shot some more video.

On Monday, it didn't take Stoneshop very long to find a garage 5 kilometres from the camp site, where we could get the bike fixed. We left around one o'clock and spent the whole afternoon and part of the evening in two-wheeled bliss, going back home.
What a perfect little holiday.