London

Back home now from my too quick two week trip to London and Holland. Was pretty excited to do a bit of a motorcycle pilgrimage in London because when I was a young fella just getting into bikes I was massively into the whole rocker and cafe racer scene from the 60s. I'd actually tried to go to the Ace Cafe when I was in London last time but didn't make it. This time I almost didn't again because I got so fucking sick and spent two days in bed when I arrived in London! Anyway I did finally make it. Went out there with Max and thought we were lost but realised we were going the right way when we saw the cafe racer cut-outs stuck to the fences under the bridges. Funnily enough I got a real kick out of seeing the bridges and imagining the hooliganism that had taken place under them in the 60s... and how many lives were probably lost to them as well. Unfortunately there were fuck all cool bikes there... actually there was a car show on. Zephyrs. There were a couple of decent bikes inside on show, and then there was this chopped Honda hardtail out front with this excellent paint-job on the tank, but that was it. I kinda was expecting more, especially as we were there on a Saturday AND the weather was ok! Was still cool to see the place though.

We were gonna go to the London Motorcycle Museum after the Ace but given my illness I was too fucked after how long it had taken us to get this far and so we bailed at this point. We did make it to Lewis Leathers though...

Where I got measured up and ordered a jacket. These jackets are ridiculously expensive and I'm still wincing and feeling like a jerk when I think about what this cost me. I'll get the jacket in a few weeks and have just found out that I'll have to pay fucking tax and customs charges on it when it arrives here too! Fuck. Hope it fits me real good and it's as awesome as it has been in my imagination for the last 20 years?

Thought I'd see more cool bikes on the road in London, old Brit shit, but didn't see anything apart from Hiro's BSA outside Lewis Leathers here. I did see some other cool shit riding around but nothing English...

This one above was outside a church!? And the Ural with sidecar was just around the corner from Max's place, but I never saw it running.

The coolest bike I saw in London was Nicolai Sclater's machine 'The Sushi Eater'... and to put this in context you need to look at a Honda Rebel 250 to see how this thing started it's life on earth. It's pretty amazing what Nico's done with this thing...

That's Nico above. I was planning to interview him for HFoS issue #2, but he was such a good dude we ended up just talking shit for a few hours which was great. He took me to meet the Kingdom of Kicks guys (see 'em here) at their garage which was also fucking awesome and a highlight of my week in London. Unfortunately I'd run out of time to hang out with these guys more. Hopefully gonna do an interview with Nico by email now (which'll be a bit sharper now I know him better anyway). Nicolai is 'Ornamental Conifer' who I've mentioned on here before, you can see his work here. I really dig his signwriting stuff.

I went to Holland for this exhibition I had some work in and there was no motorcycle action there I'm afraid. I tried to find some stuff but I'd left it too late and anyway I was kinda thinking I'd be busy with the show and all.

Back in London for one day before heading home after Amsterdam Max and I went for a bike ride to find this place...

 

Maitland Racing. Unfortunately it was closed on Mondays, but it was well worth the bike ride just to perve through the window at some of this shit. Really choice race bikes and all sorts of great parts. Was a pretty good way to say goodbye to London...

Of course I did a bunch of other shit too, but this is a motorcycle thing you know.