No one else seems to be picking up the ball...so I will drop another chapter on all you poor suckers.....
A day or two later...he took me to the garage where my newly acquired motorbike was stored. Needless to say...he had sold it in a moment of craziness, and I had bought it in my own moment of recklessness...but neither one of us had the nerve to ask if the other one wanted to back out of the deal. The pipes were all a mess, the tank had a big dent in it, the bars were bent and the foot pegs were almost useless but he said it could all be fixed. Maybe at age 23, this is the normal way to look at things. Everything can be fixed.
We pushed it out of the garage and he started it up. That settled it. No Mofa sounded like that. My questions about whether I wanted it or not, had evaporated.
Have you considered what I was doing? Not me. I had bought a 750 to replace a 50cc Mofa. I had never ridden a motorbike in my life and wanted to jump on a Commando and ride off into the sunset. Unfortunately, I was about to find out that some things just don't work the way you want them to.
I spent at least a month pouring over the latest "Gus Kuhn" catalogue out of London (see....
http://www.vintagebike.co.uk/Bike%20Dir ... s-1971.htm ) and ordering parts to replace the ones my buddy had left strewn about the landscape.
Being however that I was stupid enough to leave it outside overnight, someone had decided that they needed the seat more than I did. Now I had no seat. One of the members of the unit had a Kawa and talked me into letting him take me to a shop to buy a new seat. Naturally no one bothered to give me the scoop on this guy. He drove one of those new 3 cylinder 750, 2 cycles...correct me if I say it was a Z1. An ungodly thing that had a header system on it that was so loud that the Commander ordered him not to run the motor within the compound. You could hear him downshifting on the exit ramp of the Autobahn, evenings, and that was a good 3 miles away. This guy who drove this thing was apparently not very good at driving it either, but I didn't know that. Who was I to judge. So off we went down the Autobahn. Within a mile, I knew what the fellows in the unit had not told me...this guy was out of his mind. We were two up on this thing, he had it up over 120.... went down the white line between two tractor trailer rigs doing at least 60 mph more than they were...the open face helmet I had on was full of air like a sail and chocking me to the point of pain and all of a sudden the bike made an explosive sound and lost half its horsepower within the snap of a finger. One of the truck drivers that we had just roared between and scared the daylights out of was blowing his horn...and steam was blowing out of one of the truck radiators. The truck with the big hole in the radiator. We must have still been doing a good hundred and the bike was running rather strange, but we kept going. At the bike shop, we discovered the baffle was missing from the header...that must have been why the truck had steam pouring out of it. No wonder the driver had been shaking his fist.
He did drive bit slower on the way back to the barracks...the bike ran like crap, but I swore I'd never ride with him again. One night he came back and told everyone that the bike had been stolen. No one believed him or course, and it was generally thought he had just crashed it again, but he did get the insurance money. He was shortly thereafter transferred and we didn't see him again, but strangely, a year later, a farmer turned up with the wrecked bike on a trailer. They had found it when they cut the corn, in the middle of a field. Go figure.
So.... finally, I was ready to give it a go. Naturally half the unit showed up to see me start the thing...including the fellow who still had pictures of him and Sonny Barger,
http://www.sonnybarger.com/ ,in his wallet. His first comment was that a little "s_it" like me would never be able to get the Norton started, never mind a real bike, like his Harley.
And ...just to prove his point, he tossed me the key to his bike and told me to prove him wrong. All I can say is that if fear will start a Norton.... worry about losing face, will start a Harley.
There's an old saying that says you have to beat em, to join em. Must be true...because we were suddenly thick as thieves. Wonders will never cease. He was an OK fellow, as it turned out later.
By that time the crowd had thankfully decided they had something else to do.....my new friend included, and I was left alone to start the Norton. The kickback sent me over the bars and I landed on my chin on the cobblestones. I remember lying on the ground hoping no one had seen what happened. God must have been watching.......no one did.
Naturally I didn't have a licence for a motorcycle and no one had bothered to explain to me much about the controls, brakes and gear lever...but that all came out in the wash. There was a small road around the corner and I gave it a try. Needless to say...it was a bit heavier than a Mofa....but the principle was the same. If I could ride a Mofa....then this other thing shouldn't be much of a problem. "Piece of cake", thought I. Little did I know.
I had made myself an appointment to get my motorcycle licence and even got a plate on it too. Hadn't driven it but about 3 or 4 hundred meters since I bought it...but who worries about stupid things like that.
..The testing place was across the city and somehow, I made it there. The fellow comes out the door, and points down the street and says.. "Go down there, turn at the light, turn left at the next light and turn left at the next one.... I'll be waiting". This fellow must have been related to the fellow that gave me my car drivers' licence. That one, sat me behind the wheel of an "Automatic". I'd never seen one before and asked where the gearshift was. "don't ask stupid questions" was all I got. Naturally at the first red light, I put my foot on the "clutch" (brake pedal)...and the tester went almost through the windshield........he got so upset that he signed the paper and booted me out of the car. This driving tester had the sense to not even ride with me. I went around the block and he signed the paper. I now had a motorcycle licence and nothing could stop me. A quick ride down the Autobahn...a race against a Mercedes, God...I was in heaven.
On the way back to the barracks, there was a traffic light and I had to stop for the light. I was in the front of the line, and what did I do?...I stalled the thing out when the light changed. A line of cars behind and I had to put the side stand down and kick it started right in the middle of the road. Horns blasting. People yelling and I threw it in gear and rode off. You guessed it. The side stand was still down. It didn't take too long before I myself became aware of this, when it hit the pavement and the rear wheel left the road. I didn't dump it, but it should have made me think
About a week later, I tooled up to the big mountain, north of Frankfurt and saw a bunch of bikes parked up there and stopped. The bikes were all Guzzis and such and I was invited to drive down with them to get a beer in town. I felt like I had MADE it.
It had just turned dark and I was the last one out of the parking area, following them down the mountain. They all knew where they were going, and I didn't, so I had to really keep up with them, or they would lose me. There I am...flying down the mountain and all of a sudden, the taillights ahead disappeared. They were losing me!!!! Panic twisted the throttle and I roared through the night. Suddenly, I noticed that the road somehow went in a strange direction that required me to look over my left shoulder to see where it went. Bummer.......All I remembered at the moment, was that the one person that had offered me good driving advice had told me to never use the front brake. He said, the wheel would lock up and I would go over the handlebars. Naturally this was important to know in such a critical moment......so I pushed on the rear brake for all I was worth, locked the rear tire up, aimed the bike to make sure I avoided the nice little white pole along the road because it would surely dent up my bike...... and went straight as an arrow into the ditch.
To say I remember what happened when I went into the ditch, would be a lie...I don't remember kissing the speedometer or denting the tank with the family jewels, I don't remember a thing, until some jerk started shaking me and I came to. My face felt kind of funny. Nothing so unusual about that, but there were cops all over the place and an ambulance and flashing lights, too. Some medic was trying to steer me into an ambulance, but, all I could see at the moment, was my poor bike lying there on the ground with the front wheel up in the motor, the forks twisted like Pretzels, the tank smashed and glass everywhere. The fellow again ordered me into the ambulance and I told him to jump in the lake. Adrenaline must be a wonder drug indeed, because I remember bending over the bike and picking it up onto its centre stand while the Medic stood there and just stared. After all....I couldn't just leave it lying on the ground.
That taken care of though, something told me I'd better get into the ambulance..........
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