Isle of Man 13 April 2026

 Me and Neil set off at 07:49 for Cobham services to meet Clive, then after a quick chat, it was off to the Motorcycle museum near Birmingham. They have loads of interesting bikes there.

They even had a Norman Villiers 250, the same as I took my bike test on back in the Seventies!

(except, mine was a tad scruffier!)

   Next, it was time to head for "The Bears Head", our hotel for the night, very nice place.

Next morning, we headed off to Liverpool to catch the ferry to the Isle of Man, the ferry  was a catamaran, so it was quite quick, I think it was about 2 hours 45 minutes, the weather was ok in Liverpool, but Douglas was fairly damp, so it was on with the waterproofs. I discovered that my phone couldn't connect to 4g, so google maps were hopeless, as the hotel didn't show up, so we headed to Ramsey, and just by chance, I got a wifi signal, so was able to find the hotel. I discovered that if I changed settings on the phone, it would connect, but I would be charged between £91-£95 per gigabyte, so instead, I just downloaded offline maps for the whole island via the hotel wifi.

   The next day, the weather forecast was for drizzle in the morning, then brightening up in the afternoon, so we went to the Isle of Man Motor Museum, I have never been to a museum like it, they had so many unusual means of transport, we could have stayed all day...

Then, it was off for a ride around the island. It's worth pointing out that most places were closed at this time of year, and the Mountain road that is part of the I.O.M circuit was closed, so we had to divert a few times, which got us onto some nice scenery

The next day, we went to have a look at The Laxey Wheel, which was very impressive

  

As I am a senile old fart, I may have got the time line wrong, but at some point, we went to Castletown. 

where I saw a heron

Next day, I went to Ronaldsway (part of the shipping forecast, and back to Castletown for a closer look at the heron and Castletown

 Then it was off to the ferry for a pleasant ride home. Thanks, chaps, for an excellent few days

Cornwall 19 March 2026

 Decided to go and visit my old off roading friends, Colin and Viv, who moved to Cornwall, so a nice ride of 294 miles down to the Lizard peninsula, then took a while to find their house, I went the wrong way, and ended up going along a track that had half the road missing, that then turned into a dirt track, with lots of mud etc. The bandit handled it ok, but would have been better on knobbly tires. After a catch up , we went to the beach to give their dog a run, lovely area..

Then, after a lovely meal in "The Three Tuns" and a very relaxing evening, it was time to push out some Zeds. Next morning, I set off again, and did about 94 miles exploring the area, then went looking for a campsite, I think it was called Southleigh Manor Holiday Park, mine was the only tent there

Then, it was time to head home. Great to see Colin and Viv again, they made me most welcome!