'Around the World in 40 motorcycles'

Royal Enfield and author on the way to the Forbidden Kingdom.

 When author James McBride asked me to sample his book "Around The World in 40 Motorcycles, Life on Two Wheels," I expected to read a memoir. 

In other words, a thoughtful history of the deep meaning of an individual's life, told in the whispers of truth we share only with our therapists. 

And, yes, "40 Motorcycles" is a memoir of an interesting life; but the therapy is provided by motorcycling. 

This actually is a book about what it was like for him to ride some 40 different motorcycles in exotic environments ranging from dangerous curves to dangerous women, spiced with casual consideration of how machine and rider handled each occasion. 

Just as the title promises.

Deep soul searching is present, but mostly absent. Absent, too, is self-consciously great literature.

It's really 44 chapters of entertaining tales from the road McBride could have shared first with buddies in a pub.

In fact, the one regret that I have is that I waited until AFTER I had read the book before watching one of his entertaining, short, "Author Talks" videos.

I urge you to watch one, to realize he speaks with a delightful accent, perfect for a story told over a pint.

It's like being at the arm of an experienced rider with many an exciting tale to tell. It doesn't hurt that the author has an adventurous spirit, lived an active youth, joined the Royal Navy to learn to fly, and went on collecting stories as a pilot and respected airline captain.  

McBride keeps the chapters short, and never bogs down, a technique that keeps the reader on edge, waiting for the payoff.

For instance, here is McBride as a young man, riding pillion on a rainy night at high speed, and a lorry comes around the bend, crossing into their lane.

"At 80 mph, in the tranquil beauty of a Scottish dawn, I braced myself for impact."

And so does the reader.

But first...

Well, the reader knows the book isn't going to come to a crashing end on Page 47, so we know he must survive. But how?

That's revealed, on Page 60, in a single short paragraph. Oh... that!

The writing technique works. The book is a page-turner.

A British page-turner it is, and McBride makes that clear immediately:

"British English spelling is used throughout (apologies to our American cousins)."

No apologies necessary, although this instance gave me pause:

"I spoiled the ship for a ha'porth of paint by covering the tank with a couple of aerosols of British Leyland red."

(Here's where it would have been nice imagining it said in his speaking voice.)

Cambridge dictionary definition of "ha'porth" is a half-penny's worth of difference -- hardly any. In American, he's saying he had cheaped out on getting the tank done right, and his savings hadn't been worth a nickel.

Fresh, young, and too brave in the early chapters, McBride looks back on the bravado and admits "Of course I knew it all at 25. WHAT an asshole."

He's no asshole, but truth is he never seems to have lost his ambition to have fun. Whether he's on cliff's edge on two wheels, or a naval flyer in a Harrier jump jet, or trying to figure out what women really want, McBride keeps the story moving.

And the motorcycles are always there.

The cover shot is of McBride with a Royal Enfield, and Royal Enfields are central to two hair-raising chapters. But I also enjoyed learning about all the other bikes I probably never will ride

And every story ends with the specifications of the featured motorcycle.

One last little nibble to leave you with: one bike he finds discarded, restores at his own expense, enjoys riding, and then abandons, all set for the next finder, with the key in the ignition!

That's just how "40 Motorcycles" rolls. Watch this video for a taste of McBride:

A new kind of danger stalks the streets

An accident is about to happen here.

 A viral news clip of an e-bike rider being pulled from beneath a VW Beetle by people who rushed to help inspired RideApart managing editor Janet Jitchotvisut to hammer the news station, and local police, for blaming the e-bike rider for the accident. 

She wrote: 

"Watch this video the entire way through, and you're likely to get whiplash from how quickly the newscasters and the police start trash talking the e-bike rider, simply because she's riding an e-bike. They're quick to say the VW was making 'a legal right turn,' and then talk about how this e-bike rider just comes 'speeding up on the shoulder' before crashing into the car. 

"While it's true that the e-bike rider could have been more vigilant about their surroundings, shouldn't the VW driver have been, I don't know, using their side mirror to check that there was a cyclist or a pedestrian or anyone else to their right before executing that turn? Is using your mirrors just not a cool thing for drivers to do anymore?" 

I do not lack sympathy for the injured rider of the e-bike, but I disagree with Jitchotvisut, because I think she may have missed two important things.

First, the video shows the original Beetle has no right-side mirror.

More importantly, look at the speed at which the e-bike rider approaches to pass the Beetle on the right.

My point is that a new type of accident has become likely on our streets: fast moving electric two wheelers moving up on the right.

Here is how I responded, in a RideApart comment:

"To my eyes the clip was not as negative about e-bikes as I had expected. As a driver I now DO look back hard to the right when making right turns, because we've had these kind of accidents in our community.

"This IS something new.

"Yes, it could have been a pedal bicycle at extreme speed, but that isn't the sort of accident we're seeing. The e-bikes are FAST, faster in general than a bicycle that is doing anything except racing, which is rare.

"I know that legal definitions don't necessarily agree, but an e-bike, to me, IS a motor vehicle. Riders should be trained, tested, registered and insured, if required in their state. If required they ought to have helmets. And, for the sake of common sense, they should not be in shorts, T-shirt and flip flops as many are."

Do you blame that VW driver for not fitting a right-side mirror, required or not? Well, did you know that U.S. cars still are usually not required to have right-side mirrors (although new ones usually do)?

According to Car and Driver magazine:

"Federal regulations today require a rear-view and driver's side mirror, and a passenger mirror if the inside mirror does not meet specific field-of-view requirements. State regulations vary but most agree side mirrors are only required if the center mirror is obstructed. All agree that objects in mirror are closer than they appear."

Presumably, legal regulations lag the advent of this new kind of accident.

Cars should have those mirrors, and drivers should check them and drivers should look back hard to the right when turning right, to avoid this new danger.

E-bike riders can increase their own safety by being mindful of what motorcyclists already know: we are invisible to other drivers.

'Go play in traffic' is wrong for kids

 The kid was maybe a high school freshman, but probably even younger. He was riding what is usually called an "electric bicycle" on a two-lane road heavily used by commuters cutting through our neighborhood to get to work. 

The commuters are in a hurry, always, so traffic moves fast here. The city has installed "speed platforms" to slow things down, and they work, but 30 mph is still possible and seems very fast on this narrow, winding road. 

The kid was keeping up with the cars, his electric bike emitting a distressed whine at what probably was its top speed. 

He was using the "bicycle lane" on the edge of the road as if it was another full traffic lane. I saw him glance at the car running directly alongside him, only inches away. Was he worried? 

Trouble is, the bicycle lane is very narrow, not physically separated from the cars, and is not continuous. He'd have to negotiate those challenges — and at considerable speed.

He was dressed for school, in shoes, long pants and a back pack, and he was wearing a helmet. But his relatively high speed for conditions was working against his safety.

What would his parents — the people who likely purchased the machine for him — think if they saw him on the road?

Riding himself to school no doubt saves his parents the time and bother of dropping him off. Is that worth the risk? Probably he could take the school bus for free, in absolute safety.

Riding is, no doubt, more fun than the bus, and would enable him to stay after school if he wanted to participate in some school activity.

The electric bike is cheap to run, demands no registration or insurance, and no one enforces how fast it goes.

He is too young to even have a license to drive a car. No permit requires him to take a safety course and a test before hitting the road. 

Literally, hitting the road.

As a parent myself, and a licensed motorcyclist, I found the sight of this kid terrifying.

The child can not know the potential high cost of the risk he is taking with his life. He is the wrong person to be weighing how valuable those years hopefully to come can be.

Now, it's true that getting hit on an ordinary bicycle would be dangerous as well, and plenty of kids bicycle to school. I did.

I'll argue, though, that it is a different equation when speeds rise.

His electric "bicycle" is not automatically slower than the automobile traffic, on this residential street. That makes him unpredictable. At his speed, the kid I saw is dicing with traffic, not staying out of its way.

It's an unequal contest, and there is no doubt, in case of accident, who has everything to lose.

Now we're cooking with gas; finally

Plastic casing of gas line regulator mimics original metal version.

 I wrote here recently that one thing keeping me from riding my Royal Enfield was, of all things, the barbecue grill. 

"That's no excuse," you think. 

And I'd have agreed — a week ago. 

The issue first arose when the grill failed to light to cook dinner. It was very evidently out of gas. 

My wife retired to the kitchen, to use her stove, and I made plans to go exchange the used propane tank for a new one in the morning. 

So I did.

To my horror, opening the valve of the new tank to light the grill resulted in a rush of smelly gas from the tank. This occurred no matter how tightly I screwed on the regulator and hose assembly.

Evidently, my 10-year-old regulator-hose must be faulty, I thought. Perhaps the threads of the screw-on regulator had worn out.

I ordered a new assembly directly from the brand-name grill company, so as to be certain to get the correct replacement. Delivery took a week.

The new regulator appeared likely to fit, but I was disappointed to see that the regulator was now made of plastic, instead of the heavy metal of the original.

Incredibly, the name-brand grill company has fashioned the new plastic part to mimic the original metal part in appearance! I wasn't fooled.

But the new assembly did fit on my new tank. Ready for results, I opened the valve to light the grill.

Nothing happened. No matter what I did, no gas emerged from the tank.

What the...? As an experiment, I refit the old regulator. Still no gas. The problem must be the new tank!

So I took it back to the store. The clerks at this point weren't sure I knew what I was doing, but the tank was once again exchanged.

This time the grill did light.

Now wait a minute, you think: the guy says it took a week for the part to arrive, during which he did nothing. Couldn't he have ridden the motorcycle during that week?

Don't make me tell you about the refrigerator going on the blink...