Day 16. Route

We went to see Jeff in hospital in the morning. I am heartless and unsympathetic and was keen to get back on the road straight away. I was overruled though by more caring characters and we agreed to stay another day to make sure Jeff was OK. This left us at something of a loose end, so some of us decided to go for a ride round the local area.
We stopped at a restaurant for lunch and pointed at random items on the menu. I was trying to avoid eating too much by this stage, too much wholesome restaurant food 3 times a day was beginning to adversely affect the bike's performance, and so was happy enough with some sliced sausages and a bit of bread.
Over lunch we had agreed to swap bikes and so Mike got on the Tiger (and needed some help to get it off the side stand, it is a tall bike, taller even than standard), Jeremy on the TRX, I got on Jim's Sprint and Jim rode my FJ. The Sprint was very impressive indeed, very good handling and lots of power, more pull than the FJ, which is saying something. Jim was less impressed with the FJ, perhaps bikes have moved on in the last 15 years? Suddenly it started _really_ pelting down with rain and we sough shelter under a garage forecourt. Jim wanted the Sprint back, and Jeremy was amazed that Mike had managed to come so far on such a bone shaker as the TRX so wanted his Tiger back. Mike likes FJs, though had found Simon Morleys to be very walllowy, so I offered him a go on mine (which isn't) and so ended up on the TRX. It took me a while to feel comfortable on it (at least partly due to the way it was pelting down with rain) much more so than the Sprint ST and so much so that Mike got bored of following me and overtook. It is an odd experience being overtaken by your own bike.
We looped back into Leizen, filled up with petrol, reclaimed our bikes and set off for Kalwang, down the motorway. It was still raining very heavily at this point, and whilst Jim and Mike went haring off into the distance I settled down to about 70, nasty things happen in the rain on motorways, and unlike mountain or country roads they don't get any more fun at speed, especially in torrential rain. It certainly was torrential eventually too. I got to feel really quite wet, though inspection back at Kalwang showed that my waterproofs had done the job, but the cold nylon was feeling wet (I didn't have the liner fitted).

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