On bikes we’d not normally ride!
Chris [Honda Motorcycle Dealers in Norwich | C J Ball] kindly provided breakfast, hosted our NorHOC club meeting, and made a bunch of his demonstrator Honda bikes available for us to take out for a 50-mile trial spin to the coast and back.
Ten of us, led by Chris and tail-ended by one of his staff (thank you, Alex!) set off from his dealership on a fine summer Sunday morning and headed Eastwards for the coast again.
One great thing about this ride is everyone rode at least one bike they might not normally have even been interested in, and the outcomes were pretty remarkable. Everyone had (at least one) favourite and found themselves thinking quite differently about their biking needs (and their biking dreams!)
For my part I started out on a DCT NC750X and immediately fell in love with the well-proven dual-clutch automatic transmission – maybe I’m just lazy! I love my ageing manual NC750X but I’m starting to think about retiring her. Not sure I’ll get much of a trade in with 235,000 miles or so on the clock though….
At Acle we stopped to swap and I jumped on an X-ADV 750 maxi-scooter. The looks – and the very idea of a scooter – conceal what is in fact a pretty fierce performer – it can blast away from the lights with the very best of them, steers and brakes remarkably well, and offers more comfort and weather protection than most bikes could ever begin to offer. Food for thought there….
At Horsey I bagged a CB650 with the new E-Clutch, so changes are manual but clutchless which is rather fun, especially shifting down through the box as you brake for a tight bend.
For the final leg back to Norwich I jumped on the naked (the bike, not me) CL500 street scrambler(?) cum bobber(?) which was a real hoot. Rather basic, very light, very agile… and at the end of our 50-mile run I could only squeeze £2.70 of E10 into the tank to fill her back up again!
Speaking personally I probably enjoyed riding the DCT NC750X the best – but other members here will quickly tell you I’m a bit strange like that!
Chris himself afterwards commented that he’d enjoyed the ride so much that he is going to do more days like this for NorHOC, possibly one a month for the rest of the season, with some different bikes for us to play with.
