As we come to this weeks tale of Yellow Peril, my circumstances had changed somewhat. I was working as a labourer in the holidays, and I had two part-time jobs at Exeter. More importantly, I had to transport all my stuff on the bike, this amounting to three suitcases, a holdall, and of course the ubiquitous throw-over panniers which contained the ever-growing toolkit. I kept all this on the back seat of the bike with what was an absolute miracle of bungee engineering, which had everything locked down harder than a porn star's ding-dong on viagra and was widely counted as an engineering marvel of the modern world, especially if the number of times I got stopped by the police was any indication!
Anyway, I had this wondrous contrivance on the back of my bike, when the timing went on the damned thing, despite special attention being paid to the points cover screws before I left. But, by then I was an old hand at this and I had done this so often that I knew exactly where to realign the points, so I stopped by the side of the road and started getting the tools out to make the fix.
Then 15+ huge bikes of the chopper variety rode up. No exaggeration! None! Not even a tiny bit!
One of the nice things about being a biker is that there’s a tradition of not only being friendly to other bikers by nods and waves, but also stopping to help out when you see someone in apparent distress. I have reason to know that it’s still current and it’s a good thing.
However, on this one occasion, I’d have been quite happy to see these guys ride by. I’m sure you’ll understand why!
However, that’s not what happened. They all stopped, and the first rider got off, I remember vividly that he was absolutely huge and had a massive chain wrapped around his torso.
The second got off and I noted that he had a knife sticking out of his boot, then the third, and so on. And yes, you’ve got it. I was surrounded by a Hell’s Angels chapter, complete with tattoos, colours on a denim waistcoat, and all the other trappings you expect.
With no sign of Enya tracks or Irish scenery in the background, or indeed Michel Flatley and his Riverdance girls, I knew I wasn’t in an Irish episode of Sons of Anarchy (and if you’ve not read my review of it in a previous post, you should, it’s a masterpiece!) and I thought I was in a lot of trouble. If these guys wanted to beat the crap out of me it was going to happen and there wasn’t much 18-year-old me could have done about it.
‘GO and sit over there’ said the guy with the chain.
‘OK’ I said I am still quite proud that my voice didn’t come out as a squeak.
Not quite a squeak.
So, I sat ‘over there’, while their girlfriends brought me over a cup of tea and chatted with me and the guys stood around Yellow Peril, talking amongst themselves. I heard such words of wisdom as ‘Engine’s Fucked’, and ‘Piece of shit’ and eventually ‘timing’s out’ after many manful attempts to get the engine going.
So, they fixed the bike up and got it going for me. Honestly, I could have got it done in a fraction of the time they took, but I am sure you’ll understand why I wasn’t going to tell them that. Besides the tea, and the company was nice!
After they’d fixed the bike, they rode with me to what I remember as being the county line, me on Yellow Peril with the first wonder of the bungee engineering world strapped to the back of my bright yellow 250, in the middle of all of them with their huge Harleys and custom choppers. Did I feel utterly ridiculous and totally embarrassed? Oh yes. Would I have given the experience up for the world? Hell NO.
So that was it – at some designated place known only to them they waved me on and rode off into the sunset never to be seen again. The rest of the journey passed without incident. When (I am certain) some of their bikes broke down shortly after I am sure it was absolutely nothing to do with the individuals who took the mickey out of Yellow Peril. Honest! (Sorry about that.)
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