Nother day, nother dime

The next couple of days were spent following the trail best we could. Inevitably we got lost quite a number of times. I was also finding it quite difficult physically as each time Carly fell off the bike, i had to run to her to pick it up then kick it over the traditional 30 times to get it started again. Time after time, i ran back and forth, up hill down dale always coming to the rescue.

Going up one trail i was quite a bit faster than Carly. I recognised a spot on the trail where it was inevitable that carly would fall off. I stopped and waited, up she came, off she went, right on cue in front of the camera (see pics), what about that then. The bike had tipped past 90 of the degrees, oil was spewing out of the crankcase breather, engine stopped, oil refilled, 30 kicks and we were off. This fall had damaged the clutch lever, it was now pointing outwards and downwards, which made clutch control rather difficult. Later that evening i fashioned a spare lever i had in my bag to fit, which meant hacksawing it for 2 hours so it would work ok.

Another trail we followed a fella came out of his house and if i could have translated it, he would have probably said 'Can't go down theer kid'. We didn't argue, just turned round and put the stove on.

We started on another couple of trails. One was manageable quite easily without a rear brake while the other one was a long down hill descent. Taking the long descent my front wheel locked. I locked it for an instant and resigned myself to the inevitable tumble. However, a quick reshuffle of body weight and nifty footwork saw me rescue it back upright. Further down the same descent, another lock up. This time, with a bit of divine intervention, coupled with some help from my right thumb, my right knee and my right testicle saw me save the inevitable once again, what about that then! We stopped for a while in order to let the nicely blued smoking front disc cool down just a tad.

I soon worked out how to control the bike a bit better when going down hill by freewheeling it without the engine running, and in first gear, then feathering the clutch to give me a little bit of rear wheel braking. It worked, but it was hard work mentally.