New addition to the family

Finally did it. I bought a 1 yr old 250cc enduro bike today. 1 yr old, only 15 hrs use and 280 miles on the clock. Dealers ex-demo bike. Dealer admitted he had probably had it on for too high a price - so a 10% discount, some handguards, free delivery (saving me a 40 mile round trip+ a van rental) and a new road legal exhaust and the jobs a good 'un! Everyone happy with deal. Good work.

So we are now a two-bike household!

Motorbike taxi - the video

Back to Paris for 2 day gig. I just had to take motorbike taxi again. On the return leg i decided to use the video function on the Canon IXUS compact camera i carry with me. The video below is just down the road from our office. We enter the Arc de Triomphe. Watch out for the silver Renault! Sorry for noise but this is the normal soundtrack for bikers. The bumps are due to the cobbles!

TAXI

So this is the way to get around Paris. MotoTaxi! This is Eric. He picked me up at Gare du Nord station after i got off the eurostar and 20 mins later we were at the office in central Paris. Great if you have small luggage (i had 1 laptop and an overnight bag). You get waterproof coat, full face helmet (with mike so you talk to the rider), gloves and a waterproof cap that covers your legs. The rider has satnav so can find anywhere in France if need be and it's a flat rate of 30 euros anywhere in downtown Paris. Now I'm not the worlds best pillion as i ride a bike. I have to say i really enjoyed it. You get to "feel" the city as you whiz through. It's safe. It's also quicker than a car as i found out the next day. I booked Eric to come pick for the return journey me up via email. We went back to gare du nord in rush hour. We only took 20 mins through really heavy traffic which would have probably taken over 60 mins in a car. The fun bit? Just after leaving the office i realised we were heading towards the arc de triomphe. I can now claim to have gone around it on a bike in heavy traffic and survived!

can you tell what it is yet?

I had dinner with some of my team in Paris. We went to a restaurant away from the tourist area but on the menu was this dish. It was a weird combination that i just had to order it and see what it was like. After much amusement and mickey taking i had everyone taste it. The outcome - 100% really like it

Can you tell what it is?

Smart?

How i laughed when i saw this smart car + wheelie bin attached to the back. I noticed it because of all of the tools poking out the top. Great way to keep the city of Vienna clean.

What ever happened to road sweepers with the old push cart?

On the road again

Been on the road the past two weeks. Technically in the air and on the train. Spent couple of days in Vienna and then onto little town 90 mins from Zurich. Then last week was Paris for a couple of days.

Great news was i got about 90 mins to myself in Vienna so got out with the camera. Beauty is that it was at 8am on a Tuesday morning so the parks in the centre of Vienna were empty!

If you have never been to Vienna i can recommend it. Nice place, great architecture and the people are very pleasant