It all started quite innocently with a sunny Sunday phone call to my Dad,and an invite of a Ural ride to the Ponderosa cafe atop the Horseshoe Pass near Llangollen for a full fatboy cooked breakfast.
Dad loves my Urals (he lent me the money for my 2-tone posh 750 and then said he didn`t want paying back for it
) and since the first time I took him to the Ponda in the sidecar,he`s been gagging to go again.
So...off we went at 10am on a nice,dry,sunny Sunday morning.
Erm...until we reached the higher ground over the Llandegla moors,that is.....
Hmmm....I thought it had been getting a tad cool......
I was worried about wind chill on Dad`s head,but his little beanie hat was a thermal one,and he looked perfectly happy to me.....
How cool is my Dad there ?
The guy is 72 years old.
I so wish he could ride a bike,but taking him in my combos is a great way of sharing the thrill of biking...and my way of thanking him for all he`s done for me....he bought my first bike (a Suzuki TS50ER) when I was 16.
I asked if he was okay...this is the response.....
So...all okay...off we go for the Ponderosa.
Except that the Horseshoe Pass was closed.
I`ve never seen it closed...and even though we could get to places that cars would struggle with,we figured the Ponda would be shut too..and we were salivating at the thought of a cooked brekky by now.
Dad suggested cutting across country to Ruthin,where he knew of a small cafe,so I detoured there via the Nant y Garth Pass.
This pass is an awesome footpeg and boot scraping experience in the summer.
It wasn`t so on this morning....
Note that most of the road is SHEET ICE.
It looked beautiful though.
We got to the cafe in Ruthin....fed ourselves...rode home via Loggerheads and Ewloe Hill...in thick snow and ice,then got onto the Wirral and dry roads with sunshine.
Although I don`t like jetwashing motorbikes,the Ural was a crust of salt so I did a full jetwash with soapy brush/rinse then sprayed the machine with a full can of WD-40.
It was cleaner than ever and fully protected when I covered it up at home thinking 'that was that' until early Spring.
My 650 workaday Ural is due back on the road in a week or so,and I figured that I`d just keep using my GL1100 for work and running about in the meantime.
How wrong I was !!!
Monday dawned with a big freeze and a full blizzard.
There was no way that I`d stay upright on any of my solo bikes in the conditions that descended,so I broke my heart and uncovered the shiny 750 Ural for my commute to work.
I don`t think the GL1100 is going to move for a few days yet...
As it happened...and as documented in my 'Happy road user Thread',there was no road salt to attack the bike,and I had such a hoot riding to work it was worth risking the immaculate bike`s finish anyway!!!
There`s no photos from Monday due to the full and heavy blizzard but really unusually for the Wirral with its sheltered location and salty air on Tuesday things were unchanged.....
We really don`t get any cold weather...certainly not snow and ice...like the rest of the country,so to see totally icebound roads in sunny conditions is a novelty.
And no problem at all to a Siberian Ural.
Those crazy people in the distance were out risking life and limb sledging when they could have been perfectly safe while out Uralling.
Well....Thursday morning has been and gone...and we`ve STILL got a big freeze on.
That is really unusual here.
Despite the 750 being my shiny show bike I was GAGGING to go and play again,so out I went before my 2pm-10pm shift.
I took all the small lanes and tracks that criss cross the Wirral,just for the hell of it.
It may not appear much to look at,as the snow isn`t very deep.....but all road surfaces on those lanes were thick and compacted ice.
The occasional car I encountered was wheel spinning and sliding-but the Ural was finding traction and storming along...even uphill.
I`ve only got single wheel drive and am just on Mitas road tyres but the Ural had no trouble at all.
I`ve got to admit to having the best few days on a bike in a very long time.
I`ve said it before and I`ll say it again.......
URALS RULE !!!
Dad loves my Urals (he lent me the money for my 2-tone posh 750 and then said he didn`t want paying back for it
) and since the first time I took him to the Ponda in the sidecar,he`s been gagging to go again.So...off we went at 10am on a nice,dry,sunny Sunday morning.
Erm...until we reached the higher ground over the Llandegla moors,that is.....
Hmmm....I thought it had been getting a tad cool......
I was worried about wind chill on Dad`s head,but his little beanie hat was a thermal one,and he looked perfectly happy to me.....
How cool is my Dad there ?
The guy is 72 years old.
I so wish he could ride a bike,but taking him in my combos is a great way of sharing the thrill of biking...and my way of thanking him for all he`s done for me....he bought my first bike (a Suzuki TS50ER) when I was 16.
I asked if he was okay...this is the response.....
So...all okay...off we go for the Ponderosa.
Except that the Horseshoe Pass was closed.
I`ve never seen it closed...and even though we could get to places that cars would struggle with,we figured the Ponda would be shut too..and we were salivating at the thought of a cooked brekky by now.
Dad suggested cutting across country to Ruthin,where he knew of a small cafe,so I detoured there via the Nant y Garth Pass.
This pass is an awesome footpeg and boot scraping experience in the summer.
It wasn`t so on this morning....
Note that most of the road is SHEET ICE.
It looked beautiful though.
We got to the cafe in Ruthin....fed ourselves...rode home via Loggerheads and Ewloe Hill...in thick snow and ice,then got onto the Wirral and dry roads with sunshine.
Although I don`t like jetwashing motorbikes,the Ural was a crust of salt so I did a full jetwash with soapy brush/rinse then sprayed the machine with a full can of WD-40.
It was cleaner than ever and fully protected when I covered it up at home thinking 'that was that' until early Spring.
My 650 workaday Ural is due back on the road in a week or so,and I figured that I`d just keep using my GL1100 for work and running about in the meantime.
How wrong I was !!!
Monday dawned with a big freeze and a full blizzard.
There was no way that I`d stay upright on any of my solo bikes in the conditions that descended,so I broke my heart and uncovered the shiny 750 Ural for my commute to work.
I don`t think the GL1100 is going to move for a few days yet...
As it happened...and as documented in my 'Happy road user Thread',there was no road salt to attack the bike,and I had such a hoot riding to work it was worth risking the immaculate bike`s finish anyway!!!
There`s no photos from Monday due to the full and heavy blizzard but really unusually for the Wirral with its sheltered location and salty air on Tuesday things were unchanged.....
We really don`t get any cold weather...certainly not snow and ice...like the rest of the country,so to see totally icebound roads in sunny conditions is a novelty.
And no problem at all to a Siberian Ural.
Those crazy people in the distance were out risking life and limb sledging when they could have been perfectly safe while out Uralling.
Well....Thursday morning has been and gone...and we`ve STILL got a big freeze on.
That is really unusual here.
Despite the 750 being my shiny show bike I was GAGGING to go and play again,so out I went before my 2pm-10pm shift.
I took all the small lanes and tracks that criss cross the Wirral,just for the hell of it.
It may not appear much to look at,as the snow isn`t very deep.....but all road surfaces on those lanes were thick and compacted ice.
The occasional car I encountered was wheel spinning and sliding-but the Ural was finding traction and storming along...even uphill.
I`ve only got single wheel drive and am just on Mitas road tyres but the Ural had no trouble at all.
I`ve got to admit to having the best few days on a bike in a very long time.
I`ve said it before and I`ll say it again.......
URALS RULE !!!
Thank you! 
Liv.
