Seoul to Vancouver
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I left my hotel at 6:30am July 3rd (That time and date is important for later!) to catch a flight to Osaka Japan. When I checked my tickets to get to Vancouver it showed as a 3-stop even though I could swear I booked a two stop but not only that I had to change airports in Tokyo.
The first flight was to Osaka. From there I flew to Haneda airport in Tokyo. Continuing on from there I had to take a two hour train ride from Haneda to the other side of the city to Narita airport.
Scrambling from there to catch the flight to Vancouver we took off at 6:30pm Tokyo time.
The flight to Vancouver was roughly 8 hours and got me into Vancouver at 10:30am, july third, or put another way, 8 hours before I left.
The whole way I had either middle seats or was crammed in like a sardine but I didn’t mind. A couple of years ago if someone had shown me this flight schedule I’d have passed out, but when you’ve gone through the border between El Salvador and Honduras, nothing seems difficult anymore.
With the big swing in time change it set me up for the worst dose of Jet lag in history. Up to this point I’d crossed 11 time zones but always riding the bike, so an hour here and there does no damage but this lark was a bit too much for the constitution to bear.
My gut was also feeling the effects….in the one length of pipe between the O-rings I’d Russian grub, Korean Ferry grub, Mainland Korean grub, three different planes food, airport food in two Japanese airports, and now throw some Vancouver grub into the mix….just way too much different types of bacteria… let’s just say I nearly took off for Tokyo from my porcelain throne when I got to the hotel.
Clearing the bike out of customs was what you’d expect when dealing with the public services. I went in on the Monday morning and the chap in Air Canada said that customs have a hold on it. I asked was there any more information than that. He said no, so off I toddled to customs. The customs guy just said come back tomorrow or the next day. I asked was there a problem to which he replied no, and that I should ring air Canada tomorrow to see if had cleared
So that was it….back to the hotel and wait.
The bike cleared the next day and the Air Canada warehouse guys gave me a hand removing the crate, great bunch of lads.
I pumped up the front tire for the gajillionth time and headed off. Today I dropped it off with pacific Yamaha BMW, what I’ll be getting done with it is as follows
New Front Shock
New Tires (Metzler tourance, the only tire with Jedi powers, with a tube in the front wheel), can you believe a new front wheel costs 1500 bucks!, thats for just the metal rim!!..don't feel to bad about Germany getting their asses kicked by spain now!
Change out the fluids, new brake pads, new spark plugs, new air filter
Replace several of the grommits etc on the Sump guard
Clean out the final drive
In the mean time my buddy Shelley Williamson (note the two e’s Shelley) took me round Vancouver to replenish the kit I’d thrown away in Seoul. We spent most of the day lost but eventually we just bought a GPS and were lost no longer, but it was good fun.
Over and out
Tres Huevos
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I left my hotel at 6:30am July 3rd (That time and date is important for later!) to catch a flight to Osaka Japan. When I checked my tickets to get to Vancouver it showed as a 3-stop even though I could swear I booked a two stop but not only that I had to change airports in Tokyo.
The first flight was to Osaka. From there I flew to Haneda airport in Tokyo. Continuing on from there I had to take a two hour train ride from Haneda to the other side of the city to Narita airport.
Scrambling from there to catch the flight to Vancouver we took off at 6:30pm Tokyo time.
The flight to Vancouver was roughly 8 hours and got me into Vancouver at 10:30am, july third, or put another way, 8 hours before I left.
The whole way I had either middle seats or was crammed in like a sardine but I didn’t mind. A couple of years ago if someone had shown me this flight schedule I’d have passed out, but when you’ve gone through the border between El Salvador and Honduras, nothing seems difficult anymore.
With the big swing in time change it set me up for the worst dose of Jet lag in history. Up to this point I’d crossed 11 time zones but always riding the bike, so an hour here and there does no damage but this lark was a bit too much for the constitution to bear.
My gut was also feeling the effects….in the one length of pipe between the O-rings I’d Russian grub, Korean Ferry grub, Mainland Korean grub, three different planes food, airport food in two Japanese airports, and now throw some Vancouver grub into the mix….just way too much different types of bacteria… let’s just say I nearly took off for Tokyo from my porcelain throne when I got to the hotel.
Clearing the bike out of customs was what you’d expect when dealing with the public services. I went in on the Monday morning and the chap in Air Canada said that customs have a hold on it. I asked was there any more information than that. He said no, so off I toddled to customs. The customs guy just said come back tomorrow or the next day. I asked was there a problem to which he replied no, and that I should ring air Canada tomorrow to see if had cleared
So that was it….back to the hotel and wait.
The bike cleared the next day and the Air Canada warehouse guys gave me a hand removing the crate, great bunch of lads.
I pumped up the front tire for the gajillionth time and headed off. Today I dropped it off with pacific Yamaha BMW, what I’ll be getting done with it is as follows
New Front Shock
New Tires (Metzler tourance, the only tire with Jedi powers, with a tube in the front wheel), can you believe a new front wheel costs 1500 bucks!, thats for just the metal rim!!..don't feel to bad about Germany getting their asses kicked by spain now!
Change out the fluids, new brake pads, new spark plugs, new air filter
Replace several of the grommits etc on the Sump guard
Clean out the final drive
In the mean time my buddy Shelley Williamson (note the two e’s Shelley) took me round Vancouver to replenish the kit I’d thrown away in Seoul. We spent most of the day lost but eventually we just bought a GPS and were lost no longer, but it was good fun.
Over and out
Tres Huevos
you are on the home leg now, what are you planning next?
Its what everyone would aspire to do, but very few get to do it 
