Little Dukes

I thoroughly enjoyed the article on the restored 1967 Ducati Monza 160 in OBA 74, it took me back to 1968 when I was visiting my friend Bill Newton up the other end of Nottinghill Road in Regents Park (Sydney). I arrived on my newly-acquired Bridgestone 100 Sport and to my surprise Bill had another visitor who was riding a Silver Monza 160. After greetings etc. the owner of the Monza 160 offered me a ride on his bike, so I took off towards Lidcombe at the other end of the rather long road and was pleasantly surprised with my first ever ride on a 4-stroke. To the best of my recollection the Ducati did not have the responsiveness of my 9.8 hp Bridgestone, however I was pleased to have the experience. This bike was likely one of the 32 imported at that time and most likely came from Fraser’s at Strathfield. Over the decades I have often wondered if I would ever have ownership of a Ducati single, especially after regularly visiting Fraser’s small shop on Parramatta Road on my way to and from Sydney Technical College in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s. The closest I came was the Bultaco Metralla that I owned for several years in the 1990s which ended up in a museum in Cairns. Today, 50 years later I ride a 2014 Moto Guzzi V7 Special.

C’est la vie or should that be E la vita? Ray Kinch Cooma, NSW