Planning for summer fun

After a long, cold and damp winter, the coming of the New Year brings thoughts of long, warm days spent riding a motorcycle along quiet roads in glorious sunshine. The British summertime may seem a long way off yet, but it’ll be here before you know it, and you may need to plan in advance to make the most of your precious spare time. That way you’ll be able to have a trip that you can talk about for years to come, and not just end up muttering under your breath about the day that you popped out for some bread and milk and got no further than the corner shop… The options are many and varied, as the events listings in the following pages show. If you’re unsure of where to go, or of when to do it, the following dates will give you plenty of ideas. Many of the events in question involve nights under canvas and, if your lasting memories of camping are of a leaky, ex-Army tent, then be assured that modern camping equipment is not only waterproof, but also lightweight, packs down small and is easily erected and packed away. And the variety of motorcycle luggage that is now available varies from cheap Army surplus panniers through to modern aluminium hard cases. The long and short of the matter is that while you may be camping, it doesn’t mean that you have to suffer for your art!

Although much of the dates that are shown here are at weekends, given the expansive number of events that now take place throughout the calendar, why not get a few more miles under your tyres and try two or three in the same trip and make a proper adventure of it?