Tales of owls, string and evading the police!

In 1960, I was in the

Royal Air Force stationed at RAF Bassingbourn in Cambridgeshire, and every weekend I would travel to my home near Sutton in Surrey on my Triumph T110 and arrive late on Sunday night. It was a 60mile journey, but I could make it in about an hour. I would be doing about 50 miles per hour across London and then north of the city on the straight deserted roads of Hertfordshire I would be travelling at about 80mph and occasionally 90mph most of the way.

One night I was doing about 80mph near Buntingford when an owl flew at my headlight. I flung my arm up to protect my head and the owl hit my arm and bounced upwards. Luckily, I didn’t come off the bike because it was a heck of a bang and I only had one hand on the handlebars.

On a sunny summer afternoon in 1960 I went out for a ride with a fellow armourer, ‘Tich’ Mewton, both of us on identical Triumph Tiger 110s. We rode over to RAF Duxford airfield about nine miles away from Bassingbourn where there was a nice little cafe nearly opposite the airfield main gates (both now gone). There were no speed limits in those days and Tich was a fast rider, so we were batting along and when we reached the cafe we were the only customers. We had only been there for about 10 minutes when a police van, several police cars and motorbikes pulled up outside and disgorged about 30 policemen, all in uniform, into the cafe. We hadn’t done anything wrong, but we felt so intimidated just by their presence and, being only 18, we felt they were looking at us too closely. Anyway, we drank our coffee and left as quietly as our throttle hands would let us.

Coming back from a ride to St Neots one evening in the dark, I was passing through the 30mph limit in the village of Eltisley in Cambridgeshire on the A427 at about 50 to 60mph

(!) when some headlights lit up a side street and I had the feeling it was a police car. I accelerated up to about 90mph to head down to the Caxton Gibbet roundabout a little further ahead. When I got there I turned right on to the old A14 (now the A1198) to go towards Bassingbourn but then slowed and turned left into a small side road to the village of Caxton. I pulled in between some parked cars, turned my engine and lights off and kept low. Sure enough, a police car zoomed by, going the way I had been going. I waited a while and then carried on but I didn’t see it again.

Sometimes on a Friday night I would vary my route going south and use the North Circular Road (A406) around London to go past the Ace Cafe but on the opposite side of the dual carriageway. There were always lots of blokes and bikes outside. Just before the Ace I used to accelerate under the Stonebridge railway arches, drop down a gear to make a lot of noise and burst out from under the railway arches, giving them all a nice big ‘V’ sign as I went by. I was usually long gone before they could chase me because they had to first go up to the Harrow Road (A404) crossroads as it was then, then turn and follow me.

I never did stop at the Ace because on Friday nights going south I was on the wrong side of the North Circular dual carriageway and on Sunday nights heading north I was so late going back (well gone midnight) that it was closed.

When I finished on a very late shift at Bassingbourn on a Friday night I would often reach my home in Surrey at about two or three o’clock in the morning. I didn’t want to wake my folks at that hour so I would stop in a covered bus shelter at Banstead crossroads, pull the bike half in with me and go to sleep on the bench seat. I was usually woken by the local police a couple of times checking who I was, but when I explained they just wished me a quiet night. I would then go home at about 7am, a more reasonable time for my folks.

In July 1961 I was posted to RAF Khormaksar in Aden for two years. I didn’t want to sell my Triumph T110 so I took it to pieces and stored it in my bedroom at my home. All the engine bits went into the cupboard and drawers, the wheels and fairing were hung in the wardrobe and the frame just stood in the bedroom. On my return two years later in 1963, I reassembled the Triumph and it started second prod on the kickstart lever.

After Aden I was stationed at RAF Strubby in Lincolnshire and, on one Friday night in November 1963, I was doing my last job of the day on the flight line before packing up and heading 180 miles down south to my home in Surrey on the Triumph. As I was putting away some Canberra starter cartridges (they are made of brass and heavy), I dropped one and it fell on my right big toe, cracking the bone. I had trouble walking and, when I got on my bike, I found I could not change gear properly. I could push down with the thick sole of my boot and change down a gear, but I couldn’t pull up on the lever to change up again with the soft leather over my toe because it hurt so much. I tied one end of a piece of string to the gear lever and the other to my right wrist so that as I raised my arm it raised the gear lever and changed up a gear for me. I managed with this makeshift improvisation all the way home, but it was very awkward as I also had to use that hand for the throttle!

On some trips down to Surrey from Lincolnshire in the winter it was very cold on the bike and my hands and legs would be freezing. By the time I reached Peterborough I used to pull into where the old bus station used to be (it’s now part of a local football ground) and stand in the toilets with the hot air from the hand dryer blowing down the front of my trousers!

But the 1960s were a fun time to be young and riding a Triumph 650cc motorbike on regular long distance commutes with no speed limits and only light traffic were exciting times. Alan Carter, Donington, Lincolnshire