Martin - It's a bike! get over it. With a bit of luck you will be reunited with it in Mombasa and can get to know each other again during the eight hours it will take us to get it through customs!!!

Bike Blues...

I kind of miss my Dakar...!

Resisting Rabies

Rabies shot No 1 went into the arm today –woof-snarl-froth….I think it is working!

Going....going ...gone

The bikes have shipped...key event...must be logged on the blog...the bikes have shipped...next stop...Mombasa....!

Meaningful Money

Part of the reason we are doing this crazy thing is so that people like this guy don't die for lack of simple medical intervention. Eve took this picture while we were visiting one of the remote villages that is being transformed by one of our Love Africa partners, which was more than I could do. He and his brother were brought to us on a motorbike. They were so sick they had to be propped up on the bike with one guy either side. Neither of them made it despite our best efforts, the treatments were too late. They left a mother who was already a widow. The Pastor we are working with has a dream to build a mobile medical centre that can reach these remote rural communities with anti-retro virals and malaria medication. The one down the road from him sells the drugs to Kenya before they can be dispensed. His clinic would not do that. How do I know that? Because I know him and love him and trust him. 89% of Uganda's population is in a rural areas. They need to build this clinic.

Daring to dream ...

Hope to see one of these guys for the first time!
Having banged on about the CARNETs we can now report they have arrived. We are good to go! We also have flights booked so maybe we can start to dream just a little more about the journey ahead...we are heading for this place and it does look beautiful ! The route takes us through Kenya and Uganda and then on to Rwanda and then the long N.Tanzania leg. Job for this week...try to create manageable "legs" for the whole journey from our map collection.

The unbearable excitement for us is that we will be in this extraordinary continent of Africa with its incredible people, smells and sights. And able to just be there!

You can see Lake Victoria so clearly here...

I am hoping to see these guys again..in the Wanale region of Mount Elgon!

Midnight manufacturing and deadline disaster

Blimey! The Bikes have gone to the shippers two weeks early! Some serious crating, cutting, sawing and preparation was in order until the small hours of the night to get things ready. BIG THANKS to Paul Sands who sorted Martin's bike (Dakar I) with new bits and bobs at less than half what BMW would have charged and to the highest standards. THANKS PAUL.

Looking workmanlike with accomanying grimmace

Proper worker, no grimmace

As you can see from the pics Paul D and Martin W worked seamlessly together to get stuff ready. Martin was outclassed in the tools and high speed re-shaping of crates department but at least he had a garage to do the work in and was not short of things to whinge at Paul about and to say that he was still worried about.



Now of course, he's worried about the bikes and whether we will ever be reunited with them in Mombasa...keeps him busy!

Final Crated item. You cant tell but that is Dakar II in there!

El bloko arrived to get the bikes with woefully inadequate tools and a stray push bike. Hope that is not what I get when I arrive in Mombasa. Good effort though mate under difficult circumstances and Paul basically saying the whole situation was ridiculous. It was! But we got them on in the end. Nice one!

Water pump woes!

Bearings arrived and have duly been changed.

Whilst I was at it I decided to change the water pump as this is a notoriously unreliable component, and from what I can make out, has never been changed on this bike.

Originally I had been planning to simply take a spare and change it if it failed when we are out there.

How glad am I that I didn't - one of the studs retaining the water pump cover had seized and simply sheared off when I tried to remove it (very common on these models).

Fortunately it was not too much of a job to get it out using plenty of WD40 and a large vice but had this happened in Africa, trying to repair it in the middle of nowhere with limited tools would definitely have been a test of both ingenuity and patience!!

Cut-down Crates and Broken Bearings.

As Martin has said, the crates have arrived, courtesy of Vines of Guildford. These are standard crates that BMW use to ship all their bikes - one size (namely large!!) fitting all.

Because shipping costs are based on volumetric weight, it is essential to make them as small as possible. So 2 hours work with a hammer, saw and tape measure has seen our 2.2 m³ crate diminish to a meagre 1.4 m³. Result!

Taking off the front wheel makes the crate even smaller and while I was there I had a look at the wheel bearings.I was already 99% certain that I would change them as a precautionary measure as, from what I can tell, they are still the originals.

It therefore wasn't a big deal when I found them to be a bit "notchy" and in need of replacement anyway. While I'm there I'll replace the back ones too.

A quick search on Ebay and I've found just what I need at almost a 10th of the price BMW wanted. It's now just a matter of waiting for them to arrive and fit them.

So we're nearly there! bikes, crates, carnets - all the hard work is over. This really could happen!!

The Big Crate Kahuna!

Crates have arrived! Thanks Paul! In the garage awaiting deployment soon!

Pannier Pandemonium

AHA! Pannier frame and Allit "panniers" now installed on Dakar I (the imaginative name for my bike a la thunderbirds idea). Dakar I is looking more ready than ever for the journey ahead.
Also a first test of working together in extreme conditions to see if we can do it for three weeks in africa in just a few months time.



























































End result very pleasing...they are BIG!

Damaged Dakar Dilemma

Martin - Relax!! It will happen. In fact I am due to collect a bike today from a dealer in Bradford. It looks just the job - '55 plate, 1 owner, 27k miles with FSH and I've got them down from £2995 to £2800. Bargain! I've even bought the train ticket. Then, looking again at the pictures of it in Autotrader, I noticed that the chain guard is missing as is the rear mudguard. No big deal you may think, and so did I until I saw that the rear plastics are missing their decals - a sure sign that it's been dropped and damaged somewhere along the way. So here's the dilemma - do I travel 300 miles on a 4 hour train journey to see what may be an old nail or do I sacrifice the £40 I've spent on the train ticket and wait for something better? I'll get back to you when I've decided.

Carnet connundrums

This is Martin - The priest! I am told that all biker trip info has to be communicated in an aliterative style, like.. "Madness in Morocco" or "Tanking to Turkey" or some such...so I have obvioulsy failed with the name of this blog. However I am trying to redeem things with the aliterative content of this Carnet entry..!


Basically, the Carnet is the most important document for the whole trip after the passports. It has to go with the bike, the bikes have to go to the ship in a month and we only have one bike between us...no bike, no carnet, no carnet no shipping...So this week is Carnet Week. And for Paul it is BIKE WEEK!
Bike Bonanza!
Carnet Kushti!
WHATeVEr!

Anticipation Alley!!

Welcome to the boysbikeblog. We have set this up in readiness for the motorbike adventure of a lifetime. Paul & Martin are creeping towards making the dream a reality.

The dream...take 2 blokes, a copper and a cleric, two BMW F650 Dakar's, some last minute planning and a lot of DESIRE. And ride 2000 miles from Mombasa to Mombasa round Lake Vitoria via Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and Northern Tanzania. All to raise money for Love Africa a programme that supports communities living with the effects of HIV/AIDS in Uganda.... find out more at http://blog.loveafrica.org.uk/














In the meantime the anticipation is killing us! But you can donate to Love Africa using the PAYPAL button above. We hope to raise A LOT of money with your help.