Elation at beating all the odds
Elation at beating all the odds

Who: Patrick Hood, Dean Warderly, Jeff Vallee, Tony Higgs

What: Relief

Where: Harwich Ferry

When: 2000

Why: On our way to Holiday in Holland

 

Back in Y2K, there used to be the Seacat fast ferry from Harwich to the Hoek which meant you could leave good old Blighty in the morning and arrive in Holland late afternoon. This year we were on our way to the Speed Demon’s rally in Borculo for the infamous Holiday in Holland rally. From London it was an easy ride up the A12, or so we thought. Dean and I met Jeff in SE London only to discover Jeff had left his passport on the kitchen worktop – in Camden NE London! We’ve got plenty of time we thought to ourselves, so full of pre-scooter rally enthusiasm, we drove like despatch riders across London to fetch Jeff’s absent document. Passport firmly installed in the inside jacket pocket, we negotiated our way onto the A12 to catch up with Patch just past the M25 junction.

 

Time was tight as Booker T would say but it was ‘do-able’. A quick top up on fuel and we were off towards Colchester. Having ridden no further than a couple more miles, Dean’s clutch on his TS1 decided to give up the ghost. This is all we needed! A quick check of the watch and we were definitely under pressure now to carry out a Mclaren F1 style clutch change. We plugged the fuel cap with a carrier bag and laid the scooter on its side. Panel off and upturned onto the grass to receive the nuts and washers we stripped off his Li. Runner off, exhaust dropped, side casing off… The side of his scooter was a blur of hands, spanners & ratchets as all four of us mucked in.

 

New clutch plates in, most elements re-fitted and the side runner now bungee-strapped to the rear, we were hell for leather off again to Harwich. With just five minutes to spare, we broadsided it into the ferry port and made it. So, as you can see from the stance and smiles, we were certainly relieved at the first part of our journey coming to a happy ending. Now then, happy ending? That’s another story.

 

Full Bore!

 

Tony Higgs

 

Moment in Time

 

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