France - Touratech 1st Travel Event - Orange, centre ville
I truly believe (and enjoy) the fact that certain people were just meant to
meet. Whether it is just bumping into a friend that you haven't seen in a long
time on some random street corner or meeting somebody new for the first time,
these chance and random encounters must be part of some larger unseen force that
brings people together.
It is partly for this reason that I travel so much as I get the chance to
meet all kinds of interesting and diverse people. On the first day of the rallye
I took the pumkin orange Touratech Rallye graciously lent to me by Touratech (to
see if I liked it to purchase it...) for an extended spin around the area. I
took in some scenic roads for a few hours and got used (somewhat) to the
handling of the bike.
At about 4pm though I was in need of a rest and wandered back to the center
of the village, Orange. There were tons of bikes all over the streets and
sidewalks with many people handing out in the local cafes watching some weird
processional of bikes go by combined with cars from a local wedding. Making a
circle of the town center once I saw another Touratech rallye on the sidewalk in
cool blue and yellow colors and decided to park next to it.
After parking I went to the cafe asking two guys if it was okay to take a
seat at their table. We spoke French and English and I proceeded to order an ice
cream to cool down. It turned out that one of the guys that I was sitting with
was the owner of the other Rallye bike and so we started to talk about the bike
and the event. His name was Patrick Lambin and he's from Luxembourg. Off-road
riding is his hobby and he bought the bike to compete as an amateur in the major
rallies.
The other guy was an interesting fellow from Belgium named Jean Moxhet. He
spoke very good (perfect) English and in our conversations I could tell that he
knew a ton about the history of the boxer. I asked him if he had looked at the
boxer pages on Micapeak and was pleasantly
surprised when he told me that he was the one that put them up and maintained
them.
As this was the first rally meeting that Touratech put on neither one of them
knew any more than I did about the schedule or what to do/what happened next. We
proceeded to whittle the late afternoon away swapping stories, commenting on the
local scene (i.e. people watching), and drinking a few beers in the meantime to
stay cool and hydrated (yeah, right).
Afterwards we all rode back to the meeting place together and got in the
dinner line. As my German is fairly basic/non-existent I hoped (and knew) that I
would be seeing them around as well because they didn't speak much German (if
any) either. Anyways, meeting these guys right off the start confirmed my
suspicions that this would be a fun meeting which it was definitely turning out
to be.
Photo - Orange, centre ville, <click to enlarge>
The Europeans are so sensible. Ride and put the bike on the sidewalk. Why
can't the US follow suit?
My orange Rallye bike is at the end of the row far away. This was taken from
our key vantage point
in front of the ice cream (and beer) cafe where we spent a good few hours.
Photo - (L to R) Jean Moxhet & Partick Lambin,
<click to enlarge>
I think that I spoke to Jean first in English because he had
a 'City Bike' (local San Francisco/West Coast publication)
t-shirt on. Anyways, I'm glad that I met both Jean (left) and Patrick (right)
as they were tons of fun to hang out
and ride with. I call Jean the 'boxer historian' as he has an acute mind and
sense of detail for these bikes.
Sitting at this cafe with these two guys, hanging out in the warm sun,
watching the scene goes by is now a
good memory that I hope to repeat soon. Jean's got a great sense of humor and
Patrick's all about riding and having fun with his racing
which I definitely
understand as he and I take turns breaking our bikes to keep Touratech in business. :-)
Back Home (Main)
Touratech Orange Event (Main)
Forward
