Jewellery Box

Another project that I have had around the place for a couple of years is a jewellery box.
Its made out of a left-over piece of the wood slab that I used to make my dining table... Its very nice "figured bubbinga" (an relatively common African hardwood).
I had about 60cm of wood cut off the end of the slab where it got too narrow to use as a table. I was initially planning to make it into a bedside table but for some reason or other I decided to make a little jewellery box... At that point I cut up the remaining slab into chunks for the top and sides, but then the wood just sat around in my spare room for a year or two before I had another go at it.

Anyway, I got going on it again this winter and it is now Done!

Its about 50cm wide and 20cm high and deep.
I lined the shelves with black velvet which looks quite nice.
The wood its self should become a rick red brown with time. Its just been sanded and finished so the color is not that strong yet. The table I made from the same wood has darkened nicely (the box is sitting on the table in the pictures).

The only thing the little box is lacking now is of course some jewellery... hmmm there may have been a flaw in my planning there :))

The Cafe Racer Project

Im getting ready to head off to Africa and so I've been finishing off a couple of Projects that have been "on the back burner". The big one is the Café-Racer motorbike restoration/renovation.

The bike is a 1972 BMW R75.
I had left it with my machinist friend Mark for the winter so that he could do a suspension modification and a couple of other minor fixes over the winter whenever he got the time... And he has now completed the work and last weekend I went out to his place and collected the bike

First thing to do of course is to check out the changes to the bike... Mark is always so professional in his work that I hardly need to worry about the quality or soundness of design but he often modifies the way a "fix" is built compared to how I might have described my desires.... Its always for good reasons and this time its no exception... he called me a while back to discuss some slight changes and we agree over the phone on alternate solutions, but this is the fist time I get to see what the end product of his labours looks like.

... and I have to say I think it looks very nice :)

So here are a couple of pictures of the "work in progress":

The rear suspension "brace/stirrup" while being fabricated

The gear shift linkage (had to modify it so it would not get hit by the kick-start pedal.

This is how the new rear shock installation looks now that its completed.And here is what the finished bike now looks like with the "mono-shock" rear suspension:

 

Now the rear-end of the bike looks nice and clean... like a racer should :)

So the bike now looks just how I wanted it to and there is virtually nothing else I would do to it.
But there is a bit of a hitch with that new rear suspension in that it is excessively "stiff".
Now I thought Id figured out a design and chosen a shock absorber that should mean this would not have been a problem, but it turned out during the build that I had overlooked a critical factor... Mark figured it out and told me what was going on and we have a solution but Im yet to fix it.
The problem is that the old suspension had only three inches of travel in it... The replacement shock I found was in a "direct" suspension application without the usual rear suspension linkage that complicates things, and was on a bike of approximately the same size ( a Kawasaki Ninja 650r) so I thought I would be OK... but, the Kawasaki had a rear suspension travel of about 5 inches...

Now because of that, in order to make the shock work over its full range of travel without having the BMW's rear suspension travel increased (which would likely play havoc with the rear drive-shaft gears), Mark had to adjust the "angles" of the build...
The net result of it all is that the new rear suspension is overly stiff... And the best solution seems to be to change the shock spring for one of about 2/3 of the stiffness (its that 3" to 5" ratio from the differences in the suspension travel).
So, I will need to source a new rear spring, but that can wait till I get back from Africa I think.
In the mean time Im really happy with my motorbike and don't plan to do any other modifications too it any time soon :)

Thanks Mark for another great job on the fabrication work :))

Purchasing a Bit of Fear

Well, I went and made the commitment
Today I bought a ticket to South Africa :)
I fly out of Vancouver in mid April and arrive about mid-day in Cape Town South Africa...
It would be better for buying a motorbike to land in Johanesburg but I gotta say I just didnt feel confident about showing up there with a big pile of luggage and not knowing my way around at all... I just dont get a good "vibe" about moving around in that city ... Though of course Ive never been there and Im probbably just being over cautious... But, I felt it would be better to to get the trip off to a slightly less challenging start by heading to the "less intense" city of Cape Town.... and its also the very bottom of Africa so its a good start point for my trip North :))

I was not nearly so sure about the return trip though... SA requires "proof of onward travel" before they will let me in though, and at this stage I just dont really know where Ill be flying back from... It could be that my "rough plan" works out and Ill make it to Israel and fly back from there... or maybe Ill have to move on to Turkey or even Western Europe before I can sell the bike (I hear Ireland is the place to do that without lots of beaurocratic hastles!)... Or it could be that I dont get past Ethiopia (Sudan may shut down completely with the violence in South Sudan starting to really flare up now), and in that case, I may have to just ride back South and fly back out of South Africa??
I just dont know what will happen, but I needed a flight booked from somewhere for the visa issue, so I decided to be optimistic and went ahead and booked a flight from Israel in late November.

That makes for 200 days of travel and I get back to Vancouver on Halloween :))

But I have to say, that even though Ive gone ahead and booked and paid for flights, I feel more than a little trepidation! I definitely feel considerable anxiety about this trip... Not about my "stuff"... I dont really care what happens to my equipment or my bike... And its not lions or elephants or snakes... or even bad drivers and other traffic hazzards that concern me... nor all the unpleasant parasites and diseases that lurk there in the "Dark Continent."... No, its the most dangerous thing on the planet that Im worried about
.... yep... People!!

There are lots and lots of very poor people all over Africa, and no matter how grubby and smelly or how "low key" I try to be, I will still, always be very clearly a "rich" foreigner traveling around on a motorbike.  And unfortunately there are a great many people who are willing to use force to take things that they want for them selves... Its a behavior that is "tried and true" and has been in opperation for litterally hundreds of thousands of years ... In fact its a main stay of Darwinian selection... the Law of the Jungle! (how apropos for a trip to Africa :) )... So, I cant really complain too hard about it I guess, but the fact is that it scares me a bit... all the moreso because here in the "civilized" West, most of what we hear in the media about Africa involves lots of people with lots of guns and not much discipline or apparent moral conscience... Again, its probably got a fair bit of "media sensationalism" in it but it still manages to play on my fears.

But, Ive gone ahead and done it anyway... Ive purchased my self a big slice of adventure with a heavy topping of spicy treppidation and perhaps just a sprinkle of guilt. (should I really be blowing this many thousands of dollars on a trip like this or should I be paying off mortgages and saving for my rapidly approaching old age?)

Guess I will now have to diligently set about getting enthusiastic and try to enjoy the anticipation :))

A Christmas Story?

... A bit of history...

Earlier this year I bought yet another motorbike (It was after I had sold two that I already had though!)... Well, thats not surprising I hear you say!
Indeed, not surprising at all. :)
In this case, I was buying the bike for a specific reason, which was to get a bit more experience riding off-road before I head over to Africa.
So I bought a well used little dual-sport bike which is a trail bike that has lights and signals on it so that it can be road registered as well as used off-road.It was a 2001 Suzuki DRZ400.
So, over the summer I went on a couple of organized weekend trail trips and also did several of my own little jaunts into the dirt. I still have a long way to go before I would considder myself  a "competent" trail bike rider, but it did provide me with the experience I was hoping for, and as a bonus its a much smaller and more fuel efficient bike just for tooling around town too. In fact, I had decided to keep riding it through the winter months as my commuter bike rather thatn using my nice street bike (winter here is really hard on a bike with all the rain and the salt on the roads).

The bike as it was when I bought it..

... But then, one Monday morning when I headed out the door to go to work I found that the bike was not where I left it... A quick re-check of the situation confirmed that the bike was indeed gone and I still had the keys... Stolen!
In reality, it did somewhat serve me right... I had become very blase about vehicle security and I always park the bike on the street in front of my house... I take the keys but security for dirt bikes is pretty minimal and is really just the ignition lock... The bikes are pretty easy to hot-wire, and failing that, any two reasonably fit guys can just pick the bike up and throw it in the back of a pick-up truck and be gone in two minutes flat!.
So, not that I at all condone property theft, but I had made the bike an easy target and sooner or later it was gonna happen.

So I called it in to the police and made the required statements, and that was about all I could do... The bike was old and cheap (about $2800 in value) and so I had not bothered to put insurance on it for theft etc (many people with dirt bikes are the same here, though they mostly dont leave them parked on the street!)... So I could not make an insurance claim and the bike was simply gone!... Oh well... In fact, I was really quite pleased that my response to the whole situation was pretty un-flustered and I didnt really bother being upset about it at all... Though, make no mistake, suddenly being out $3000 is definitely a "big hit" to take on the chin for me, like most people!

So, it looked like Id just have to drive my little truck for the winter... I didnt really need the bike since I had got what I wanted out of it and id be off traveling to Africa next spring, so no need for a replacement bike.


But, then about a month later I got a call from the police saying that they had recovered my bike!...
Thats great!... But I didnt get my hopes up too high cos who knows what they ahd done to it...
A bit more information came through and it seemed that the bike was probably rideable cos apparently they had caught someone trying to jump-start the bike on a street somewhere (dead battery??)

Anyway, after a few more phone calls and me having to pay a couple of hundred dollars to the impound/towing yard I was allowed to collect my bike...
And indeed it was no-longer "the same" bike that had been stolen...

They (who ever stole the bike) had removed (and by removed I mean ripped and cut-off) all of the lights and instruments, and the ignition lock as well as some of the side pannels... And the bike would not start at all..
So, I spent about 20 minutes figuring out what was wrong with it, and it turned out that the only real problem was a blown fuse for the ignition/starter solenoid. After I fixed that the bike fired up imediately and the engine ran perfectly :)
That made me smile a bit though, the guy using it had probably tried to start the bike while it was in gear and the extra load on the starter had blown the fuse... which killed the whole ignition system and hence he couldnt get it started at all.... or maybe water/salt had managed to short out some off the "snipped-off" wiring. And then the police had found him with the bike with no lights trying to jump start it on a public road.... So he got caught and I got my bike back all because of a $1 fuse :))

But, there is still lots of expense and effort required to rebuild it, and again I can not claim insurance to pay for it...

The bike as I got it back (certainly not "recognizable")... new "custom" paint job!! (done with three cans of paint, a paint brush, and a very sloppy hand!)

No instruments or lights or turn signals and all the electrical wires are just snipped off!

Both the side panels that protect the radiator were just ripped off... as well as the mounting tabs on the rad.

So, I at least had the bike back, but after my initial assesment, I figured I'd just sell it "as is" and take the loss... But after some more consideration, I figured that there is quite a lot of value in the bike being a "plated" road bike... (its got road registration papers)... Id likely only get about $1800 for it just as a dirt bike (ie I lose $1000 in value).
So, I did some internet shopping and found that it was going to cost me about $600 to get the parts to "rebuild" it...
So, that is what Im going to do... Ill order tha parts and put it back together over the next few weeks. then Ill have the bike to ride for the winter again and after Im done, I can sell it for probably pretty much what I bought it for (I hope).

The whole episode has still cost me about $800, but its a lot better than having cost me $2800 which was the situation when the bike was stolen.... So, its a little Christmas Miracle for me :)

... Its great the way perspective can completely change the way a situation feels :))

Bike Options for Africa...

Well Ive had a look on the local web classified sites for South Africa (and also a bit for Europe), and there seem to be several options for an overland touring motorbike.

I have some “priorities” for bike features that are based on my experiences of riding the VSTROM through the Americas for a couple of hundred thousand Km… My main intent (compared to the bike I used for touring in the Americas) would be to maintain the reliability but reduce the “suffering” as much as possible for what I “imagine” the riding will be like in Africa (since I have not been there yet!).
Well, the main points of suffering were:

1)      Poor loose/rough surface control/durability … Need a 21” front wheel and longer travel suspension… Not Negotiable!

2)      Too heavy… Want the lightest bike possible… This is critical for sand/mud riding but the reality is there will not be that much of this type of riding (10% or less). Likewise, this is less of an issue if the wheels and suspension do a better job, but Id really like to be less than 170Kg for the bike if possible.

3)      Seating Comfort! ... The reality is that you get a sore ass regardless of the bike, and there are after-market seat upgrades that can be made on any bike, but it is a significant factor for comfort and I will pay close attention to this detail J

And, some points that I really would not want to sacrifice are:

1)      Reliability with minimal maintenance… The VSTROM was amazing on this front and will be hard to beat.

2)      Fuel range of 300Km or more. Again the VSTROM covered this point very well (over 400Km of highway riding on a tank!).

3)      Capable of carrying 150-200 Kg of rider/gear for trans-continental distances at reasonable speed (100Kph). You can always get by with less, but I think this puts the required bike in the 500cc – 750cc engine size range.

So, having looked at the bikes that are available in Europe and South Africa, there are several that meet the basic requirements… All bikes are in the 650-750 size range, and all have 21” front wheels and off-road capable suspension. There are all sorts of makes and many different engine configurations, cooling systems, and power outputs… And as an aside, it turns out that they almost all only have five gears, are carburetored,  and are “older” designs…. Newer bikes all have 6 gears and fuel injection but the manufacturers have been focusing on “street” riders who want to look like they are "off-road tourers”, and so the newer bikes simply do not have the real performance characteristics that I require… The only exceptions to this are the KTM990/950 which are too big and expensive for what I want, and the Yamaha 660 which I have included in the list.

On paper, the “rough” details are as follows:

The reference bike for weight, power and fuel capacity  is my old touring bike, the VSTROM 650:
Suzuki   DL650         189Kg    22L     67hp      2.8     650 liquid        $5000

The contenders:
Make          Model          Weight  Tank  Power PtW    Engine            Cost (used)
Suzuki        DR650        147Kg   13L    43hp   3.4    650 air/oil, carb        $3000
KTM           640/50        158Kg   28L    54hp   2.9    640 liquid, carb        $4000
Kawasaki   KLR650      176Kg   23L    37hp   4.75  650 liquid, carb        $4000
Honda        XL650V      191Kg   19L    52Hp  3.67  650 liquid, carb        $4000
BMW         F650 Dakar 177Kg   17.3L 50hp   3.5    650 liquid, injected  $4500
Honda        XR650L       147Kg  13L    55hp   2.67  650 air, carb             $5000
Honda        XRV750       207Kg  23L    61hp   3.4    750 liquid, carb        $5000
Yamaha     XT660Z        183Kg  22L    47hp   3.9    660 liquid, injected  $6000

I have an intended budget for the bike of about $5000 but that needs to include the bike and luggage and any required modifications/add-ons.... Prety much all the bikes will require a centre-stand, bash-plate, crash bars, hand-guards, heated grips and hard luggage... I may get one or two of those items when I buy a second hand bike but I need to factor that into the costs.

Fortunately, I have a set of side cases from my earlier trips that I can take and use for minimal cost, though I still need a “top-box”.

Now, a some “eliminations”…

The first one to go is the Honda XR650L… Its way too expensive compared to the Suzuki DR650 and as far as my riding is concerned, provides no advantage over the Suzuk.. Note that it’s the lightest and has the highest power-to-weight… It would be an excellent "full-off-road” choice, but that’s not what Ill be doing!

The next to go is the Yamaha XT660Z… Its just too expensive for me (because it’s a relatively new bike and still has high resale value) though it looks competent on paper :)
And the last one I'll eliminate is the Honda Transalp (XL650V)... Its too heavy and is more "road bike" than any of the others (the 21" front wheel not withstanding), so I think Ill try to get something else if at all possible.

That leaves 5 bikes, all with quite different “personalities”.

The Suzuki DR650 is the lightest and cheapest (both admirable qualities in my opinion!)… The big downside is the fuel capacity (about a 200Km range) and the minimal “equipment” …like the terrible seat!… It would need lots of bolt-on mods (bigger tank, sub-frame strengthening, modified seat) and that adds quite a bit to both the weight and the cost (so its not as good a deal as it might seem!).

The Kawasaki KLR650 is the least powerful by far (likely to be a real issue in deep sand but how much of that will there be?), but other than that, it’s a proven very reliable overland bike with pretty good on/off-road manners (if not particularly fancy )

The KTM 650 is light and has the largest fuel capacity and is very capable for off-road… The down side is the reliability, the tall suspension (stand-over height) and the discomfort of the ride (vibrations from the “high tuned” engine)... It undoubtedly has the best suspension of them all but Id be pretty concerned about reliability.

The BMW 650F is squarely in the “mid-range”… Its been used for over-landing by lots of people and has a good reputation… Im not sure how I feel about this one... reliability is a bit of a concern, and prices for spare parts in Africa too.

The Honda XRV750 is really heavy and quite expensive… But its immensely reliable and very capable, and is a classic bike to ride Africa on. Its called the “Africa Twin” and has a very devoted following and loads of after-market support for up-grades etc.

Note: If I ended up buying an XRV750 then Id very likely ship it back to Canada after the trip and keep it/project it and so Im a bit more willing to pay a higher price and put up with the heavier bike… I would not do this with any of the other bikes though.

So, those look like the main options to me (though there are a few other somewhat less likely options too), and they are all available second-hand in South Africa. Ive also looked into the buying/selling, registering, insuring, and exporting aspects from South Africa and it doesn’t look too difficult :)

At the other end of the trip (Im still not sure about start or finish) is Europe… Ive looked into the same issues at that end and it is MUCH more complicated and difficult! The same bikes are available there (and in larger numbers it seems) but the rules about registering and insuring and buying/selling are very restrictive and hard to get  around… That’s a bit of a bummer weather I want to start there and purchase a bike or finish there and sell the bike…

What looks like the best solution at this stage is to call my European end-point Ireland!...

 It seems a bit strange but apparently the rules are less stringent there and there are some good contacts to help out with the process… It means extending the ride to go from Italy/Greece to go through southern Europe for a few thousand Km (presumably on nice paved highways)… It could be done quickly (in about a week I guess) or extended as much as desired , though Europe is very expensive and more days is more dollars!

So, at this stage, those are my thoughts on the Bike options :)

North African Alternatives

It seems that things in Egypt are steadily deteriorating, so, while I sincerely hope that things in Egypt become more stable (for the sake of the civilians there primarily and much less so for my own travel plans) Ive been considering alternatives...
And it seems that there is a reasonable one that might well be workable...
From a S-N direction, rather than heading North from Sudan into Egypt, it is possible to head East to Port Sudan, and from there catch a ferry to Jordan (on the Red Sea)... And then ride overland to Israel and thence an easy ferry to Turkey or Greece.
The only significant issue is the long running political/military "tensions" that surround Israel... The result is that getting an Israeli stamp/visa in your passport can make it difficult to travel in the neighbouring countries. However, it seems that the relevant customs authorities are willing to accomodate travelers by putting their stamps on loose papers rather than directly on the passport pages...

So, it seems that there is a viable route even if things do continue to deteriorate in Egypt... I guess Id just have to check out the pyramids at some later date then...

Further Contemplation...

The next question to resolve, seems to be "What are my desired destinations within Africa?"
What is my hit-list of things to see and do?

Well, the list can be made as long as you like of course, but if I try to stick to some major interests then it would be something like this:

Egyptian ruins... Pyramids/Luxor etc.
Gorillas/Chimpanzees - Rwanda/Uganda (Virunga Mtns?)
Flamingo flocks - Kenyan Lakes
Mombasa Beaches - Kenya
Lake Victoria - Kenya/Tanzania/Uganda
Zanzibar - Tanzania
Serengeti wildlife (great Migration)  - Tanzania
Mt Kilimanjaro - Tanzania
Ngorongoro Crater - Tanzani
Mozambique - Beaches/Diving
Victoria Falls - Zambia (May-June)
Lake Malawi
Okavango Delta (wildlife) - Botswan
Kalahari desert - Namibia
Desert Landscapes of Namibia
Lithops plants - Namibia deserts

There are numerous excellent wildlife parks in many of the counties, but I figure you would get "all safari ed out" rather quickly, so for the time being Ive limited my intentions to two major locations for focusing on "big game", those being The Serengeti area and the Okavango delta area.
And of course there are infinite aspects of human culture all along the way too which Ill inevitably be experiencing as I go... But all-in-all, that's a basic list of places Id like to go and see that will give me something to try to stich a route together around :)

...and I think that will suffice for the purpose of inspiring my travels  :)


Then the next question becomes  "When is the right time to ride these different portions of an Africa route?" Essentially what are the seasonal conditions like along the way...

Well, again, tackling it from N-S, the first section is basically the Sahara desert!... No surprise here, but you really dont want to be doing this in high summer!!!... Thats the Northern hemisphere summer. So "Not from June to August" if you can help it, and it'll be nasty hot through-out April  to October.
Then the next challenging section is the equatorial tropics and the season to "avoid" there is the monsoon. The "Long rains" are the worst of it and its very wet from April to June with flooding through till August.
And South of that, its less critical and different areas have different "high and low" tourist seasons... So I should be able to work something out... There are two periods of "high season" for the Serengeti area (Jan-Mar, Jul-Sep). Botswana "high season" is Jul-Oct, and namibia is Apr-Oct...

But, what does that all mean for a route/schedule plan?
Well, Im loosely planning on taking about six months for this trip(6-10 I guess), and Im planning to commence the trip some time between February and April of 2014...(I could start at the earliest  in mid January, or could wait things out till May if its significantly more preferable)
Im also planning to fly to my start point and purchase and kit-out a motorbike there, rather than shipping a bike from Home... That will likely take a couple of weeks to a month to sort out.


So, if I started in the North, Id need to really "get cracking" pretty early... (I could maybe have a bike sorted by week 1 of Feb.)
Say Egypt - 3 weeks, Sudan, 2-3 weeks, Ethiopia 3-4 weeks, Kenya/Uganda 4 weeks, Tanzania 4 weeks... and then the southern section of the continent can be "addapted" as seems fit at the time :)
But, that all seems rushed at the top there, especially since I couldnt buy a bike in Egypt, and buying, equiping,shipping from Greece all inside a month seems a little over ambitous!

OK, so what about S-N...
I want to hit the southern edge of the tropics (Northern Tanzania) after about August
I want to hit the southern edge of the desert (Northern Ethiopia/Sudan) after October... Which suggests finishing  in Egypt around end December 2013!... But thats a very long trip... so maybe start later in April/May???

Hmmm... Well, it looks like either direction can work. But, for N-S it would be better if I started in December I think, while for S-N it would probably be better to start in April or May.

No hard plan at present... Ill play it by ear I thnk. :)