The Manchester Honda

Owners Club 2013

An afternoon ride

Saturday - the day we are riding to see the fireworks at Southport. Of course, something always gets in the way - in this case, the RTTW event at the National Arboretum. “No worries” says the crowd, “we can do both”. And so it came to pass - the 3pm set off time was nearer 3:30 because they were late.

But never mind, that’s normal for the manhoc crowd. John and Judy turned up about 20 minutes early, I was about on time and the rest came in dribs and drabs until we had 8 bikes and 3 pillions Which was a nice number for the ride.

We duly set off and shot over the A56 and onto the A59. No incidents but a lot of traffic lights (which caused John much merriment as he knows how much I like them). We soon hit the Southport firework traffic and the last 10 miles took ages  - even though we were on bikes.

Once we had parked up in the pub carpark (and extracted Norma from between the panniers and handlebars) we wandered into the pub to find chairs and food. This took a while as the pub was very busy. Well, it would be considering it was right next to the park with the fireworks. But we were soon sat down and food was ordered. Johns liver turned into pork chops and there was not chocolate rumpy-bumpy (much to Robs disappointment) but overall, it was a pleasant way to spend a couple of hours while it got dark. We had a lot of chatting to do and, of course, we all had to share Garys sweet (for those who don’t know, Gary likes his food - and other peoples - so we make sure we have spare spoons available whenever he eats).

Paul eventually turned up - so at least Julie had a lift home, but he’d missed the food and most of the banter. He did make up for it later, though.

At last it was dark so we walked towards the park and the spectacular displays. No-one was willing to pay the £9 entry fee so we watched it from outside the park - as did about 2,000 other people. It was very good.

We stayed for 2 out of the three displays and then headed back to the bikes. Getting out of Southport was the normal chaos, but we were soon on the right road and on the way to home. Not sure what the others did, but Norma and I had cheese & a nice bottle of wine when we got back.

And so ends another successful manhoc ride. Thanks to everyone who came. Here’s a few photos to remember it.