Vespa Restored

Gene handed over my 1979 P200 today. I took a short test ride, he tightened up a few odds and ends, gave me some sound advice about breaking in the new motor and sent us on our way home.  Scooters Originali have done me proud. Now I want Gene and Andrea to do me another one! He had a rather nice restored Lambretta in the chop. My wife now thinks Lambrettas are prettier than Vespas. 

I picked up the trailer from the storage locker where I had left it and went over to the Allentown scooter shop. The whole operation went amazingly well.  Gene basically did a frame up restoration, all new fasteners, carburetor, clutch, cables, suspension and crankshaft and piston related gubbins. Like new I hope with a halogen headlamp and new wiring as well! 

And now time to start the 1500 mile journey home to heat, sunlight and lots of commutes to get this brand new motor ready to burn up some roads. I am hoping for some touring too, ambitious of course but that's me. 

My Island Life

I heard on the radio (because I don't have TV reception) that some "expert" has decided 46 million Americans will be on the road this week. Well, bugger, I hope they see me coming and get out of my way; I've got a Vespa to pick up in Pennsylvania before turning around to enjoy a leisurely traditional Thanksgiving with friends at Jekyll Island in Georgia. All of which means Cheyenne the wife and I have left the November warmth of the familiar for the frost studded steppes of the wastelands of mainland America. Brr.

I told a friend that Key West is a great place to live if you have to work and he looked at me, puzzled. Most people, he said, say Key West is a great place to on vacation. True enough but when faced with the daily grind I by far prefer it frost free and easy. I like sunshine, it makes me happy.

I get to work where people come on their time off. A visit to Key West is a hard fought privilege for many people and for me a walk among the orchids is a lunch break.

You've got to get yo the very end of the road to find half a town built two hundred years ago, and maintained just so. The other hundred miles of islands are a jumble of free range unplanned neon chaos, but Old Town Key West is this:

I admire people ready to pay hundreds of thousands to spend a few winter weeks in these architect-free structures. Just because they are among the costliest houses in Florida doesn't mean they are nests of modern conveniences. What you see is often a lot more than what you get. Straight floors...right angled corners...central air? Nah, not needed in 1828 so not really useful now. Enjoy! I like my modern conveniences in a modern, weatherproof house on a canal twenty miles out of town, but I'm weird. Long live suburbia.

The best free entertainment in this high cost town is taking your dog for a walk, and she will thank you. But there's so much more. Live music, education, restaurants, theater, parties, movies, fund raisers masquerading as events and gatherings called to raise money for community needs. If being a social butterfly is your thing and you have time and money to spare and a powerful alcohol-proof liver, Key West is your oyster. But Key West is a hard taskmaster for most people. Living among beauty and culture and copious expensive alcohol often requires a punishing work week from two or more part time, benefit -free jobs. I have been feeling the heat lately working too much overtime to fill holes in the schedule desperate for a couple of trainees to get trained to take the heat off. Not much free time left over...

I still get a chance to check out some of the odd corners of this great little town. Left over paint brush strokes anyone? Typical of this lovely little town the devil is in the details, not clean, not spiffy, frequently shy of maintenance, not displaying a city cherished and loved by its residents. There's a big debate ruffling the city at the moment about Fantasy Fest. A coalition of city residents led by native born prominent citizens is pressing for an end to raunchy nudity and displays of middle aged flesh on Duval Street each October. The rules are clear but this event is a money raiser and now we get to see if money talks over the wishes of the bubbas who feel this event has gone too far. I figure that if someone could guarantee all nudity was youthful and sexy all objections would evaporate, a conclusion that bothers me more than tasteless displays of poor costuming. In the end whatever they decide works for me but I shall watch the process with interest. Money versus morality, the ultimate capitalist dilemma, made public.

I miss it when I'm away. I love traveling, but I like coming home to the Keys. I miss my friends at work, we deal with life and death every night but we laugh at each other a lot. It's natural that we we do, because life is contrasts and we see a lot of shit in people's lives every night. Key West is beautiful but it's not easy, it's not cheap, though sometimes it looks it. It's got problems on display for all to see, it never makes a best place to live list, it's population is graying and getting steadily wealthier and less creative. But I'd rather live here than Montpelier, Burlington, or any of those podunk little towns that national magazines profess to love as best places to live. I get to ride my Bonneville year round. Beat that, snowmobilers.

Yet, yet yet. For all that I've lived in interesting places Key West remains the best place to earn a living. I have a great job, dispatching at night and by day I get to enjoy more sunny days a year than I deserve, warm waters all around, fantastic views and a few solid friends. Is that all it takes to make me happy? Guess so. Can't wait to get back.

 

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Cheyenne

She's doing great, just about five years since I got her. She's 13 now and still loves to walk every day twice a day. The cooler weather has woken the inner puppy and I enjoy her company as much as ever. She seems to like my company too, even though every now and again her inner stubborn Eeyore comes face to face with my implacable deadlines of daily living. She gets grumpy when I need to end the walk before she's ready. "Come on Cheyenne!" I can be heard to implore from time to time, trying to hustle the old impostor ("Look at me, I'm so old, so slow, so tired!") back to the car. When life gets tough, the tough walk their dog. And their dog can be pretty tough too and determined to have her own way.

She has been a bit anxious about being left behind as we prepare for our road trip. The plants I can leave behind with a house sitter, but not my Labrador. She comes with, but she'll only beleive me when she is tucked up on her bed behind the driver. Her previous owners have a lot of unhappiness to answer for as I don't think they treated her as one of the family and that's what dogs crave more than anything as they are pack animals above all. Cheyenne rules her roost.

 

 

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Monochrome Veteran's Park

 

 

 

 

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Summer in Winter

My friend Nick went to the car show in Miami last week and sent me this picture illustrating the return of Alfa Romeo to the United States. He's a gear head (known as a petrol head on Top Gear) and drives a Lexus, getting only slightly annoyed when I describe it as a Toyota Corolla. He knows I want to own an Alfa before I die, even though the odds look very long at the moment and this picture was his revenge.

My wife, a good sport, agreed to let me get my Vespa nostalgia fix by supporting my purchase two years ago of a 1979 Vespa P200 but I don't think a cramped two seater, be it ever so sexy, would get past her bull shit  meter. Besides I need my Ford Fusion to haul my precious Labrador around. We got a late start on our latest excursion onto Caroline Street, her favorite walk and  the weather was heavily summery. Not good for her fur-ness. I watched a couple of tourists haul their airport luggage down the bumpy sidewalk and pause in the shade to consult a map. It actually was last hot Monday morning.

Cheyenne took an early pause in the shade as the heat and humidity was oppressive. It always happens like that, as we wait for the promised cold front to arrive, the pressure from Up North squeezes the air down south and the temperature rises, rain falls briefly and then the temperature plummets, which is what it did the next day. 

 Plummet is a relative term and you have to be here to appreciate the fact that 63  degrees is cold. It's an uphill battle when Montana is cold enough to kill you and the Northeast is going into the 20s every single night. I hope to god outdoor pets (horrid concept!) are indoors. Cheyenne is and  she likes 60 degrees. There again she pretty much sleeps wherever she wants every night, and she always chooses indoors as any sensible dog would.

When it gets that cold I get out my padded jacket and my handlebar  muffs which is about as wintery as my gear gets. Usually I ride in a mesh jacket and light summer gloves and kept my helmet visor closed on the open highway, but below 70 degrees I get cold. What can I say? Blood gets thin in the tropics.

 I enjoy the shift in seasons, the sun lower on the horizon, the occasional widely spaced cold snaps, the emphasis on less waterborne pastimes. That's enough of a seasonal adjustment for me. If I plan a long distance ride north of Lake Okeechobee I try to plan the trip between cold fronts. Central and north Florida get frost most winters and I actually remember snow flakes drifting down one winter in Tampa. It didn't settle on the ground but my girlfriend and I sat in the window and watched that phenomenon, as she was a Florida native and had no idea what that white crap was.

For Cheyenne was not enjoying the heat but she will be all too frisky all winter long every time temperatures zip down below zero- which is the local joke to describe 70 degrees Fahrenheit (20C). 

I'm telling you, it may not look tough but people who find themselves on vacation here during a cold snap understand that cold in Key West is relative - and unpleasant too. WE just have to tough it out, like folks in Montana and points north.

Cross Winds And A Vespa

I did  tell my wife, by way of reassurance that I planned to take the car in to work last night, but there again I told her that the night before when I took the Bonneville...and had a rollicking good time despite a little (a lot actually) of cold wet rain on the ride home at four in the morning. Cheyenne was waiting for me as I stripped off my waterproofs and then demanded a 90 minute walk in freezing North winds. After the fun of my ride I felt unable to refuse her so I got to bed at 6:30 quite chilled and cheerful.

I studied the entrails offered by the National Weather Service and it looked to me like rain might be in the offing but only on the way home which is not much of a problem. Getting soaked and cold on my way to a twelve hour shift in an artificially chilled office is more of an issue. The communications center is kept quite cold year round not for our benefit but to keep the radio telephony stacks at comfortable operating temperatures...which is quite important as tax payers like 911 to work all the time. So getting wet feet and hands and shirt collars and sitting in damp clothes on a 63 degree ride is not indicated. But all looked good enough to risk. Bugger the car! I'm riding!

The next thing to think about was whether to take the Bonneville or the Vespa. The Bonneville has 60 horsepower, enough to fight headwinds easily, and a big windshield to keep my torso warm and relatively dry if the rain's not too heavy or continuous. However the Vespa has floorboards to keep my feet dry if there is any residual rainwater on the road. And the small screen helps to push air over my head though I think it is really more of psychological support in nasty weather. A lot of people think ten inch wheels are a liability at speed or in cross winds but I have never found them to be so. My technique in strong winds, and the weather service reported gusts to 35 miles per hour, is to hold the handlebars lightly and let the machine take care of itself and it works really well. I never get blown across the road and I have been out in stronger winds. You need to keep an eye on passing slab sided vehicles and hedges or buildings that may shield you from the wind because sudden changes in wind pressure can cause a motorbike to lurch but  a light touch on the handlebars is all it takes, I find. 

The Vespa performed flawlessly and I had a nice ride into town easily keeping up with traffic even in the 55mph zone. I had another reason for wanting to test the Vespa in these conditions: next week I am scheduled to drive to Allentown Pennsylvania to get my 1979 P200 back from Gene at Scooters Originali. I can hardly believe the 18 month restoration is just about over. Tuesday morning I plan to show up with my trailer, in what I hope will be 55 degree weather, and tow it south as fast as I can for a Thanksgiving with friends in Georgia, at Jekyll Island. Anyway I am hoping the P200 will perform in similar fashion to my wife's more modern 150cc which I have found ideal for my flatland commute. 

The problem with the Bonneville is that it's too powerful some days for this road. It's an easy bike to ride and seventy miles per hour is entirely comfortable but that just gets me in line for a ticket. My theory is that a Vespa commute will keep the pace slower and leave me less tempted to pass everyone all the time. Why I prefer the old two stroke over a modern Vespa is a story for another day. First I need to make sure my theory about the 1979 nostalgia trip works in real life. That I rode one from New York to San Francisco, via Guadalajara, in 1981 is not a guarantee that this P200 will be the ideal daily rider I think it should be. Certainly my wife's 2004 four stroke automatic handles the job really well at a high cost in tires belts and variators. I am hoping the P200 will use almost no consumables with its gear box needing oil changes and split rim wheels making tire changes easy even at home.

I got to work in plenty of time and in fact there was evidence of rain in the parking lot at work, but I was dry and ready to sit up all night in comfort. My half hour ride is quite a  privilege this time of year when snow and ice is the order of the day most places in the northern hemisphere. I found this rather evocative picture on the Web from a long defunct Italian blog. They seemed to be enjoying snow, something I find hard to imagine frankly.

To each their own and mine is sun, tropical primary colors and heat thanks.