Ally Pally 2013 Part 2

www.london-motorcycle-museum.org 

7^th and 8^th September 2013.

Sunday morning dawned and I was on my way to Ally Pally on the tube. It was cloudy and the sun was peeping from behind the clouds. Greenford tube station was closed, so was Hangar lane, the Central line was out of sorts until White City. I had been on my journey for almost an hour and I felt as though I had got nowhere. I got another tube to Finsbury Park and then couldn’t find the bus stop to get to Alexandra Palace. Finally I did, it was around the corner out of sight and not even a signpost to guide you. A short wait and I was on the move again. I finally arrived at the show about 10:10am. Ron was already there. He knew I might not be on time and Paul arrived a few minutes after me. That was a two hour journey compared with 40 minutes on a slow bike. No wonder public transport is not the main choice for travelling. I have been on local buses and I could have walked to my destination faster!

More visitors today and more interest in the club stand and the club. The Museum exhibit was again a centre of interest and gives me another opportunity to hand out fliers along with a few for the British Motorcycle Trust. I did another walk around and took a few more pictures of interesting bikes, a nicely restored Triumph and another version of the Monkey Bike that was homemade and for sale.

 I bought some instant glue that might just repair the horn rubber on the Valiant that had split at the ends and talked to the British Legion Bikers and the Christian Bikers. One of the guys was very keen to hand out fliers for me at the events he would be going to later in the year so I left him with a wad. More from the stunt men and more noise and burnt rubber. The day was going quickly as the pasty lunch disappeared in a few mouthfuls with a bottle of water. My voice was starting go by the end of the afternoon. Paul had persuaded a young lady who was handy out air fresheners to sit on one of the bikes. She instantly leapt on the Valiant and Paul captured it with his camera. He persuaded her to return after her trip around on a stunt bike to be photo’d on his LE.

At 4pm prizes were awarded to the best bikes in show. A beautifully restored 125 Bantam won the best British bike on show and I gained another runner up prize for the Valiant.

 The Two Stroke club had the best stand prize and the business stand that had the DKW on received a prize for the most interesting bike in the show. It was a 4.2L Kawasaki 48 pot giant! 

By the time the awards had finished all the visitors had gone and by 4:30pm wed started to dismantle the stand and Gita arrived in the car to take it all away. She left and so was a plate for the rope-cum-banner barrier. I tried phoning her but Ally Pally has no signal so Paul was left to sit on it to take it away. There was a heavy shower as we were about to leave so we all hung around until the rain stopped. We said our farewells to the Bantam club some of them I am starting to know as I have spoken to them at the Bristol Classic Bike show, Kempton Park and at Stafford. There was heavy traffic on the North Circular and the Valiant was playing up. It was not many minutes before I had filtered through the traffic and passed Gita in the car. She did catch me up as the Valiant came to a halt at Hangar lane where it refused to go any further. I messed about with plugs and after a few false starts reset the timing and managed to get home. Must be the price to pay for winning a prize I guess!