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A former textile-factory was turned into
a hotel exclusively for motor-bike riders and an additional restaurant.
Rooms are reasonable and sober - but who
keeps his eyes open while he is sleeping ?
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Half restaurant, half discothek, half
pub - but surely a place where you are feeling good ......
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Forget the sorrow over room for parking:
Your good bike stands protected and dry in the hall.
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That was the surrounding we entered on
Friday 4th in the evening. Boomer and his friends Paul, Stuart
and Rebecca and Jesal Odedra were already here. Mark Harling and
Valerie/Belgium came with Walter/Austria at 8:30 in the evening
and had a good time with excellent beer, interesting and also
funny talking.
During breakfast next day morning Berten Steenwegen and his wife
Katelijne arrived on their "it's silver damned" Connie,
ready to do the Saturday "short tour" with us.
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Mark and Valérie
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Ride
on Saturday following an idea of Boomer lead us through Flandern
in the surrounding of Brügge. The flat landscape interlaced
by channels and dikes unfortunately is no good region for motorbikes:
there is a loss on curves and the land is populated too thickly.
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In restaurant "Moerlant" we
had a break, drinking hot chocolate or coffee, while Boomer got
excited by a "White Lady"
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Afternoon was the time of the GTR: Boomer
removes fuel tank and fairing and demonstrates how to adjust the
valves. Everybody was allowed to have a try for himself, if he'd
wanted to..
Meanwhile Clemens and Brenda Lettinck
had arrived
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Interested audience: Walter Kirchweger,
Brenda und Clemens Lettinck from the Netherlands, Paul from Great
Britain.
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And that's how camshafts and valves are
presenting theirselves - ready for adjustment.
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Next day after breakfast we got ready
for a tour that should have lead us into the North of France -
but when Boomer got his bike out of the garage the motor leaked.
He tasted and said "Sweet, that's coolant fluid". "Tastes
like Austrian wine", Jesal shouted out, making allusion to
the Austrian wine-scandal years age, when wine was "treated"
with ethylen glycoll (an anti-freeze fluid which really tastes
sweet). So Boomer brought his "Otto" back to the garage
and once again started disassembling the damned thing. He removed
fairing, battery of carbs and the thermostat, as the location
of leaking was found at a spot where a hose enters the thermostat.
Latter was dismantled, cleaned and then under use of "blue
glue" put together again. After 2 and half an hour the bike
was ready again, Boomer was ready for another drink and another
cigarette, and we were ready to have fun for the rest of the day.
It was afternoon, too late for a longer ride and the weather turned
to be nasty.
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A lot of different beers are offered to
the guests by Ivan, the owner of the GRD Motorcycle Loft Hotel.
Over that good music from the sixties and seventies, good food
and smaller titbits too.
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Jesal Odedra, George "Boomer"
Garratt and Stuart
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No wonder that we were enjoying the evening
in a comfortable clubby atmosphere ?
Rebecca and Phil from England, Mark Harling
from Belgium
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Center of the guest's room is the comfortable
with drinks well equipped bar. On the roof over the bar a selection
of the beers available, amongst them some with raspberry or cherry
flavour. Not as bad as one should think .......
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Boomer - it seems he already is dreaming
of the 2003 GTR Rally in Austria with it's tours through the alps
........
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