What I enjoyed on TV this year...

My repect goes to Charley Boorman and Ewan McGregor for making the TV show called "Long Way Round". On BBC there was a re-run of the 2004 show but it was the first time I saw it. Later this year National Geographic showed a re-run of the follow-up show called "Long Way Down".

In Long Way Round Ewan and Charley are riding on their BMWs 1200 GS Adventure from London to New York heading East trough Europe, Russia, Siberia, Canada and the USA. During this trip they film their adventures with helmet cameras and being film by a third guy on a motorcycle. Check out their website http://www.longwayround.com/
In Long Way Down they're using the same senario but are riding from the top of Scotland to the bottom of South Africa... I was more impressed by the first series, thisone gave me more a 'holiday in Africa' feeling.

Eatherway, respect and thanks to these guys (weather they had SAS escort or not...) for making Long Way Round.

The pirate is my addition to the logo; always be a pirate... (go your own way, be cocky and do the things you wanna do!).

The last (dark) days of 2008...

Just another vew days and 2008 is over, heading for 2009. These are what they call: The dark days around Christmas... In my opinion there is always, somewhere, some light... you only have to find/see it. Just a vew days more and we're gonna play with light again, yesterday I ordered the fireworks for Newyears-eve. Let's all make the best of the end (end it with a BANG!!) of this year and have us all a very good new one with all the best... I hope. Let's make it a beautiful year with loads of bikerides, save miles/kilometers, and cool pictures/stories/cars/bikes/cool stuff etc.

1973 Ironhead 1000cc Sportster

My first motorcycle ever, my first motorcycle I ever put a wrench on, was 1973 Ironhead 1000cc Harley-Davidson Sportster. The bike was almost original except for the paint (beautiful dark redish/brown color) and the exhaust.
The previous owner imported the bike from the US, I still have the paper work in a big folder. The years I had it, it saddly broke down a couple of times. The first time it was when my girlfriend at that time borrowed it. The rotoraxle broke when she was leaving a tunnel, with a view bangs the bike stopped running and the girls started pushing. Later that night my girlfriend and the Ironhead were brought home by a thowingtruck. Luckely I could do the repair myself with a noseplier and a replacement rotoraxle; cost approx. 3 Euro's.

The next time it broke down was when I was overtaking a truck on the highway near Utrecht, The Netherlands with about 110 km's an hour. It started to run like a tractor and I quickly stopped it. The roadassistance guy quickly saw it was not repairable on the road side and brought me home with the bike. The inlet valve had been in touch with the piston and broke... ending up in 100+ pieces and couple of them flew out the engine through the exhaust. Another top-end overhaul was needed. Not much later I traded it in for my current 1985 Softtail Custom.

I'll tell you about the transformation of that one later.

Minding my own business...

So we had our typical Dutch two (!! Yep, we have two) Christmasdays with loads of food and looaads of drinks. This morning I had to go to the smallest room in our house... Accompanied by my favorite bikermagazine, I stayed there for about 45 minutes, in the end I feld quite releaved. I closed the mag and layed it aside to finish up the paper work. Then my eyes caught the roll where a full roll should be... When I saw the topic of this picture here, the only thing that came to my mind was...

Ooh Shit !!!

And another cool one...

Thank you for another very cool picture Mr. Mann!!

Driving home for Christmas...

Respect for David Mann... Very cool picture/painting! David Mann is one of my favorites, he impressed me rightaway when I first opend the magazine Easyriders back in 1980/1981 when I was 11/12 years old... David Mann always had the centerfold picture. That's when I got infected with the motorcycle/Harley virus (or does it run in the family? I'll tell you later about that...). Never been the same since.

Up-date:
Here is the bike that caused my infection, what even might changed my personality. 1981 Harley-Davidson FXB Lowrider Sturgis... Still a cool bike, I think

Christmas 2008

This is our tree for this year earlier this morning. When we came down from our bedrooms we saw that Santa brought presents and we could not wait to un-wrap them. All nice goodies !! Candy and toys for the kids and other cool stuff for mummy and daddy. Thanx Santa, thank you very much.
The tree we decorated together with the kids, the youngest one thinks it's also very cool to un-decorate it whilst playing with his other toys...

X-mas Down Under

It still was about 20 degrees celsius, 10 o'clock at night somewhere in the wine district in Australia (also known as The Land of Oz). We had parked our rented camper/mobile home at the campsite and made our diner, put the little one to bed.
At that time is was still smoking so I went out side to see Nicky and this what I found around the corner... Moving lights including music and everything. Strange experience when you associate X-mas with cold weather and snow... me in my shorts and sandles...

Cool picture...

Here is a picture I took in Swiss on a ski holiday. This a very cool (not to say cold or nipply or freezing) picture.

Bare aluminum

Here is my pride and joy since 1999... When I did not trust my 1973 Sportster (tell you later about that one) anymore further then the corner of my street, I traded her in for this beauty. Untill 2002 she used to be a redhead with cast wheels and almost as standard as standard can be. I got the chance to customze her I tookthat with both hands. All aluminum there is on her is bare and polished, that's why I don't want to use thisone for commuting to work. It's a 1985 Softtail Custom but almost completly customized by my friend Sean and me at Bones Motorcycles (another topic, later...).

Working on it...

In and nearby the center of Amsterdam parking with your car is expensive and finding a spot can be difficult. My new job is in that circle and I desided to buy me a 'commuting' cycle. I bought myself a 2005 Honda Transalp - 650 cc. Within 40 minutes I'm from my house at the frontdoor of our office, 40 minutes faster than public transport. I park on a very wide sidewalk in front of the office, so no parking issues. The only downside to this way of transport is the Dutch weather... but hey, it's better to get wet and be fast & cool then stuck in traffic or public transport and be un-cool!!

Cool dude

Back in the time when I was in school to be a Graphic Designer, we often went to museums and art exibitions. This little guy I ran into on one of these field trips. He is so cool... looks he is reaching for the angels.

Spread page for Mark

In Februari Mark, the guitarist from my band had his birthday. He turned 10 or was it 40? His birthday is on the 29th of Februari and that day only comes ones in four years... His girlfriend wanted to make a 'Mark-book' from all the pages his family and friends made for him. Here's my contribution...

I borrowed a lot of images (guitars, amplifiers, all the Fender stuff) from several websites, made a fake website for his 'tube amplifiers company' *his family name translated is 'tube'*, created this page of how I see and know Mark. I even putted in a picture of him painting in my house.

On the left side of the page...On the left side I made up a story; that he didn't work where everyone thinks he works, that he has his own company in tube-amplifiers, that he has a scale model of graceland in his basement where he would go every night to light a candle for The King... A load of bullshit ofcourse.

On the other side of the spreadpage I made a scrapbookish style idea of a moodboard, I even made a pin-up sticker on his lefthand (!!) guitar. Pin-ups, hotrods, fifties bike, fake website, the band playing at a party, a great guitarplayer Bryan Setzer, beautiful Gretsch guitar even a beer bottle opener on the right bottom of the page. I love creating things like this for friends...
Creativity; that runs in my family but I will write about that later. Got a painting sister, 'thousant armed' uncle and so on and so on.

1934 Ford Model 40 Special Speedster

Earlier this year I shared friends of mine the news about this car in my local newspaper. I think it was March and made a scan of the picture in the paper. The last line of the story was that the car would be in an auction the following weeks. Now months later I was curios what became of the (last of only 3 build of these/onlyone found...) story and Googled for the 1934 Ford Model 40 Special Speedster. I found out that it was auctioned for... $1,760,000...



Up date: Here is the original picture I used from my local newspaper, the new one is sooo much better...

December 2007

December 2007 I took these through the glass window, I was amazed how good it turned out. So I took another one, even better. I will do my best to better these and will share them as soon as I got them.

Gettingyourhandsdirty and other Cool Stuff

I took a trip through my photo archives and ran into some cool pictures. That's what this blog is about; finding, seeing cool stuff, taking cool pictures, showing cool stuff etc. Here is a picture I got from my brother in law from Australia, notice the open (!!) door in a typical Aussie rainstorm...