The ride from Bratislava to Budapest was an uneventful 125 miles that was still wet but our spirits were lifted by being able to leave the dump of a Slovakian capital behind. Our GPS took us down a road that was blocked by a barrier that was in sight of the highway (don’t you just love it when that happens?). Thankfully we could manouver our bikes round the barrier so we didn’t lose a lot of time.

We had booked the Carlton Hotel congratulating ourselves at getting such a high-end hotel at such a good price. We should have known better, I am sure it was not part of the Carlton group and was situated in a back street a block from the Danube. The service was surly but the beds were clean. The bonus was a bar outside that sold 67 varieties of beer, the strongest being 14% alcohol (where I come from we call that wine).

Bar from the street outside our hotel in Budapest

Budapest is an historic city with many wonderful sights and a lot of history, they were one of the countries that stood up against the communists in the ’60′s. We took a boat ride down the Danube from where you can see a lot of the city’s history.

Hungarian PArliament Building Budapest

After two nights (and a lot of strange beers) in Budapest we hit the road to Zagreb, the Capital of Croatia. The 215 mile ride was a pleasure after we crossed the border. The roads in Croatia are not the best but the scenery is stunning. We arrived at our hotel and were met by a crowd of approximately a thousand people (no kidding) at reception. It seems there was a conference centre across the road  that had a prayer meeting attended by some 25,000 people and a lot of them had used the hotels parking lot and had come to pay. Thankfully we were ushered to the front and got checked in without too much bother. Because of our laksadaisical ride we arrived in the late afternoon and really only had time to shower and go out to find a hostelry. We ended up in a local pizza place where we received excellent service from the owner and his wife together with some free beer whilst we related the stories of our travels. I promised to recommend this hostelry and will now do so, the place is called DG Pizzeria and is just around the corner from the Sheraton Hotel in Zagreb. We all agreed it was the most awesome pizza any of us had tasted, if you are ever in the area it is really worth trying it out.

We left Zagreb just in time as the rains we had experienced so far had caused flooding over this part of Europe and as we left Zagreb the water was threatening to overflow the bridge that forms the exit to the city.

Flooding just outside Zagreb

The ride from Zageb to Salzburg via Ljubliana in Slovenia was awesome, the rain had stopped, the sun came out and the highways were in first class condition. In the final part I will revisit Austria and Germany where bikers know their bikes.

Between Zagreb and Salzburg

Austrian Roads

I thought I would give a bit of feedback on my previous posts.

African Bureaucracy or African Corruption?

Due to the rising number of cases involving corruption amongst petty officials in our government, our President, Mr. Jacob Zuma has opened a “hotline” to help ordinary citizens overcome such issues.

There is the option to telephone or e-mail this “hotline”, and as a last resort I wrote to him about the problems I was having getting my Softail registered.

I thought this would be the last I would ever hear and resigned myself to a life of riding an unregistered bike.

Imagine my surprise, when, ten days later I got a phone call from our local traffic chief!

He asked if I wouldn’t mind popping in to see him the next day. I had visions of him booking me for riding without plates, could it be that he reads this blog?

Then I thought, maybe my letter to the President got into his hands and he was going to arrest me for treason or some such violation.

With trepidation I went to his office the next day where he had documents on his desk which he proudly told me were the registration papers for my bike! He apologised for the delay in registering the bike and explained that “he” had moved hell and high water to help me!

What about the roadworthy (vehicle safety test) I asked? Not to worry says he, you have waited long enough.

I paid the princely sum of $50 and walked out with the bikes douments and licence. To be kind to this wonderful man I promptly bought number plates that are smaller than the legal minimum size.

Apathetic Dealers

I got a call, only 2 days after getting my Softail registered, from Harley Clearwater telling me that the accessories for our FLHTK had arrived and could we bring her in for them to be fitted.

I thought that I had travelled through time and that Christmas had come early!

I arranged to take both bikes through as the Softail was in need of a service.

On arrival, we had a chat with the service manager and I explained that I had modified the intake on the Softail and could he please re-map the Power Commander to cater for the change in gas flow?

We don’t do Power Commander he said.
My heart fell.

But he said he could send it to the other dealer in Johannesburg who has the software for this.
Wonderful I said, please can you arrange it for me.
We will do the service on Monday he told me and send it to Rivonia (the other dealer) on Tuesday for mapping.

We went through the accessories to be fitted to the FLHTK and everything seemed to be in order. They agreed to clean and detail the bikes for me, which is a blessing as this is about 2 days work for me and the chief bike cleaner (my partner in life)

As I have mentioned before, we live some 200 miles from our dealer and it isn’t easy to deliver and collect the bikes, especially whilst I have a job to hold down.

They offered to send the bikes back on a trailer by Saturday, maybe earlier, but certainly by Saturday.

Friday comes and we get a call that the bikes are on their way home. The trailer arrived at about 7pm with both bikes on the back, looking nice.

Can it be that Harley Clearwater have got their act together? Do they read this blog too?

Being dark, we waited till the next morning to have a look and take them for a spin, the Softail first. I noticed when I got on that the grips were covered in a fine film of oil that was now all over my hands. Closer inspection showed that the whole front of the bike was covered in oil and no-one had bothered wiping it down, never mind detailing.

I took a look at the FLHTK and the same story there, the front was covered in a fine mist of oil. We took her for a spin and heard a rattle.
When I put down the highway pegs the left one dissapeared and my foot nearly hit the ground, which is not good when you are travelling somewhere above 80mph!

I got her back to my house and took out the toolbox, where I reset the highway peg that was loose, and fixed the rattle, which was a loose muffler (also on the left side).

Do different technicians work on different sides of the bike?

This is concerning to me. I don’t want mechinics working on my bike that don’t know how to tighten bolts.
What if it was a wheel nut?

We had chrome lower fork sliders fitted, and closer inspection showed that the axle clamp was not chrome.
Where is that I wondered? We have lovely chrome forks and an alloy axle clamp sitting at the bottom of the forks.

It also turns out that the Softail never got re-mapped!

So a big onion to you Harley Clearwater, you still haven’t got it right, and you still have $850 of my money.

I think I will spend that on accesories and take the bike to Rivonia in future and see if they know how to give customer service.

Other Stuff

Thanks to this site we have “found” a great radio station that can be found at Bikerlowdown.com.

DJ L J James runs a great show for bikers and his guest for the day “bag lady Sue” had us in stitches. Keep it up LJ you have two big fans in Africa, Oh Yeahh.

Till next time, Ride Safe