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What can I say? We had an absolutely brilliant time at this years BMF. If you didn't go, you missed one of the best shows that's been presented for a long time. Got you thinking? Then read on.
I'd only just got my bike back on the road from last years little altercation and I had hurriedly slapped it all back together only a week before - (missing the South West Custom and Classic show by one week, sorry Vice). It was destined to go onto the VSOC stand in the centre of the display, so when I duly arrived I was very pleased to see that Paul Burdass and Mark Winterbottom, C9 rep and vice rep, were eagerly erecting the stall inside the new bigger marquee and laying out all the new goodies that you can buy this year. To say Paul was gobsmacked when he saw the bike seems an understatement although it could be that he and Mark were very tired from all the work put into the VSOC stand. I dumped the bike along with the keys and headed off to the extremely long queue of other Members waiting to go into the Memba rally itself.
This year the Memba rally was back in the usual place which is much better than last years attempt in the big cow shed. As per normal the bar seemed to be propped up with the VSOC rally regulars. If you've never been before this seems to be the meeting point, just look for the patches and badges and you'll be amazed at how many members go to this one event even if they don't go to anything else in the year. Trust me, it's worth the effort.
The darkness and rain rang with burbles and bangs of bikes in the night (that could be a great lyric!) as chaps and ladies endeavoured to show their prowess of right hand throttle twisting - still no evidence of any broken bikes in the morning. I do remember one camping Marshal, at about 8.30 on Saturday morning, shouting over to a friend, Tim, who was revving his Cagiva Raptor with less than legal end cans, "If you don't stop that now, I'm coming over to take the keys off you!" and quite frankly I don't blame him - you see, Tim fails to understand that some of us get hangovers, but it's his new toy and we all know what boys and their toys are like. Suddenly it's 9.00am and "Hooray", we're allowed into the BMF Show proper. It remained a bit overcast all day, but that was a bit of a godsend because there was so much to see and do and buy. If you wanted to get yourself some new kit then stands like Frank Thomas (who had no less than six stands), JTS Leathers and Hein Gericke should have been able to give you more than you could need at very discounted prices. I managed to get a Cordura jacket, trousers and gloves for a miserly eighty quid - not this years fashion I'll grant you, but who cares when you're safe from the cold and damp?
Around the rest of the show, you could go to the outdoor jumble (or scrap yard) but there were some bargains to be had. All the top manufacturers were there (not in the jumble), but I still can't believe that BMW have made a bike with a hole where the fuel tank should be. Something about putting your helmet there while parked. I though it could be more to do with not being able to get your head down on the tank of a BMW or perhaps it was a new type of motorcycle child seat? The Harley bikes were strangely absent but Yamaha had a small range of Stars on display, Honda had the big VTX 1800 while Kawasaki and Suzuki seemed to not have their cruisers.
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As I was passing the fencing on the way to the entrance gate I spied a lot of C6, C11, C14 and C17 members getting their tents up and beers down (which is how it should be), said hello to them all and then, by the best luck, came across my mates who'd transported all our tents and bags in the back of a car. I don't care what you say, but I'm a realist and if there's a lift going that saves me loading up my bike, I'll take it (who's taking a car to Denmark then eh?). So we all helped throw the bags over the fence into the campsite, queued for about 1/2 an hour to get in and then made camp - with a very, very, very tall flagpole with a flashing light on top. It was by far the tallest pole in the site and extremely useful when finding your way back from the beer tent, which is where we ended up next.
There was a band,
Hogwash, playing the ever trustworthy Glam Rock 70's and 80's music and I do believe that I spied a very large afro hairstyle on stage. After them came a great
U2 tribute band, who played to the end. Throughout all the festivities of the night there were people climbing up and down the tent poles, flashing their bums and bits for the crowd to see - to mostly rapturous applause unless you were booed down because you never got more than halfway up. There were even a few brave souls who climbed up through the access holes at the top of the tent and slid or jumped down the outside of the roof. It got so bad on Saturday night that the band had to stop playing while all you naughty boys and girls were kindly asked to GET OFF THE TENT!!.
As always there was plenty of food available, with burgers, hotdogs, noodles (was there Thai - oh no, it was a massage tent to relieve all those aches and pains of the day). You could even have a go on a Rodeo Bronco or the TT races simulator. Of course there was always the Christian Riders gazebo to shelter in and drink vodka when it rained, but that could have just been, my mate, Louise's little way...
The main arena put on some fine displays of vintage speedway including a speedway sidecar demonstration which was mad. The Royal Artillery's Flying Gunners Motorcycle Display Team put on a great show. Their precision high speed passing and jumping was simply fantastic, they were really did not let the throttle off. Sammy Mack did a stunt show which really doesn't work well on grass and shale, so the less said about that the better... though the Long Jump competition that was open to the public (and supervised by the Flying Gunners) was entertaining enough considering a top prize of £150 went to a chap who went the vast distance of, ooh could it be nearly, well almost 20 feet? I'm doing that next year I can tell you! Who's with me?