Kind of a Trip

Bob Bitchin

this was in old Salem, North Carolina, where a building built in the 1600s still stands. Hell, hotels were still operating that were older than that in this region. That night we went and partied again at another carnival that was going on, and once again came stumbling back into camp around sun up. One of the bikers had actually managed to obtain a little smoking material, and I waited like a puppy in heat for a hit, after being without for almost three days straight (a new record). I reached for the glowing joint and took a deep

hit.

Then I started gagging like I had been poisoned. Seems that in France they take a little bit of pot and mix it with a whole lot of tobacco. It was enough to gag a maggot. It seemed to work though, cause I got a little light-headed from it, and wandered off to crash. I still think it was the tobacco that got me high, since I had quit smoking almost two years ago. The Cafe-Restaurant De La Mairie, located in the small (population about 200) town of Badil, was to be the scene of a banquet that marked the end of the run. Advance reservations had been made for a dinner for 67, and that was the biggest meal they had ever served in the small hotel. Around noon the bikers pulled into the square of the town, parking around the fountain that had spouted forth life giving water since the days of the Romans. They wandered into the small cafe-bar-restaurant and ordered mass quantities of warm, thick bier and vin. Soon the banquet room was opened up and the food was served. They started with thin slices of

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uncooked ham, followed by a very good slab of meat (but I ain’t sure what it was) and topped it off with a fruit cocktail for desert. Of course there were also multitudinous bottles

of vin.

After the meal the bikers bid each other adieu, and most took off for the far ends of Europe, officially ending the biggest run that the French have seen. But the fun was far from over. It seems that there were still a bunch of folks who wanted to party some more. One of the bikers produced a guitar and started playing, while the remaining fifteen or so joined in singing some French ballads. Then, American songs started coming forth. Soon we were all involved including the inn keepers, their 15 year old daughter (sigh) and a couple of townsfolk who had happened in. Then a Gypsy came through the door. He was dressed in baggy pants and an old shirt, but he was obviously a gypsy. He started to dance when the guitar player did a flamingo number, and soon a couple of the bikers and the gypsy were dancing on top of the table. Then the gypsy’s mother came in (she was about 60 years old) and started dancing too. The place got a little wild and beir was flowing fast and heavy. Somehow a bottle of bier was spilled on one of the bikers by another biker, and he got the mop bucket and douched the guy with it. He, in turned, picked up the offending biker and hauled him outside to the old fountain, where he unceremoniously threw him in. For the next few minutes it was a free for all, and there wasn’t a dry biker in the place. It was a

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madhouse. After awhile we all hopped on our bikes and made our way back to the campgrounds. Back at the campground the fire was stoked up and clothes were set out to dry. The sun was getting ready to set, and no one likes walking around in wet clothes at night. While the clothes were drying we started to see who could throw a boulder the farthest. Soon the games had escalated until we had a log that was a foot in diameter and fifteen feet long in a Scottish style of log toss. Then out came the axe and we decided to see who could throw the axe farthest into the air and catch it. I upheld American honor in that event, but was outclassed in the running (cross country style) event, and when they started in with their rendition of football my overweight body had to be benched. Their idea of football is to take a helmet and throw it in the air, and whichever team gets it takes it across the goal line. No time outs, no downs, no rules. Before the game was over there were a few black eyes and many bruised bones and muscles. It was a madhouse. That night, after the clothes were dried off, the remaining fifteen or so of us decided to make it to the fun fair again, since it was still going on. About 10 p.m. we wandered to our bikes and rode to a small town. This time there were fewer bikes and a smaller commotion as we pulled in. We wandered amongst the folks, checking out the midway for woofies to pounce on and other fun things to do. We got into a few bets on who could

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shoot the closest bullet into a picture of the Mona Lisa, that was one of the prizes at the shooting gallery, but had to quit when the bullets went through the painting and into the trailer behind. It was called a draw and we split the bottle of vin that was bet. As we stood by the bier stand refilling our dwindling supplies we noticed this punk rocker over off to the side, kind of shuffling his feet and drawing things int he dirt. His mind had slipped whatever cogs it may have had, and he just stood around, looking down and smiling at something. We noticed his ol’ lady off to the comer, just smiling at nothing. She wasn’t too shabby looking so Sacha and a couple of the other dudes walked over to get better acquainted. At little while later the little lady was giving hand and head right there on the midway. Hell, and I thought America was forward. Now, you have to picture this. Here are a bunch of bikers, which France just ain’t ready for, getting head on the midway of this small town’s fun fair. Hell, I was almost too embarrassed to get in

line.

When we found the reason she couldn’t go back to camp with the crew for a menage-a-groupgrope (she had the clap) we immediately turned our attentions to new and better things. In the morning the swelled heads mounted their bikes and headed out for the four comers of the country. I felt as though I were leaving friends, even though I had only partied with these guys for four days. Jean and his old lady decided they would ride with me to Marseille (pronounced Mar-say) so we

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headed into the town of Nontron, where his folks lived, to pick up his stuff. We wolfed down a quick lunch, and got ready to leave. But first nature called, and I asked to use their

head.

Now folks, you ain’t gonna believe this, because I didn’t but they directed me to this here little concrete room, about four feet square. Inside the room was a hole, about six inches in diameter, and two little bricks. One on each side of the hole. It seems that the name of the game is to stand on the two bricks, drop your pants, and try to hit the little hole. Seems that is as close to indoor plumbing as they had in this old town. It didn’t bother me a whole lot, but pictures of poor little old ninety year olds passed through my sick mind, and I couldn’t help but laugh. Soon we were all loaded up and on the road. We passed out of Nontron, down past the old town of Bromtome that we had partied at just two days earlier, in through Périgueux (Par-i-go). This was the old section of France and the roads are not traveled much by tourists. The roads were good, but the drivers just plain drive you nuts. They follow at about a foot’s distance behind you, then they pass on curves, whether cars are coming or not. It’s freaky. Anyway, we managed to make it down to a town called Villefranche-de-Rouergue (Veelfrank-deRorg) and started to look for a place to crash. Jean

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didn’t have room on his Sporty for sleeping bags, so we had to find a room. We stopped at an inn that I would not have stopped at alone, and sent Jean’s ol’ lady in to get a room. The reason I wouldn’t have stayed there had nothing to do with the looks of the place, but it was right in the middle of town and it looked like we would have to park our bikes outside, and I didn’t want to do that.

As it turned out, they had a garage and we parked the bikes inside. The reason all of that was surprising to me was that the hotel, called Cambounet de Petit Languedoc, looked to be about three days older than God. When we asked how old the place was, we were told it was pretty new, built in the 1600s, but down the block there was the center of town, and it was built in the 9th century. After checking into our rooms, and after I sat there wondering how many travelers had stayed in the same room over the last 400 years (and it looked like the same bed, too) we walked down to find a restaurant. The next day we made it all the way to the Mediterranean. I had read about it in history books, but this was a first for me. We made our way to Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer, and checked out the halfnaked babes. Seems most of the ladies don’t wear tops there. After eyestrain started to set in, and after Jean’s ol’ lady commenced to give him sly kicks under the table, we took off for Arles (Arley) which was to be our

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stopping point for the night. Except we couldn’t get a room there. Seems that bikers have a rep even in France. We tried three hotels, and then we headed to the next town, which was much smaller, and found a place called the Hotel St. Victor in the town of Pont-de-Crau (Pon do crow). As we sat outside the hotel, after a damn good meal (the best I had in France), I noticed this odd looking bridge across the street, and we walked over to check it out. It had water running over the top of it. And it wasn’t a bridge. It was an aqueduct that had been built by the Romans when they occupied the area some 2,000 years ago. You know what, our American engineers could take some lessons from those guys. The damn thing was 2,000 years old, with no cement, just blocks fitted together, and it still had a full river running through it, and no leaks. In the morning Jean and his of lady took off heading back to Nontron, and I continued my trek east, toward Italy. I got on the autoroute, which is like a toll freeway, and made good time, all the way to Cannes (Cans). From there the trip took a new twist. I stuck close to the beach and found that the terrain heading out of Cannes was about the prettiest that I had ever seen. The shore was like the rocky shores of Oregon, with water as clean as that in Tahiti, and the coast was dotted with old castles and even some WWII concrete bunkers. Top all that off with topless foxes and you have a small idea of what it was like.

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I rode through Antibes, along the rocky shores of Cagnes-sur-Mer and into Nice. From here the beaches started to look more like the sandy beaches of home, and the traffic through Nice and into Monte Carlo, in the Principality of Monaco, was stop and go all the way. The only difference being that the drivers were, as usual, totally berserkoid. The laws are non-existent, and the walking beauties drew many of the motorists’ attention, causing numerous bumper jumpers. That evening I started looking for a hotel early, not wanting to be left out in the weather that night. After I tried three of them I gave up, and settled for a campground in Monte Carlo. The folks who ran the campground were the epitome of the word assholes. They were ripping off folks left and right for 37 francs a night to camp motorcycles, and only 20 for cars. Even so, there is no other place in Monte Carlo a biker could stay, so the campground was where most ended up. That night I decided that Europe didn’t really have much that I didn’t have back in the good old US of A, and I made a mental note to start heading back to Frankfurt, for a plane ride home. Once the Bitchin boogie fever hits me, slow travel is all over. I aimed the bike out the gate of the campground at 6:30 in the morning, and by 11 a.m. I had crossed into Italy, ignoring the odd looks by the gestapo at the border, headed north, away from the Mediterranean and up into the Italian Alps. I zig-zagged across the French border three or four times, and soon was crossing through the St. Bernard pass (where the

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dogs were made famous) and into Switzerland. Where you cross into Switzerland there is a tunnel that was almost two kilometers long, and I really got a kick out of it, but when I went over St. Bernard pass I found that there was a tunnel five kilometers long, and inside the temperature was a constant 30 degrees. Since it was in the eighties outside I was riding in just my T-shirt, and when I hit that tunnel I nearly froze my butt off. The downside of the Alps was a fun ride, and soon I was heading into Lausanne, where there is a lake so big you can’t even start to see across it. As I crossed back into Germany, just a little west of Zurich, the bike started to make strange noises, and soon I was running on just one cylinder. I had already changed my reservations to the next day, and all I could think of was that my bike would break and I would miss my plane, and end up as a prisoner in Europe for the next fifty years. In a gas station on the Autobahn I tore into the bike trying to figure it all out, only to discover that the plugs had fouled, and that was all. I borrowed a plug wrench from a passing biker (from Sweden) and soon I was on my way again. I made it past the town of Heidelberg and into Manheim, and started to search for a room once again. The first hotel I stopped at the manager just stared at me in stark disbelief, as if I couldn’t really have just walked in. She shook her head frantically saying what sounded like “Noo rooomes.” As I walked back to my bike in the parking area

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I noticed that there were no other cars around. The place was empty. I rode down the road a little and found another hotel. I walked in and found a repeat performance of the previous hotel. But she did point down the road and mumble something about another hotel. I finally found the place she was talking about. It was a rundown dump that looked like a rooming house. I figured I might as well try it, and walked up to the door. When I opened the door I knew I had made a mistake. The place was full of smoke and it was a bar. Not that I have anything against bars, but this was not the kind even I would go into. As I opened the door everyone in the place stopped what they were doing and stared at me. That was it. I’d had it with Europe. I turned around and walked out of the dump. A few minutes later I was sitting in a coffee house on the Autobahn. As I sat there I noticed that everybody in the place was blatantly starring at me. Not the sly little looks that I am used to seeing in America, but looking at me like I was a freak in a freak show.

Now I always knew I was a little odd looking, but it was really starting to get to me. Folks were openly pointing and saying God only knows what. And the worst thing about it was I didn’t have anyone to talk to to take my mind off of it. Finally I got fed up with it, walked outside and mounted my only friend, my Harley. I rode to one of the numerous roadside rest

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areas, where folks stop to drain their lizards, and found an unlikely area to crash for the night. After three days of hard riding and sleeping on rocky ground I could have slept on anything. If it hadn’t rained. Since it did rain I spent the night, my last in Europe, huddled under a bench at a roadside rest. When the sun finally came up I looked like Godzilla, complete with red eyes and large bushy head dress. I won’t even go into how lost I got when I hit the town of Frankfurt, or how it took me two hours to finally find a place that had a phone I could use, but I was sure happy to see Hans’ smiling fact as I got back to the Harley headquarters. Once I got to the airport I felt like I was almost home. The stares of the people around me didn’t even bother me. Fuck ’em if they can’t take a joke. I found my seat and fell into it. The two folks that were sitting in the seats next to me made some excuse in German and headed for other seats. I had the whole thing to myself. I dropped the two Quaaludes I had saved for my flight home, and dozed while the plane went over Greenland, waking as I landed in the Good Ol’ US of A. God Bless America.

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