Since my sister and my brother-in-law Manuel decided for an even closer destination — the South of Spain — this year we only had the pleasant company of Teresa and Carlos Paz Ferreira on their Honda Pan-European.

As we always do, we planned this new trip in its smallest detail and, on May 18th, we were finally shipped our bikes to Lisbon.

Whilst in Lisbon we decided to exchange our old and already noisy Shark RSR Summum helmets for the new Schuberth S1. We bought them at Motoponto, where I also presented Elisa with a new pair of gloves. As we had to transfer the intercom system headsets to the new helmets, Mário Moniz and his partner Carlos, from Mocasmoto — Autocom dealers in Portugal — kindly did it for us on the eve of our departure.

The beautiful morning on this first day of June in Lisbon was promising another fantastic trip. We could hardly imagine that this trip, the shortest we carried through Europe till now, would be the most troubled one we ever had.

After the farewells at our apartment, in Lisbon, where our children hardly disguised their usual inquietude when watching their parents leaving for another two wheel "adventure", I came across with the first annoyance of the trip. I forgot my cell phone at my son’s apartment, located in the other side of the city (Queijas), and my new GPS was not working. Because it was difficult to go back to Queijas at a peak traffic hour, I arranged a meeting with my son at Barreiro, close to where he works, so that he could deliver me the cell phone. Still without GPS, unfortunately we got lost at Barreiro, so we only meet him at about 10:30 AM, which delayed our departure in two and a half hours. To recover the delay we rode fast in our way to Madrid, stopping for lunch and repairing the GPS at 14:30, less than 100 km far from Madrid. After lunch and thanks to the help of a breakdown-car mechanic, I found that the GPS problem was only due to a blown fuse. As I didn’t have a replacement fuse and the GPS was needed to cross Madrid, I decided to make a direct connection to the bike’s battery.

So, with the precious GPS help, we crossed the Spanish capital without any route mistake. Since I was receiving the detailed road directions through my bike’s sound system, therefore I rarely needed to look at the road signs. I only occasionally did I felt the need to check this information with the map running in the GPS colour display. This was my first experience with this fabulous navigation equipment, which efficiency and easy of use, was confirmed throughout the entire trip, to my delight.

The more we headed north, the less heat and difficulty we felt in riding this day 1.122 km planned journey. Meanwhile and after stopping for dinner at one of the many Meda’s self service road restaurants, we only arrived at Lleida hotel at about 11:00 PM.

Since this day’s journey until Perpignan was not too long, we left the hotel at 9:30 AM on route of Andorra Princedom. The beauty of the landscape increased as we rode the Pyrenees towards "Andorra La Vella". The sinuous mountain road, zigzagging between sunny lakes, scarps and valleys, makes the delights of any biker. On this day we rode slowly to enjoy Andorra’s majestic landscapes. Some places were so beautiful that they reminded us of our previous trip to the Norway.

As planned we stopped at "Andorra La Vella" for lunch and to visit this city, full of restaurants and nicely priced stores, mainly electronics. We were sorry that our bike’s cases were so fully loaded. Even so, our wives managed to find a small place to carry the perfumes and bijouterie that they couldn’t resist buying.

At 03:00 PM we got back to the road heading to "Pas de La Casa" ski resort, located on top of the Pyrenees. On the way we stopped by the many belvederes with wonderful mountain sights. After visiting the picturesque "Pas de La Casa" resort, we got back to the road to start descending all the way down to Perpignan, where we spent the night.

On the descent towards the Pyrenees I had the first fright of the trip. In a sharp bend I suddenly faced a tourist bus coming in the opposite direction, just in the middle of the road. If my FJR wasn’t equipped with ABS I would have been unable to avoid an accident. But before this incident, fortunately with no other consequence other than a big fright, I had already noticed that my bike’s front wheel was pushing slightly to the right. Anyway I didn’t give it too much importance and we continued on our way to Perpignan, at our normal pace. When entering the city and due to my natural lack of experience on GPS navigation, I missed one of the many auto-route exits and had to ride a further 24 kms to find the right way to the hotel again. Anyway I was surprised how fast the GPS recalculated the new route after this mistake of mine, leaving us exactly at Hotel Ibis’s main entrance at about 07:00 PM.

Day 3 – June 3rd, 2004 - 534 km

We left Perpignan at 08:30 AM towards Menton, a small French city located near by the Italian border. We rode a Motorway during the whole day, which is always monotonous. Besides that we were fustigated by the usual South of France winds, which makes high speed bike riding even more difficult. In one of those auto-routes and when Elisa was trying to tune our portable radio, she lost one of her new gloves that I bought in Lisbon. High speed and intense traffic made it impossible to come back and pick up the glove, so she decided not to tell me anything.

Before lunch I started noticing a strange vibration in my FJR’s handle-bars which was getting more noticeable every time I slowed down. I checked tire pressure while stopping for lunch and, since everything it was fine, we continued our trip arriving at the colourful city of Menton at about 04:00 PM. Thanks to my GPS once again we quickly arrived at Menton town centre and found the Princess & Richmond hotel, a small but comfortable 43 bedroom unit reasonably priced and with an excellent sea front location. Because the weather was great we spent the rest of the afternoon at the hotel’s solarium and Jacuzzi, located in the top floor, with a pretty view over the sea and the mountains.

After a pleasant walk on the seafront avenue, overlooking the French Riviera, we had a nice supper in a typical restaurant by the city’s marina. When getting back to the hotel we were surprised by the first rainfall of our trip. Suddenly a loud thunderstorm echoed and it started raining heavily. Even though this evening we were a little wet when we arrived at the hotel, we were still nicely impressed by this picturesque city, full of small, clean and perfectly maintained gardens.

Day 4 – June 4th, 2004 - 483 km

On the following morning we were a little sad having to leave Menton so soon, when heading towards Florence, our trip’s next stop. Fortunately the bad weather had gone and the sun was shining again.

Back on the road my FJR was getting more and more difficult to ride, so much that in Italy already, in a Service Area close to Genoa, I decided to call my Yamaha dealer in the Azores. After telling them what was happening and according to the bikes symptoms, at first they thought the bike could have a steering slack, so they suggested to me that I stop at the nearest Yamaha dealer to have it corrected. Since I always carry a complete trip dossier which also includes all Yamaha dealers in the countries I plan to cross, I called "Yamoto" in Genoa to arrange an inspection. Because of the stress those situations always cause, I almost dropped my bike. Fortunately I was helped by a kind Italian scooter rider who helped me at the exact moment I no longer had enough strength to hold the bike. However, my new Schuberth helmet didn’t have the same luck and was seriously scratched when falling down from the bike.

Because we only arrived at Genoa close to midday, we had to wait patiently for “Yamoto’s” lunch break. Only when the mechanic tested the bike he found that the problem was due to a huge bubble in the bike’s front tire which I hadn’t noticed before. We were lucky enough that this faulty front tyre did not blow up whilst riding at speed in a motorway. If this had happened I would have hardly been able to avoid a serious crash with serious consequences. Because my rear tire was quite worn out I decided to change both of them for new Bridgestone BT020. It was 05:00 PM before we were back on the road heading towards Florence again. But this was my “bad luck” day. When resetting the GPS in Genoa I entered the wrong coordinates of the hotel in Florence and ended up at the wrong hotel located in the opposing side of the city. After re-entering the right coordinates we only arrived at Holiday Inn Florence hotel at 09:00 PM.

After the usual refreshing evening shower we went Florence City centre for dinner and for a first walk in this beautiful city.

Day 5 – June 5th, 2004

Fortunately we had good weather during most of our trip. On this day we woke up early to visit the romantic city of Florence, so full of pretty and impressive monuments, intercrossed by medieval small streets.

During the morning we walked through the city and, during the afternoon, we took a guided tour visiting the city’s main squares, monuments and palaces. We loved it!

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