BMW Offroad Course Level 1 today. We decided that lack of off-road skills could be reduced by taking this course. We travelled to South Wales to the BMW Offroad School run by Simon Pavey and his team. I approach this with, I think, a calm attitude and was asked by someone if I was apprehensive and truthfully could reply ‘No’. Anne on the other hand admitted she was somewhat apprehensive. We chose to ride the BMW 650 singles as they were closest to our bikes. We met up with a group of 34 course mates and after meeting the team of instructors, rode the bikes to the training ground. Was funny to ride a bike with no mirrors, which we both kept looking for. On the training ground, we were split into groups and taken through the basics of slow riding. It quickly turned out that I found myself struggling, slow riding has not been my forte and now, standing on the pegs, removed my normal ‘both feet on the ground to turn’ option. Despite the helpful hints, tips and time that the instructors spent with me, I managed on a number of occasions to end up on the ground. Good thing I purchased the knee pads yesterday, should have added hip pads! While this may sound like a tale of woe, I know I learnt so much in that day that will help on the trip. I do now have more confidence than before on varied and uneven surfaces. It was interesting that when we left the training area, we sat down again while riding on the main road, which seemed strange after riding standing up during the training the first time that day.

My various falls left me the next day deciding that with only five weeks to go before our scheduled departure date for the trip, I would not undertake the second day, with the likely falls again. (Anthony could barely walk that next morning!)

Ran into someone on the course who I had not seen in 20 years. Its a small world…

– Anthony

We seem to have spent the last three months between trips to family in Europe and researching many aspects of the trip including route, visas, equipment, other people’s experiences. We must thank all those who have taken the time and effort to provide their thoughts, experiences and feedback to help us and others in making more informed decisions about such a trip.

We now need to take all the research and start to purchase the selections we have made. Our blog section on equipment will detail all the items we have selected and our reasoning. We will provide feedback during our travels on how each item performs for us or meets our expectations we had of the product at the outset of travel. We hope this will be useful for others, but remember that these are our personal experiences which may not reflect the products use by others (see Equipment section for more details).