I've been a bit slow on posting recently, mainly because I've been so busy going out and having fun. One of the fun things I've been out doing is riding on the Moto Melee.
The Moto Melee is one of the highlights of my year. It is an 850 mile ride over three days for vintage motorcycles and scooters. I've ridden it many times, and it always blows me away. This year was no exception.
While I could regale you with stories of motorcycle bliss, I won't. This being a scooter publication, I'm going to focus on the scooters. Two of them to be exact.
There are always a few scooters on the Melee, and this year was no exception. The two that came this year were Patrick on his TV175 Lambretta Series II, and Lars on his Rally 200 Vespa.
Patrick is an old hand, having gone on the Melee previously. Most memorably for me, he rode is highly modified smallframe Vespa with a externally mounted fuel tank on the floorboard. This was the same scooter he has done the Cannonball coast-to-coast rally aboard. This year, he rode a stock Lambretta Series II. Was that a crazy choice? Nope, he made it just fine with no problems at all. Kudos Patrick!
Now I must tell you Lars' story. Lars had a tasty '74 Rally 200 that he had modified with a disc brake and a well sorted suspension. The week before the Melee was the Scooter Rage scooter rally in San Francisco. On the way over the Bay Bridge from Berkeley to San Francisco for the rally, Lars had an accident. Not just any accident, but a full-on crash in which his Rally was totalled.
Miraculously, Lars escaped unscathed. However, this left him with a conundrum. It was only a few days before he was supposed to leave for the Melee, and his scooter was totally dead. Lucky for him, I knew of a bone stock Rally 200 that I had worked on last year. It was owned by a friend who was interested in paring down his scooter collection. A deal was made between the two of them on the Friday before the Melee.
Now this is crazy. Would you buy a scooter from someone, and then the next day, with no special preparation, embark on an 850 mile journey through the most remote parts of Northern California? Lars did. That man is a RIDER! He had a few small issues, mainly a spate of bad luck with flat tires. He also had one of the bolts on his carb come loose. Otherwise, he made it the whole way! What an accomplishment!
If there is a lesson from the scooters on this year's Melee it is this - Stock Rocks. Both the scooters who left from San Franisco on Saturday morning, arrived back on Monday night. That is a testament to the 50 year old engineering on our beauties. Keep riding 'em everyone!