Charity Run report 16th June 2021
This run was an ad hoc run, organised to deliver our charity money to Donna’s Dream House in Blackpool with a ride on to the Wyre Country Park for lunch.
With medical/dental appointments, sickness and holidays affecting some of the regulars 5 riders arrived at the Garden centre, a few less than expected but enough to mark the occasion. Our new member Neil arrived on his 1955 G80 having spent some time after buying it fixing a leaky petrol tank but overall it looks a clean and tidy bike. The tickover was erratic (non existent!) Dave and I said “Pilot jet blocked!” and we promised to look at it when we stopped.
The weather was mild but a bit overcast as we set off down to Bilsborrow and took the right turn onto St Michaels road past Myerscough College towards St Michaels but here we took the left turn onto pinfold Lane and across to Lane Heads and then Elswick to cross the A585 at Thistleton. From Singleton we rode to Hardhorn on the outskirts of Blackpool. The traffic started to build as we approached the Victoria Hospital where we turned sharply down to North Park Drive round Stanley Park and down to Whitegate Drive. Here the group failed to follow the leader into Reads Avenue as expected as Neil’s bike was just not playing ball with the tickover problem and stalled and was a *** when trying to restart it. Eventually it started and we rode the last mile down to Bethesda Road and the Dream House.
Michael Tax the Special Projects Manager heard us arrive and opened the gates to let us in and he and Mark Curtis (Donna’s brother) greeted us and introduced themselves. Much of the facility was in lockdown mode and not able to be visited but Mark was able to show Neil and John round the facilities in one of the houses while we set to work looking at Neil’s Bike. Yes the pilot jet was blocked and it took a wire pulled out of a wire brush that Mark Curtis went and found to unblock the stubborn dirt that was in there. The jet was reinstalled and at this point Neil and John returned from their tour so Neil started his bike. Tickover was established! Success.
Deputy Treasurer Dave handed over our cheque and Michael thanked us very much for supporting the charity and told us that the money would soon be used to welcome and support their first post Covid guest in the next few weeks. He then gave us a certificate thanking us for the donation and took a photo of the group for their Facebook page.
We then took our leave and headed out onto the promenade where we made slow progress down to Cleveleys. The traffic was bad so a diversion via Amounderness way to Skipool was taken to blow the cobwebs out of the motors and then to Stanah and the park.
Here we sat on the benches overlooking the estuary and were eating our lunches when a chap on an electric monocycle came whizzing by. He did a few stunts and disappeared out of sight. A short while later he came back and did a few more stunts and stopped to talk to us. An obvious extrovert he reckoned the bike would do 50MPH and was road legal although classed as a bike the law doesn’t seem to recognise monocycles so he was sort of chancing it as it is a grey area as far as the police are concerned. We discussed the use of them after he went on his way and I think we felt the law would need to regulate these on a public highway as they don’t look very safe to be doing 50MPH!!
At this point we headed back to the bikes and talked to the onlookers before heading home via Singleton and Weeton.
A pleasant enough outing on the bikes once out of the traffic and nice to see a new member on his bike, now tickover fettled. Thanks to all who made the journey to support Donna’s Dream House.
Richard