That was one hella fast rabbit.
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Well, according to this, rabbits are quite fast:
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This is so sad! I met a woman a few years ago who was fresh from a research project in China. She was studying the criminal justice system and I can’t remember the precise statistics, but it think it was something like, if you were accused of a crime in China, there was a 50% chance you would end up in a hard labor camp or executed. I may be over or under estimating, but it was high enough that when she was robbed on a train and was 98% sure she saw the guy who did it, she didn’t point him out to the police, knowing the statistics.
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The problem with cycle helmets is that they aren’t designed to protect in cycle accidents; they’re basically tested against the scenario of ‘falling over from standing’. It’s very easy to have an accident where the forces overwhelm the helmet. That said, I’m glad I’ve worn them in the accidents I’ve had; accidents were likely downgraded to much more minor incidents than I may have otherwise had - but who knows? The most recent one could have easily been a cracked skull.
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I prefer my vehicle to provide the crumple zones. Captain buzzkill, that’s me.
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Right neighborly, that! Not everyone can reckon back on the last time they had to wait on the road for an EMT and expedite healing processes like that. Thanks.
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Mind the oncoming logging trucks. This video is compressed, which adds a lot!
I did that at 2am in the Vanagon with the Great Pyr riding shotgun and occasionally bumping the transmission out of gear. One hell of a scary flight.
That said, Fort Bragg rules. I kinda of want to live there.
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I got my favorite tattoo there. That shop, Madame Chinchilla. Much Art Car, Very BoingBoing.
Motorcycles are dangerous almost suicide machines. Getting any sort of wobble means you want to stop or at least slow down. amazing this guy thought he could get away with such a thing
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So about 10,000 accusations per year in a population over one billion. I wonder how many judges they need.
By the standards of roads in the rest of the world the two passes are nothing at all to worry about, the main risk is British drivers who aren’t used to that kind of thing. Every so often an idiot tries to pull a caravan up. This is why a motorcycle is recommended, assuming some off-road capacity. You are unlikely ever to go fast enough to get into serious trouble.
(All the 1 in 3 gradients, like the one at Porlock, seem to occur on near-hairpin bends.)
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While I realize you can get into accidents in cars, for the life of me I don’t understand why anyone would get on a road bike.
In California you can start with the highway we call 1 and go from there.
It’s relatively flat and fun cruising, with a few twists here and there in southern California, the central coast is stunningly beautiful and currently closed in several places from landslides. Northern California is a long run of amazing twists and turns, with the ocean on one side and redwood forests the other – only closed in one place I know.
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When the throttle is blipped, HO twins tend to rotate in the opposite direction to the crank. I guess it’s something you adapt to fairly quickly, but it was very noticeable in my limited experience of BMWs. Accelerating in first gear you noticed that the bike had a preferred direction. It isn’t instability as such, just more evidence that gyroscopes are strange.
It’s certainly not nearly as bad as the effect of the rotary engine of the Red Baron’s Fokker, which meant it turned much more quickly one way than the other.
I think you either get it or you don’t.
Personally I don’t get horses; no brakes, no handlebars and the ECU behaves as if it had a mind of its own. But each to his own.
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Many moons ago my work brought me on a daily loop from Philo to Rockport to Willits to Hopland. It is some of the most beautiful country I’ve seen. So many microclimates in such a small area.
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I have an 1981 R100RS (1 liter BMW boxer twin cylinder) that used to shake it’s head pretty viciously on downhill sweepers. I think it was a combination of soft suspension, noodley frame, and compressing the forks thus reducing the rake. A billet top triple clamp, a fork brace, and suspension work including stiffer springs, better oil, and improved dampening helped a bunch. It is pretty lumpy at low rpms (below about 2500), but smooths out around 5k. The huge pistons banging back and forth produce some interesting torque steer when you get on it hard. Takes a bit getting used to, but its a great bike for long, fast touring.
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I seem to remember that in some cultures, if you save someone life you are under an obligation to look after them from then on. This, of course, might just be some racist bullshit from my early days back in the 1970s.
You description of road closed by landslides, as though they are never going to get cleared, reads like some post apocalyptic fiction. Cool.
I don’t get horses, either. They were a fine form of transportation 100 years ago but today it just seems like abuse. However, they don’t go as fast and are much softer than a bike. I’d choose a horse over a road bike even today.
