Driving across the beautiful desert backdropped roads of the Southwest gives me the yearning to come back here and experience the countless miles, uncounted corners and lack of cars along the long stretches between towns.
Though NOT in the summer months!
White Bonneville parked in this historical mining town of southern Arizona
Eric Fellner’s production company, Working Title Films is currently one of the most successful in the industry. With movies such as Four Weddings and a Funeral, Fargo in the nineties, to the more recent Rush it encompasses the lesser mainstream items and ones I’d prefer to see.
A well framed portrait of him with prized vehicles: a Ferrari 458 Italia and a late 50’s Triumph Bonneville. Smartly attired he seems for attracted to the moto!
Photography by Neil Bridge.
Granny Moses takes a Triumph for a cavort around a Beverly Mansion. Yup! It’s the adventures of Jed Clampett and his kin from their windfall of a bubbling crude from the ground on his swampland. Black gold.
“Y’all come back now, y’hear?”
Different color than what is typically seen defining the lines of a motorcycle: jade. Frame, tank, fenders ‘n’ all. This is an elegantly fettled Bonneville with just the right level of detail to make one desire. A mint icing to a fruity cake. The worn brown leather single seat with the usual racy clip-ons and rear-sets set what looks like a comfortable streamlined pose for its rider.
The rural farmyard setting gentrifies it and the complementary redhead quickens its heartbeat.
French actor Jean Paul Belmondo was surely the Gallic McQueen. Starring in several New Wave films of the sixties such as the classic, and pivotal, Jean-Luc Godard’s 1963 Breathless, he managed to reinforce his ‘le cool’ demeanor by being seen riding ‘un moto’. Especially when it is ‘Une Triomph’!
Whereas James Hunt drove with passion and emotional drive, his main contemporary on the Grand Prix circuit, Niki Lauda, was a clinical technician. He ensured all aspects of the race under his control was scrutinized to the n’th degree. The car setup, the track, his physical and mental fitness. His Teutonic attitude gave him three championship successes, which would have been four if it hadn’t been for that fateful season in 1976 and the fiery crash at the ‘Ring as well as our man Hunt snapping at his heels on the points table.
Here is Lauda on a muscular Kawasaki Z1. His need for speed extends to appropriate motorradd selection!
Actor Richard Gere utilizes an old familiar ride in this nondescript forgettable film from twenty years ago. We saw him on a T140 and whites in An Officer & a Gentleman… Here he totes around as some character with bipolar disorder with a more classic 60’s Bonnie.
It least he got to tootle around some sunny Californian streets on a sweet moto.
A wee scoot up the shore to blow the cobwebs out of the system. Super sunny skies, scudding water surface and a fresh breath of air.
For late September it is what could be considered Perfect Weather.
Rush, the latest movie from Ron Howard: Opie to some Richie to others but nonetheless a great director. It concerns the rivalry between James Hunt & Niki Lauda during the ’76 Grand Prix season. A balanced mix of the human tale along with some marvelous racing footage. The 70’s are evoked superbly and the main actors take on their roles of these racing legends with aplomb. The bawdy lifestyle of Hunt is contrasted sharply with Lauda’s near monkish approach; yet their respect for each other as worthy opponents comes through to the closing.
Two thumbs up! And why not!
The last day of the week: generally one looked forward to on Monday is traditionally the feminine one. Literally The goddess Frigg’s day; wife of Odin and queen of Asgard, highest goddess of the Æsir, the realm of Norse paganism. The romantic countries further south adopt Venus as their Friday gal; hence the French Vendredi.
Friday’s symbol is the same for the planet Venus and is the symbol for femininity: a circle with a cross underneath it. It is also used for the chemical element copper. Since mirrors used to be made of polished copper it has been suggested that the icon is a simple form for a hand holding a mirror.
Don’t say this blog doesn’t teach you anything!
Yesterday I wrote about balance and an attitude necessary to achieve it. Well a motorcycle (and its sibling the bicycle) have its own equilibrium already built in once the wheels are spinning. Their gyroscopic effect maintain an alignment unless subjected to a turning moment; such as a lean on the bars (counter steering anyone?). It’s the marvelous world of physics and the mechanics of things with mass, velocity, rotation; and the forces acted upon them that derive our friend of two-wheeled conveyances: Angular Momentum.
Riding is about balance, poise and a smidgen of grace. To feel at one with the road below and the corner ahead smooth flow needs to be achieved. A moto dance so to speak. The ballerina uses years en pointe at the bar to achieve this; the motorcyclist must use active miles on highways and byways of various kinds to build experience, allowing that balance between mental attitude and motor skills to speed along swooping along from apex to apex like some swan of the road.
Honda
BSA
Cagiva
Ducati’s
Peugeot or Daimler
F.B. Mondial
Moto Guzzi
Hodaka ?
Indian
Jaws
Kawasaki
Laverda
Matchless
Norton
Ossa
Parilla
Husqvarna
Royal Enfield
Suzuki
Triumph
Ural
Velocette
BMW
X
Yamaha
Zundapp
Poster available here:
iron lung vintage typography poster
geordiebiker.com 