The weather has been near perfect the last few weeks, a little bit chilly in the morning then cool and sunny in the afternoon. Perfect for riding and for some reason the streets seem to be emptier then usual so it was to be taken advantage of. Nawaf wanted to ride as well and he just upgrade from a Ducati Monster to a Ducati 999, and in all black that machine looks pretty good.
As usual our point of contact was Starbuck Bida’a since it nice place to start and a good location to choose the route from. This time around we wanted to take the sea side to the free zone, then the airport road, then to Sabhan and back again. The weather started out cool but as the day went by it got hot and hotter, and I wore my air jacket but a light sweater under it and I was boiling.
We took to the seaside first and Nawaf was behing me with Monichum at the rear. Staggered formation as usual, sounds a bit like a military line up but not that rigid. We were flying out of the lights and cruising on the road and taking turns hard and fast, I love open high speed curves that you can take smoothly. Nawaf was falling back a bit since the machine is new to him and he has only been riding for a year. So we just observed how he reacted to our riding and how he ws riding, that is what we do with first time riders. Then we sit down and give him pointers and things to remember, and practice makes perfect. The one thing to keep in mind when riding is the smoother you are the better the ride will be, the better the bike will react when riding, even when you want to brake hard it can be done smoothly with great results. We always have new people riding with us and learning, sometimes they ride with us for a while and sometimes they join us at a later point, not everyone is willing to wake up at 7am on the weekend to go riding.
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Feels like Italy has just moved into Shuweikh, I have known for a while that Aprillia and Vespa were in Kuwait but I didn’t know that most of Italy is housed in one location. Just behind City Center is the motorcycle shop for Aprillia, Vespa, Motto Guzzi, and Piaggio with a large selection of motorcycles. There is probably a motorcycle or scooter for every person, every color or king from retro to modern to aggressive to comfortable to sport in the showroom.
I’m a huge fan of Piaggio Motorcycles and its my first time seeing such a large selection of them. Whats popular in Kuwait is the Vespa scooters, I have seen some women driving them, and I have heard some guys driving it all the way to the border. Never underestimate those machines, some of those scooters can hit up to 180 kph which is ridiculously fast for a scooter, I never imagined that they did. Then there is the Piaggio three wheeler, and there is a black one which looks like a combat machine with all the bells and whistles to be driven by Robin, because Batman has the cooler bike.
Now for the Aprillia, the main reason that I went to the showroom, it has been too long since Aprillia has come up with the revised version of the RSV, since 2004. This machine looks better in person then any picture can depict and its reasonable priced. MSRP in Kuwait is 4990 KD for the Aprillia RSV which is pretty low for an Italian Motorcycle, and its sounds oh so good. Thanks to Ahmed for starting one up for me, I was impressed and it sounds so good for a stock machine, the Italians know how to make their machines look good and go fast. If you have any inclinations for two wheeled machines then I recommend that you head there directly, and if you like to see all the color combinations then head over there.
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Getting up early in the morning isn’t too hard when the weather is this nice and sunny outside, it was perfectly chilly. Showered and went down, got my leather jacket out and ready to go, warmed up the beemer for the ride, Robo was ready to go. I have been enjoying riding Robo a lot recently, I have missed this beast and he is one hell of a beast, a scary mechanical brute who can destroy all at will. All my bikes have personalities in my head and Robo in this case has the soul of Iron Hide from Transformers, ready to fight, shoot first and ask questions later.
We took an easy route by the sea side then heading to the free zone, and I was just enjoying the brute force of this machine. Monichum was enjoying the joyride we were taking, every corner was an adventure, from turn to turn, the best part is how empty the roads were, and then head to the free zone for a few shots. After we were done we met up with the guys at Prime & Toast, pretty much we were the first and got the seats together before the other lazy guys got up and came over.
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I was contacted by Mohammed one of the Club Members about the new Kuwait Ducati Club, I was asked to come to this meet up and join when I can. It was to be held at Chillis next to Kuwait Towers, a lot of variety of machines were supposed to be there and I was surprised but what I saw. We got there around 12:45 pm with machines lined in front of Chillis, lots of red that you can see as you ride in. Me & Monichum pulled in with the Beemer & KTM, while our machines were parked with the Ducati Club.
This is one active club, you can see their track days at Bahrain International Circuit, full leathers, racing gear and ready to go. These guys are riding their machines hard, it did get me excited to see some people who are interested to go to the track. They even had the Desmodicsi RR, and a selection of other bikes, Hypermotard 1100, Street Fighter S, Monster 696 & 1100, Ducati 1098, 1098S, 1198, 1198S, 999R, 749S, and so many more. I am signing up for this club with my Vin number and everything, looks like its going to be a lot of fun.
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Friday morning I look forward to the most, whenever the weather is nice I want to go out these days. It rained the day before, and the next morning they said it was supposed to rain but I looked out the window as soon as I woke up and it was looking good. I called up Monichum to wake him up and meet up, short time to get ready then fill up with gas, and some how we met up on Fahaheel Express Way just entering the Gulf Road starting from Bida’a.
With some sign language and almost wacking Monichum’s helmet at the stop light we decided to have breakfast at Prime & Toast, and as usual the place was packed. A few of our friends caught up with us for breakfast, and more people started showing up. We then decided to head home, with the new playlist I got a song I was enjoying which I took off faster then usual which resulted a very high wheelie and freaked me out, but still a fun thrill. I’m loving this weather.
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This is as crazy as it gets, offroading, tricking, stunts, on every object and road that you can find. Julien Dupond is one of those underground riders that is known for his insane skills, and he makes mistakes from what you can see int he videos but his precision is what makes him amazing. Some stunts twist and destroy his bike because of what he is doing to keep his balance, stunts in the middle of the road, just pure insanity and this type of skill is something you are born with. Just check out the videos.
We had an early morning ride planned for Friday, and as soon as I woke up I realized how cold it was and I was going to enjoy it. Put on a sweatshirt under my air jacket, just in case if it got hot in the afternoon. We decided to stay in the city this time, and we met up at Starbucks Bida’a. As soon as I got there I could see at least 30 Harley Davidsons and customs choppers of every kind was parked in the lot and just three Ducatis standing out between them.
We decided to head out and it seems that the Harley Guys had the same thought at the time. So you had three colorful bikes heading out between a bunch of Harley’s, we were zipping around getting to the front, these guys are extremely organized and hopefully they keep this up, its great work and they are enjoying their rides.
We headed out down the Gulf Road and zipped around and all over Kuwait, it was an interesting ride we even had a new rider with us but he was doing a decent job. We even faced a few crazy people and an oblivious old man on the road who nearly took us off the road but luckily that was avoided, you run into those people every once in a while. He needs a lot of work on the corners but it seems he has the natural ability to riding so thats always fun. And the weather was fantastic.
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This is the second year running for the Ride 2 Save event brought by Dar Al Shifaa & BMW Motorcycle Club. We went last year to the event with over 150 riders of different kinds donating blood and saving many lives. I know that I will be attending the event as last year, hopefully even more riders will show up. Donating blood is a very important issue in Kuwait as not every blood type is readily available and many lives depend on the availability of blood at the blood bank. I hope many people join this event this coming Friday, and looking for a big turnout.
Date: Friday 20th November
Meeting: SHIIK Resort parking On Gulf Rd Bedi3
Timing:
- 2.30 pm Start of Registration & Blood Test
- 4:00 pm police escort from the resort To Hospital
The Thalassemia group also will be there to welcome all bikers and thank them for saving their lives by donating blood @ Dar Alshifa hospital all donors will donate from 4.30 to 7.00 pm and Beverages will be served @ Parking of SHIIK then the same @ Dar Alshifa Hospital
In the morning @7:45 am in Mishref, we had a very long ride planned out and all the machines came out that day. Its been too long but Robo also came out after all this time, so the KTM and Ducati were out. Three of us wanted to do a lot of riding, we had one planned all the place and with three experienced riders we decided to take long fun routes.
Route:
- Bayan Gas Station
- Julai’a for a bite to eat
- Back to the city
- Taking the GulfRoad starting @ Miseela
- GulfRoad to KPC
- KPC to the 2nd Ring Road
- 2nd Ring Road to the GulfRoad to Salmiya all the way down to Bida’a
- Bida’a to the 6th Ring Road then to the Airport
- Airport to Sabhan then to Mubarak Al Kabeer where we almost ran out of Gas
- Filled up at Malik Fahad Gas Station in Al Qurain before heading home
We got in over 4 hours of riding, my odometer added over 350 Kilometers that day and I had a lot of fun, whenever we made a stop I would switch to another playlist to listern to. The feeling of those corners that we were enjoying were fantastic, I wanted to go knee down into some corners forgetting everything but the riding and the machine. What felt odd was that I was riding the KTM and Monichum was riding the Ducati and even when it was over 7 meters away from me I could clearly hear the exhaust tone of Pyro over the music and sound of the machine I was on, I need an exhaust for Tango. What an amazing day, the weather was fantastic, the roads were mostly empty, we saw other riders and as soon as I was done I felt that my day was fulfilled, I felt satisfied with this accomplishment, and it was still early in the day with so much to do, nothing beats a good day out riding.
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Its been a little while since I have had a ride like this, woke up around 7 am and called up Monichum to find out he was out since 5:30 am. I got up showered, checked my iPod Nano, took my camera and headed down to my bike, checked the 1098s to find out the gas was really empty so I took Tango out for some fun. Filled up gas on the sixth ring road and headed to the freezone starbucks and that was a fun ride with the highways and streets mostly empty all the way there.
There was only one other guy sitting at starbucks looking at architectual drawings that early in the morning, he was even asking us what we were doing up that early in the morning, usually young people would be sleeping at this time on a Friday is what he said, our simple answer is we take advantage of the empty streets. We headed off after having a nice cool drink, and headed down the Gulf Road starting from the KPC side only to find out there is so much construction and there were a few police checks but they were bothering the bikers, mostly a few sports cars, and we kept on ahead all the way to Bida’a and enjoying the ride, we saw a lot of Harley’s on the way, a lot more then other kinds of bikes, Harleys not my cup of tea but they I always admit they are a dedicated group in any country. After making it all way around Kuwait back to the Bida’a, we headed back in the other direction, towards Salmiya, then towards Kuwait Towers, and all the way back to the city. After a few hand signals, we decided to head to Prime & Toast for an early breakfast around 9:30 am and a few friends decided to join us, that place fills up face. I was enjoying the ride but the humidity was ridiculous, luckily we found seats inside and I asked for a bottle of cold water and two scoops fo strawberry ice cream for breakfast, that was it, Monichum had an assortment of Pancakes which I’m not really a fan of. That was such a refreshing feeling, I haven’t had a ride like this in a long time, and I need to have more, luckily Kuwait is cooler this year then last year so we can enjoy the cool weather and so are a lot of other people out walking and enjoying a nice drive.
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