The return of a legend!

[africajim]

Hi all, well, after 3 yrs in the wilderness I'm back in the fold! I've sold the Triumph Tiger and ordered a brand new Varadero!

Brief adventure bike history;
1 KLR 650 Tengai, 1 Dommie, 5 Africa twins over 12 yrs, 1 Vara followed by 3yrs on a 955i Tiger.

Triumph replaced the Tiger with a speed triple with a fairing so i looked around. I decided not to continue with Triumph, nothing else compared to the mighty Varadero!

I've ordered a new 09 Vara, in black with ABS. I've also bought a plate for it, my initials on the top line (almost) and XLV on the bottom!

Glad to be back folks!

[samben]

The prodicle son returns. Nice one Jim but i dont think DC will be too happy.

[digitalcaptive]

The prodicle son returns. Nice one Jim but i dont think DC will be too happy.

Disapointing but if I was in the market for a new bike at the moment I'm not sure the new Tiger would do it for me......would have to be the varadero or the BMW F800GS.........nice one Jim

[africajim]

I thought long and hard about my decision folks, my pet hate with the Tiger was the wind noise that no screen could cure, no storage space and the poor lights. Honda has brilliant weather cover behind that huge fairing and I honestly loved riding Honda's in the dark as their lights were so good.

DC, I considered the BMW, had a look at one up in Inverness, sorry but I couldn't get excited about it at all. The 1050 is a sexy bike but didn't add up to the adventure bike ticket.

Offroad the Vara is still a major handfull, but I have to look at the majority of my riding being on tar and the offroad bits will have to be minimal, but fire tracks to lochs for fishing's my stretch nowadays so the Vara will be perfect. Roll on the summer.

[Snaphappy]

Ahh welcome back to the fold
with a bit of luck Madstad will be bringing out a screen bracket that should cure the stock screen troubles so hold on a bit before you splash out on an aftermarket bolt-on

[africajim]

Well, hope to pick up the bike in just over a week when the 09's come out, although I'm not putting an 09 plate on mine. I'll post up pics as soon as I can find a reasonable backdrop offroad for the photo shoot!

It took a lot of soul searching but I decided to go back down the Honda twin road, reliable, comfy and very user friendly. I crossed 8 countries in a week on my last one and loved it, the bike just never missed a beat!

Roll on next month!

[bigmac888]

welcome back mate ,
bet you cant wait, just come back from week in tenerife, while out there i hired an BMW R1200 RT, which is exact model i used to own, i often wondered why i changed it.!
i love my varadero, so i thought good chance to compare the two, well the bmw dosent come any where near it mate,, corners, over bumps, general handling, the lot , varadero much better bike, and about £6,000.00 cheaper. nice ride though , went up to the foot of the volcano tiedi, snow on the ground, so quickley came down again, picked up the misses from beside the pool, went round the west coast. only to come to a small town called guess what ? Varadero, how strange..

hope every one's well,.

[Freerangestormer]

Nice one Jim, by the end of March I should have one of each, I am not sure which one I will miss but the Vara hasn't let me down yet, even when a 3ft monkey stopped in the road in front of me at 120kph this weekend don't know who was more surprised

I thought Varadero beach was in Cuba