See that gap? That narrow space between the semi-truck hauling 20-foot long, 6-inch diameter solid aluminum rods and the BMW M6? I’m taking it, man, riding the horn button and twisting the throttle: zoom-zoom. See that intersection? The one with a whirlpool of scooters, three-wheeled single-cylinder diesel trucks and at least a hundred cars spinning left leaving eddys of pedestrians lapping at the edges? I’m a Hurricane Hunter riding straight into the maelstrom buffeted from side to side, tip-toeing around, swerving, cussing, sweating and focused, man, focused.
China’s city traffic requires all your intensity, taxes all your ability and is like nothing I have ever seen on the planet. There is no respite. There is no pause, You must lock on and track hundreds of individual trajectories from every point on the compass, constantly. Insane traffic scenarios unfold at a lightning pace, there’s no time to marvel at the stupidity. There’s only time to act.
The chaos is cultural: Chinese motorists drive like they’re riding a bicycle because they were only a few years ago. In less than one generation the Chinese have gone from pedals to 125cc Honda clones to driving millions of air-conditioned automobiles on surface streets designed for a sleepy agricultural nation. At any given moment dozens of traffic rules are being broken within 50 feet of your motorcycle. It’s a traffic cop’s dream.
Except that there aren’t any. For a Police State there are not many police in China. I’ve ridden entire days and not seen one Po-Po. My Chinese friends tell me the police show up for collisions but otherwise stay low-key. Because of this hands-off approach stop signs are ignored. Red lights mean slow down. You can make a left turn from the far right lane and no one bats an eye.
China uses the drive-on-the-right system but in reality left-side driving is popular with large trucks and speeding German sedans. Get out of the way or die, sucker. Painted lane-stripes are mere suggestions: Drive anywhere you like. Of course, sidewalks and breakdown lanes are fair game for cutting to the front of the cue.
China’s modernization process has happened so fast that the leap from two-wheeled utility vehicle to motorcycles as powersports fun never really occurred. In China there are millions of people riding motorcycles but relatively few motorcyclists.
If the cars don’t get you there are other strange rules that serve to dampen the popularity of Chinese motorcycling as a hobby. Motorcycles are banned on most major toll ways between cities. Law-abiding motorcyclists are shunted off to the old, meandering side roads. Which would be fun if they weren’t so infested with heavy, slow moving semi-trucks and near certain construction delays. In practice, since tollbooths have no ability to charge motorcyclists, Chinese riders blow through the far right lane, swerving to avoid the tollgate’s swinging arm. Ignore the bells, shouting and wild gestures of the toll-takers and roll the throttle on, brother.
Being banned from the highway is not a deal breaker, but being banned from entire cities is. In response to crimes committed by bad guys on motorcycles many cities remedied the problem by eliminating motorcycles altogether. Sales of new motorcycles in these forbidden cities is non-existent.
Rules designed to discourage motorcycling abound. Vehicles over 10 years old are not allowed to be registered, thus killing the used and vintage scene. Gasoline stations require motorcyclists to park far from the gas pumps and ferry fuel to their bikes in open-topped gas cans. Add to that the general opinion of the public that motorcycle riders are shifty losers too poor to afford a car.
So why do Chinese motorcyclists bother to ride at all? It’s not the thrill of speed; 250cc is considered a big bike in China and it’s really all you need to keep up with the slow moving traffic. I’ve spent a lot of time with Chinese riders and even with the language barrier I get that they ride for the same reasons we do: The road, the rain, the wind. After being cooped up in a high rise apartment (very few Chinese live in single-family homes) I imagine the wide-open spaces between crowded cities must seem like heaven. They did to me. Chinese motorcyclists and Low Riders ride a little slower, taking long breaks to smoke a cigarette, drink in the scenery or just nap. Every motorcyclist you meet is instantly your dear friend because we share this passion and despite all the minor regulatory hassles everybody knows love conquers all.
A comparo…Slick and Zero. It was fun doing this one.
Hey, this is cool. Our story on the CSC City Slicker and Zero electric motorcycles was picked up (and quoted extensively) by a website called Electrek, an Internet magazine focused on electric vehicles. Imagine that…being quoted in a magazine. That’s cool…other people quoting me. I’m working on learning how to write gud (spelling and grammar mistakes intended, folks) because when I grow up I want to write as well as Arjiu (and that would be my good buddy and literary hero, Joe Gresh).
Okay, enough on that. I said I would someday explain the Dajiu and Arjiu business, and this is that day.
Dajiu and Arjiu in China. Yeah, we like gladiator movies…
So I’m Dajiu (which means big uncle, I’m told) and Joe Gresh is Arjiu (which means little uncle). Our Chinese buddies gave us those names on the Western America Adventure Ride (you can read about that in 5000 Miles at 8000 RPM). Joe and I were leading a ride around the western US with a group of guys from China, and they were having difficulty with both of us having the same first name. It’s funny…most of the Chinese guys had adopted English names (Hugo, Leonard, Kyle, etc.) to make it easier for us, but they were having trouble with us having the same English name (Joe and Joe). On the second day of that ride, Hugo (Zongshen’s factory guy) fixed it by giving us new names, Dajiu and Arjiu. Hugo called us all together to make a formal announcement, and he handled it in a very solemn manner. I imagine the ceremony was similar to becoming a made man in the Mafia, or maybe a Bar Mitzvah. The Chinese guys thought it was marvelous.
The pronunciation is “Dah Geo” and “Ar Jeo” and our new Chinese names stuck. Whenever we’re with the Chinese guys, they simply refer to us as Dajiu and Arjiu, as if those were our given names. That’s how we’re introduced to others in China. It’s pretty cool. You can call us that, too, if you wish.
Mt. Rushmore, South Dakota…the turnaround point on our 5000-mile Western America Adventure Ride, a wildly-publicized event to show the world that the Chinese RX3 is a reliable motorcycle (and it is; we rode the entire ride with a bunch of bikes without a single breakdown, I wrote a book about it, and the rest, as they say, is history). We cut a meandering beeline (I know…we’re running a special on oxymorons this week) on some of the best roads in the US, from So Cal to South Dakota, turned west and hit more great roads until we ran out of continent, and then turned left again to follow the Pacific Coast back to So Cal. It was an amazing ride (you can read about it in 5000 Miles at 8000 RPM) and it was incredible fun.
My favorite moment? Hands down, it was a photo at Mt. Rushmore. Kyle, one of the Chinese riders, was grabbing a pic of King Kong, Leonard, Hugo, and Tso in front of the world-famous monument. Dumb-ass me…I thought Kyle just wanted a photo of the four with Mt. Rushmore in the background and I wondered why he was making it so complicated. Holding the camera with his right hand and barking orders in Chinese while motioning with his left, old Kyle seemed to be injecting complexity into a situation that required none. At each new Kyle edict, the four guys in the above photo moved this way or that, changed their gaze slightly, and generally responded instantly to their Chongqing taskmaster. It suddenly dawned on me (and the rest of the folks watching this show, who started laughing and cheering at about the same instant): Kyle and his men were creating a “Made in China” Mt. Rushmore!
I guess I should start this piece by explaining I’m not even sure what the Clifton Club is. After spending several minutes on Google researching it, all I could find is that it’s either a wedding and Bar Mitzvah venue in Lakewood, Ohio, or a series of bling pieces from high-end watch maker Baume and Mercier. I’m going to go with Door No. 2 on this one. It’s the only explanation that makes sense in the context of what follows.
Let me back up a step. Yesterday I chauffeured the ladies to Fashion Island in Newport. It’s a very trendy shopping mall in a very trendy part of So Cal (think Neiman-Marcus, Nordstrom’s, French poodles, BMWs, and the like). For me, a visit to any shopping mall is torture, but it keeps me in good graces with the rest of the clan and builds up goodwill points for the next collectible firearm purchase, so it all works out.
Anyway, while the girls were shopping I wandered into a high-end watch store (think Rolex and armed guards) and I noticed, of all things, a motorcycle. A new Indian, to be precise, in the middle of the store. I’ve never ridden an Indian (new or vintage), but I always thought they were beautiful motorcycles (again, both new and vintage). I’m not a big cruiser guy, but if I was, I think I would buy an Indian. They are good-looking motorcycles, and my buddies Joe Gresh and Duane both hold them in high regard (and that’s a powerful endorsement).
While I was admiring the Indian, a sales guy approached me (my new good buddy Eduardo…Eduardo, I think, is a particularly elegant name). Eduardo saw my confusion (a motorcycle in a jewelry store?), and he explained that Indian had a marketing partnership with Baume and Mercier, a high-end Swiss watchmaker. It all centered on Burt Munro and his record-breaking land speed record activities. Indian. Baume and Mercier. Burt Munro. Ah, it all came together.
The Baume and Mercier Indian watch. $3900, and it could be yours. Motorcycle not included. It is a beautiful timepiece. It’s part of their Clifton Club collection, and if you wear it, you could be a member, too.Indian got it right. It’s an OHV engine, but the valve covers are designed to emulate the flathead design of the original Indians. It’s masterful, I think.There’s a lot of room in those freight and setup fees. Don’t ever pay what any dealer asks for in these two categories. Read 5000 Miles at 8000 RPM, available on Amazon.com, and you’ll see what I’m talking about.
Do these marketing partnerships work? I suppose they do. More than 20 years ago, Ford teamed with Harley to offer a special limited edition F-150 pickup with Harley decals. As near as I could tell, the decals were the only thing special about that truck, and the only thing limiting the edition was how many they could sell. I had a lot of fun teasing a friend of mine who owned both a Harley Bad Boy (yep, they actually had a model with that name) and the limited edition truck. I drove a ginormous Tahoe and I rode a Suzuki TL1000 in those days. I told my friend I was going to put Suzuki decals on the Chevy and call it a TL-Ho. Good times.
Anyway, the Baume and Mercier watch I saw yesterday was cool (at $3900, it should be), and the Indian was beautiful. I hope the deal works out for Baume and Mercier, and for Indian. I pondered the Harley and Ford partnership mentioned above; I’m guessing nothing came of that, as the two companies seemed to have parted ways. Then I remembered that Bentley, the luxury British carmaker, has a partnership with Breitling (Breitling is another expensive Swiss watchmaker).
I wondered…what’s in it for the companies that strike up such partnerships, and what’s in it for their customers? I don’t think there’s any kind of pricing advantage or free gear package, so what would be the attraction? Is it simply living a branded lifestyle (you know, for insecure rich folks who need something more in their lives)? Or is it somehow making a statement about one’s wealth? Look at me! I drive a Bentley and wear a Breitling!
That got me to thinking…would a marketing partnership work for other brands, and in particular, would such a partnership work for less expensive motorcycles and watches? You know, look at me! I ride an RX3 and I wear a Timex!
What if you could sell a new motorcycle and give away a free watch with it? I’m thinking of China bikes, India bikes (not Indian Moto, but bikes actually made in India), and maybe Thai bikes. It might work if you included a free watch with each new motorcycle, and it would cost essentially nothing. I visited the Canton Fair in Guangzhou last year and I’m on their email list now, so I get all kinds of offers from Chinese manufacturers. You can buy new Chinese watches for $0.62 each (and if you’re thinking they are low quality, you need to think again and maybe research where what you’re currently wearing is actually manufactured).
The branding and theming opportunities might be fun. KLRs are made in Thailand…suppose you got a free milk-crate-themed watch to match your KLR’s topcase? The KTM 390 is made in India; perhaps you could include a Taj Mahal themed watch with each new 390 (isn’t that what the “TM” in KTM stands for, anyway?). Think of all the marques with models, engines, or major components manufactured in Thailand, India, and China…Hawk, SWM, CSC, Royal Enfield, BMW, Harley-Davidson, Triumph, Honda, and more. You can see the possibilities.
On its face, it seemed like a weak market to target…folks who want very high end, small displacement, expensive custom motorcycles. But it worked.
When CSC revived the Mustang motorcycle concept 10 years ago, the company didn’t really have a grand plan, a handle on the market, or even a clearly defined name. CSC was originally California Scooter Company, and the original plan was to re-introduce a concept pioneered by the Mustang Motor Company in the postwar 1940s.
Original vintage Mustangs. Both of these bikes, along with more than a dozen others, are in Steve Seidner’s personal Mustang collection (the largest vintage Mustang collection in the world).
The idea was to spin off of Pro-One Performance Manufacturing’s line of very high billet and other accessories (and complete large V-twin custom motorcycles), and apply it to a small, modern version of the Mustang. Pro-One, CSC’s sister company, was founded by Steve Seidner (the same guy who started CSC). And boy oh boy, did those little bikes sell. They were beautiful little creations. Jewels, actually. Hand made, and built to extremely high standards. Mirror-like paint. Billet. Chrome. Little choppers. Expensive little jewels you could actually ride.
Ah, but that name…the California Scooter Company. It created confusion. People would see the new California Scooter modern Mustang and ask: Is it a scooter or a motorcycle? They didn’t get that the name was old school. Back in the day, antiques (folks like yours truly) called any bike a scooter. A Harley was a scooter and so was a Triumph…as in “I’m going to ride down to Cabo on my Scooter.”
Me? I wanted to tell anybody who asked that question (is it a motorcycle or a scooter?) that they were too dumb to ride either, but I couldn’t do that. Then one day, the boss hit on the idea of just calling the company CSC Motorcycles. You know, go with the tradition of other world-class marques with three-letter names: BMW, BSA, AJS, KTM, and more. And that worked. The dumbass scooter or motorcycle questions stopped, and the bikes continued to sell.
Back to the modern Mustangs…the initial thought was that the bikes would sell for $4,995, and they’d be a hit with young folks.
The modern California Scooter Greaser in the San Gabriel Mountains. Folks loved this bike and it was one of the best-selling paint themes.
Ah, what we didn’t know. The market will tell you what it is. Plans and fancy marketing studies mean nothing. A hit with young folks? The problem with young folks is that they don’t have any money and they don’t buy motorcycles. Hell, a lot of them don’t even want driver’s licenses. Just, like, you know, call an Uber.
Good buddy Walter B, back in the day, on his Knucklehead Harley-Davidson.
What we found out at CSC 10 years ago was that our modern Mustang market squarely centered on older folks (who often have a lot of money). Specifically, older folks who wanted a Mustang back in the day, but Dad said no. Or folks who rode big bikes way back when and who still wanted to ride, but they didn’t want to wrestle with 800-lb monsters. Fast forward 60 years, Dad’s no longer around, an Advil a day is just the ticket, and what do you know, I can buy that Mustang I always wanted and still ride. And they did. In droves.
A near-standard CSC Mustang on the right, and two custom versions on the left. Nearly all California Scooters were extensively optioned with additional chrome, billet, and custom paint.
Almost no one bought the standard, no-accessories, $4,995 CSC 150. They could have (that bike featured a slew of custom high end stuff, like billet and chrome all over the place and a world class finish). But those old guys who were denied an opportunity to scratch that Mustang itch as teenagers wanted more. A lot more. They would call on the phone (“I don’t do the Internet”), option the little California Scooters up to over $10,000 with lots more bling (custom wheels, custom paint, and more), and then put it all on a credit card. They wouldn’t attempt to negotiate price. California Scooter buyers wanted to spend more. Negotiate a lower price? Nope, that would demean the purchasing experience. It was full boat, full freight, and here’s my security code number…
A custom California Scooter. This was the “Bobber” variant. Note the gangster whitewalls, chrome wire wheels, and other custom touches.Steve Seidner built a personal aviation-themed custom California Scooter he called the P-51 (get it?…the P-51 Mustang). Steve intended to keep the bike, but I put this photo on the CSC blog and it sold within an hour. Someone called with a godfather offer (a deal Steve couldn’t refuse).
Those little bikes were awesome. I owned one of the very first ones, and I found I was having more fun on 150cc than I had on bikes with ten times the displacement. I rode mine all the way to Cabo San Lucas and back, but that’s a story for another blog. The Baja trip did a lot for CSC, too. The 150cc bikes had Honda CG clone engines manufactured in Asia, and the Baja trips showed the bikes were supremely reliable. We invited famous people to ride with us in Mexico and that was a force multiplier. The press coverage was off the charts.
Simon Gandolfi, British novelist and world traveler, on the road in Baja with a California Scooter. He cuts a commanding figure, doesn’t he?Simon, suspenders flying, at speed on my CSC 150, just north of Cabo San Lucas.Arlene Battishill, CEO of Go Go Gear, on the Sea of Cortez with her custom California Scooter. Arlene later appeared on the TV show, Shark Tank, with this motorcycle.
One of the things that sticks in my mind is the uninformed and the ignorant occasionally posting somewhere on an Internet forum that you could get a used Sportster for the kind of money people were happily spending on California Scooters. These keyboard commandos just didn’t get it. You could actually get a new Sportster for that kind of money, but that wasn’t the point. California Scooter buyers didn’t want a Sportster. They wanted, and were happy to pay top dollar for, a custom-crafted bit of motorcycle jewelry that could be both admired and ridden. A current classic.
There’s a market for such a thing. I know. I was there.
We’re Los Angeles Times subscribers. I tell you that not to imply I’m a well-read person who keeps up with things, and I’m certainly not bragging about the paper (in fact, I don’t think the LA Times is a very good newspaper). But this morning’s issue had an advertising supplement from China, and it got my attention. It’s one of those supplements where the advertiser tries to make it look like another section of the paper, except the whole thing was a big ad. What caught my eye this morning was the faux International Daily’s headline about Qingdao’s international beer festival.
I’ve been to Qingdao. I like the place. The story in the Times this morning immediately brought me back to the Arjiu and Dajiu China ride (that would be Joe Gresh and yours truly), a ride that was the grandest adventure of my life. It’s what Riding China is all about.
I’ve thought about this a lot, and you should buy Riding China (you can do so by clicking here or on the cover photo to the right).
Then I thought about it a bit more, and you know what? I’m going to share Riding China’s last chapter with you, right here on the ExhaustNotes blog. I think you’ll like the story on Qingdao, and I can tell you that the rest of Riding China (the other 26 chapters) is just as good. Like I said…you should buy a copy.
Enjoy, my friends….
Chapter 27: Qingdao, Our Final Destination
Qingdao (pronounced “ching dow”) means “green island” in Chinese. It’s on the eastern edge of China on the Yellow Sea, and it sure is green. It is one of the most beautiful cities I’ve ever seen, and it’s one with a storied past. Beaches, seafood, and more, the city has had more owners and rulers than you can shake a stick at. Like a lot of places on the east coast of China, it was controlled by the Germans in the late 1800s (you can see the German influence in the city’s architecture). The Japanese took over after World War I, it reverted back to Chinese control shortly after that, and then the Japanese took it over again during second World War, and then, well…it’s in Chinese hands now. But I’m getting ahead of myself yet again. Back to the ride.
The changing of the guard in Qufu, the birthplace of Confucius.
We started our morning in Qufu with a visit to a fort that is evidently a significant Chinese attraction. I didn’t understand too much about the place at the time we visited, but it made for some great photo ops. There was a changing of the guard similar to what might be seen at Buckingham Palace or Arlington National Cemetery, and it was exciting. I enjoyed watching the Chinese tourists take it all in even more. This is their country, and I could tell that what we were all seeing was of great significance to them.
A waterway in Qufu near the fort.A Chinese woman, standing on the pegs of Sergeant Zuo’s motorcycle, photographing the changing of the guard in Qufu.
After the ceremony, it was back to the freeway for the quick 200 kilometer ride to Qingdao. I was very excited about seeing Qingdao for several reasons. It marked the end of our ride. This had been a motorcycle ride like no other, and Qingdao was our final destination. For that reason alone, it was significant.
Qingdao is a city with a rich history, as I mentioned at the start of this chapter. Situated on China’s eastern coast, I was hoping that the temperatures in Qingdao would be a little cooler. On a personal level, Qingdao had a special meaning for me. It was situated directly on the Yellow Sea’s western shore. More than 40 years ago I had been a US Army lieutenant on the eastern shore of the Yellow Sea, in Korea, on a HAWK missile site. Our primary target line (the direction in which our missiles and radars were pointed; the direction from which we anticipated an attack) was not aimed at North Korea. It was instead pointed west, directly across the Yellow Sea, toward the People’s Republic of China. Yes, the spot I would be riding into this fine day was the very spot my US Army missiles pointed to more than four decades ago!
Ling, a great guy and a great rider.
Our freeway ride to Qingdao that morning was largely uneventful except for one thing: Ling’s RX1 ran out of gas. To me, it was amazing that this was the first time any of us had run dry. We routinely rode 50 or more miles after our fuel bingo lights starting blinking. Gresh and I never quite understand our approach for determining when to get fuel, or who called the shots on that topic. We didn’t know if it was Zuo on the lead bike, or Tracy in his car, of Qi and Ma in the chase truck. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t Zuo.
Up until the point when Ling’s bike ran out, I thought the RX1 had more range than the RX3, because Zuo (who rode an RX1 on this trip), kept going long after I would have refueled my RX3. But Ling, on an RX1, was the guy whose bike ran dry that morning. Gresh was riding with Ling when it happened. Joe stopped and luckily he found a rope by side of the road, so he towed Ling along until the next gas station.
When the chase truck caught up with us at the gas station, Ma evidently said something to Sergeant Zuo in Chinese about waiting too long to refuel, and Zuo didn’t care for it. Sometimes we weren’t sure if the Chinese were upset with each other (we couldn’t tell from the conversation), but there was no doubt in my mind this time that Zuo was not taking what Ma said very well. A little bit of gasoline later (or oil, as the Chinese refer to it in English) and all was well.
As we approached Qingdao, Zuo was working his magic on his smartphone’s GPS, and we found our way through thickening Chinese traffic to the bay. A ferry ride across the bay was in our plans. This was good. Any motorcycle adventure always goes better with a ferry ride. It adds to the magic.
We took a ferry ride across the bay to downtown Qingdao.
We rode the bikes onto the ferry, parked them, headed topside, and were underway in minutes. I was surprised that we didn’t need to tie the bikes down, but they were still upright when we arrived in downtown Qingdao. Everybody was in high spirits. We were arriving at our destination, the city we had been riding to for the last five weeks. It signified the end of our epic journey. The cameras were out and we were all snapping photos. I took a photo of a Chinese man and his young son, and then the son asked me if his father could take a photo of me with him. He did so with his cell phone, and then I handed him my Nikon and he took the same photo with it. As Americans, Gresh and I were unusual sights on that ferry.
Qingdao has a population of 9 million people. Once again, I thought about how amazing being in this place was. I was the unusual American; I had heard of Qingdao before this ride. I only knew of it because of my Army days 40 years ago. Most Americans have never heard of Qingdao, yet we have only one city (and that’s New York) that has a population comparable to Qingdao.
With my young Chinese friend.Joe Gresh, somewhere on Qingdao Bay, as seen through Deng’s Canon.
We hit downtown Qingdao at rush hour, but the traffic wasn’t too bad on the elevated freeway that ran over the city. It was a Sunday afternoon, and that helped. Once we were into the city, though, it was the usual tuck and roll routine we always did when we blitzed through Chinese urban areas. That meant lots of weaving and bobbing, giving the horns a thorough workout, and a bit of profanity thrown in for good measure, directed at folks who most likely had no idea what we were yelling about.
Riding on an elevated freeway above downtown Qingdao. That’s Gresh and Zuo in front of me.
I realized I had become accustomed to Chinese urban traffic. As I worked more motorcycle miracles keeping up with Zuo and Lu, I thought about what it would be like to ride back in the United States again when I returned to California. I knew I’d have to dial it down substantially. No more missing cars by centimeters passing on the right and the left, no more assuming people will move over when we pass into oncoming traffic, no more passing on blind corners, and much less risk. I wondered if it would be boring. When our Chinese and Colombian friends rode with us last year on the Western America Adventure Ride, they told us the riding in America was less intense than what they were used to in their home countries. It’s only scenery in America, they said. Riding a motorcycle in the United States required no aggressive maneuvering with cars, trucks, buses, other motorcycles, and scooters. They said that the courtesy of American drivers made the riding less exciting. Riding in China, on the other hand (and Colombia, too) required absolute and intense concentration. It was stressful, exhausting, and exhilarating.
The dinner that evening was extravagant and exciting, as you might imagine it would be for a group that had just arrived at their destination after an 8,800-kilometer motorcycle ride across China. When the restaurant realized how many of us they had to feed (and they heard the story of how we made it all the way across China to Qingdao on our motorcycles), they wisely opted to move the tables to the parking lot in front of the restaurant and let us cut loose outside.
It was a grand dinner. The beer flowed freely. Where before our Chinese brothers drank beer from little juice glasses, tonight it was all pitchers of draft beer and mugs. And folks, these Chinese guys can put away the suds. Everybody was in high spirits. Ma and Zuo were good buddies again (they had forgotten all about Ling running out of gas earlier in the day). There was more beer and more toasts. Lu was spilling been all over himself as he chugged mug after mug. Tracy was telling Sean that he should shave off his goatee to be more popular with the ladies (bear in mind that Sean is Tracy’s boss). More beer. More toasts. Did I mention we drank a lot of beer that night?
Lu enjoying a beer, with a bit of help from Dong.
We stayed late and closed the place. It was one of the best dinners I have ever had anywhere. The food was outstanding (as it always was during the entire China adventure ride), but that wasn’t what made it all so grand. We had arrived. We would do a little more riding in and around Qingdao, and then we would all be heading home. Everyone realized that as the evening ended, and there was a palpable note of somberness as we called it a night. Everyone wanted to get back to their families and their normal lives, but no one wanted the ride to end.
A fine celebratory dinner in Qingdao!
That night ended well, and the next morning we were off for a publicity ride to Qingdao’s coastline. We met at the Qingdao Zongshen dealer where five or six guys on other bikes were waiting for us. One was on a Shineray 400cc single that looked more like an original Triumph Bonneville than do the current Triumph Bonnevilles. The company was one I had heard of but didn’t know much about. We say “Shine Ray” because that’s the way it’s spelled; the Chinese pronounce it “shin you way.” There were a couple of 250cc Suzukis and a couple of all-out dirt bikes (with no lights or plates) that used the Zongshen NC250 RX3 engine. The Zongshen dealer rode his 650cc CFMoto street bike (it’s a very large motorcycle that looks a lot like a Honda ST1300). Interesting motorcycles, to be sure.
It was to be one of the best rides of our entire China adventure. We were on the edge of Qingdao headed across the peninsula and there was very little traffic. As we rode, I saw a concrete ribbon off in the distance that snaked over a mountain, and sure enough, that was our road. It was a great ride. Zuo set a sensible pace, we crested the mountain, and then we descended to sea level. Soon we were riding the Qingdao coastline. It was a magnificent road. The road and the location reminded me of Italy’s Amalfi Road below Naples. We stopped for photos in several locations. It was definitely a tourist spot for the Chinese; there were lots of busses and more than a few cars with families. But it was not touristy. It was just fun.
Has China out-Triumphed the British?
At one of the stops I commented to Gresh that this was a great ride and I was enjoying the more relaxed pace. Joe laughed and said, “You’ve gotten too used to riding in China. We’ve been passing busses on blind corners and doing all the things these guys do. If you think this is a relaxed ride, you’ve become a maniac, too.”
I guess maybe I had, but unlike the other times, it wasn’t bothering me that morning. I guess you can get used to anything. I really enjoyed that ride.
Riding along the Yellow Sea coast in Qingdao. It reminded me of Italy’s Amalfi Road.
As we road along the coast, Lu saw an opening on the left that led directly onto the beach. He took it and we all followed. The beach was great, it wasn’t too hot, and it felt wonderful to be there. I parked my RX3 in a spot where there were rocks and the sidestand found decent support. Gresh was in soft sand and his sidestand was just sinking into it; there was no way it would support the bike. Dong was next to Gresh on an RX1 and he said, “No, Arjiu, like this,” and with that, he revved the engine, popped the clutch, and spun the rear wheel. The back of his motorcycle dropped several inches as the rear wheel excavated a hole, and when it was resting on the frame, Dong stopped, killed the engine, and stepped off. The bike remained vertical, held in place by the sand on either side of the rear wheel. Gresh did the same.
I walked up to the edge of the ocean and shot a few photos. Gresh was walking toward the water in a bright green floral pattern bathing suit. It looked brand new. “Where did you get that?” I asked.
“There’s a guy selling them over there,” Joe said, pointing to a shack, “and he’s got a place where you can change.” That was all I needed to know. I wasted no time in buying my own a bathing suit. I had been hot and sweaty for over a month. A swim in the ocean sounded like it was just what the doctor ordered.
It was wonderful. I was swimming in the Yellow Sea, along with Zuo, Ma, Qi, Gresh, and Dong. The water was warm for the first few inches near the surface and cold below that. The chill felt wonderful. It was lowering my core temperature, and I basked in the wonder of it all. It was the first time I felt that good in quite a while. We cavorted in that water for a good hour. I didn’t want to leave.
Dong demonstrates how to park a motorcycle on the beach.
The Yellow Sea. I thought about where we were, what we were doing, and what we had done. We had ridden across the Tibetan Plateau. We rode in the Gobi Desert. We followed the Silk Road and China’s Great Wall. We rode our Zongshen motorcycles in sweltering heat and in torrential rains. We had been terribly cold at altitudes as high as 14,000 feet. And now we were at sea level, swimming in the Yellow Sea.
This was not my first time being at the edge of the Yellow Sea, but it was the first time I swam in it. As I mentioned at the start of this chapter, four decades earlier as a young US Army lieutenant, I had stood roughly 700 miles due east of this spot on the other side of the Yellow Sea, ready to shoot down any Red Chinese aircraft that violated Korean airspace. Fast forward more than 40 years, and now I’m a senior citizen on a motorcycle adventure ride playing in the water with a bunch of Chinese tourists on the other side of that same body of water. Times change, I guess. In this case, for the better.
Lu grabs a selfie in the surf.
After our swim, we all rode the bikes into a line at the water’s edge so the video guys could do their thing. Our videographer, He, was running the drone and Deng was working his magic with the Canon digital camera. In the maybe 10 minutes we were there on the beach, I watched the tide move the water line up a good 10 feet. We had to keep moving the bikes to not let the water surround us.
The Yellow Sea is an interesting body of water. It was originally more yellow in color due to mineral sediments carried downstream by the rivers that feed it, but it lost its yellowish tinge (according to the experts) due to pollution. To me, the water looked about the same as any other place I’d ever seen the ocean. The most interesting thing about the Yellow Sea, though, is its extreme tidal variation. It has one of the highest tidal movements in the world. When I was in Korea, I was told the water level moved up and down vertically 30 feet every day (I later read it is actually 26 feet). Whether it’s 26 feet or 30 feet, that’s a huge tidal swing. I remember being in Korea and looking at the Yellow Sea when the tide was out. It was stunning. Where before there had been ocean, there were now miles and miles of mud, with the occasional fish flopping on what had been the sea floor an hour or so ago.
On the way back to the hotel on that next-to-last riding day, we were caught in a severe downpour. We were soaked, but nobody cared. We were China-riding veterans. It rains, you get wet. No big deal.
The next day, we all saddled up and rode to the freight forwarder who would ship the bikes back to Chongqing. It was a short ride, and we were in and out of the freight yard in less than 30 minutes. Gresh and I wanted to buy jewelry for our wives, and the Zongshen dealer’s wife accompanied us to downtown Qingdao’s jewelry district. She helped us score great jade necklaces and both Joe’s wife and my Sue loved what we brought back for them. We said goodbye to the Chinese riders at the freight yard, thinking that we would see them at dinner that evening.
When we returned to the hotel late that afternoon, we learned that the goodbyes we said to the other guys at the freight forwarder had really been our final goodbyes. While we were shopping, the Chinese guys left by air to return to their homes. King Kong was still there (he had gone shopping with us); we would drop Kong off at the Qingdao train station the next day. Joe and I flew home after we dropped Kong off. It was a long flight, but it was great to be headed home.
I had mixed emotions about not being able to say a proper goodbye to the other Chinese riders, but I was glad it worked out the way it did. I wanted to say goodbye for real, but I really didn’t want to say goodbye at all. A few days after I arrived home, I received a nice email from Zuo. He told me that he and the other riders had left while we were shopping because they, too, did not want to risk becoming emotional during our goodbyes.
