There's somewhere I have wanted to visit for a very long time. Dick Craven has a private museum full of motorbikes and memorabilia collected over his lifetime.
He opens to the public on the first Sunday of the month from April to October. I have been going to check it out for years, but like most things, by the time I remember where I had planned to go it was a couple of days after the open dates!
So, I was very exited when Chris, a mate from the Enfield Yorkshire group put a message out that he know Dick, and had arranged a mid-week private viewing for our group. The date was put on the diary with reminders set of the week and then the day before. There was no way I was going to miss out on this.
Or, so I thought.
A couple of weeks before we were supposed to go the incident with the shoulder happened. On the day the rest of the group went to see the collection, I was laid up with my arm busted and high on painkillers.
Well, you can imagine how I felt when Chris sent me a message saying he had arranged a tour for a sidecar group and that the leader of the group said I was invited as well. I literally jumped in the air.
The day came around and I was still in pain, so arranged to pick Chris up in the van and go on four not two wheels.
On the way there he told me he had sent a link to Martin from the sidecar group. Apparently, Martin has been following me and Betsy for a long time. It was good meeting him and looking at the sidecars that came along.
Anyway, back to Dick’s collection. When I walked through the door my jaw hit the floor. I thought I had died and gone to heaven.
This was a very different sort of museum. Not a sanitised area with bikes on plinths, all polished to within an inch of their lives. Ho no, this was like walking into a real garage. Everywhere I looked was packed with bikes and memorabilia.
And the smell, a heady mix of old oil, grease, dirt and rubber. The sort of smell I wish they could bottle. I’m the same with steam, that smell to me, is addictive.
I loved the way shelves were rammed with old tins, walled covered in the fantastic enamel signs and on the floor, tools and other bike bits.
I couldn’t get over the range of bikes. From a BSA assisted pushbike to something I have never seen before. A Vincent Black Shadow with a side car. Some of the bikes had their own areas, military, police and AA bikes were set in their own dioramas, complete with workshop bits and bobs and in the case of the AA area, an original AA Box. Now that is attention to detail!
Two hours disappeared in the blink of an eye. Like I said to Chris, I could live in there. We had a chat to Dick, a lovely fella, he got me to buy is autobiography, detailing his exploits building and racing bikes, and all the other things he has done in his life. He said to em “how I made it this long with the things I have done, I don't know” that’s a life lived.
I will defiantly be going back for another day.
A massive thanks to Chris for arranging it, Martin for letting me join the sidecar tour,
and to Dick Craven for amassing such a fantastic collection.
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