A Last Hurrah
In issue 39 of The Rider’s Digest – which came out in September 2000 – I wrote:
Riding over to visit Derek Mansfield in Thorpe yesterday (author of two excellent books of “Notes from the Road” and all around lovely, dapper chap) , it suddenly occurred to me that it was my fiftieth summer on bikes (something I never for a moment imagined I would see in my mad, bad despatch riding days at the tail end of the ‘70s!).
When I met my father-in-law 15 years ago and we got to talking bikes, he told me he’d given up riding when he was 70, which sounded perfectly reasonable at the time. However having rolled past that milestone myself last year, I felt zero inclination to give up riding; in fact the opposite is true. As I get older and less mobile, the only time I leave all that behind is when I’m on two wheels; and once I’m settled in a saddle, I feel downright graceful as I glide through traffic or around country lanes.
My regular ride for the last 4 or 5 years has been a 12 reg Burgman 400, which is hardly a bike that’s designed to raise one’s heart rate the way the Ducati I’d owned for a few blissful years in my comparative youth did; 
but as I say, it still delivers everything I need by way of two wheeled satisfaction. It’s perfect for bopping across London, where I still slice through traffic in a manner that betrays my courier roots, or for riding along leafy lanes to see the grandkids in Kent; but it hardly inspires the sort of last hurrah that began to form in my mind on that Thorpe wait & return.
My last motorcycle tour was on the Burgman 650 I bought shortly after I quit the Digest in the summer of 2009. It was a wonderful leisurely ten day tour that started with a ride to the south coast, before heading up the west side of the country taking in the wilds of Wales, the Lake District and the west of Scotland – including a ferry to Argyle & Bute – all the way to Oban where I swung inland through Glencoe, before heading home down the east coast. Although I took plenty of photos, that was my only bike tour that never made it into print, which was a shame because the way it combined satisfying days of solo riding and overnight stops with friends across the mainland, was the kind of stuff I’d been enthusiastically writing for an appreciative audience for almost decade by then.
How cool would it be to repeat a variation on that trip? Especially if, as seems likely, it proves to be my last big one. But the thought of doing it on the 400 – although it’s perfectly capable right up to the national speed limit and just beyond – hardly provides the sort of inspiration required to stir my 70 year old body to cover hundreds of miles a day for a week or so. I wondered whether it still might be possible to borrow something equally practical and comfortable, but just a bit more stimulating.
When I was editing The Rider’s Digest at its 32,000 copies a month peak, I had no problem getting anything I fancied by way of press bikes and regularly enjoyed and then reported on solo road trips around the UK, Europe and the USA. However, that was 16 years ago, which doesn’t seem like a particularly long time to me, but a lot of people in the bike world have moved on – or retired – in that period; so although I still know a whole load of bike journalists, travel authors and industry luminaries, my profile is hardly what it was back then.
Which brings me abruptly back to my calendar and the realisation that as I write this, August is barely a week away! Not that I need to start on the 1st of the month, just as long as I’m home for the 15th (I need to be back in town when my boy picks up his A level results – hopefully to celebrate), but that means I’d need to set off by the following Monday or Tuesday at the latest if I’m going to do the full ten days.
That doesn’t leave a lot of time to try to re-establish links with manufacturers’ press officers, but it’s got to be worth a whirl because the idea has started looming so large in my head that I know I’ll have to do it anyway, even if I end up doing it on my trusty old scoot. It just feels like an awful shame given all the years I’ve put into riding bikes and the 25 years I’ve been involved with The Rider’s Digest, not to celebrate my golden anniversary in a style I couldn’t possibly afford on my pension.
Now all I have to do is to convince someone who’s probably somewhere around half my age that they’d be mad to miss the opportunity to see one of their machines photographed against some stunning backgrounds and lyrically waxed about by a well-established (if ageing) scribe, with a rock solid reputation for evoking the timeless joy of touring on a willing bike.
If you think you might enjoy reading something like that, please leave a comment to that effect, it might just help to persuade someone who’s never read my book or any of my contributions in The Rider’s Digest that I’m worth a punt.
Dave Gurman
I’d like to see you scooting about the UK and hope you get offered something with a bit of stress-free oomph.
Count me in straight away! Your down-to-earth but descriptive story-telling and jounalistic prowess always informs and entertains. Fingers crossed you get a worthy steed, it would be an investment for those loaning it.
Sounds like a brilliant adventure and last hurrah! Hope you get to go so we can all read about it!
Each and every morning a fresh new day. Some are tougher than others, some we might well recoil from, and some have us bouncing up to meet it with glee. Roadways. Travels and travails. We grow older, never old. We’re always present, now, in a moment, the moment of each and every breath. And there is a kindness in that, a light touch that goes deep. Perhaps that’s one of the secrets of a life worth living, both with hindsight and indeed, foresight.
Our young ought to be reassured that the path is always the path, that sedate is not the same as sedated…
I’d enjoy a film of your journey on a modern metal steed, with reflections on your history and our history, a riders history, a scribe’s history, a worker’s history, a persons human history – you have stories to tell, I am sure of that, and rich in life they are.
Well digested work becomes compost, feeds future lives, and as one rides towards the sunset, the feeling of having nurtured one’s way is one we all would aspire to.
The song ‘Ride On’ comes to mind as a poem of wishing well in those who will indeed ride on.
I hope someone with the right bike comes to your assistance in this sweet mission.
Absolutely brilliant piece of writing Dave.
Your golden year,this trip has to be done for sure.
I look forward to reading more from you in the future.
If I had a suitable bike I wouldn’t think twice about lending it to you…
There must be someone with something locked in a garage begging for a good run, hopefully a good soul will come to your “rescue”.
If not then get on yer Bergman!
They would totally be mad!
I’d read it! Always gripping stuff and, as you’ve shown, I bet you’ll get some good photographs too, you’re a much better snapper than most of us.
I disagree with the title though, ‘last hurrah’. I reckon there’s still room for a few more hurrahs. Just take it steady, put on the miles and tuck yourself up in a nice pub with rooms at the end of the day.
I, for one would certainly enjoy reading.
You’re due another last hurrah on something special and I, for one, will definitely enjoy the trip with you in words and pics. Surely there’s a serious bike out there waiting for a run with a serious rider.
Definitely worth a punt. Your writing captures the essence of motorcycling and the joys that two wheel travel brings to the voyager. Far better than another crotch rocket report obsessed with top speed and horsepower figures.
50 not out, nicely done Dave! Love a Burgman too as ye know hahaha great work! Al
It has to be done DG, you know it makes sense!
Dave,
I am sure that someone out there will come up with something. What sort of bike would be suitable?
Dave Gurman started riding for Mercury Despatch in the year I started with Delta Despatch, 1978, Japanese two strokes were in abundance. Easy to start and great power delivery.
The smell of two stroke fumes!
I was on my RD250 and Dave was on his Mercury GT250.
Dave kept riding when I had a 13 year gap.
He is a safe pair of hands.
I reckon a Triumph 400 would be perfect.
I’d love to see the pics and read the story – what a great adventure!
What a great piece a golden anniversary tour would make. Hope you get something that befits your own esteemed biking heritage!
Another great article Dave and yea, I’d love to see you on are loaner bike. That would be great
Dave’s colourful style of writing about all things motorcycles, involving journeys, adventures and other escapades have been a source of fascination for me and countless others. As someone with a lifelong love of all things motorcycle, I would enjoy reading about another epic trip by Dave, with more scenic shots of his adventure. A suitably powerful machine would add something special for his readers.
In the twenty years or so, I’ve seen Dave grow crisper and sharper in his observations of the passing scene. Put this man on a jobworthy bike and prepare to have your eyes opened on where the UK is headed. Yes, observations of lives buffed by Brexit or transfigured by tariffs. On your bike, Dave.
The last, last ride…. looks like a good craic. The kettle is always on, when you pass through York(shire). Might even join you for a bit.
I really hope this happens, Dave. Loved reading your RD articles and your book was a blast. It’d be a missed opportunity for someone if they don’t jump at your “offer”.
The riders digest was like a courier bible back in the day and I would like to see more than one last hurrah!!!!
Always love your writing and would definitely look forward to this instalment!!!
Great piece (as always), and great idea! Hopefully not the last hurrah, though!?! But, just in case, let’s make this happen!!
This is a must do, I’m looking forward to reading about this adventure – I hope somebody has the sense to provide you wiuth at least a 1300cc – double the cc’s of the last steed and you’ll be home in half the time (thats some good mathing)
It would be incredibly remiss of the motorcycle industry as a whole to forego the wonderful opportunity to see their bike front and centre in this, your golden anniversary UK tour. It seems a small price to pay for the lucky front runner to be immortalised in prose, warts and all, by a venerable scribe such as yourself.
Go on bike importers, we’ve been paying your outlandish prices for decades…the least you can do is grant us our wish and lend this two wheeled bard a bike.
The Last Hurrah sounds like it would be a fantastic read! It brings to mind moto-tour retrospectives like Ted Simon’s Dreaming of Jupiter or Keith Thye’s Ride On, where the author revisits a past journey and reflects on how the current trip, the world, and they themselves have changed over time. It’s both enlightening and entertaining.
Count me in—I’d love to see this happen!
Dave “Tiger” Coward
Enjoyed reading this but then I’ve always enjoyed your wriings and the photos that illustrate said writings.
I’m looking forwards to reading about your ‘last hurrah’.
Someone lend this legend a new scooter!
I’d love to hear your 50th tour tales regaled and if posh wheels are needed to help facilitate this I hope some industry whippersnapper are able to sort it.
Good luck with the mission Dave, and I look forward to reading of hour trip.
Best wishes
Baz
It would be fitting if you did this ride on a 25 year old bike. A VFR 800 Honda would be perfect as it was the iconic sports tourer of the era. It would also allow for some “less mature” antics which would allow the rest of us over 60’s to vicariously relive our wild days. Try asking Sammy Millar or the National Museum for a loan bike…it would be good publicity for them too.
Well let’s call it ‘The First Last Hurrah’ and take it from there.
Just need a manufacturer with the cajones to supply a bike that’s durable enough for such a tour, which really should be all of them…
It’ll certainly be an adventure!
Nope. I’m not happy at all with the ‘last’ part of the hurrah. I’m a bit sensitive about these things right now as we finally said goodbye to old Sid, my veteran biker father-in-law last month. You may remember the article I did about him in TRD years ago when he was in his late 80s. I thought back then that it was a kind of pre-obituary but I should have known. He was just short of 100 when Mr Reaper finally found his bungalow (it’s always been difficult to find) and our last hurrah was just four weeks before that. I winched him and his catheter bag out of his wheelchair, up into the garage roof and slid him across to above the Morgan 3-Wheeler. And then down into it for a blast around the Cotswold lanes, not sparing the horses or tyres. It was the third or fourth time we’d done it that month. So no, stop thinking about the ‘last’ anything. It’s a bloody good idea and I’ll do whatever I can to help (you can use the Morgan if you like and if your leg is up to the heavy clutch), or stay here on your way round. Call it the Next Hurrah or something! Px
This would be a fantastic piece. And fantastic exposure for a savvy brand!
Dave
I have no doubt your audience is still out here. The RD was read by everyone I’ve known in the industry in London and, we’re not all dead yet.
Get it together and give us something to read on standby
What better way to publicise a motor cycle brand than to feature an experienced rider, who started at the tail end of the “mods and rockers” era when bikes were dangerous and their riders even more so, through the evolution of motorcycles to the current choices of mad speed machines to genteel cruisers, travelling the country on a suitable “hog”?
Dave Gurnam writes witty, knowledgeable and thoughtful prose and he knows his bikes. Can attest to the suitability of 2 wheels and long distances in his ‘70’s when many in their 50’s are thinking about investing in such an indulgence…….and most DO have the money to buy one.
Just saying…..
Gurman gold, as usual!
You gotta do it man! It’ll be epic, look forward to reading about it
You absolutely must do this. I’m currently part way through your excellent book Reasons to be Cheerful, and I’m already looking forward to this Golden Jubilee edition. Here’s to many more years !
If either of my bikes worked for you, you are welcome to borrow one.
Some manufacturer somewhere must have one for you…after all 70 is the new 50 (I just made that up by the way).
It has to be done and done in style too… something I’ll look forward to reading.
Hopefully a kindly PR department with a bit of foresight will step up and furnish you with an appropriate machine for an hurrah! A last maybe but the last, I doubt and hope not 🤓
What evil part of the international capitalist conspiracy caused you to stop writing? Surley only a full-blown campaign could keep such a master from his craft. Your writing draws me in to the world of bikes, speed, landscape and the full gamut of human interaction, beauty and atrocity so credibly that I am spirited away completely and all other theories of the meaning of life and everything pale into insignificance. We must all have craved additional material from the great writers of the past at some point, though they are dead and gone. This one is still living, so please, someone, lend him the tool of his worthy trade and let us all read the outcome, live, learn and thrive!
Get this man on a worthy steed to bring passion to his penmanship and lucre to the lucky sponsor! Dave’s writing is enticing and his photos entrancing. He has a wide and loyal international following of committed and knowledgeable bikers. His copy will bring charisma and kudos to your business – you’ll be quids in for years. Get him the bike your brand deserves him to ride – get him on your bike!
I would love to read that article Dave! Bit sad to think of it as your last hurrah but I’d love to live vicariously through your adventures! You made me realise I might have sold my bike too soon! Might have to rethink that even though I’m knocking on now. You never forget, right? You’d do a great of bringing any ride and bike to life. Will follow with interest!
I always enjoy your writing Dave, (plus accompanied photography) as another 70+ year old motorcyclist it would give me great vicarious pleasure to read about one last big tour. Go get ’em Dave.
Having read your articles voraciously over many years – and taken many of your tips during that time – nothing would please me more than to see you on something a little more inspiring than your present bike. I’m just a few years behind you age-wise and recently bought another Guzzi. This is lovely for those short blasts, but I’m looking for a longer-ride steed, so hope you can get one for your ride and I can benefit from more of your advice.
I’ve always enjoyed your writing on our shared love of motorcycling. You capture the soul of what it is to be transported to places far and wide (as well as near), by our powered two wheelers of all descriptions.
One doesn’t have to read between the lines to realise that you are a true enthusiast, undiminished by time. Eloquent, entertaining writing from the heart, poetry in motion one could say. Keep up the good work, whatever you ride!
The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.
I can’t claim credit for that – it has to go to Bilbo Baggins!
But as I read this piece it sprang to mind, particularly as I’ve just hit 50 years in the saddle myself. I’m glad to see your enthusiasm for following the road ahead is undiminished, and sincerely hope that someone, somewhere can come up with two wheels to let you continue ‘ever on and on’.
I for one will look forward to the tale you’ll have to tell.
Gotta be a good story for any one. Just to read how well Gurman’s old knackered bones stand up to to the ride and whether it will really be the Last Hurrah?
As a 71 year old who is busy undertaking a slightly more sedate way of enjoying his latter years in photography that certainly sounds like a great plan. I’ll look forward to seeing your shots from around the UK Dave.
Come on groovers, give the old dog a bone 🍖, or better still, loan the old dog a stunningly cool bike, befitting a 50 year, two wheeled veteran 😎
Cheers
Jamie
Difficult to leave any comment that could add to those already so eloquently expressed, especially coming from a four-wheeler with zero credibility. All my two-wheel thrills have been obtained vicariously but I can’t be the only one and suppose I can still offer a heartfelt plea that you really should be knocking on Amazon’s door!
As so many have already pointed out (and with time against you), maybe save that for the NEXT ‘Last Hurrah’. This time, the plea to “help him out!” is directed squarely and urgently at a suitable PR department not yet off on their hols.
Oh for god’s sake just give him something to ride.
Enjoy Dave
I would certainly like to read your account of this proposed adventure Dave, regardless of the machine used. It’s a shame that BMW discontinued their 650 maxiscooters. On the other hand Honda’s Forza 750 maxiscoot is in production and also comes to mind – lighter and more powerful than a Burgman 650 and much faster than your Burgman 400 (which would still be up to the task of course). However, my steed of choice for you would be something more radical – an electric motorcycle! As you know, I’ve been a fan of volt-powered motorsickles for a long time now (along with FFs and all manner of conventional beasts). So I suggest a Harley LiveWire (4 models to choose from) or a Zero DSR/X! PNB
This sounds like a great trip and would make an engaging article. Fingers crossed that someone takes the leap of faith and lends you something nice for it!
I totally concur with everything said so far Dave! This would be the most amazing and inspiring adventure. We all need to read more about positive energy activities! Lots of luck in your endeavours!
A lifetime of passion, grace, and storytelling on two wheels—this golden anniversary deserves a worthy ride and a final chronicle. Give the man a machine and let the road write the rest.
Sounds like an excellent plan! And I’d certainly enjoy reading about it. I’ll ask around Somerset bike contacts in case anyone wants to sponsor/loan a bike 😊⭐️
Yes ,who ever this someone is, I think you should give Dave a loan press bike he is an excellent writer, an dam good motorcigle journalist, as you can see from the rider digest, back in the day the rider digest was one the top free glossy, riders magazines, it a lot of features in it, just think of the publicity, you, Mr or Mrs someone would get, & the good kudos for letting Dave use of your shiny new press bike, doing a long distance tour & featuring your new shiny motorcigle with all its whistle & flutes, not to mention the sale,s in might bring in for you Mr or Mr,s someone
Dave, you were my “Ed” for years. You’re words were always and remain, carefully chosen poetry from the soul.
When I wanted a piece of work to complete my upcoming anthology of Motorcycle stories, “Full Throttle”, I could only think of one writer who fitted the bill. Guaranteed to supply the goods. No question that he would come up with the goods.
Any manufacturer or shop would be mad to miss out on the opportunity to cover themselves in glory by loaning your suitable bike of your choice.
Ykims.