Mamerki – and as Gareth knows I love a good conspiracy…

But today I had four. In a bunker, hidden deep in the woods of NE Poland, the site of some secret WW2 activities that, wait for it, included;

  1. The supposed site of the plundered amber room, worth half a billion at today’s prices. All we know is that after the war, the Amber Room was never seen in public again, this compounded by the destruction in 1968 of Königsberg Castle suggests it “has to be out there”.
  2. Die Glocke, which means “The Bell” and according to some researchers, was supposed to be a prototype of a machine for controlling magnetic field and gravitation, enabling the Nazis to journey in time.
  3. The UFO project, where the Germans flew a saucer shaped craft (Haunebu III) to carry 40 troops and fly and Mach 10 in silence. Not surprisingly it was a secret weapon of the Third Reich (Wunderwaffe).
  4. And lastly, a secret subterranean complex for the construction of U Boats that then allowed onward transport via a series of interconnected locks via the Mazurian Canal leading to the Baltic sea and overcoming the 110 meter drop.

All I know is these bunkers are pretty amazing, massive structures that are slowly being reclaimed by nature and won’t be moved in a hurry, and remember as Michael Barkun says, conspiracy theories rely on the view that the universe is governed by design, and embody three principles; nothing happens by accident, nothing is as it seems, and everything is connected.

Mamerki Bunkers

Rendőrség – Could I outrun them?

I think it is fair to say that I could have outrun the Hungarian Civil Guard members who were laying in wait on the back roads near Szekszard in Tolna but even I knew better… as I traveled further east the one striking observation I have is that Policemen’s hats get bigger, I mean the cap size, enormous, like some overhanging sunshade. The car was lovely and in fairness so were they – more interested in the bike and my passport than anything else and seeing as I responded to the request for “papers please” with the correct documents they let me go. With a parting wave i noticed the lack of door trims and the fact that the boot was held shut with a bit of string and a bungee – least I could have done is given them a rocstrap…

Papers Please

What makes a classic?

Sometimes it is the first bike you had, sometimes it the one you did a special trip on or the one you made another personal connection with, sometimes it is a bike you lusted after as a youth. I have always loved the angular style and square ‘in your face’ engine of the old and original K Series bikes from BMW. I found this, an unpainted aluminum tanked, 1989/90 K75C in Berlin this week… The bike was propped up under an industrial unit balcony, being protected from the worst of the winter elements, and after almost 30 years it looked like it would have coughed into life. From memory and new, it would have had about 70bhp so not much chance of me getting a (read ‘another’ German) speeding ticket, even if I had persuaded the owner to part with the flying brick…

K75 C

Hillclimb Cuneo – Col de la Madeleine

Laying in the grass trying to cool down but no shade for miles as I reached the top of the plateau from a road off the Col de la Madeleine. I decided to follow the tracks of the famous 1920 hillclimb route as I snaked the sixty odd kilometres between the French and Italian borders through the edges of the Vanoise National Park on the SP212 and into Novalesa. Easy on the CRF1000, but i wondered how the original hillclimb enthusiasts managed in the 1920s on such sharp includes with unforgiving and unprotected edges?
Hillclimb Cuneo - Col de la Madeleine

La Coupole

Hewn from the soft chalk, I wandered on my own through rough cut tunnels and chambers carved through the rock by labourers overseen by the German Army, the sound of running water never far away and despite the outside heat in the open air there was a cold chill and damp which quickly penetrated down through my jacket into my bones. An eerie place, yet I could not help but be in awe of the massive civil engineering efforts that were delivered at a cost of 1000’s of lives to create La Couple. The huge bunker was built by the Todt Organisation between 1942 and 1944 and was the base for launching the V2 rockets against London. The complex was bombed mercilessly by the Allies and the scars of the high explosive detonations can be seen in collapsed chambers and offset concrete caps and arches. La Coupole was abandoned during the summer of 1944, after the Normandy landings and is now slowly being reabsorbed back into the tranquil french countryside.

La Coupole