ONE Ride 2013 - Royal Enfield Owners Club Gauteng

The FIRST Sunday of April is celebrated as the Royal Enfield ‘ONE RIDE’ all over the world. It fell on the 7 April this year.

The Gauteng Owners Club took part contributing 22 bikes to the thousands of bikes taking part all over the world.

The riders departed from the Germiston showroom shortly before 9am and made their way to Rhino Park Adventures. 

After working up and appetite we arrived, parked the bikes and got ready for our breakfast.

There is a growing number of ladies joining the rides. Mostly pillion riders but I am sure that is going to change in the near future. Here are the ladies...

All in all it was good, safe ONE Ride for 2013....

Ride Info:
Depature: Royal Enfield Germiston
Destination: Rhino Park Adventures
Number of bikes: 22

Go to Royal Enfield Owners Club Gauteng to view the upcoming club rides

On the road again…..so to speak

On the road again…..just means that I am back to blogging about this journey…the quest for an Enfield.

So let me start by explaining why there has been a lull in posts in the last year. Honestly…I got distracted by other things like life….So i have spent some time fixing my BMW and finally got my full drivers license. Now the wife and I can ride together.

As I might have mentioned before I am trying to convince my wife to learn to ride a bike and then the plan is to buy an Enfield for her. We are making progress and now debating what colour we should get. So I (or we) are closer to getting an Enfield. The other factor is finance….got to find a gap in the budget for the extra bike…all in good time I suppose.

I have realised that the Enfield is one of those bikes that I would like to have several variants of. Starting with the Classic, I would like to have it in various colours…Military, Maroon, Cyan, Chrome and Maroon, oh and why not the Desert Storm just for good measure. I would also like to a have a Cafe Racer version, either the factory one from Enfield (hopefully soon) or one with an after market kit. Then strangely enough I would also like a Trial/Scrambler version just to mess around on. Is this too much to ask….I think my bank manager would say so.

I recently went on a business trip to Toronto. Is was a great trip…besides meeting Rodriguez

, the first day I was walking around down town Toronto and happened to look up a side street and saw the unmistakable shape of…..an ENFIELD!!!

I chatted to the owner. Turns out that it was brought across to Canada by an Indian family. They had done the gear shifter conversion to comply with Canadian traffic law. But seemly had not ridden it much as it only had a few thousand miles on it even though it is an early 90’s bike. The guy picked it up for a ridiculous price, something like R 9000. As you can see the bike is in great shape.

This brings me to another point which I am sure I have mentioned before. I have been involved with the Gauteng Royal Enfield Owners club (https://www.facebook.com/REsouthafrica?ref=stream). Even though I do not own an Enfield, I am always invited to their outings and functions. To me this demonstrates the kind of people that own Enfields. Not an exclusive club.Whenever I meet an Enfield owner we get lost in conversation about the history and the charm of the bike.

The sound of Black Betty the Airhead

So in my last post I deviated a bit from the quest for an Enfield to tell you about the restoration of a ‘78 BMW R80/7 that I acquired from a friend. I mentioned that I would post a video of it running so you can hear what it sounds like. So here it is…

Royal Enfield Riders–Part 2

Here is another happy Enfield customer….

Follow this link…http://www.vimeo.com/28460858

I think this video will make a commercial for Royal Enfield….What do you think?

Royal Enfield Riders–Part 1

Here is a photo of Stuart and his father with their new Military Enfields.

Stuart tells me that the reason they both got the military spec was because his late Grandfather was a dispatch rider in WW2 up in North Africa and they were equipped with Royal Enfields (Fly Fleas). So they got them for sentimental reasons.

Congrats guys…..I hope you both have many hours of fun on your bikes….

What’s new in the world of Enfield

International News

New Website

The official website has recently been upgraded. I think it is more user friendly .It has a bike comparer which is great but for those of us that are outside India is does not serve a huge purpose as we only get the 500cc. Well is creates room for new models to be comapred in the future. Maybe a 750 or 1000cc.

New factory

A new state of the art factory is being built in Chennai. It is due for completion in 2013. This will increase the annual production of Enfields thus meeting the growing demand for these pieces of art.

Local News

Pretoria Distributor

The is a new place to buy Enfields, CIT Motorcycles in Pretoria.

CIT Motorcycles

1222 Pretoria Street,

Hatfield

Contact Ronnie on 012 342 8571

Stock

It seems that the Black Classic is a popular bike. Therefore if you wish to buy a black one you will have to order one specifically. The other colours seem to be available.

What’s your favourite colour– Part 2

So we have mentioned colours to choose from when it comes to the Classic model. As if the decision was not difficult enough here is an other variation. One of this blogs readers pointed me to a post that a fellow Royal Enfield Blogger made recently (http://www.royalenfields.com/2011/07/royal-enfield-to-offer-military-in.html). It speaks about a potential colour variation to the current olive drab military version. It seems like an obvious variation to me. The colour has been dubbed “Desert Storm”. I think it is an appropriate name

What’s your favourite colour?

I suppose that after choosing the bike, Enfield of course, you need to decide on the colour. I have blogged about this before, different paintjobs and which colour to choose.

No there is more choice. Some of you might have heard that there is a chrome version of the Classic available. This is true and it is on its way to South Africa. If you haven’t seen it here it is….

 

When I first saw a photo of this bike the first time I was not convinced that it was an option for me. This was until I saw an aerial shot of the tank. Now I love it. As if I did not have enough problem making a choice in colour.

1000 Bike Show – Feedback

As you might know the 1000 bike show was held at the Germiston High School this past weekend. I made a turn there on Saturday to see what it was all about. I have never attended this event before, probably because I never knew that it existed. Fortunately Allan (Royal Enfield Gauteng) mentioned it to me when I visited the showroom recently.

So what were my expectations? Well I didn’t really have too many except as I knew I was going to have a chance to see lots of classic bikes and off course the Royal Enfield. I had mentioned to my wife that I wanted to attend the show and she agreed to come along. This was perfect, now show her the bike that I am so passionate about.

I was pleased to see such a large turn out. Of course there were plenty of bikers that turned up and their bikes were parked in front of the large marque tent. There were many beautiful bikes to be viewed, ranging from superbikes to Harleys. But the really treasures were in the tent.

 

Of the course the best treasure were the Royal Enfields. I had a chance to meet Brice the man behind Royal Enfield South Africa. Here he is alongside the poster of the new Military version. He told me they only have one left as the others have been snapped up already.

I am happy to say that my wife was impressed with the Enfields. She prefers the teal colour over the maroon (my choose). The teal as I understand is a more “classic” Enfield colour so that might not be a bad choose when I eventually purchase one of these beauties.

Here are photos of the other Classic Bikes that were on display

 

Triumph

Norton

BMW

1000 bike show

The Classic Motorcycle Club is hosting the 10th annual 1000 bike show this year. Royal Enfield will be represented there, so go have a look at the bike that is built like a gun. Below are the details….See you there

Gauteng Showroom Visit

I finally got my butt into gear and made a trip out to the showroom in Germiston.

Firstly is was not as far I as I expected it to be. I was driving from Randburg and it took me less that half an hour to get there. This is not bad considering that sometime it takes me as long to get to Fourways.

The showroom is situated at the Classic Motorcycle Club (CMC) premises. This is the ideal position in my opinion. The showroom is not big but is suitably sized to display several bikes.

 

I met Allan whose is the person to speak to if you are wanting to test ride or buy an Enfield. Allan is a great guy and is very enthusiastic about Enfields (well classic bikes in general). He is also the vice president of the Classic Motorcycles Club. We chatted for several hours about Enfields and bikes in general.

Unfortunately I did not go for a test ride as my learners license has just expired. Poor planning on my part.

The showroom is kitted out with high quality mounted pictures of Enfields. On the back wall was a history of Enfields in picture form. This is great if you want to know more about the heritage of the Enfield.

 

 

It is great to see the bikes in person as photos never do these bikes any justice. In my case I have only see the classic in the green/cyan colour. I initially was keen on the maroon Classic but I have seen many photos where the bike looks candy red as opposed to maroon. Well let me say that there was one in the showroom and it was everything I expected it to be. So I am sold on the maroon colour.

I realised something when I was standing the chatting to Allan, when you buy an Enfield you are not just buying a bike you are buying into a lifestyle. If you buy this bike you need to join a club like the CMC. The CMC have regular meets, outings, etc. This really appeals to me I must say. I intend to bring you more information about the CMC in the near future.

So my advice is this….if you are fond of classic bikes do yourself a favour and visit the showroom. Where can you get a new classic styled 500cc for around R43 000.

If you do happen to visit the showroom, drop me an email let me know what you think of the showroom and the bikes….

Showroom Address

Pavillion sports Centre, Cnr Power and Refinery Street, Germiston.
Contact Alan: 078 1375609

The local Royal Enfield website (www.royalenfield.co.za) is currently under construction but should be live by the end of June so visit it soon for more information on the bike that is built like a gun….

Military version now available

I was really pleased to see in the latest Royal Enfield newsletter that the Military version is now available in South Africa.

I have to admit even though I would really like the Classic in the green (Cyan), the military version does have some appeal.

New Enfield Showrooms

Some of you might know that Royal Enfield has an official presence in South Africa again. There are "showrooms" in Durban, Cape Town, Kimberley and Johannesburg.

Here are the details
GAUTENG

Classic Motor Co

Alan on 078 137 5609
royalenfieldjhb@gmail.com
Pavillion sports Centre, Cnr.
Power and Reñnery Street,
Germiston

KWAZULU-NATAL

Headquarters

Brice on 076 361 7615
sales@royalenfleld.co.za
24 Kings Avenue,
Westville, 3629,
Durban

NORTHERN CAPE

Mr Bike

Herman on 082 464 1042
mrbike@telkomsa.net
65 Transvaal Road,
KmberIey

WESTERN CAPE

Thruxton Motorcycles

Garth on 072 436 3642
thruxtonmc@gmail.com
Unit 6, Tazra Park, Somerset
Business Park, Somerset West,
Cape Town

Here are some photos of the Gauteng showroom from the Latestt newsletter

So go and visit you nearest showroom.

It is also important to note that f you are not in those areas and you purchase a bike they will deliver to you free of charge anywhere in South Africa.

The quest is back on!!!

Okay, it has been a long while since I posted on this blog. I have decided that it is time to make a concerted effort to maintain this blog as well as get my grubby paws on an Enfield.

So watch this space…

Good news, it seems that there is an Official South African distributor again. This might be old news to some as I clearly lost my focus. I will give some more details in my next post…

Lastly I would like to hear from some South African Enfielders (can I call you guys that). I would like to know about you riding experiences. Where have you been in South Africa? How far have you travelled in a day? Have you been outside of SA with your bike? Dropped me an email at drewfen@gmail.com. I would like to start doing a few posts dedicated to the Enfield riding experience in South Africa, the bikes and their owners. Surprise me and flood my mailbox.

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