While recovering from my long pillion ride from Aqaba to Jeddah, on my luxurious seat with great back support, I have been thinking about a young Russian woman that we met while we were in Beirut. She had come up to Beirut with the Cairo Chapter, riding all the way on Harley-Davidson's smallest pillion seat on a Harley “Rocker”. It has no backrest, and is really just a “get you home” pillion seat, not designed for long distance riding. How she managed to stay on it going over all the speed bumps and uneven surfaces in the roads, I don't know – but she was quite cheerful about it and as far as I know, rode all the way back to Cairo on it. This evening we went down to the Dealership to collect our bike for the next leg of our journey, to Abha, about 800 kms south of Jeddah. The new bearing on rear wheel that was put on in Damascus has been checked, the air filter cleaned, oil topped up, clutch adjusted and brakes checked. When we are both on the bike, and it is fully loaded, the extra weight on the back makes the head light shine upwards and off the road, so this was also adjusted. Several friends who had been in Beirut with us were at the Dealership and we exchanged stories about the rides through Jordan and Syria. Everyone spoke very highly of the help given by the Jordanian and Syrian bikers to all the Chapters travelling through their countries. They were also very complimentary about the Beirut tour, organised by the Lebanon Chapter Director, Marwan Tarraf, and his team. The Harley Owners Groups (HOGs) in the Middle East are rapidly gaining momentum and following the first official Lebanon HOG Tour (which we have just attended in Beirut) is the third Saudi National HOG Rally in Abha this weekend, and then the tenth Middle East HOG Rally in Bahrain in November. The enthusiasm among the bikers to attend these events, as well as toorganize them, is spreading like a bush-fire and they draw a diverse age range and mix of Middle Eastern nationalities, as well as expatriates from all over the world. Tomorrow, one group of bikers from Jeddah will leave at around 8.30 A.M., and we will follow with one or two other bikes at 10.30. Our route will take us to Taif, and then to Al-Baha for one night, and then on to Abha.
