I bought a Ducati Darmah in the UK in 2006 with the hopes of doing a 3-week journey of England / Europe. The bike had problems, so I had to cut my trip short, pay mucho £££ to have it fixed, and then store it for £5 a week in a fellow's garage near Portsmouth (obviously this would be more expensive closer to London) until I return.

Obviously £5 a week adds up. That's £260 a year, so my storage bill on my return is going to be at least £400. I've got my trip planned (May 12 - 28th) but clearly if I return to Europe every 2 years or so, I will have paid at least £500 in storage fees between trips.

I'm hoping to find a cheaper solution. I know it's a long shot, but I would offer storage here in the US in trade for storage in the UK (for example, if you want to buy a bike in the US, I live in West Virginia and I could store the bike for you and then use my address for registration purposes). I'd even be willing to pick you up at the airport, 90 miles away, whenever you'd want to do a trip. Effectively you could buy a bike, and come back periodically to use it. In return, I would get storage of my bike somewhere in the UK.

Another possibility, is I could trade the storage for the use of one of my bikes for an agreed upon time period. A sort of free rental. I ride a Triumph Tiger, probably the best bike I have for touring.

Alternatively, maybe there's a cheaper way to store the bike. The bike is registered in the UK (UK number plate), and needs MOT/Tax to be legally ridden, so I think storing it in another country would be a problem - for example somone suggested it would be cheap to store in the Czech Republic - yes, but when I return to my bike 2 years later, I would have to illegally ride all the way to Britain to get it taxed. Without being a resident of anywhere in the EU, I doubt I could get the bike registered in another country. The arrangement I have in England is complicated enough.

Any ideas or help appreciated.

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