Well what's yours?

A freind of mine filling his 1200GS with Deisel last week requiring the thing to be flat-bedded back to the shop to get the tank removed and drained got me thinking about my most embarrassing biking moment.
I've sifted through inumerable incidents involving idiotic crashes, innumerable Enfield breakdowns, running out of petrol, spending half an hour trying to kick start/push start/swear and punch start a bike only to realise the kill switch was on (very early in my biking career!) but have decided it was the following.
I'd been riding round Tehran for about four hours in what felt like about 35 degrees celsius. The polis had told me I couldn't ride on the motorway, I had no GPS and so no way of knowing where I was and just ended up going round and round in circles. I was VERY tired and VERY pissed off as my massive 'been planning this trip for ten years' trip had just gone pear shaped and I was going home.
So, I was over at the side of the road, staring at my map, losing all grip of reality and I just lost my temper.

"F-U-C-K!" I shouted in my helmet. "F-U-C-K, F-F-F-F-F-F-U-U-U-U-U-U-U-C-C-C-C-C-K-K-K-K-KK-K--K!" I didn't feel any better so I tried: " F-U-C-K-I-N-G F-U-C-K!"

I had just stopped shouting this at the top of my voice when I felt a presence at my shoulder.

A quizzical looking Iranian was peering over my shoulder at my map and clearly wondering if he should call the police.

"...hello..." I said quietly and with that rode off feeling very silly...

Matt

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http://adventure-writing.blogspot.com

http://scotlandnepal.blogspot.com/

*Disclaimer* - I am not saying my bike is better than your bike. I am not saying my way is better than your way. I am not mocking your religion/politics/other belief system. When reading my post imagine me sitting behind a frothing pint of ale, smiling and offering you a bag of peanuts. This is the sentiment in which my post is made. Please accept it as such!

I'd parked in the railway station parking lot, which was basically loose gravel. It was a huge job getting out, as the front wheel did not seem to want to steer and seemed to be creating a furrow through the gravel instead of turning freely. Took a minute to wrestle the bike towards the parking lot entrance and I was preparing to give the guy there an earful about the surface.

It was then that I noticed that the front wheel disc lock was still on.....

Fortunately the guy did not seem to have noticed

Entering the parking-lot of a "Hungry jack" (Australian Burger King) on a warm
day, I did not notice that the centre-line of the in/out-entrance was an
elevated (10 cm) ridge instead of a painted line.

My front-wheel took the left side of that, my rear-wheel the other side.
I was looking around for parking space, going 5 km/hour. Ofcourse this did
not go well for more then 2 seconds, then the bike went on it's side (I did not
even realize :confused1: why the bike went down on it's side) leaving me
standing on two feet, with 250 Kg of Africa Twin and lugage lying down between my my feet.

As I said, it was a warm day and the terrace was filled with eating people.

To my total relieve no one had seen this "super silly crash"
happen but.... I was unable to lift the bike on my own with all the lugage and
to my total and utter shame I had to ask the people on the terace to help
me.
To get their attention I even had to wave my arms in the air....

Lunch did not taste as good as usual.

Maarten

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maartensworld.com
beyond-anywhere.com

A long time ago, I was about 21 then, I had a Harley-Davidson SS250 two stroke and at the parking lot of the office I worked then, I was talking to a very nice girl from the office.
Then I wanted to ride away as the real tough biker I thought I was but forgot the lock in my front wheel........................

Very, very, very embarrassing.

Another one was even longer ago. Emberrassing, but not as bad as the one above.
I had a Yamaha RD350 that I rode from Holland to Luxembourg to the East German border, loaded with all my camping gear etc.
To get on a camping site near Kassel in Germany, I needed to cross a very narrow bridge over a small river. I had been driving all day and was very tired and in the middle of the bridge, I did something wrong and almost tipped the bike over, into the river.....
I could just hold it in its capsized position above the wild water but did not have the strenght to put it straight on it's wheels again. I had to wait a few minutes in this odd position until someone saw that I was in trouble and helped me to get the bike upright again.

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Jan Krijtenburg

My bikes are a Honda GoldWing GL1200 and a Harley-Davidson FXD Dyna Super Glide

My personal homepage with trip reports: https://www.krijtenburg.nl/
YouTube channel (that I do together with one of my sons): motormobilist.nl

Feeling rather flush near the end of a trip through Morocco, I had stayed overnight in the best hotel in Agdz, where there was some live music played by a traditional band from out of the Atlas, I bought them all a drink.
Next morning as I was leaving, several members of the band (men and women) came outside to 'see me off'.
Needless to say, I dropped the loaded bike even before I'd moved off, but as it did so, the tankbag caught in the fly-catch of my trousers, and pulled then 1/2 way to my knees as the bike fell over.
It seemed like several minutes before anyone was able to help me lift the bike back up as they were all laughing so much.
Needless to say, it will be some time before I go back to Agdz......
Bill H

I've dropped the bike a few times and looked like a bit of an idiot but the most embarrassing bike moment was probably when some soldiers at a border post told me to go through a door to baggage check. I then rode my bike into a room full of people (no other vehicles at all) getting their bags searched, I turned round to see the soldier that gave me the directions actually kneeling on the ground because he was laughing too much. Luckily the people in the building saw this too and realised that I had been pranked, so it was pretty funny all round...