Highland Gathering ……….No

Wetlands Gathering ……….Yes!

Today was the Highland Gathering in Jakarta. For those that don’t know this is the largest Highland Gathering outside of Scotland. This year it was also the wettest. We met for breakfast at Mad Dogs at just after 7.00 AM. Too bad the bar owner and staff didn’t get there till 8.00AM! One strike against Glen. The police escort failed to turn up as well so there went the easy ride down the toll road. I somehow got appointed Ride Captain for the day and we headed out of town thru Bintaro. The location is easy to get to if you can get on the toll but it was all back roads for us. A new section of housing had changed the roads about but following some of the road signs we kept going.

With some help from Ralph we took a somewhat longer then average short cut but it was interesting to see the reconstruction going on in Nias and Aceh. Finally we saw the twin towers and the oval is next to them so we did make it. Thirteen bikes driving across the infield at a Highland Gathering thru a game of soccer brought the game to a standstill and we parked the bikes and were just getting settled down when it started to rain. Our private drinks supply was minus some CO2 thanks to the guys at Bintang

So that meant having to buy all the beer instead. Strike 2 to Glen. It rained then it poured then it deluged…...for almost 3 hours. Totally flooded the whole oval and stopped all the events. By that stage we had all had enough so we waited for most of the water the drain and then made our way back across the oval to the exit. Grant found out that his bike couldn’t swim but no harm done except to his pride. Thanks to some early help from Grant we ended up in BSD then short cut thru what some cruelly described as a goat track back into Sector 9 Bintaro and back to Mad Dogs for drinks and food.

 

Too bad the weather was so bad as we all had a great day last year. Thanks to all the riders who put in extra effort to make it to this event. Things started out badly but we all make it thru without losing anybody or indeed any breakdowns !

No they are not kidding!