Cold Week Ahead

With Angelle facing a cold week down in Invercargill, we thought it time to share a few of our photos from our recent trip to Bali. It was wonderfully warm there and there were scooters for Africa! About 80% of the traffic in Bali is made up by scooters - a lot of modern scoots but we managed to find some vintage scoots riding around and restoration workshops.

Waiting for Salvation

Scenes From the WorkshopVespa Garage with Ape's Out FrontShowroomShowroomCustomization ServiceTypical Street Parking

We have plenty more photos of interesting scooters from Bali to come. For now, however, it's back to packing and other errands.

Scooter Brands

Well, I'm sure this is starting to look like a disused blog...no entry for almost 2 weeks. Or was there?

Angelle here. When I was away in Tauranga, I wrote a blog entry about the abundance of Chinese 50cc scooters I saw there. Looks like it didn't post for some reason. I'm not going to try to recreate my thoughts from then, but I will give you the general idea of what I had to say instead.

I was in Tauranga for a week of work. Long days, starting at 7am and finishing between 5-5:30 each evening. On my drives to and from the work site from the suburb of Mt Mauganui during those hours, I saw quite a few scooters. One day on my way home and in a time frame of about 20 minutes, I counted 14. The majority of these scooters were unknown to me - someone who calls themselves a scooter enthusiast. I was only able to recognize one Yamaha BWS, one Honda Today, and one Suzuki maxi scoot over the whole week. Not a single Vespa, Lambretta, Belladonna, etc. I don't consider myself elitist when it comes to scooters - I'm happy to see every one of them out and about, but I do wonder where are all these new Chinese scooters coming from and who is the market? In the area where I stayed (which seemed middle to upmarket), there were 2 scooters that I had a look at and still couldn't tell you the manufacturer. I discussed this with Simon one night and he surmised that these scooters were likely first vehicles for youth with their learner licenses and not enough money to run a car. That sounded reasonable so I kept an eye out. One morning, I saw someone getting on to one of the scooters parked next door - it was a portly, middle aged man who seemed to be dressed in business attire. I kept a look out at all the other scooters to see if I could see Learner plates or young riders. I saw neither. Well...one learner plate but the rider was a woman, not what I would call a youth. Perhaps the Tauranga riders are not youth, but practical minded 30-50 year olds with a bit of spend-thrift attitude.
Personally, I don't like the styling of many of the Chinese bikes and those I do like, I wonder about the quality. Back in Canada, I rode a Honda Jazz/Metropolitan/Scoopy for 3 years and a Yamaha Vino 125 for about 6 months and found both of them to be very stylish and reliable bikes...stylish and reliable, 2 words I often associate with the Japanese. Lately, I've obviously been on a Vespa and of course, I enjoy the styling and haven't had any mechanical issues as yet. Maybe I AM a bit elitist when it comes to scooter brands and never even realized it. I'm going to put up a new poll to find out what type of scooters all of you ride, and if anyone has any feedback or experience with Chinese scooters, I'd love to hear it - leave a comment!