Bye, bye, Bertha

Today,  I ordered a new ride. Big Bertha is due for retirement – just don’t tell her. Not yet anyway. She has served me well, never complained. Not once.

She got me safely to the gas station and back, when Ryan ran out of gas in the middle of nowhere in the Romanian mountains back in 2013.

She held strong when I broke the gear shift lever in Ukraine.

She has taken a fair amount of beatings when I couldn’t keep her upright.

She took the beatings from the 70 km washboard road on the Arabat Spit, next to the Sea of Azov.

She got me safely down from the mountain where Thonny fell and broke his leg, after he was picked up by the rescuers.

She sacrificed her right fog light when I got cocky on the muddy patches of the Transfagarasan, to protect me from injury.

She took my 72-year old mother and me on an epic 2-week trip through Balkan.

I can’t count the hours of pure joy I have had ridden that bike. Almost 100,000 kilometers of pure adventure.

That will continue with the new bike, that I ordered today. It is a GS Adventure, a newer model with an improved engine, better safety equipment, and countless improvements over the 2011 model that Bertha is.

The model is the Exclusive model, which is the brown/green-ish color.

Valve easier to get to than previous

A fair amount of switches

Adjustable windscreen – while driving

The bike in the pictures is not mine. But mine is very similar. Same color, same equipment. Production week is confirmed to week 3, January 2019. With a little lock it would be ready to be picked up at the dealership start of March.

I can’t wait.

But what should I call her – is it a “her” – or a “he”? Big Bertha got her name from the big front (tank) and that wide rear (aluminium panniers). The new one is like that too.

If you want, leave a suggestion to a name in the comment below. That way I also know that you’ve read this far.