Biker, Clive, finally gets to achieve a lifelong dream by riding on the route of the Isle of Man TT
Words & pictures ❚ Clive Mott
We all have a few things we aspire to achieve while we have the ability, and doing the Isle of Man TT route was one of mine. I have been a biker of sorts all my life and my wife, Janet, has become afflicted with this perilous ailment for many years. She took her test on an overgrown Monkey bike and aspired to the heady heights of a KTM Duke which was very capable of exceeding the speed limit.
However, I need to add, that my aspirations in the motorcycle arena are not matched by my courage. I will play at the engineering, and ride, keeping half a mile between me and anybody else, but laying the bike on its side with knees scraping the Tarmac isn’t me. So, moving forward, and as Janet has packed in riding solo after too many falls, I have added a DIY sidecar to my little CCM FT35. Now our aspiration is just to ride around the 37-mile TT course at a leisurely pace and then visit as many of the varied attractions as we can on this little island, using our campervan with a trailer.
The Isle of Man is about one and a half times the size of the Isle of Wight and situated in the Irish Sea, roughly halfway between Liverpool and Belfast. It has no national speed limit, nor are vehicles required to have an MoT certificate. It has hills and a mountain and these are used as part of the TT motorcycle racing and other challenges.
The distance between our home on the south coast and the ferry port at Liverpool is 197 miles; however, after realising we are not crows, it increases to 257 miles by road. Back a few decades we would have scoffed at this, however, a gentler pace is appropriate today. Stops included the very welcoming Camping and Caravanning Club site at Oxford and also the Caravan and Motorhome Club Wirral Country Park site near Liverpool.
Task one was booking the ferry, and there are choices, two places of departure for starters. We chose the closest, at Liverpool, which lands at Douglas. The other departure point is Heysham, which also docks at Douglas. The Isle of Man Steam Packet Company website is very comprehensive, excessively so, and we were looking towards £800 to get us and our clutter there and back. Eventually I gave up and phoned and was offered what we wanted for £531. Never found that on the website!
The next requirement was a campsite on the island. We only needed the one, as with the outfit and two leccy bikes, we were sorted for running about. It seems that the only campsites on the Isle of Man are privately ow
