Raportti 2012

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Finnish Branch Report 2012

Past year has been good and active for our branch, some new members and plenty of happenings here and there.

King's Road 2012

This year's rally was held in Riihimaki, where we gathered 13th July, Friday at Lempivaara Camping. I booked their biggest cottage already in January so we had room for all of us and could have sauna there instead going to public one. I have to mention that our gathering is maybe the smallest around, ten to twenty participants, so it is easy to arrange facilities. This year there was seven of us full time and total of ten counting all that rode the route. Saturday morning we set on the road to Lahti where is motorcycle museum and I knew that there was going to be somekind of exhibition that involves drag racing because it was named after Janne Ahonen, former ski jumper and nowadays a drag racer. There was also some pinup girls having a photo shoot and we had some pretty good photos via pinup.fi.

On the way it rained a bit, not so much that we would have needed waterproof clothes and clouds were pretty dark but we managed there without getting wet. It was only minutes after we had parked our bikes that it started raining really hard and though it last only minutes it would have been soaked us pretty bad. Luckily we had roof over our heads then. The first RE came in to sight when we got in. There was one brand new in the lobby for sale. Exhibition had no RE's and that was a bit strange, but maybe there will be some in the future. Exhibition changes every year, so next summer will be another ballgame.

We got back on the road late afternoon and took detour back to Riihimaki. First 20 miles it rained but then the weather got better and at halfway sun was shining. At this point there has not been any technical problems though we had service car and trailer with us, so it seemed that we would all get back in sound condition. And we did though it took seven and half hours to drive 110 miles, counting all coffee stops and that visit to museum in it. Back at Riihimaki we had prize seremonia for oldest bike, longest journey and such. Highlight of the evening was Matt's harmonica lesson. He had bought several ones (cheap, said he) and he wanted to teach us to play blues. Might be so that I am unmusical or prefer loud pipes, but I did not quite get it. Some of us did and that is nice.

We left Riihimaki at intervals and I returned the key of the cottage at noon. Last ten miles back home I soaked so bad that my cellular phone went dead. We had good conversation at our Internet forum over our journeys back home. Best was to see that everyone got there without any bigger problems and I bought a water resistant phone next Tuesday. That forum I mentioned can be found at https://enfield.palstani.com.

Internet activity

As said, we have lively community in the net at our forum and there is a section to our friends abroad. There is also webpage of ours at http://royalenfield.dy.fi but it is still sore to an eye and needs much more work to look good and hold the information we want to give of us. This year's rally was 12th and there are pictures from former ones, so we have plenty of stuff to put to the pages. Other project has been own FTP-server which now has some 2300 pictures of past rallies and bikes restored or in original condition. Most of those are collected from our personal archives and Internet. Then there are workshop manuals and spares books beginning from 1910's to this day. They have sometimes saved the day when someone have needed help concerning spares and you really cannot say anything without seeing a proper picture.

Other mentionable projects

We have had our own calendar since 2010 and next year's edition will be printed in late October to be ready when we have Christmas party / annual meeting. King's Road provided several good shots and we have some already so everything looks good right now.

Our branch is not big but we try to compensate that with enthusiasm.


REgards, Kaj Nyholm, REOC Finnish Branch chairman.

Nice debrief, Sir.

This rally reminded me of my first swimming lesson; my dad threw me in the pool and shouted SWIM!

Oh boy.

This season has been my first in 30 years. Having my daughter on the back too made me realise it's not a joke being on two wheels, and I'm sorry if I let the group get broken a bit in the pouring rain at 80k/h.

What a great time. You lads gave me a bike lesson, and I'll never forget it.