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Welcome to my blog, these are the ramblings and musings of an (upper) middle aged biker and if you enjoy braais, (barbeques) beers and motorbikes then hopefully you will enjoy what Janet and I do; we do lots of braais, we drink lots of beer and we tour South Africa on our motorbike, which at the moment is a BMW R1200RT. Join us, read about what we do and please leave us your comments.



Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Weekend in Capetown and a bro gets cut up

I had a bit of a different weekend, my bro's all rode off on Friday morning heading for Stillbay and the Freedom Road rally, it's a very nice rally run by the CMA and it is a lovely ride. We unfortunately had other commitments so I couldn't go, instead we headed off on the bike to Capetown that evening.
We went with Linda to the Italian Club and as the place was full of real Italians I thought I would have a pasta, I wasn't disappointed it was great!
On Saturday morning I switched my phone on and there was a message from Frank at the rally, if you've been reading my stuff you will know that he is my riding buddy;
"Hey Pal it's twenty to two and everybody's fucked off, there's nothing going on here, Dalton's nodding off in the corner. I'm gonna have one for the road and then I'm gonna turn in - missing you Pal." Normally the two of us party right through the night but he was on his own poor guy!
Janet and Linda headed off to a spa for the day so I was left to my own devices, I met up with our friends Penny, Jo and Robyn for a seafood lunch and then went to the movies to see "Burlesque" - fantastic is the only word to describe Christina Aguilera! (If you're reading this Christina - I love you!)
We were out on the road quite early on Sunday and had a really good ride home, pleasant weather with a light breeze pushing us from behind. It wasn't long before we were at our favourite restaurant; Beira Mar in Saint Helena Bay - I won't go into the details of our lunch because I've covered it all before, suffice it to say it was great as usual.
This was the view from our table!
After lunch I took Janet home and then I went over to the Phoenix for a beer or two and to meet up with Frank and the boys on their way back from the rally.
I got a hell of a shock when I walked in and saw Danny! My initial reaction was to turn and look at his bike, "How's the bike?" - I thought he'd dropped it but it turned out that on Friday night while he was in the bar with a couple of customers he noticed a suspicious movement outside and instead of calling some of them to go with him he went out alone to check.
In the parking he saw that "V's" bakkie (pick-up) door was open and someone was lying inside, this person heard Danny coming and sat up and when Danny asked what he was doing he lit up a cigarette and said that he was having a smoke in his bakkie!
Danny saw that the radio had been taken out already and instead of asking any more questions he swung a punch and dragged the scumbag out of the vehicle, unfortunately the villain had a weapon and he started swinging it. Danny felt the blows to his face and knew they weren't punches (we've all been punched in the face before!) but he couldn't see the weapon, he knew that he was bleeding though.
He blocked one of the blows with his right arm, close to the elbow which caused his arm to go lame and swung again with his left at which point the scumbag decided he'd better beat a hasty retreat and ran off into the darkness.
During all this the guys in the pub were none the wiser, the music was loud and nobody heard anything but they were shocked when Danny staggered back inside dripping blood, they were all for searching for the low life and sorting him out but Danny needed to get to the hospital.
Apparently the perp was arrested some three hours later inside another vehicle in another part of the town, I hope he gets his just desserts and in the meantime we will carry a big stick or a bigger knife!
Crime is a major problem here but until it hits close to home we don't really bother about it and we just carry on with our lives, we all know what places to avoid but we don't expect it at our favourite pub! That was a once off though, a random event and Danny was unlucky, it certainly won't put us off going to the Phoenix bar.
Danny's okay, it takes more than that to keep a biker down.

10 comments:

Geoff James said...

Geez Andrew....

Really sorry to hear about that incident. Whist we do have violent crime in NZ, what happened to your mate would hit the headlines as it's not all that commonplace.

You take care out there mate!

Canajun said...

Ouch. Fortunate the thief didn't have something more lethal than (probably) the pry bar he was using.

Roger said...

Glad your mate came away from it all okay. Unfortunatly where ever you live some thing lke this can happen.

the rider said...

Thanks for the comments guys, yes Danny was lucky that the scumbag wasn't carrying a knife, most of them do and this sort of thing just serves to remind one to be cautious and carry a big stick!

BeemerGirl said...

Cripes!! I'm glad your mate was ok. Has he learned to always take backup now??

-Lori

the rider said...

Yes Lori he definitely has! That pub is in an industrial area so at night it's a bit isolated, something was bound to happen sooner or later.

Anonymous said...

Sorry to hear about that Andrew, however Danny seems to have come away ok - maybe a liquid spray like the New York cops use is the answer - that stuff burns like hellfire - and you just squirt it on any part of the body - you can get it at gun shops - and also not as badly affected by the wind which is the problem with pepper spray
Glad all is ok!! ciao Dick

the rider said...

Yes Dick maybe you have the answer there, a disabling spray. We have to be careful when we apprehend criminals, we mustn't hurt them too much....spray them. disable them and park the bakkie on their hand until the cops get there - I like it!

Rhonda said...

Some people just ruin it for everyone. It's a good thing that it didn't turn out worse...Course that's part of the reason why I carry concealed (legally :o)).

the rider said...

Hi Rhonda - yes carrying a gun would be the answer however we are in a bit of a grey area at the moment with gun permits. We had to go through a whole new licensing rigmarole, supposedly to rid the country of illegal guns so what happened was thousands of legal guns were handed in because the owners couldn't be bothered with the inefficient authorities and the time consuming paperwork. Now there are probably even more guns in criminal hands and I still do not have a permit to legally carry mine!