Ducati Multistrada S DVT

[Dave]

The following morning was tough. I climbed on the Ducati and quietly reminded myself not to crash the bike.

Today we were heading from Banja Luka to Mostar.

Bosnia is quite something, you're reminded of the tragic history of the country, we encountered a lot of shelled houses, areas riddled with bullet holes. At one stage we were going cross country, and in the middle of nowhere, we encountered this military base, Bosnian, serious amount of hardware, gives you a really uneasy feeling. I wasn't hanging around to introduce myself.

It started to rain, bad news when you're on the beaten track, as we were heading to Mostar.

The road surface was polished and slippery, I took it quite easy, had to crawl as I could feel the bike squirming for grip in corners.
I really enjoy riding in the rain on the right surface, you have to be smooth, fortunately the surface changed to lovely black grippy tarmac.

It's now raining heavily, Peter, part of our small group is leading, we take a short cut down this dust road, this is not Ducati road, my handlebars are too low to stand up straight and my suspension is too hard for any real off roading. I have no crash bars, we cover 20km down this dust road, in the pissing rain, sliding all over the place, I couldn't tell a puddle from a pot hole, now cursing my 17" wheel, I plough on behind the 4 BMW's who are flying down the road.

We hit tarmac after what felt like an eternity, we make our lunch stop, and we're there first, I thought we had lost a ton of time, turns out our shortcut had knocked 50km off our journey. We couldn't help but laugh.

We stop for lunch. Afterwards we do the final run for Mostar.

All 22 bikes were now in convoy, I was towards the front as I had made pace before the rain. I could see the tour guide working his way through the pack, Derek is his name, marvellous rider.

I see him overtake the two guys behind me, motion for him to pass me, he waves and shows me a thumbs up, I got the message. Happy with the traction, I pushed on.

Myself and Derek separated from the pack and I had one of the best days of biking I've ever had, you had to be so careful for slip, white lines were a sure fire way of coming down, you couldn't cross them on power, you had to enter the overtaking lane, put the power down in a straight line. It was completely exhilarating.

Derek was on an Africa Twin Adventure Sport, I had a 50hp advantage and he was my number plate, serious rider. We reach the end of the twisties, he pulls up beside me puts his hand out for a high five, I had to laugh.

He pulls over for the rest of the group, soaked, I push on for Mostar.

Hit the hotel, shower, beer, dinner. I decide to wonder around Mostar for the evening. Friday we take in a 100km loop around Mostar, grab some lunch by this fab spring.






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