SoCal VOC

We finally moved into our home and received the contents of the shipping container on February 2nd.  Here are a couple of photos of the bikes inside and outside their new home.  After almost three months in their crates, I filled up the Comet with oil and took some fuel from the can used for the lawn mower, and the Comet started on the third kick, Peter Redmond was there to see them and hear the Comet run.  Now if I can find someone to take all of our empty shipping boxes and packing paper, I would have enough room to get around the bikes inside the garage, it is a pretty tight fit for now.

Here is the start of a new blog category, where I will try to maintain a log of the Vincent activity I can stir up here in Dublin, and also the rest of Ireland, with a little bit about the experience of moving to another country.

First, a quick recap.  Corina and I arrived on Dec first, and moved right in to the temporary apartment my employer arranged. It is a decent enough place, but it is in an area that we later found out is not so great.  After a couple of days off, I started right in at work the following Monday.  We had looked at rental listings before we left, and we knew that unfurnished rental properties are rare over here.  Even more rare are garages, so the combination was going to be tough.  What was even tougher are the listing agents.  We couldn’t get in contact with most.  We only actually had two or three agents show us a property.  Luckily, many property owners handle the listing themselves.  They were easy to work with.  We looked at a few properties that were either a nice house in a bad area, or a not so nice house in a good area, or the garage wasn’t included since the owner was storing stuff.  Then the holiday season hit, and the country comes to a halt.  We found a listing for what looked like a suitable place, but it wouldn’t be available for a yearly lease until April.  My company was only paying for one month at the temporary apartment, and we really didn’t want to stay there on our own dime for the reason mentioned plus a few other reasons.  Then, I noticed the ad had been updated, and it would be available Feb 1st.  We were having such a hard time viewing other properties, we decided to extend our stay in the temp apartment one more month.  The owners were really nice to deal with, and we made the deal.  We move in Feb 2nd.  Meanwhile, the shipping container with our belongings and motorcycles arrived January 6th, and cleared customs within a few days.  The contents are being stored, waiting to be delivered to our rental home the day we move in.

Now the interesting part, getting the motorcycles registered and insured, and getting a driving license.  It looks like I will have to go through the whole licensing process, written test, road test, provisional license, then full license.  The USA is not a country that Ireland recognizes existing licenses from.

I knew the names of a couple of Vincent owners here in Dublin, and had been in email contact with them.  One was spending most of December in Florida, so a week or so after arriving, Peter Redmond and I arranged to meet at a pub near our temp apartment.  Peter rode his Royal Enfield and we had a nice quick visit.

Jump forward past the holidays, and I sent an email to Henry Martini and Peter to see if the three of us could get together.  Peter said he would pick me up in his car and drive over to Henry’s, so last Saturday we did just that, and a fourth Vincent owner, Gerry Clarke, from the west coast near Galway, was there too, having ridden a modern BMW over to Henry’s.  After a nice lunch provided by Henry, we spent a couple of hours out in the garage admiring Henry’s 1300cc Vincent with disc brakes and a few other nice mods.  We will try to continue the get togethers every month or two.