George Higgins’ Alaska itinerary for next year’s trip has precipitated two or three weeks’ frenzied planning chez Rynne. Trying to work in two services for John’s new bike, and get to Calgary in time to see the last couple of days of the Stampede, has had us burning the candle at both ends. The trip may be 14 months away, but we already have scarily detailed descriptions of conditions for all the major Alaska highways, and have plumbed practically every gas station en route into Garmin MapSource. However, having suggested to George that 300 miles per day might be a touch on the ambitious side, we have not managed to do any better. And, frankly, after all these late nights and early mornings, I am beginning to feel the simulated effects of 24 hour daylight already. Our lack of sleep could partially account for John’s latest irritation with Triumph.

To recap briefly, until November last year, John was the proud owner of a 2003 Triumph Trophy. When I registered my BMW in France, John assumed that registering his bike would be just as simple. He was wrong. A letter from Triumph in Paris told us that the French authorities did not recognise the bike’s VIN number as being from a type sold in France. Putting the bike through the necessary tests to ensure that it meets current French road-worthiness and emissions regulations, would have cost in the region of € 5-6k. With no Certificate of Conformity, John could not register the bike … and no registration meant no insurance. The only thing he could do was take the Trophy back to the UK and sell it. In January, he took delivery of a brand new Triumph Tiger, a bike that is most definitely available here in France.

Luckily, as fate would have it, John decided to leave the new bike at his brother’s, giving him a set of wheels when he had to return unexpectedly to the UK at the beginning of February. Unluckily, the day we eventually chose to bring the bike back to France turned out to be the shittiest 24 hours of weather we have had this winter. John braved driving rain, sleet and gale-force winds to get the bike as far as St. Gaudens, about 13km from home. But, when snow began to settle on the A64, I insisted that he abandon the bike, covered, at the péage station and come back for it in the morning.

Once we finally had the bike back it took us a further week or so to send the log book, together with receipts for the necessary modifications to French spec, off to Triumph in Paris in the expectation of receiving the coveted Certificate of Conformity.

Picture the scene, if you will, when we opened the response,

“Il s’avère que je suis dans l’impossibilité de vous faire une attestation …. il faut vous preniez rendez-vous à la DRIRE …. TVV Anglais n’est pas le même que le TVV Français.”

We still don’t know exactly what TVV means, but even if you don’t speak a word of French, I think you’ll get the jist.

Having peeled John off the ceiling, I rang the nice man at the DRIRE (Direction Régionale de l’Industrie, de la Recherche et de l’Environment). I say “nice”, though the last time I had spoken to M. Lavielle over the Trophy, he had sounded less than sympathetic. I read Triumph’s letter to him and he, as I feared, launched into a schpeel about having to send the bike to Paris for emissions tests and it being too expensive to be worth the effort. As he paused for breath, I mentioned that he had said the same thing to me regarding John’s previous bike and, surely, the same could not be true for a 2008 bike. To my relief, he agreed that something didn’t seem quite right, and to send him all the documentation we had sent to Triumph. He then went on holiday for three weeks.

Having been in France now for more than 30 days, the Tiger’s UK insurance was invalid, and so John’s bike joined my BMW in the hall. With a bit of manhandling, we managed to tuck it snuggly under the stairs, leaving just enough room for us to use the front door. It was quite a talking point. I don’t know many other people who keep two 1000cc+ motorcycles in their hallway.

With the weather now warming up and the mountain roads beckoning, we have made some progress. I rang M. Lavielle again the day he got back to the office. Encouragingly, he remembered seeing my letter. There was a bit of shuffling of paper at the other end of the line before he told me that I needed to ring Triumph in Paris. “What!?”

Apparently, instead of writing a half-witted and unhelpful letter, referring me to the DRIRE, what Triumph should actually have done was to supply an “Attestation de Conformité Partielle”. “Bien sûr”, said M. Rivain at Triumph, when I spoke to him a few minutes later, “I’ll post it today”. Great, isn’t it, when people know their jobs.