As I write, I’m sitting by a reservoir in the Derwent Valley. I’m taking a few days off from a day job of writing and driving in pretty places like the Peak District by, er, riding in the Peak District and writing.
Anyway, it’s more peaceful this way because there’s no photographer shouting at me and it doesn’t matter that there’s no phone reception.And it is peaceful. The sound of birdsong and gentle lapping water, the quack of ducks attempting to drown one another; all very idyllic. But every now and then, a car or motorbike fires up in the nearby car park. Nothing seriously quick and not driven or ridden away quickly, but for a few moments, it’s all you can hear.
Then, less frequently, there is the rasp of something fast, being revved and ridden or driven quickly along some good driving roads.
I don’t mind it, but I can imagine thatif you’re here for the peace and quiet, it might get your goat. Not everybody likes machines as we do, and I’m more aware than ever that fast cars and bikes are, if used to anything like their potential, massively antisocial.
That’s a pity. I recently spent a weekend perving over extraordinary machinery at the Goodwood Festival of Speed. I admired supercars that are more powerful and that can go faster, harder, louder than ever.
And yet:the most enjoyable metal you can buy is something that has none of those ambitions. It has modest limits, engages at all speeds, and doesn’t shout about it while doing so. The power race never stops, I get that, and anyone who moves near a race track and then complains about the noise will have nothing but my contempt. But the perfect driver’s car will entertain the bod at its wheel, while not advertising its presence to an entire valley of walkers.
That said, I met a man in the pub last night, out for the peace and quiet but a keeper of old motorbikes at home. He polishes them, looks at them and sometimes listens to them, but doesn’t ride them any more. He’s 87, he told me (quite a few times as it happens), and likes to remember riding. He liked remembering a lot because “at my age, you have more memories behind you than you do experiences in front of you”.
Which is likely true, I’m sure, but that – the incessant creeping of time, which, at 87, you know is going to catch up with you at some point – sounds to me like a reason to be trying to fit in more experiences in the years you’ve got left, not fewer.
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You have to do it somewhere......!,but
Yes, I agree it can be antisocial to go screaming along a Country Road or through a Valley but, where else would you go?.....a Track Day...?..... They can be expensive in more ways than one,then there's the getting there, get up early and if the Weather is decent, go for a blast at 5-6am, otherwise your left with doing it on a Day when it's decent or not and you'll annoy someone,but, unless you stop at the same Pub as them it doesn't matter,like it or lump it it's part of life, the noise isn't forever unless it's a Motorbike Club and there are 20+ in convoy,so if the Sun is out,just enjoy it.
Interesting topic
I love to escape to the national parks, but its often surprising just how busy the roads are and how far road noise travels. Its not simply bikes and sports cars, but lorries (a V8 Scania lorry hauling a heavy load up a hill is makes quite a noise) and entirely average cars. Everything makes noise, and roads in the valleys can be heard on the top of the hills and mountains. Of course I have to admit to being part of the problem, given I drive to the parks, but I wonder if we need to explore different road surfaces and perhaps different noise limits in the national parks to try and control the problem.
Time and a place.
Time and a place.
Some idiot in an Impreza doing 50mph through a town centre in 2nd gear, with the stupid turbo blowback noise and a loud exhaust, or someone on a housing estate in a ruined VW with a loud exhaust playing crap music in the stereo system worth more than the car, or someone who has ruined a RWD Nissan doing donuts on a crossroads.
However at a track day it's all good.