Black Country MAG

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since 04.04.2000

Trafalgar Square Demo.

22nd July 2000

I'm not writing much for this one, coz I'm ill - something virulent picked up from Chris' slum-flat in Wycombe where we stayed for the weekend. Instead, loads of pictures!

Getting there was exactly what you would expect. We all get up with severe hangovers (it was my birthday on the Friday!), get the bikes out (trying to start them without making any noise!), and blast down the M40 to try and meet up with the Wycombe and Windsor MAG lot. Get there with just enough time to take our lids off, then put them straight back on again.

Back on the M40 into London to meet up with loads of others at the Ace Cafe. Just enough time to sink a can of Red Bull - my hangover's gone by this point, but Chris is looking worse by the minute! - then off again.

Then we got lost! It wasn't the most comprehensively posted run - we saw one marshall just after the Ace, then everyone just had to make it up. Me and Chris followed someone who looked confident, but they got lost as well!

Eventually found our way to Trafalgar Square, and got directed into Whitehall to park up with a few other bikes. Chris is looking very unwell and moaning a lot by this point!

Found our way into Trafalgar Square, just as the speeches were starting. Neil Liversidge gave Tony Blair and John Prescott a good slagging off. Ian Mutch had his usual rant, and the MAG President - Dennis Howard, one of the founders of MAG - put in a few words as well. We didn't hear all of the speeches, coz we had to find Chris a bench to sit on at the rear of the square as he was still very fragile.

I haven't heard any offical estimate of attendance figures yet, but it seemed woefully short of the 50,000 that was aimed at. However, you can see from the crowd pictures that a fair few people did make the effort to get into the Capital. Most dissapointing is the lack of news coverage - we found a few lines on Ceefax on Saturday night, but haven't seen any other references to it. If anyone heard any coverage of the event, let us know.

And, yes, we did get lost on the way out of London! Over an hour and a half to get back to Wycombe! (we did go through Camden twice, even though Chris assures us he was travelling in a straight line!)

Had to include a picture of this KTM, coz I've never seen one in the flesh before, and they're pretty!

Below are the pictures Scott sent of the West Midlands run to Trafalgar Square: