Wednesday, Thursday and Friday night have had live music on stages around the city. I had work to do on Thursday and Friday so couldn't stay out late (as a result I've still not seen Mooi Wark live - they were at half past midnight on Friday morning). However, no work today so we did go along last night.
An excellent event. As usual with a big event in the city there was simply not enough cycle parking to go around, even in places like that shown which are not actually bicycle parks at all. Bicycles are overwhelmingly the method used by locals to get into the city for events.
However, the focus of this event was another type of bike...This jet bike was demonstrated on streets in the centre of the city. We watched the demonstration. Someone videoed it during the day and put it on youtube. It takes a while to start, and then it makes an awesome racket. So much so in fact, that the camera used to make the video seemed to give up the will to record sound:
Also there were people doing stunt riding in the city streets. Very impressive it was too. We were standing in the crowd on the other side of the landing ramp from this video:
And we spent a bit of time drinking a few beers and listening to music before riding our bikes home in the early hours. A great night out, in the company of around 40000 others who were also enjoying the evening's events.
For the next post I'll return to bicycles with pedals...
Thanks to sybrand2 and MetalMike50 for the videos
As a postie from a competitor to DHL said to me a few years ago: "You know what DHL stands for? Das heisst langsam" (DHL is German).
ReplyDeleteIt would seem that they are trying to improve on that image.
DHL in Dutch: Doet het langzaam.
ReplyDeleteFor those who understand neither Dutch nor German, I ought to explain that both of these mean "does it slowly". The jet bike may well be, as Frits says, an attempt to change the image :-)
ReplyDeleteThis is one of the most obscenely stupid demonstrations I've seen in a long time. Sigh.
ReplyDeleteThe Deutsche Post (a.k.a. DHL, or vice-versa) should better use their customer's money to properly pay their carriers. The overworked staff might in the future avoid leaving mail and parcels on the doorstep in the busy hallway.
Anonymous: "Obscene" ? Really ? In my view, this is obscene, as is what is reported here, and, of course, this.
ReplyDeleteHowever, that long yellow thing jet engined thing above ? That's just someone having fun with a motorbike.
You may well think it's in bad taste, and I might just agree with that, however, if the only use of fossil fuels in the world was the occasional person daft enough to put a jet engine in a motorbike, there wouldn't be a shortage. The problems we are facing, with peak oil and climate change come from mundane uses such as the daily commute by car, not from people like this.