The Romanian Iron Man?

1000 mile per day Iron Butt riders are endurance lightweights compared to Bogdan Vasilescu of Romania. I got an e-mail from him the other day commenting favorably on my blog and remarking that he'd spent about three hours reading the whole thing through. Zowie! Read the whole thing? That feat of endurance, both physical and mental, (probably more mental) surely deserves a mention here. Your interest, sir, does me great honor!

Taking delivery of your first bike, even a 17 year old GPz is always a good thing.

About motorcycling in Romania, Vasilescu says "Riders are mostly split into three categories: rich (new bikes of all types, usually recent models), medium-class (second hand japanese bikes) and low-end (really old, '60s-'70s russian or german models like Jawa, MZs, Dnepr, Voshod and so on)."

Vasilescu just recently bought his first motorcycle, a "17 year old Kawasaki GPz 500S." I have to congratulate him first on getting a bike, always a good thing, and second on not getting stuck with an old 1972 Dnepr. The Kaw 500 is a pretty nice bike even used and way better than the Yamaha 60 I had to start with. I hope Vasilescu will favor me with a picture or two when the weather warms and he gets out riding more on the GPz.

"Cafe de Coke"

A really interesting picture Vasilescu included with his e-mail is of "an old airplane, transformed into a pub (it's really funny: under the wings there are tables and benches, for the summertime; inside, more tables and benches, for the winter time)" The plane is a Douglas DC3, one of the most successful aircraft designs of all time. Nice to see it's not just gone to the scrap heap but still serving a useful purpose and what could be more useful than dispensing beverages to thirsty motorcyclists?