We have a Bowl

Yep as you can see the concreting of the park in Whitley Bay is well underway, the contractors started spraying the transitions on Tuesday. The bowl looks very impressive and that oververt section should be intersting! It is sort of kidney shaped with a channel and 2 hips leading from the 5ft into the 6ft sections. The rest of the park is nearing completion too and I reckon it should be around 2 weeks for the rest of the concrete work to be finished then maybe another week for the landscaping. Me and Wally went down there tonight to try and test it out as the flat bottom had been finished but a gang of rats on bikes and boards had already tried jumping the fence and the rent a cop was phoning the law, then it pissed it down so we retreated back to Wallys for chicken pie and peas. Very nice it was too! That bowl will be ridden before the week is out.
Heres the plans for a reminder for what it will look like:

Cleggy has posted a Ruben Alcantara thread on the Attila blog, not sure how many times I've watched those sections but they never get old. Check it out.

The Count gets blogging

The Chris Lee aka Sky Heed aka the Count has started a blog focusing on partying in Newcastle with a bit of riding thrown in too- sounds good to me. Its called Vampire Attack and there is a humorous post on there about his house mate Scott Taylor and his rise to infamous Heaton tattooist extraordinaire . He did my leg and it came out pretty good, not sure about some of the others though!!

Berlin trip..

Last summer I was fortunate enough to go traveling for about 4 weeks around Europe, hitting up Amsterdam, Berlin, Prague, Melt Festival, Lyon, Tarragonna and Barcelona. I had the time of my life and rode so many amazing spots and went to some brilliant places, but the one place that stuck out for me out of everywhere was Berlin. There are so many good things about it that I struggle to even think of a negative to describe that place. The vibe of the whole city seems chilled and people seem to move around at there own pace, cycle paths are in abundance and the roads are wide. The people are friendly and it is far cheaper than other capital cities such as Paris, London or Amsterdam (kebabs and Turkish pizza less that 2 Euros!). The music scene is large and varied, with the city being most well known for its love of techno (& the techno viking!). And it goes with out saying that the street spots are unreal. .
In short I love Berlin and have been longing to return since soon after I left last July. So now the plane tickets are booked, festival tickets purchased and money has been saved.

As we are flying this year instead of getting the ferry and trains we have all bought bodyboard bags to pack our bikes and gear in for the flight, once you take your wheels, bars and pedals off there is enough room to pack your rucksack as well so you only have to take one bag onto the flight saving on baggage costs. They are cheaper than buying a proper bike bag and when you land and unpack your bike it rolls up pretty small and can be strapped to the side of your rucksack no problem.

Bodyboard bags do the trick for an inexpensive bike bag. £20 on Ebay

For the first week myself Wally and Jo are staying at this campsite which is only 5 mins walk from the main train station. Aside from hosting bands, Dj's and BBQ's on an evening it also boasts an empty pool with flatbanks in the deep end that you are able to ride, does it get any better?

On the weekend of the 18th we are heading to Melt Festival for 3 days, we went last time and it was an amazing weekend. Aside from the music there is also a huge lake that you can swim in which was handy last year since Germany was experiencing one hell of a heatwave during July.
There are a load of other riders heading over at the same time including Kenny B, Cookie, Ratty and Benson so hopefully some good sessions will go down and good times will be had. Here's some photos from last year-

Roll on the 10th July!!!!!