Closing date for April issue -> February 17
Making Memories: The XT500 – column
After more than half a century of riding motorcycles, I'm in the heyday of my decline. Because what everyone's talking about these days – making memories – I did that a long time ago. And I'm reminded of it more and more often: of those memories.
I was in my early twenties when, through a stroke of luck, I bought a like-new XT500. The owner had bought it second-hand, but hadn't been able to get it started after buying it. And yet, starting an XT was and still is more of a skill than a craft.
The summer after I bought it, I went on holiday to France – as always, alone. Long story short: an illegal youngster riding his older brother's dirt bike found me unconscious on the outside of a bend, several meters below the road. I only learned the story later, when I woke up in a regional hospital – where the air reeked of urine and disinfectant; the smell of urine prevailed – to the soft chirping of birdsong.
Recovery: There was a handsome, young Asian nurse standing next to my bed, talking to a man in a white coat. We're talking about the late 1970s.
In short: after three days, I knew the nurse as Maria Thérèse, and the bed was uncomfortable. But that could also have been due to my injuries. Fortunately, I was kept firmly on morphine. I discharged myself from the hospital, bought strong painkillers at a pharmacy, and limped home on public transport.
When I arrived at my parents' house, I saw my mother and father in mild panic. Before my departure, I had purchased an ANWB International Travel and Credit Letter. You also had to enter an address that would notify them if anything happened. They hadn't received any notification, but a tow truck had delivered a severely crumpled XT500 to their home.
"No, ma'am, I don't know anything about it. I was just supposed to deliver it here, according to the letter."
Well, all the misunderstandings were cleared up, and I got a few days of parental care, just like in my younger days. And everything turned out fine. The XT was rebuilt with stuff that made it even more fun. And after that, a whole lot more bikes and bike memories followed.
But the XT500 memories came flooding back when I saw a beautiful XT500 at Albert Venema's. Completely neat and perfectly original, except for the – civilized-sounding – BSM replacement exhaust. Plus a playful spelling error on a side cover. All the XT memories came flooding back. And if my kickstarting knee hadn't reminded me that it had seen its share of abuse too...
There are electric starter conversion kits for XT500s these days, but that was too much for me. Otherwise, I would have bought myself another XT. For now, I'll just stick to the memories.
The following year I went on holiday again, carefree, on the rebuilt, and no longer original, XT500. To the same place where I had died.
In the petrochemical industry, if the production of a batch goes wrong, a rerun is performed. That is why ReRun Now on my traveling companion's tank. The holiday was fantastic and went smoothly. But I think that was because the corners still remembered me, and because they heard the XT approaching from afar, riding with a virtually undamped suspension, and therefore stretched out as much as possible.
On a vaguely romantic impulse, I visited the hospital where I'd been admitted. Could Maria Thérèse still be working there?
Maria Thérèse no longer worked there. But there was still an unpaid bill waiting for me.
But the most enduring memory of that memorable dive down? I carry it in my right knee and neck. Every morning when I wake up, I feel like something went wrong there at some point.
Beautiful, this memory-making.
Well, yes, the XT500 at the end of 1988, one of the last new ones I bought - if not really the last (that special version with chrome etc.) at Termaat in Nijmegen, before I thought (invoice is still somewhere in the attic in a box) for Fl 4750,00.
It had been gathering dust in the showroom on Hertogstraat for months, and finally a buyer was happy to be rid of it. Starting it was indeed a skill you had to learn. I'd barely ridden it, I think, less than 1000 km. It ran beautifully, braking was a kind of slowing down, especially the front drum. No, then indeed, my later SR500 from 1978, which was standing still.
And then a house came into view, sold in mint condition for 4 guilders. The buyers in Hilvarenbeek must have been thrilled. Oh well, that's how things go when you know everything in advance...
I still occasionally ride my son's HondaXL250 (also 1978) and after a while the Suzuki TS250 two-stroke, but that's another story.
It was around 1980 and then I bought a like new second hand XT 500 from 1978 with very few km on the counter, when I first read something about this bike I wanted one and I used it for holidays and for enduro competitions, I still have it and last year I rode a week OTR with my 52 year old daughter on a Honda XL 125 R in the Cevennes with a guide from MDMOT.DE, always great guides, I am 80 years old and still enjoy off-road riding, now a lot with the Honda from 1986 that I got from my cousin who bought it for his daughter at the time. The XT500, unfortunately they don't make them like that anymore...
An XT….nice thing; always wanted one but never got around to it.
Luckily I don't know what I'm missing!🥴
Me too, and at least as happy! I quickly swapped it for the road-going SR500. I've done about 80 km/h on it without any issues, not least because of the better handling and a real front brake, which the XT doesn't have.
Never rode an XT500, which is a real shame. I still vividly remember the sound of those things, though. Speaking of memories… Also, the rider sitting low, and often seeing them practically fly into a corner with a leg stretched out. It's a shame the prices have become out of this world. They're really fun bikes!!
It was 1975, fresh out of college and a first job. A motorcycle was on the horizon, but which one? It had to be unique and affordable. Absolutely zero knowledge and skill compelled me to buy my first Moto 73; inside it, a life-size advertisement for Motorhuis Safe. On a reckless Saturday morning, I set off on a 2CV4, Safewaarts.
And there it was, the XT500, a year old and (at that time) affordable……
The following Friday he was to be delivered, hardly slept that night and clocked out of the boss's office on the second to go home... there he stood, in all his temptation.
So, start it, turn the ignition, and pedal away—no sweat. With an oversized right leg, I called Safe's helpdesk: squeeze the decompression lever, pedal gently until something metallic appears in the window on the engine block... release everything and pedal!
Pedaling until you drop, no messing around, and furious. My good dad, who'd also ridden a motorcycle, sees my red face and Hulk-like right leg and asks, "Why is your ignition on parking light?"
SIGH……!!!
I have two completely worn-out world bikes; I still secretly look at them now and then, but back then they only cost 3500 guilders new in the crate, and now...