A One-Cylinder Porsche - June 5

Tuesday, June 5

Arne, a Danish Nimbus riding friend, happens to be in Toronto for a few days of business, so we meet in The Annex for brunch. Nice place, and a nice Italian waitress (?) who claims to dreams in German, much to the dismay of her father, who fought the Nazis in WW2. She also dreamt of a river of champagne flowing through Copenhagen, she said, when learning we were Danish. Never heard of such a nice dream about my town before.
   Some hours later I'm off to Oakville where another Nimbus owner, Ed Olesen, lives. I met him in 1982, on my first transcontinental trip, and have in the years since been sent Nimbus pictures of him from time to time.

Friend Adrian in background tells Ed's weakness is peanuts, so he had a 10 lbs. bag of them in the garage - until one day when it mysteriously had been emptied completely. Turns out a chipmunk, who clearly knew how little Ed uses the Nimbus, had moved them all to into the sidecar.

He's waiting in his garage, where all his toys are parked; A Honda Monkey bike that won't start, a Batavus moped, his red Nimbus outfit, and on a trailer the Porsche. Best known for his sports cars (and less so for his tanks*), Porsche also built more mundane vehicles like this single cylinder tractor from 1958. Bought in Denmark, restored here, and now used for cruise night (!), tractor pulls (!!) and plowing contests.

   Unfortunately the next generation of his family cares little for motorcycles or mopeds, so everything but the tractor has to go. The 1926 'Stovepipe' I saw him on back then is already gone, auctioned off in Las Vegas a few months back, and now resides amongst 200 other bikes some collector has collected.

* https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=porsche+tank+ww2&qpvt=porsche+tank+ww2&FORM=IGRE

825 cc one-cylinder Porsche Junior's groundshattering 12 (twelve) bhp lifts its front wheels during a tractor pull.

A younger version of Ed Olesen, astride the Nimbus 'Stovepipe' way back when it still had the 19" wheels from the later 'Bumblebee' model. The old Nimbus handled much better with these tyres, say Ed, than it did with the original ones.

Having a Nimbus over here is a great way to win prizes, which Ed has done to his heart's delight. I see the trophys, plaques and medals everywhere, even a dozen of them stacked on a bookshelf. But it's so easy: All one really has to do is just showing up, after which the uniqueness of the design, and the judges having little idea about how original or not the bike is, takes care of the rest.

Many remininces and a dinner later I ride back, and on the elevated highway through downtown Toronto's canyon of glass highrises. In the US I often saw Stars & Stripes flying free from big Harley's rear ends. Canadian flagmania aside, here it's the cars that have them, like the one with a Russian and an Iranian flag I saw earlier today. Or now, unfortunately going in the opposite direction, one with two East German flags....

House around the corner from Hanna, whose inhabitants said they have not yet made up their minds on which candidate to vote for.

Later, after going to bed, all hell breaks loose in the back garden, a just few meters from me. It's the bloody raccoons again, a small army by the sounds of it. Gnarling and screaming, they either fight or - for all I can tell - have an orgy. After ten minutes of this, I open the garden door and yell at them to get lost. Three seconds of silence, then some mutterings, raccoon style, and they decide to take their leave.