Nineteen mates on 40 year-old motorcycles with a top speed of 35mph have raised more than £18,000 for St Catherine’s Hospice after riding the Coast to Coast route and back.
The idea started with Martin Marot and a mate having a pint in the local pub talking about their classic Honda Cub motorcycles and over the next couple of months turned into a 300 mile round trip across a whole weekend.
The riders left Robin Hood’s Bay at 8am on Saturday and rolled back in at 5.30pm on Monday.
A mix of pre-1985 Honda C50s, 70s and 90s navigated the backroads from Robin Hood’s Bay to the Lakes, via an overnight stop in Windermere.
Martin said: “Like all good things, me and my mate were sat in the pub one night talking about our Honda C90s and said we should do something before summer ends. Then we thought of the Coast to Coast and a few more mates said they will do it, then a few more and then we said we should do it for charity and ended up with 19 of us.”
“We chose St Catherine’s as it is a popular charity around here and we have a lot of friends and family who have been in over the years.”
Due to the slow speed of the machines, they had to take the back roads and passed through villages and hamlets who ended up following and supporting their journey on social media – and quite literally.
A JustGiving page collected £18,000, with more money donated to collection buckets still being counted.
“It is a fantastic amount”, said Martin, “and we are over the moon with it. We thought we would set a silly figure at £10,000 and would be happy at that, but we have nearly doubled it.
“The support along the way was amazing and humbling really. People turned up to see us in places like Hawes and Kirkby Stephen and were asking us where we were going next.”
The trip wasn’t without its mishaps. The engine on Martin’s bike seized and needed to be replaced in the car park at The Tan Hill Inn and keeping 19 motorcycles together was tricky at times.
Martin added: “Literally every day there was a mishap or a wrong turn. On bigger bikes or cars it is easier to keep up with each other but with these being so old we were spread out over three miles.
“It is all part of the fun and we are already planning next year – it was fun, for a good cause so why not?”
