That’s what awaits me on Sunday at The Ace Cafe in North London as I attend the Overland & Adventure Travel Bike Day. The day kicks off at 9am and I’ll be there from around 6am helping Les set up the Traveldri Plus stand. I can’t wait to show off the XT on the stand and explain to everyone why I have a rubber mat on my seat.

I’ll also be announcing the winner of the 2012 most inspirational travel book awards (voting closes on Friday so go vote now). In true thelondonbiker style I also have some stuff to give away.

Motorcycle Direct – the bike insurers – have given me two hampers to give away. The first is a valentine’s week special – this is your get out of jail free card – if you’ve left the Mrs behind to get to the Ace and play with your mates – head home with this to calm the waters. The hamper has:

It’s easy to win these hampers – I’ll have them with me on the day – all you need to do is find me and say at the top of your voice ‘These BMW jobs are crap!‘ See, easy. First person to find me and say these magic words after 9am gets both hampers there and then – can’t say fairer than that.

See you on Sunday!

And the winner was: Alex Richards from London! Congratulations Alex and I hope you other half enjoyed the bubbles and chocolate.

I stopped commuting into London when I moved out of town and had to ride down Euston Road and out to the Old Street roundabout every day. I had four near-death experiences on that stretch of road in as many days and decided it was time to hide the bike away for commuting and concentrate on the adventure bit. But reading through the stats it seems I’m in a minority.

London has more bikers than Manchester, Birmingham and Newcastle combined. In fact 12 per cent of the total UK bikers are based in London. Which is hardly surprising when you consider the daily grid lock into and out of town. It also turns out that over the last year we’ve been registering more low-powered bikes (50-125cc) than ever before. There were 17 per cent more new, low engine bikes registered in the UK between December 2010 and December 2011. I just hope they’re not all scooters. (not that I have anything against idiot scooter riders you understand).

We all know that biking into London is quicker, cheaper and greener than pretty much all other options – so I think it may be time to reconsider that season ticket with Chiltern Railways and get back on the bike. I may even get the gear out in time for the ride from The Ace Cafe on Saturday with Ross Noble and friends in aid of Riders for Health - something you should consider if you’re heading to the show on Saturday.

For me though, the highlight of the show has to be going to see Dougie Lampkin wreck the place – I love the press blurb:

By day he’s the mild-mannered 12-times World Trials Champion, but by night Dougie Lampkin roams the streets in pursuit of an ASBO. This should do it – breaking and entering the ExCeL London where in just a few days he’ll be racing David Knight, John McGuinness, Neil Hodgson, Ian Hutchinson and Chris Walker in our Revolution extreme obstacles enduro challenge, sponsored by Michelin. But will he get past the SAS-trained guard to do the pre-race research he craves?

Nothing else to say really… mild-mannered 12-times World Trails Champion? Surely that’s not possible. Take a look at the video to see what I mean.

I’ve been stunned by the response – so many books have been nominated that I’ve had to narrow them down to the top 20 so that voting will be a little more sensible. The winners of the nomination competition to win a £30 Traveldri-Plus voucher and a Lonely Planet book up to the value of £15 are:

• 1st Place - Greg Hughes (voucher)
• 2nd Place – Steve Freeman  (book)

Congratulations to you both. Now, without further ado – get clicking the votes below and help make your favourite travel book the 2012 Inspirational Travel book of the year!

• Power Traveller Products
• Power monkey
• Mini gorilla
• Exped Down / Syn Mats
• TATONKA – Narvik 2
• EXPED – Orion
• Garmin Zumo 660 – long term test

I want to do a lot more than that this year – especially when I head down to the Pyrenees in September – but I’d really like your feedback on what you’d like to see reviewed. So please… take a moment and use the form below to make some suggestions and I’ll get right on it.

I’ve already started to gather recipes to film over on Horizons – but if you’ve got something you’d like to try let me know.

Let me know what you'd like me to review.

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Suggestions so far:

• Spearmint Rhino (I’m going to say no here)
• Bike luggage (will do a comparison I think – soft vs hard, different types of hard)
• Brick lane bagel shop (no idea, but okay why not)
• Tucano Thermal Aprons
• France (what the whole country?)

So to kick things off here is the 2012 nominations form. I’ll keep nominations open for 10 days (closing at midnight on the 21st January 2012). The titles nominated will then be put up for public voting over another 10 days – we’ll then be able to announce the top 10 most inspiring travel books for 2012. You can nominate any book – it doesn’t need to have been published recently.

To help things along I’m going to put two prizes up for grabs – 1st prize is a Traveldri Plus £30 voucher and 2nd prize is a Lonely Planet book of your choice up to a max value of £15. In order to enter you must provide your details on the form below (which you can also access directly here). Judges (my) decision is final and winners will be selected at random from all nominations received.

::NOMINATIONS CLOSED::

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Tortillas to Totems by Sam Minicom

I’ve been reading Sam’s books for quite a few years now. First there was Into Africa - a journey through the heart of, you guessed it, Africa, by a man who had only just figured out what a motorbike was for (travel of course). Next up was Under Asian Skies which took us right across Asia with Sam and the people he met along the way. The next book out of the already quite impressive stable was Distant Suns which was based on the diaries of Sam’s partner and travel buddy Birgit Schuenemann. Finally we have his latest book – Tortillas to Totems- and what a corker it is.

As regular readers of this blog will know, I don’t often write book reviews. Not because I don’t devour every single adventure motorcycle book out there – but because for the most part… um… they’re not very good. I’ve made some exceptions to that rule – first with Lois Pryce and her book – Red Tape and White Knuckles and eventually I will for Paddy Tyson and his books – but the stand-out daddy of them all is Sam Manicom.

Tortillas to Totems is easily Sam’s best book so far. The writing style is engaging and steady – that horribly addictive style that leaves you realising you’ve been reading for 10 hours straight and just can’t put the book down. The stories he tells don’t just transport you there – they encourage you to get on your bike and ride. For me – that’s the best thing a travel book can do. If you only want to read one of Sam’s books – start with this one, then head back to Into Africa and read the rest – just be prepared to leave a few days clear before you start!

You can buy Sam’s book over at amazon.co.uk (where you can also find his books in kindle format) and also learn more about Sam and his adventures over at his website.

Take a look at the map below and let me have your thoughts on the route. No real planning in there so far – just the roads that google maps tracked as I drew the lines. The idea is to get the bike run out to Trieste in North Italy and then run the circle over two weeks. The red line into Bosnia and Herzegovina is only there if I have time on the way back.

View Albania 2012 in a larger map

The reason I’m writing this post is because I’ve found a new insurance company and they’re actually pretty good – I’d even go as far as to say they rock. MCE Insurance seem to cover pretty much everything (even quad insurance should I decide I need a quad…. well I need a quad it’s more a case of persuading Mrs Cashmore I need a quad) – the breakdown cover is supplied by RAC and the online forms (for once) were easy and quick to fill out. Right, enough gushing, I just thought I’d point them out and you can take things from here.

It’s been a blast getting this far – I’m holed up in a hotel for the day whilst a tummy irritation sorts itself out so I’ve taken the opportunity to get all the photos of the journey so far together – here they all are!