Frustration
March 5, 2008 at 8:41 pm | Bike | No comment
I finally found a BMW F650 GS Dakar on Ebay, for the right price no less!
Downside it was in Rotherham, which is a good 3 hours drive away.
I cheekily asked Alex to give me a lift yesterday to go and see it, but he declined the thankless and tiring task of driving for 6 hours.
The next day I arranged to get a train up, (quite how it worked out at £29 at 9am and £58 at 10am I haven’t the faintest, needless to say I opted for the earlier!) but as the chap works nights I couldn’t get a train that would arrive before he left, so I booked one for the day after with the promise that if I liked what I saw, he’d let me have it for £2,100.
Less than 3 hours later he rings me back and informs me politely that some-one has just been to see the bike and given him £2,500 for it!
Oh well, such is life and I spend 10 minutes wrestling through automated telephone mazes attempting to cancel my ticket, only to be told to go to the website to cancel it (usefully neglecting the address, which I had since forgotten as I’d been referred through more places than your average ISP tech-support query!).
After tearing my hair out to find the address, and swearing and shouting so loudly (admittedly quite unnecessarily) that the neighbours resorting to playing the piano (badly) to drown out the racket, I eventually find the site!
As you may already have guessed by this point, at the end of it all they did not in fact grace my card with a refund as I was “ineligible” for unexplained reasons.
I’m beginning to wish I hadn’t chosen to go on an F650 Dakar, and I certainly wouldn’t have had they been as rare when I was buying the first one as they are now!
Quite why the entire world has suddenly decided they’re the best thing since sliced eggs and are tripping over each other for the opportunity to sell their granny for one I don’t know.
I think a non-dakar will have to suffice.
My original plan to buy a Kawasaki KLR was scuppered today by an email from Kiwibob (reseller of all things Jesse) informing me that the racks required to attach my panniers to a KLR (which is the only bike cheaper than the F650 that they’re compatible with), would have to be made to order and shipped from the US, and as if that wasn’t bad enough, they were always backlogged with orders for them.
Still! The F650GS standard is a fine bike, and I’ve found one nearby that is cheap, the right age and seems in fairly good condition!
So fingers crossed some cunt doesn’t come along and offer twice the asking price for this one!