... and how I got there.

The destination...

On Tuesday I said, "I'm going to be visiting a fascinating piece of architecture, and getting there in an unusual way": today I visited the East Beach Cafe in Littlehampton (designed by Heatherwick Studios) and got there by Harley Davidson. e-architect.co.uk says: "The studio saw its challenge as being to produce a long, thin building without flat, two-dimensional façades. The building is sliced diagonally into ribbons which wrap up and over the building, forming a layered protective shell, open to the sea in front.". I've wanted to visit it ever since I saw the Heatherwick exhibition at the V&A, and today was the perfect opportunity.

How I got there is a character quirk: everyone is always baffled by how much I like motorcycles... The motorcycle above (funny angle...) is a Harley Davidson Fat Boy (a.k.a. The bike that the terminator rides in Terminator 2. It is actually the star of the film). Before today I would have said that I wasn't really very keen on Harley Davidsons (neither my style nor my volume), but today was such a blast (my face hurts from grinning so much) that to say that now would simply be untrue.

Acts of kindness: my dentist K. is the coolest dentist ever, and the most generous man you're ever likely to meet. He knows that I'm nutty about bikes (we'd talk about it as I knew that he had a Harley...) and one day I went for a routine appointment, but he had booked a double slot for me so that he could take me for a half-hour ride around the lanes of Sussex. That was amazing! Today, however, I spent the whole day with him as he'd had me insured on his bike so that we could go for a ride! A ride?! We rode from Worthing to Littlehampton, then on to Southampton, before returning via a very scenic route. He rode his other bike (another Harley: a large Electra Glide) and I rode The Terminator Bike.

Coolest dentist? No, coolest and most kind-hearted friend.

p.s. I took my father's little camera on my adventure, but it had a freak out (the lens got jammed, and would neither extend fully nor retract: eventually it retracted so I turned it off and left it off) so I resorted, begrudginly, to my phone. I'm not happy with the pictures, but decided not to let it get to me: I had a fantastic day, and the pictures were secondary to wonderful memories.