Trikes and Wings a Fine Madness Brings…

What started as a quiet evening at home, having a bit of a surf on the “net, has led to my full understanding, at the age of 55, of what the term “mid-life crisis’ means. It ain’t pretty. It hurts. It affects not only the sufferer…

Trikes. Things with three wheels. Some can’t quite bear the weight – those children’s things – of the average, overweight 55 year old, and those that do have a tendency to greatly oversteer at speed. Been there, done…anyway…there are others – another kind of trike – that require the driver to be decorated in tattoos and wearing a headband before he or she – one can never be quite certain nowadays who actually wears the bigger tattoo - ventures out onto the highways and byways in a roar of big sound and hot exhaust fumes. Then there are TRIKES. Not three wheeled bicycles. Not three-wheeled motorcycles. Real TRIKES with a great big wing on top and with the three wheeled bits hanging off at the bottom. And a propeller at the back. Flying things with people on board! As Crocodile Dundee would say, “Now THAT”s a TRIKE!’.   And I want one. Badly. All because I’m 55 and tripping out over a video…

I found this internet site in Norway, quite by accident, as I had ventured accidently into someone’s blog, authored and filmed by a Norwegian (logical), and curiosity overwhelmed me. So, after waiting for the video program to fire up, the first thing I see is this guy taking off in a hang glider with a trike body underneath and an engine and propeller attached. He had his camera bolted to the wing and flew over, at a great height, some of the most beautiful scenery in the world…all of this set to music…whilst wearing a massive snowsuit and goggles…with a huge grin on his face! Maybe the grin bit is going too far…but I had one! This was heaven! To me, the scenery eclipsed even the Sound of Music scene where the camera pans in from a great height and circles Julie Andrews as she emotes her joy to the world…I was hooked. Not on the music, the Norwegian, or even the Norwegian scenery, but TRIKING! And it is a terribly painful affliction. Trikes, I’ve found, cost a lot of money and one must get trained properly. But then, this is a crisis. Crises need attention…