The long road to setting up motorcycle and sidecar tours?
So here we are. I have set up this company, a one man band called Mid Wales Tours and launched it onto the world. The only fully licenced motorcycle and sidecar tour guide in the UK. Well unless you know differently of course.
How did we get here then I hear you ask? Well a little background information to start with. Having been born not far from Llanidloes and then lived in Mid Wales all my life at the age of twenty three I joined the dark side and became a police officer.
For some reason still unknown to me Dyfed Powys Police thought I would make a police officer and accepted me into their ranks.
My Police Service
It was the year 1982 just as the Falklands conflict started and I was sent to Cwmbran training school. I was one of the Pongo’s, That’s how officers from DDP where known. I started marching, studying, marching again and had a haircut every Monday night for ten weeks. The barber was Italian who only knew how to cut hair one way. I had no idea my hair grew that quickly, either that or the drill instructed took a back hander from the barber.
Posted to Welshpool
I was posted to Welshpool following my initial training and quickly decided that I wanted to become a traffic officer in particular I wanted to become a police patrol bike rider.
A few years later I joined the traffic department as a motorcyclist. My driver and rider training involved a, five week standard driving course that was based on the police method of driver control. Then I received a three week standard motorcycle course in Bridgend. A year later I took part in a two week advanced motorcar course again in Bridgend and this was followed by a three week advanced motorcycle course.
Over the next twenty five years I continued to receive further driver rider training totaling about 53 weeks in all.
I was posted to Newtown, Llandrindod Wells and back to Newtown. The last five years I was traffic sergeant and covered the whole of Ceredigion and Powys dealing with fatal and life changing collisions. As a result I travelled just about every road there is in Mid Wales building up me knowledge of not only the roads but the tea and cake stops as well which has served me well during my tours.
That amount of rider training allowed my to become the rider I am today. As a result I have been an examiner for the Institute of Advanced Motorists for both car and motorcycle. I have been providing advanced training courses and tours for about the last twenty years, passing on the knowledge gained during my service.
Retirement
The day comes to us all in the end. I was fortunate that I completed my thirty years before the pension rules changed and I was able to retire at fifty three. Happy days indeed. I continued to run advanced motorcycle tours and began my life as an unofficial tour guide.
I applied for some training from WOTGA the Wales Official Tourist Guiding Association but they were not running a course at that time but took my name anyway. Then seven years later oy of the blue came an email asking me if I was still interested in training. Of course I said yes and so a short while later after an interview training began.
During one of the first sessions we were asked the question, ‘What are you going to do that will make you stand out from the crowd as a tour guide?’
I decided that I wanted to run motorcycle and sidecar tours taking two clients out on unique tours of Mid Wales. I searched the internet and couldn’t find anyone else in the UK who provided that service.
I didn’t wait to complete my tour guide training which was much delayed due to Covid-19 before starting the long process of setting up the business.
Was I onto a winner? could I get it off the ground? What would the council say? Well that’s for the next blog.