D7

Rod Allen

Stumble Upon

del.icio.us

Digg

Facebook

Print

Email

Speak Up

My personal 'biker experience' being confined to a second hand mo-ped and three readings of 'Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance' back in the glorious 1970s, details being sketchy at this considerable distance, I assumed Atlanticade was just some delicious, ocean-flavoured Maritime sports drink until I read with shock and chagrin this week that it is actually a biker's ball of some kind.

Shock, I say, because I always spend the summers fixing my hair and doing clinical swine flu vaccine trials for extra cash (please don't mention the extra nostril I'm a little sensitive) and thus missed the darn thing three years running.

And as to chagrin, I learn this week that I will never get a chance to attend this blessed event in my own dear burg since the 2010 edition of Atlanticade (yum) has been lost to Metro's hated rival, beautiful downtown St.-Andrews-by-the-States.

Near as I can make out from our stories about it St. Andrews Mayor John D. Craig, in a rather limp-wristed twist on Marlon Brando's 'Godfather,' has made Atlanticade chairman Dale Hicks "an offer we couldn't overlook."

Powerful stuff, that.

Can't say as I blame Mr. Hicks for accepting the offer in whatever dastardly or at least mildly irritating form it took.

But apart from Mayor Craig's somewhat heavy-handed bargaining tactics I am also given to understand Mr. Hicks is not altogether impressed with the degree of support leant to this event by the City of Moncton.

This assertion is based at least in part on the fact the municipal government booked two other events for the same weekend as Atlanticade last summer, the Bon Jovi concert up on the Hill and a huge meeting of Jehovah's Witnesses at the Moncton Coliseum.

I can see Mr. Hicks's problem; legendary party animals, perhaps, the Witnesses may well have packed the downtown and drank the bar zone dry of delicious, refreshing Atlanticade (non-alcoholic, by the way, and simply stuffed with electrolytes), leaving the bikers to subsist on nothing but beer and whatever might be gleaned from the mini-bars of the local accommodations industry.

But whether I have the story entirely right or not is moot; the show has moved on and there is no point crying over spilt 10W-30.

So I wish Mayor Craig every success this summer entertaining the motorcyclists who, I am given to understand, have in past Atlanticades enjoyed driving their motorcycles hither and yon to various points of interest not only here in the city but to the many regional attractions readily reachable from our advantageously central location.

They will enjoy much the same in St. Andrews.

They can drive up the main drag, which is surprisingly long.

And then they can turn around and drive back right back down it again.

Then they can drive back up, and so on; fill your boots, boys.

But wait, there's more and I quote.

"The St. Andrews area offers an outstanding quality of life in dramatic scenery and an uncrowded, unpolluted environment," states the town's official website.

Besides that there's the "new" Algonquin Golf course (though I'm a little suspicious of the town's use of quotation marks here) the W.C. O'Neill Arena (an impressive multi-purpose facility, they say) and one of the most prestigious hockey schools in North America.

Plus, "the old downtown commercial core is a shopper's paradise, and it's especially renowned for handcrafts and woolen products."

There are also no fewer than three (count 'em, three) marine research laboratories.

A little too much action?

Worry pas: older bikers 'born to be mild' can escape all that hustle and bustle with a river tour, featuring visits to nearby Minister's Island, which has a really cool empty house on it, or alternately fabulous St. Croix Island, which boasts several 400-year-old graves featuring members of Samuel de Champlain's crew, the region's original tourists, still discreetly buried.

What else is there to say?

Congratulations, hated St. Andrews, and to Atlanticade 2010 participants: parrrr-tay.

* City Views appears daily, written by various members of our staff. Rod Allen is an assistant managing editor with The Times & Transcript. His column appears every Thursday.