My Scooterist Life

Unfortunately nobody in my family was really enthusiastic about scooters and I grew up in the back of an old VW Bug, but sometimes I was dreaming of my Vespa Life already!

It was very slow and it was not overly pretty, but it was my only way to see my first real girlfriend. She did not like it too much, because we lost an uphill race against a cyclist once. There were no available spare parts for it and it was difficult to tune. I started wrenching but even nearly lost my front wheel once on my way to school.

As soon as I turned 18 I had my motorcycle license which was necessary to get my shiny black Vespa PX200 GS which was back in those days not overly popular because only elderly people had the 200 and all the teens rode the smaller P 80 X. I fitted alot of chrome and even got custom made chrome side panels and had a union jack seat. All that was very fancy and expensive for a teenager.
Unfortunately I have no picture of it. I was absolutely happy because I had the fastest Vespa in the neighbourhood... at least till I tuned it and it seized at full speed on the highway The same day I damaged the chrome and the seat.

2007 I spent the entire summer in Malaga Spain where I became "DonCalvo". I organised big beach parties for international students on the Costa del Sol. During winter I organised myself an old dented V50N to take with me in the seaon 2008 so I could ride from language school to language school along the beach.

Already back in 2010 after living in Spain, Sweden and Cyprus I tried to plan on my first big Vespa Roadtrip through europe and I wanted to visit Vespa Clubs and produce a coffee tabel book about trip and the vespa scene in all of europe. I made a concept, produced an embarrasing video for a crowdfunding of the trip and it failed. Barely any club answered me because and nobody was interested. I did not care because I was freshly in love and moved to Eindhoven. The idea went back into the drawer.

My first Vespa World days where great!
It was also the start to my big ride all around
Europe. Made many new friends back then

After some years living in the Netherlands and Portugal and Backpacking in Asia I came back home to Germany to work in a digital agency. The job was ok but the perspective horrible and my boss was an idiot. I decided to quit, simply go on a sabbatical and ride through all countries of Europe. I bought myself "Madalina" and left. After 130 days, 22.450 kms and 32 countries around Europe and northern Africa I was hooked on "LA VIDA VESPA"

End of january 2015 I rode 750 kms in temperatures under 0 to "Elefantentreffen" in Solla Bavaria and spent a night camping there at -14 degrees Celsius. Riding in ice and snow was quite an experience. It was also fascinating to chat with many hardcore bikers attending the oldest and biggest motorcycle winter meeting. Some Vespas are there but that is really an exception.

In Spring 2015 I started to organize the Vespa Scene in my Hometown. I literally rode from Village to Village to invite Vespa Riders to attend weekly scooter meetups in changing bars. We had anice average of 20 people attending each week. I also organised rideouts and season start and finish events. On the biggest event 120 riders attended!
In 2016 I decided to give up my presidency and focus on my personal riding goals again, because the club cost me a lot of time and money and did not contribute to my personal goals.

During Summer 2015 I visited in one big vespa travel adventure the

Vespa Alp Days in Austria,
Vespa World Days in Croatia
Vespa Rally Tomelloso inSpain.

All riding on my dear P200 E "Madalina.
It was a great holiday in 8 countries and with over 6000 kms ridden. My longest Day was 880 kms/Day.
During this event the idea of my 80 days around the world was planted in my head!
It was also my first time on TV in a foreign country because scootering.

Summer 2015 was very busy for me. I had also decided to set a Double World Record.
For this challenge I picked another type of scooter. A stock 125 Scomadi. The first one delivered on european main land. I had a team of three people follow me in a service van and we started a 23.5h challenge through 10 countries and over 1691 kms from Brenner Pass in Italy to Padborg Denmark.
30 degrees celsius and sun at the start changing to 9 Degrees and hard rain during the night made it an awefull ride.

In Winter 2015 I had the Idea to connect Vespa & Lambretta Riders worldwide in a Contactbook on Facebook to promote friendship and travels between riders. In a matter of only 2-3 weeks the network grew to over 11.000 Riders from over 70 Nations. Many new friendships and international visits between scooterists resulted from it.

>4500 km Roadtrip to Spain to the Event Vespazahar + Alp Days
1 Accident
1 holed Piston
Alp Days

Ride with 2 friends over 1400 km to Lake Garda Italy
1 Accident
1 broke Clutch
1 Emergency Medical Transport

Ride for kids with cancer
8290 km in 5 Countries to raise
>25.000 € for Deutsche Kinderkrebsstiftung

Preparation of my 80 Days around the world on Vespa
Ridng 10.000 km from Virginia Beach (East Coast)
to San Diego (West Coast) with a small Excursion to Tijuana
for Tacos and a Tattoo 😉

27.113 km in 18 Countries on 3 Continents
3 Scooters (One for each continent)
Fastest Solo Circumnavigation of the Planet in Vespa History

Visit of the Alp Days in Zell am See and the Vespa World Days in Zanka Hungary

3600 kms in Ape50 Threewheler "Anita"
from Faro Portugal to Kempten Germany

6300 km in 7 Countries in 62 days
on 50 ccm Vespa V50N from 1971
Raising >84.000€ for 19 Kids Cancer Foundations

After aprox. 120.000 kms in 44 countries on 4 continents, several charity actions, 3 unofficial world records and 1.000.000 memories made, I take a timeout for a while to recover. Need to refill my wallet, my energy and also do some maintenance on most of my vehicles.