Driving along the East Coast en route to Margate to cover Africa Bike Week, there’s one goal that I just can’t seem to shake from my thoughts: make Hunter S Thompson proud. That’s what we’re here for: to be journalists at a bike rally, the way that he was during his (attempted) coverage of the Mint 400 Motorcycle race in the Las Vegas desert…to immerse ourselves in a culture; to be Gonzo Journalists.

Granted, he was surrounded by sand in the desert while we would be surrounded by humidity, Harley owners and the bike curious. He was attending a real, like, race, with marshals and a winner while the only race going on in Margate over Harley-Davidson’s Africa Bike Week was the one for onlookers eyeballs. A valid attempt would be made none-the-less.

It’s year 6 of Harley’s annual infestation of the East Coast, and thank God for it otherwise there’d be little other reason to visit this sleepy little stretch of coast. Aside from the beauty. It is a stunning place to be.
Harley’s presence here has been hard felt as well. You can’t walk the main street though Margate without bumping into a local who’s grinning like a raver on E thanks to the feet this event brings through the door to their shop, or the quiet streets that get to see a GP number plate for the 1st time. And we’re not even going to mention the fact that thanks to this event potholes have been outlawed from the streets of Margate, street signs have been polished and restaurant larders have been stocked up, if only for one week of the year.

The reason everyone is here is to flex leather. To show off their metal. And to rev their fucking engines until 2AM. But it’s not a talent show or a competition. In fact more than once I’ll find myself leaning over to Nico saying…well…screaming over the V-Twin engines and the superbike screeches, “Everybody has got the best bike here bro!”

Nico’s come along to shoot the event with me for the Upgrade show on AlternaTV, and while I might have already had my more than fair share of unforgettable Harley experiences, he has yet to even sit on one, let alone feel what a 1.6-litre engine feels like when you wear it 20 centimeters under your ball sack.

So we strap him immediately to the back of a Belgian named Serge who we then strap to the back of a Harley-Davidson Dyna cruiser. 20 minutes later. Nico returns. “How was it?”
“Yoh” #ThatIsAll.

Off to the bar. Which gets us thinking about the strategy meeting that happened all those years back where someone at Harley said something like: “I know! Let’s have a H-D festival. We’ll invite everyone to bring their most powerful bikes and we’ll cram them into a 500-square-metre area in an unassuming seaside town, and then open all the bars and restaurants until 2AM. Then we’ll tell them to bring their families and kids with them. But wait, we’ll also let them start, rev and maneuver their bikes in and amongst the crowds of children and onlookers.”
Sounds like a plan, right? Yeah a plan for a disaster movie!

And that’s what is so impressive about what we’re seeing here. This recipe for mayhem above is all laid out just waiting for the keg of dynamite to ignite. Just one idiot to get too much speed or try race through the crowd or knock someone over or wheelie in the wrong place or try a do-nut. It never happens. Seriously. With all the ingredients here for something bad to happen, it just never does.

That’s one of the most curios parts of Africa Bike Week. Everyone’s here for wholesome, communal, innocent enjoyment of 2-wheels. Helmets must be worn when riding anywhere (it’s the law) and burn-outs and do-nuts are outlawed and monitored by police sauntering around the festival grounds. And if they happen to not be around when some jackass attempts one, best believe in no time one of the nearby bikers will pull the offending party off their bike quicker than you can say “nice chaps, chap”.

“There’s always bound to be some sort of dust ups,” says Michael Carney, the marketing man behind Harley-Davidson Africa Bike Week, “but it’s no worse than any other gathering of people drinking anywhere else in South Africa”. And we can attest. For the 2 days we were there taking it all in, the most hostile incident we were privy to occurred between two rival HOG members (Harley Owners Group for the uninformed) who bumped shoulders and were practically falling over each other to apologize to one another, mortified that they had both jeopardized each other’s chances at a good spot at the bar post Fashion Show.

Day 2 kicks off, and it’s a sweltering Saturday that everyone has promised us is going to be “the big one”. And we’re not disappointed, with almost all H-D dealerships from around Southern Africa represented with a stupefying display of wares and hundreds of bike, tattoo and fashion-like accessory stalls on the tar too, Saturday pulsates to the tunes exuded from the official Harley-Davidson stage.

The choice of entertainment goes a long way to showcasing the ever-changing demographic of South African bike owners and Africa Bike Week attendees. In past years biking and particularly Harley-Davidson ownership has been a predominantly white affair, the main set on Saturday night being DJ Fistaz, a black house DJ from Rustenberg says a lot about who’s buying bikes and enjoying the two-wheel culture these days.

Our suspicions are confirmed later in the day when we catch a chat with some black riders from Pretoria. “Black people are really getting into the biking culture. We have seen it get really big in America. Lots of girls, riding on the back. Shaking their asses LOL. If people think it’s just for the white people, they’re very wrong!” A big statement on the shifting South African middle class perhaps.

The main party carries on late into the night all over Margate, much later than Nico and I make. The day of walking the hot streets, burning our Jozi skin, the intake of too much alcohol and the fact that we’ve got the mass ride to consider at 8AM all plays on our minds. We’ve called it.

We do make a quick run to the Steers at 3AM only to find the fun filled streets now pulsing with the brave. HOG lights, house tracks and hooters. Everything is under control but you’ll need at least (quickly open your arms up as wide as you can) THIS MUCH in you to find the streets of Margate manageable right now.
We’ll be back next year!