Since 2010 Mikel started to follow the Cagiva Elefant scene. The root cause was the late decision to get such an animal. While searching for it, he discovered that Elefant enthusiast are spread all over Europe. Even if the bikes are relatively rare and there will be no new bikes coming onto the market, the guys who did ride them - and are still riding them, are not gone. Elefant rides must be some kind of crazy. Some of them seamed to be mavericks others are organized in groups and it seamed that some of them did know each other already for years. Even if there was no official cub or association, they managed to come together once per year somewhere in Europe.

As we are talking about enduros here some of those guys did have a huge track record in long distance, cross continent journeys like Africa or Asia. Most of then seam to have further a strong knowledge in building or repairing bikes. They did mount any kind of Ducati engines into their Elefant’s - some of them to keep them going as the original engine had more than 100KKm - some of them just to show that it is possible - who could imagine a 999R engine in an Elefant...

The International Cagiva Elefant Meeting started 2001 in Switzerland and was after that already in  Germany, Italy, UK, Slovenia, Nederland, Austria, France, Portugal, Poland and Sweden. After discovering the meetings, the first ongoing meetings in Sweden and Poland have been out of reach. Mikel did read all the content about those meetings from a distance. Beside that Mikel’s Elefant was sleeping in the same state that the bike was purchased. There was at that moment only one week that the bike was tested with a temporary number plate. The first meeting that was surely a target was Belgium in 2014. Unfortunately for private reasons it wasn’t possible to be there even if it was almost in the neighborhood.

In 2015 the event was announced to be in France. Mikel did fix the Batterie on the Elefant an prepared again to get a temporary number plate. One week before the meeting, that was supposed to be in Voges, Irene and Mikel had some holidays. They decided short notice to spend them with their Monsters in the French Alps. Depending on time and weather, Mikel kept it open to return and get the Elefant to ride it to the meeting.

Time flies and especially when you are with the bike in the French alps. At the end they decided to pass by on their way back to the north. Only one day was planed. Who knows how those Elefant guys would accept someone like them. One evening was surely enough to get an idea.

Val D'Ajol is a tiny little but very sympatric village in Voges. A place you love as soon as you get onto the main square. It was a Friday afternoon when they arrived, coming from the south after a view 100 km tiny roads. The weather was great and they found in deed the first Elefant in front of the cafe on the main square. It was a german rider. He was a real maverick but a very sympatric guy. He was there on his own. He did hardly speak (most Germans are not like that) and he didn’t even spend a lot of time with the other guys but preferred to be on his own. He came to the most meetings just because he likes the Elefant's and there was usually no stress. No one did really expect something from him and he didn’t expect something either.

They found a nice place to stay for one night and went then to the camping to inscribe themselves.

There were plenty of beautiful Elefant’s on this Camping. The people they met where great too. There was for example this guy who was working for the BMW factory building GS bikes. He had each year a new GS model that he got from his employer for a good discount and he could sell it one year later. After several GS models he was forced to make a break because it was time to build a house and there was no money left for a bike. He stopped riding for a while until his friend did borrow him an Elefant. Since that moment he was sold. He bought a used Elefant and didn’t want to ride a GS again. The GS surely was a perfect bike but it had apparently zero character compared to an Elefant said the guy who builds them.

The most of the guys were real characters and their bikes are gorgeous.

It was a bit like in Misano during a WDW. The entire village was Elefant land. There were Elefants all over the town. In the evening Irene and Mikel had a very nice dinner and went then for a drink with the Cagiva guys at the Camping.

Obviously there was a party going on. It wasn’t a huge event. No burnouts or wheelies. This was France - you would expect something like that but the campsite was in the middle of the town and beside the Music everybody behaved quietly. The main goal beside finishing the beer was to figure out if they would stay for another night or continue tomorrow morning on their way to the north. That decision was easy to take and they decided to go to bed and look early morning if they could find another place to stay for one more night.

Next morning the weather was still great. There was a big green Elefant standing in front of their window. Most of the guys seams to stay at the campsite but still a lot of them did occupy the hotel or guest rooms in the village.

After breakfast Mikel studied how to fit a 1000DS engine into the Elefant frame. That seamed to be straight forward. You might have to modify the engine on the swing-arm in the same way as you have to do it when you want to place a modern engine in a Pantah frame but thats it basically. There is of course all the cable stuff but there is no bike with more complex and weaker cabling then a 851 or probably and Elefant 900ie.

It wasn’t easy to get a room for the 2nd night. The people in the village were great. After moving from house to house they got tips who still might have a room available. At the end someone just did improvise by emptying a bedroom that wasn’t currently foreseen for renting and offered it to them. French are great people and when it comes to the point they can be very pragmatic just to help someone.

There was a ride planed for today. Having coffee at the usual place they did study the map that was part of the deliverables. There was no convoy thingy as you usually expect form classic bikes or from organized german biker clubs. Mainly small groups had their own ride in their own speed following the map.

As it was already late, Mikel and Irene decided to follow the map on their own. It was a great ride that went through the forest. It was not the off-road track but the roads sometimes ended up in small paths. Mikel could imagine those Elefant's going really off-road. They did shortcut the road after an hour and returned to the village. The plan was to go back to the camping and wait for the Elefant’s to arrive.

The afternoon was covered by hanging around the campsite and studying Elefant’s. Mikel couldn’t get enough of them.

Non of them were the same. Some have been very special like Garvin’s 999R Elefant. No idea if that makes sense but if you can build it why shouldn’t you?

The main attraction of the day was an official reception by the mayor of Val D'Ajol. It was impressive. All those Elefant's ended up in front of the town hall and presented themselves there. This was really cool stuff. No way that you could imagine something like that in Luxembourg or Germany.

Che spettacolo!

The evening approached and they had dinner at a local place where some other German Elefant Riders did join them, before the evening went on with a massive final party at the camping.

At final evening there is an official part where the Elefant Trophy gets handed over to the country which will host the next International Elefant Meeting. Further there is a special Alex Fischer Trophy that is handed over to somebody of the community that the guys believe deserves it. Alex is seen as one of the major forces that did a lot for the community in the early days. He is still considered as an idol within the community and he lives on with the guys even when he died due to cancer in 2007. These guys are usually smiling but when it comes down to Alex some of them have still a tear in their eyes.

There was some kind of confusion noticeable when it was announced that the next meeting would be in Denmark, while no Danish representative made the trip to France.

The party was great and even if they had to get-up early next morning for the trip back, there was plenty of beer involved. They met some great characters and even if they still did feel like visitors here, it was obvious that they were well accepted by the Elefant guys.

The final story deserves Serge. He was a great guys that they had several beers with on the last evening:

These guys came from all over the place: Croatia, Scotland, Poland and even Israel but Serge was the top. He came from Singapore where he has an Expat job. He came apparently over by ship and had a very tight planing. He arrived in the north-west part of France close to the British coast on his Elefant 900ie. On arrival he received a bunch of equipment to rebuild the Elefant with a rear tanks. The whole bike was in pieces. He did work the entire night, got it all together, had almost no sleep and then jumped on his bike and made around 1000km crossing France from all the left to the right. He made it, just arrived today and was as happy as an Elefant Rider can be. To prove that the story was true he did show his hands which have been still black and dirty from the night session when he was working on the Elefant. A great character!

They went to bad late at night and on the next morning they saw the last Elefants while leaving Val D'Ajol behind them. What a great weekend.

So the next meeting should be in Danmark...