Vespa World Days 2012: June 14-17, 2012. It ended after four days of celebration and friendship. After Italy, England is probably the country most closely associated with the Vespa. So it's fitting that Vespa World Days 2012 was hosted by London, under the aegis of the Vespa Club of Britain.
Over three thousand Vespa reached invading London O2 Arena in Greenwich, home of the Vespa Village 2012. It was concluded in London, the sixth edition of the Vespa World Days, the largest international gathering of all the Vespa Club were four days of celebration and friendship, a long meeting in the name of the Italian scooter that has combined generations of each country. More than three thousand Vespa, belonging to over 780 clubs in the world, reached London O2 Arena invading Greenwich, home of the Vespa Village 2012. Two thousand members of the Club, who yesterday took part in the great gala dinner, which represents the moment of celebration in the Vespa World Days.
On Saturday evening, the winner of the Vespa Club Trophy was declared, the competition between tourist Vespa riders, with 1,752 checkpoints scattered in 25 countries and the collaboration of more than 2,000 of the Piaggio Group dealers located throughout the world. L '2012 edition was won by an Italian club, to Sirmione whose members have traveled 1,610 km on a Vespa for London. The strongest applause and much sympathy has gone to the caravans of Vespa arrived from Canada and Argentina.
The world gathering in London was an opportunity to remember the 60 years of the founding of the first Vespa Club of the United Kingdom. What associations in the name of Vespa (born in Italy virtually all the scooter clubs, since 1946) is an ever-growing phenomenon, which now involves 40 National Vespa Clubs, associated in the Vespa World Club, over 780 local Vespa Clubs officially registered for a total that exceeds the 40,000 registered members worldwide. Only in Italy last year were held over 100 meetings of enthusiasts.
Vespa fans of all ages, riding the many models that have made the Italian scooter a timeless myth, are sharing home with the promise to meet again next year, the 2013 world meeting to be held in Hasselt, Belgium . The Vespa World Days 2012 has been lived through the web. The same vespisti present in London told the journey of approach and their meeting with photos and texts, in a continuous interaction with the site www.vespaworlddays.com, who followed the event in real time. Vespa fans also went on the rampage in the pages devoted to them on social networks: Facebook.com/wasp, Twitter.com/vespa_official and Hashtag #vwd2012
Holders of a ticket to the full four-day shebang enjoyed a gala dinner on Saturday night and a rideout to the country lanes and woodland around Epping Forest. There were other informal rideouts around London and beyond, giving our European visitors a chance to experience the traffic jams, draconican parking regulations and selfish or downright homicidal drivers our great capital city does best.
Some scoots were piled high with luggage with foreign number plates speaking of journeys from France, Italy, Germany or the Netherlands. Of the 2,500 tickets sold, only about two hundred went to British purchasers. That’s a lot of international travelers, with Vespa fans arriving from the United States, Sweden and Yugoslavia, to name but a few. For those riding from home, there was a chance to pick up a long distance award by collecting stamps at dealers along the way. Others chose to have their scooters transported overland by lorry, or hired a scooter on arrival.
There were stretched Vespas, Vespas with sidecars, and one with a wonderful wicker transporter bed; Vespas lovingly restored to their original condition and colour scheme, and Vespas equally lovingly given paint jobs the manufacturer would never have dreamed of.
With all this spectacle for free, what did the show itself have to offer? Due to the British location, the focus of the small museum marquee was on the Douglas Vespa, manufactured under licence from Piaggio at the Douglas motorcycle manufacturing plant in Bristol during the 1950s and 1960s. Some lovely advertising signs and other ephemera were also on display.
The latest Vespa models were showcased outside, while English and Italian merchants vied with each other to sell T-shirts, clocks, bags and other official Vespa goodies. Parts for classic Vespas and custom accessories for both new and old machines were also on sale, plus stickers for your scoot and patches for your parka.
The main focus of the gathering, though, was to meet friends old and new, socialize, inspect each other’s scooters, and just hang out. The best parties always end up in the kitchen, and much of the Vespa World Days action seemed to be taking place in the car park.
See you next year in Belgium!