The Club was formed in September of 1973 in the back room of the Dukes Head Public House, Laindon Common Road, Billericay, Essex, by a group of bike riding friends that used to meet at various pubs and cafes in the area. After a short while, the club outgrew the room at the Dukes Head (over 50 people in a room no bigger than 30' x 20') and moved to a clubhouse at Billericay Town Football Club in Blunts Wall Road, Billericay. We stayed there for a number of years and then moved to the De Beauvoir Arms (locally known as the Beavers, now Azuma), Downham and then to the Nags Head, Ramsden Heath, before ending up, as still a local club, at the Coach and Horses, Chapel Street, Billericay.
The Club was formed in September of 1973 in the back room of the Dukes Head Public House, Laindon Common Road, Billericay, Essex, by a group of bike riding friends that used to meet at various pubs and cafes in the area. After a short while, the club outgrew the room at the Dukes Head (over 50 people in a room no bigger than 30' x 20') and moved to a clubhouse at Billericay Town Football Club in Blunts Wall Road, Billericay. We stayed there for a number of years and then moved to the De Beauvoir Arms (locally known as the Beavers, now Azuma), Downham and then to the Nags Head, Ramsden Heath, before ending up, as still a local club, at the Coach and Horses, Chapel Street, Billericay.
The club had a change of direction about this time and decided that, as our membership was spread out around the country (and had been for some time) and only an average of eight people were turning up for club-nights whereas over 40 members were attending camping weekends, we had better change to become a National Club. The club has a virtual clubhouse organised around our camping weekends and rallies, meaning we keep in touch with the membership even better than before.
The club retains its friendly nature and attaches no stigma to any make of motorcycle, nationality, sex or age group. All we ask is that members ride their bikes and come along to weekends with the sole purpose of enjoying themselves in a responsible manner. We have always tried to promote the good things about motorcycling, the enjoyment, freedom and comradeship of a way of life.
We participate in international gatherings all over Europe and have had members visit, by motorcycle, every one of the European countries including Russia. We regularly participate in rallies such as the FIM Rally and FIM Motocamp which in 2019 were held in Greece, Denmark, Germany and Portugal. 2020 sees these events being held in Italy, Austria and northern Germany.
We organise a full social calendar with an average of one camping weekend every month in different parts of the country. Pre-requisites of a Mayflower camping weekend are a real ale pub with good food, overnight access to toilets and preferably a reasonably flat and spacious camping area (although we have been known to cram together for a good pub). We like to try to camp in interesting parts of the country where members can enjoy a decent ride to get there and have somewhere to look around whilst they are there. These weekends are usually attended by an average of 40% of our membership which reflects the enthusiasm of our members. Over the course of the year, some 75% of our members will have attended at least one club event and this may surprise some of the larger local, National and One Make Clubs, who seem to struggle to get their members out and riding their bikes!
Most of our membership also take part in other clubs' rallies up and down the country which happen nearly every weekend. We also organise our own Force Ten Rally in January and Pilgrims Rally in August which are attended every year by riders from all over Britain and the continent of Europe.
If you have found some of this of interest and would like more information, please contact us.
Thank you,
The Committee, Mayflower Motor Cycle Club
- Category: History
