Alice’s Restaurant, Full Throttle Saloon, Ace Cafe London … these destinations are required visiting for followers of biker culture. Alice’s Restaurant (the song and movie notwithstanding) is in Woodside, California, at the junction of La Honda Road and Skyline Boulevard; the Full Throttle is famously in Sturgis, South Dakota; and while there is an Ace Cafe in Orlando, Florida, the original stands where it first opened in 1938 as a 24/7 diner and truck stop. The Ace’s history is widely known and well recorded in places like its own website, in Mick Duckworth’s book Ace Times and in general motorcycle media.

It’s a story I’ve followed with interest over the years, growing up as I did less than 10 miles from the Ace. But it was off limits to me and my Vespa; in the days of Mods and Rockers conflict, had I ventured onto the site in my parka and desert boots, I’d have been as popular as a root canal.
No longer. Now, the Ace is a welcoming watering hole for 2-wheeled travelers of all persuasions. In the ’60s, the North Circular Road fed its traffic right into the Ace, but the mayhem has been moved to a new highway and the Ace now sits on a quiet access road.

And the Ace is much more than a cafe. It’s a movement that has endured, especially for the 25 years between the closure of the cafe in 1969 and the Ace Cafe Reunion in 1994 — the time when it was a tire store. Since the Ace reopened in 1997, there are events most evenings and weekends, including an annual Ace Reunion every September. Apart from that, there are meet-ups for every make of motorcycle and many car clubs, too. Friday night is always bike night, and the tradition of riding to the Ace on Sundays is still popular.

The modern history of the Ace really begins with ex-London policeman Mark Wilsmore, who ironically is too young to have frequented the Ace in its heyday. Regardless, Wilsmore fought relentlessly to acquire the original site of the cafe and lobbied for planning permission to rebuild it. The project was partly financed by sales of refreshments and memorabilia at “Ace Corner,” adjacent to the cafe site. The first Ace Cafe Reunion on the 25th anniversary of the Ace’s 1969 closure attracted an estimated 5,000 bikers, and it instantly became an annual event, culminating each year with a run to Brighton, 50 miles away on England’s south coast.

I happened to be in London for the 2005 reunion and joined the throng (reckoned to be “tens of thousands”) at the cafe parking lot, which overflowed onto the surrounding streets. From my vantage point on a bridge overlooking the M40 highway, the phalanx was led by five motorcycle cops and trailed behind them as far as I could see.

I also dropped in on the Ace on a chilly Thursday evening in April 2009 and found the parking lot hosting “mods and minis” night, with a generous selection of superannuated scooters and the mods in their neatly pressed Levis and Ben Sherman shirts. Dozens of minis arrived, with a frisson of good-natured joshing between owners of the all-British originals and their modern part-German models.

So the Ace continues as a universal gearhead destination, serving up tea and bacon sandwiches, just as it did in 1938 — though the chairs and tables are no longer bolted to the floor! MC