Why I ride motorcycles

The ol' 650C - Photo by David Heiniger

Shreveport Motorcycle Examiner Mary Baker talks about her first motorcycling experience and why she rides in My first motorcycle memory; why I ride. She threw the question out to all of us so I thought I’d give it a whirl. After all, what rider doesn’t like to hold forth on that topic?

For me, that’s a complicated question. There isn’t a single answer but my reasons are best illustrated by one of my worst trips on a motorcycle.

It was about three years ago, late in the riding season as September faded into October. I was riding my old 1983 Honda 650C home from Utah to Washington. The plan was to take two days and mostly blue highways.

I got a late start after enjoying lunch with some friends. An hour out of town I ran out of gas. The 650 had a notoriously small tank but I should have been able to go more than 60 miles before running out. I put my AAA membership and cell phone to work and soon a tow truck showed up with a can of gas. It got me to the next station where I topped off and went on my way.

Less than 50 miles later I ran out of gas again. This time I could see the next exit and the gas station so I pushed the bike a half mile or so to the pump. I wasn’t sure what the problem was but the bike was clearly not running well and was sucking down way too much gas.

So much for day one.

I got a room in Twin Falls, ID, barely 3 hours from my start and set about trying to chase down the problem. I won’t bore you with all the troubles I had the following day but suffice it to say that I spent several hours fussing with the bike and trying to get somewhere. By mid-afternoon I had gone less than 100 miles and was seriously considering calling the wife and telling her to bring the trailer and come get me.

After racking my brain it finally occurred to me that the only thing I hadn’t checked was the air filter. Checking it was easier said than done because the screws holding the filter housing together had clearly not been removed in several years. After an hour or so of struggling in the heat at a gas station in the middle of BFE, Idaho, I managed to pull the filthy air filter and throw it away. Since there was no way I was going to find another filter for my rare, vintage bike, I ran without one.

The bike was flawless from that point on. Since I’d lost so much time fiddling with the bike, I decided to abandon my blue highway plan and made my way to Nampa and the freeway.

Watch for local yokels.

I’m sitting at the stoplight in Nampa waiting to make a left turn onto the freeway to make some time when a local yokel in front of me in an old, full sized van decides to back up to allow a turning semi more room. I shouted and honked but he didn’t hear me and backed up into me.

The van peeled my front fender back like a banana peel and wedged the front tire under the bumper. I tried to hold the bike up but the pressure was too great and I had to drop the bike and bail.

The damage was minimal. After manipulating the peeled fender with a crowbar for an hour or so, my poor old girl was rideable again and I went on my way after losing a few more hours. Having lost another day, I got a room down the road in Oregon and resumed riding the blue highways since I now had another day.

Finally...

The following day, the bike was flawless despite catching a fair bit of gravel in my face shield thanks to my useless, crumpled fender. Oregon has some of the best riding roads on the planet and I was soon flying through the twisties and having a grand time... finally.

As I rounded a curve in full lean, somewhere in the Oregon mountains, I saw a shaft of sunlight pouring through the trees ahead. A single, giant autumn leaf floated gently in the shaft above my head as I approached. It seemed suspended in the air, as if that beam of sunlight were holding it in place. The scene played out like a slow-motion vignette in an art house flick.

I watched the leaf float gently down as I approached and then as I came upon it, the beam of light flashed in my eyes as I passed through it and the gentle, giant leaf whooshed past my helmeted head.

I remember the moment as clearly as if it were happening again right now, partly because I made a mental note to remember.

As I set up for the next curve, I remember thinking that despite all the troubles I’d had on this trip, it was all worth it. That single moment was pure magic.

That’s why I ride.

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