(As Seen In ‘09 Canadian Biker)
by Bill Gedye
Long Distance Touring (or, how I learned to embrace monkey butt).
What is it that makes grown, mature men long for endless hours in the saddle of a motorbike? Baked by the sun and whipped by the wind, sometimes deafened by din of interstate traffic, soaked by the monsoons, pelted with insect missiles and flying debris? We revel in the experience – the sensory overload which puts all of our everyday concerns on the back burner.
We look forward to it like a dog wanting to go for a ride in the car. The time spent planning a ride is either like a military campaign or nothing more than:
“Which way are we headed?”.
“That way.”
…the answer indicated by a pointed finger.
The motivation for a ride is determined by one thing – anticipation; the anticipation of going on your first ride longer than the overnighter to Whistler, or adding to the experiences of a previous ride. Seeing Devil’s Tower for the first time, meeting new people, like that group of war vets at the old general store in Fort Klamath, getting lost at Billings then following the Bighorn River to that misplaced stretch of I-90, or wandering through the abandoned streets of Goldfield, our imagination running wild with visions of it’s heyday.
What do we get in return for the time and money invested in a long ride?
For one, we receive the precious gift of perspective. At the end of each day’s ride, we sit at the motel or campground, a cigar in one mitt and a Jack in the other, reliving the high and lowlights, like the best peach pie we ever tasted, or the debris field outside that abandoned truck stop. This information is unconsciously stored, and comparisons are made, to our everyday experiences in our lives.
Its like stopping to look at a traffic accident. Studies show that people slow down and gawk at MVA’s to see what happened, but more importantly to integrate that event into their own life and extrapolate what they would do in the same situation.
We are spectators to our lives. Sure, we actively live them and make decisions and choices, but at the end of an average day we’ll sit back and say, “Gee, I could have handled that better”, or “I hope that doesn’t happen again”. Looking back like that, we watch ourselves and how the lessons from that experience can be incorporated into ‘the next time’.
Motorcycle riders are forced to adapt every time we swing that leg over the bike and press the start button. Touring riders have to extend that adaptability for long periods and over several days, or weeks. Road and weather conditions, breakdowns, our bike falling over in a hot parking lot – even finding a place to stay for the night, this long stretch of having to meet daily challenges might just add to our depth of character, millimetre by millimetre.
When I was having a particularly bad day on the road, having lost a notebook which contained a week’s notes of the trip, my buddy Jack gave me a stellar piece of wisdom; …”It’s the bad days that make you appreciate the good days”. That stuck with me ever since and has carried me over some rough patches.
In the end, when we ride up the driveway and signal the finale of the trip by shutting the motor off, we’re both relieved and saddened that the experience is over. Relieved that we can get a good night’s sleep in our own bed without the parade of semis bellowing by the motel, and saddened that we have to wait for the next time we can load the bike down with gear. The anticipation starts about a week later. Our new found touring perspective makes us look at home through altered eyes. We appreciate the little things we took for granted, like the dog licking our face or how great our girl looks when she walks through the door.
We’re better people for the experience.
That’s why we ride.
Bill Gedye
Two Wheel Tales
