To Ride, or To Trailer... that is the question

Well, funny you should mention that, but it does bring on a story, so I’m glad you did.

It was back in ’03, it was, and a group of us were on the road headed for Milwaukee.  The Harley Davidson Motor Company had somehow stayed in business for a hundred years, and they were promising a big ol’ party for anyone who showed up.  Now this is a company whose customers have a tendency to get the corporate logo tattooed on various parts of their bodies, so that gives you a hint at the depth of their affection for the brand, and at the wildness of the parties that develop when enough of them get together in one place.

I was riding with Rachel and her gang.  She was the escort rider on her cop bike, which gained us some respect from the locals, when she didn’t run off and leave us, which she occasionally did.

I had looked at the map and realized that good old Highway 2 ran right across the top of five states between Seattle and Green Bay, which was just a hop and a skip north of Milwaukee, so that was our route, over the mountains and across the rivers and the wide open spaces with the great big skies.  I wouldn’t recommend that route today, the parts through North Dakota are pretty fracked up. We traveled light, and stayed on the cheap, mostly at KOAs or one of the many little clapped-out resorts that grew up along the highway in the ‘50s that would put up a biker for $10 a night, but the communal shower had floors that sagged under my weight.  It was at one of those where we saw the essence of the old biker question:  “Should I ride, or should I trailer?”

This little resort in upstate Minnesota had been carved out of an old quarry on the riverbank, so you drove down a steep entry to get to the campsites, one of which was enough to fit 4 motorcycles and their tents.  Up top, by the highway, was a strip mall that contained the restaurant and the gas station that completed the roadside oasis.

So we’re down at our site, sitting around the table, when we witness the arrival of a motorhome the size of a Greyhound Bus, which pulled into one of the full-service sites towing the largest Wells Cargo enclosed trailer you can buy.  Two guys get out, wearing biker leather vests and bandannas on their heads.  They’re, ahem, experienced, been around, shall we say, not young bucks anymore, but who among us is, either?  They fold down the ramp that closes off the back of the trailer and proceed to back out two brand new looking Harley Baggers, one a Softail Heritage and the other an Ultra Classic, which they fired up and rode on up the hill to the restaurant for dinner, just like we did.  After dinner, they rode back down to camp and went in the motor home to watch tv or something, while we sat outside and watched the stars come out.

Next morning, while we were packing to leave, they climbed back on their bikes and rode back up to the restaurant for breakfast, just like we did, too.  As we gassed up and hit the road East, they went back to tie their bikes up in the dark inside that trailer before they followed us out of the quarry.  I later saw that same motorhome and trailer parked on a back road outside the Milwaukee Town Center.  There were so many of them there it looked like a convention of Good Sams had hit town with all the bikers.

The bottom line is that it doesn’t matter if you ride or drive, as long as you get there in one piece and have a good time.  And it’s perfectly understandable that everyone gets to a point where the pleasure of the long ride is not enough to make up for not being able to do it with the same attitude you used to have, the knowledge that your skills were at their peak, and you were prepared and ready to handle anything the road put in front of you.  And, of course, if time is a factor it’s better to dash in, drink deep, and dash out again than to have stayed home.

But the ones who drove deserve a certain amount of pity from the ones who rode, and they know it.  Here’s a little experiment you can do on your way back from Sturgis this year that illustrates my point:  As you ride by a pickup with one or two perfectly capable motorcycles tied up in the back, glance over at the driver and give him a nod.  Nine times out of ten, I have observed, he will not meet your glance, but will look away.  He knows he’s depriving himself of the authentic experience of being on the road on a motorcycle by being belted into that cage, for whatever reason, time, health, whatever.  He knows that when you’re out there leaning into that nasty side wind outside of Caspar, Wyoming, or powering into a set of dark clouds forming outside of Bozeman, that’s when you’re fully alive.  Just you and your bike taking on Mother Nature, and winning.  It’s something not everyone can do, and it’s what sets us apart from them.  Ride on.      :-{)}