Cross-country journey helps rider earn his stripes
Horace Greeley said, “Go West, young man.” However, I don’t think he had in mind what I was about to encounter. It was on the last leg of my two-flight journey to Detroit that I had some doubts about my decision to go west.
I was just about to land and rent a car and to drive to Flint, Mich., where I would pick up my new (to me) Honda Gold Wing and ride 2,200 miles back over the same terrain I had just flown. Could I, at 63, with no experience on a big bike (900 pounds), ride west to Spokane?
As we landed I realized I was holding my breath and I recalled my experience in U.S. Air Force pilot training many years ago. My instructor and I sat at the end of the runway ready to take off when all of a sudden a hand slapped across my mask and my instructor shouted, “Breathe, son, breathe.” In my hyperventilating, I hadn’t realized I had become frozen with my fear.
As the wheels touched the ground in Detroit, I realized I had some fear along with lots of anticipation.
Twelve hours after I started, I met up with my new challenge. For 25 years I had ridden a small Honda Trail 90 (for off-street and mountain trails), then only two years ago purchased a Yamaha 650 (a medium-sized street bike). Having never ridden a large motorcycle, much less driven it across country, trepidation had struck my insides. This was about facing the tiger – all 2,200 miles of it.
An hour later I packed and drove off to the shores of Lake Michigan to meet up with the new high-speed ferry to Milwaukee. Crossing Lake Michigan in two and a half hours was a thrill (the older, slower ferry farther north took six hours). There was not a cloud in the sky, making for a wonderful start to a new adventure.
The next day was one of making myself at home on the bike. I was tired from muscling around a larger machine, and found I was holding on for dear life, driving afraid of upsetting the balance. I found by noon of day two the bike and I had settled into each other and I stopped to pick up energy bars and water for some warm days ahead. I didn’t want to be bothered stopping for meals.
At first, my riding didn’t feel very comfortable on the freeways. However, I didn’t know the back roads well and didn’t want to take longer than six days driving. I discovered the interstate system to be very safe and helpful, with numerous rest stops which saved my backside many times (in biker terms I was earning an “iron butt”). On day two I slowly moved my feet forward to the foot rests and on day three I leaned forward to turn on the radio.
Riding an open-air bike was amazingly different from driving my car. I noticed the fields of vegetables, the scents, even the fireflies as dusk arrived. I could seemingly reach out and touch the roadside geology, the relics of the ice age through Wisconsin and Minnesota. The farmhouses, barns, silos – all were a significant part of what I had read about but had never seen. Now they were at my fingertips.
One of the sights that shocked me was the abundance of “steel trees” – the mobile telephone system towers. They were signs of a changing cultural landscape.
I put 400 miles on the bike that first day. My riding confidence was rising rapidly.
The next morning I awoke to thunder, lightening, and sheets of rain and wondered if I would be riding at all that day. As I waited out the storm over breakfast, I pondered the psychology of bike riding. After all, as a psychology instructor, I constantly tell my students that there is learning in all our experiences.
What was I learning about myself? Would my big-bike experience change me in some way? How would I be conditioned to see the world differently? What would Freud have said about me on a big motorcycle? These were just some of my “psychological” thoughts.
I stood in the rain, thinking of my questions and wondering about the bike. Would it “care” if it got doused? What would the wet freeway feel like to ride on?
The thought of cooler air rushing by me was a welcome relief from the intense heat the day before. As the rain abated, I was beginning to feel more comfortable about the water when the manager of a motel came out to give me some rags to wipe the bike. She obviously had seen bikers before.
When I saw the sign welcoming me to the South Dakota border I felt I had entered a new stage in my travel. The bike and I were now becoming one, and I could move around on the seat and relieve my “iron butt” syndrome.
At one rest stop I encountered another biker heading to Spokane for the BMW rally and noticed he was wearing leathers – in the heat of the day! He mentioned he would rather be safe than sorry.
As I was uncomfortable in my long-sleeve T shirt, I asked how he kept cool. By directing the wind with his movable windshield and dousing himself with water inside his coat, he was able to endure the heat. Now why hadn’t I thought of that? I filled up my water bottles, wet my shirt, and took to the road – what a difference!
After touring the ancient badlands in South Dakota, I headed for the world-famous Wall Drug (doesn’t everyone stop there?). A cool milkshake went down all too fast and the long road ahead beckoned. I noticed the population of Wall to be 818 and thought if they registered the tourists, it could be about five to six times that size.
I began to wish for rain to cool the roads and lighten the air, although I certainly didn’t relish riding in the oncoming thunderstorm. As a pilot I knew to stay clear by 20 miles, so I parked under a highway overpass and waited it out. Just as I was ready to start up again, a lightning bolt hit about a mile away; I jumped up off my seat and decided to hang about a little longer.
Driving through Sturgis, S.D., where the annual “bike week” (for big street bikers) is held, I wondered how they accommodated more than 100,000 people for a week. Perhaps I’ll find out someday on a return trip.
My next lesson was with the wind. Up to now what little wind I had experienced was all tailwinds. With yet another thunderstorm nearby, I encountered very challenging crosswinds where I had to lean into the wind to keep from being blown across the lane. I held tight and pressed on into Wyoming.
Wyoming holds such beauty with its pine trees, plains and mountains. After long days on straight, flat freeways, I longed for this new scenery. The beautiful mountains and rolling hills are a breathtaking sight, especially in the cool morning air. In some ways it was like riding back through time. That morning at breakfast my waitress, who could have been my mother, kept calling me “honey.”
I rode on to Sheridan through the incredible Powder River Basin. I hadn’t realized the basin supplied so much oil and coal – as much as one-sixth of our needs at one time. I passed miles of snow fences, reminders of difficult winter driving and harsh living conditions.
Sheridan was my gateway to Yellowstone National Park, where I trekked through the Big Horn National Forest. This is one of the most awesome geological drives I had ever encountered. The roadside geology was identified with signs beginning with the bottom of the mountains being approximately 205 million years old. Approaching the pass in the mountains, I encountered rocks more than 2.5 billion years of age.
Cresting the Bighorn Mountains at 9,000 feet it was wonderfully cool, a welcome reprieve from the earlier, lower plains and the high desert heat prior to Yellowstone. The beauty was again breathtaking. I was now very glad I was on a motorcycle so I could experience the sensations directly rather than through glass.
Yellowstone offers a ride through its geological splendor, the streams, lakes, geysers, and mountains. I was surprised to see that it hasn’t been eclipsed by the recent forest fires.
After stopping to experience Old Faithful along with thousands of other tourists, I hurried on to Bozeman to overnight, but not before another milkshake in downtown West Yellowstone. I sat and enjoyed the shake, taking in the sights and sounds of a western tourist town. Later, alongside the Gallatin River, I watched fishermen wade in the clear waters and I wished I had my fishing rod.
It was along the Madison and Gallatin rivers that I reflected upon my outdoor riding. The fresh air had blown away the depression I had experienced for some weeks prior. My self-confidence was soaring. I felt younger and freer than I had in years. The tailwinds kept encouraging me to stay my course westward. My new, two-wheel perspective was refreshing to my soul.
From Bozeman, I wheeled on to Whitefish to spend a relaxing three days with a longtime buddy. We would tour the mountainsides on four-wheel quads and let the branches brush our faces and pause again, in a different, slower way, to drink in the scenery, a cool mountain stream and a lasting friendship.
As I finished what I now call my “soul journey” on day six, riding into Coeur d’Alene and Spokane, I felt I had crossed a new boundary. I thought once again of my pilot training experience. I was no longer holding my breath; I realized my fears had turned into fun.
Would I do it again? In a heartbeat!