What everyone needs: 5 motorcycles

SCONE, Ont.–It almost goes without saying, of course, that every man, woman and child in this country should own at least five motorcycles: a sport bike, a cruiser, a tourer, a dirt bike and "something interesting."

Unfortunately, not everyone has the means to make this possible. Garages get cramped, and closets fill rapidly with the different styles of clothing and armour that are needed to dress the part. As well, I suppose it can get quite costly, especially since each motorcycle, for some reason, must be individually insured for collision.

Consequently, not everybody actually does own five motorcycles. I myself, for reasons of limited space and funds, own only three and a half. But because one and a half of them are in pieces under my workbench and up in the garage rafters, and the second is now ancient and officially retired from strenuous activity, I have to make do with just the one.

This can be terribly difficult at times. My main motorcycle is a cruiser, since I'm now 46 years old and have slowed down to smell the roses and drink the (decaffeinated) coffee. There are many times, however, when I think about her being something else.

On the way here, for example, a 200-km ride northwest from Toronto, it would have been nice to have ridden in an entourage of my motorcycles, swapping back and forth to the appropriate bike as different opportunities for riding came available.

But with just the one, which should it have been for today's ride?

I know this route well, having taken variations of it over the years to reach Collingwood, or Owen Sound, or up to Tobermory to catch the Manitoulin ferry, and no bike can do it all to its full potential.

The most exciting ride was probably with the Ontario Dualsport Club a few years ago, heading north on trails and gravel roads to the Ride For Sight campground when the charity event was held outside Collingwood. That was fun. Muddy, too. Not every machine could make it through the bogs and swamps when the official trail kept disappearing under water.

I was riding a Suzuki DR650, monikered the SEX that year, which broke the ice right away with my new-found dirt-riding friends. We reached the campground tired and filthy, then pitched tents and began drinking. The next morning, still covered in the previous day's mud and feeling tender from the previous night's mood, we rode south and I crashed spectacularly while descending the trail beside the Mansfield ski hill. Ah – good times.

Riding here now on the cruiser, warm sun on my face and strong wind at my flank, I passed a few gravel side roads that promised a lack of maintenance just over the ridge. "Use at your own risk," said the signs. The cruiser kept straight on along the asphalt. Another day, perhaps.

The next year of the Ride For Sight parade up to Collingwood, I rode an extremely fast sportbike, a Honda Fireblade. I lined up at the starting point and found myself behind two Harley-Davidsons. When they started their V-twin engines, the pavement rippled from the decibels and the few shreds of baffle mesh left in their mufflers were blown out the tailpipes.

I moved discreetly to another line to park behind two Hondas, big Gold Wings, known for their sedan-like quiet and limo-like ride. I don't know if their huge water-cooled engines were running or not. But I do know that as soon as the parade began and the sound of the other motorcycles increased, the volume on their radios was turned up automatically to compensate for the ambient noise.

The whole way north up Airport Rd., I sat hunched at the speed limit on the race-ready sportbike, listening to the CHFI song stylings of Whitney Houston and Billy Joel pumping back at me. And somewhere around Stayner, the heavens opened and I arrived soaked and cold at the campground.

On the way home that year, I opened up the Fireblade and took advantage of the curves south of Creemore, and the interesting roads around Cataract, Belfountain and Georgetown. But there are long straight stretches that link these sections and the bike was uncomfortable at anything even approaching legal speeds. I longed for the more upright position of a tourer or even a cruiser over such distance – and I was younger then.

Riding today on the road to Damascus (Ont.) past the Luther Marsh, the wind grew stronger from the west and the horizon there darkened. I've rarely chosen this road, though I used to live nearby in Mount Forest.

Local lore has it that the two townships I was passing through, Luther and Melancthon, were deemed by their surveyor to be the most ghastly tracts of swampland he'd experienced; a devout Roman Catholic, he named them after the German Protestant reformists Martin Luther and Philipp Melanchthon, the most ghastly people he knew.

On a warm and sunny day, this road is quiet and idyllic, rarely travelled. On every other day, with the wind whipping across the fields, it's obvious why the road is little used. It's fine for a cruiser if you're stretched out and relaxed behind a comfortable windshield, but exhausting if there's no fairing and you're fighting the wind with your forearms and the small of your back, as I did a quarter-century ago on my Honda CB350F.

Ah, that little 350. What a plucky bike, and I loved her for a while. Not for long, though. I left her to die in a farmer's field when she no longer had any value even to me. No starter, worn-out tires, and a head gasket that just wouldn't seal. Not enough power to fight a strong headwind, unlike the 70 hp or so of my cruiser today, which snicked confidently into sixth gear and loped comfortably toward the horizon, firing its pistons at every other telephone post.

The road turned west into the wind and through Mount Forest. This town hasn't changed in the many years since I lived here, when I was a recent immigrant and desperately homesick for the winding country lanes I'd left behind. Mid-western Ontario in the wintertime is not a welcoming place for a young transplanted motorcyclist with aspirations for cafe racing.

I weathered the years with the little Honda, and then with a Kawasaki GPZ750 that I bought for myself on turning 21. Now that was more like it! The police didn't think so, though, and it became clear that the sportbike would have to go.

I bought a dirt bike, then soon after, found myself getting lost across America with my friend Ian on a pair of big Japanese power cruisers.

We flew a Stars and Bars off the back, which made them a lot more interesting. A few years later, my world opened even more with a Honda Trans-Alp, but you don't need to travel far on a motorcycle to find adventure.

Today, just outside the tiny pioneer community of Drew, east of Clifford, it was finally time to check the map. The roads haven't changed, but my memory has. I looked for the highway that leads north to Hanover and then up to here, a tiny intersection just outside Chesley.

According to ridegreybruce.com, the Harley Blues Cafe in Scone is "a great watering hole," which is as good a reason as any to ride up here on a rare day with an empty schedule.

Every journey must have a destination, no matter how vague.

While I stood beside the bike at the side of the road, mulling over the map and sheltered from the growing side wind by a copse of trees, a Buick slowed and pulled over alongside. Its window wound down. "Are you okay?" asked the woman in the passenger seat. "Do you need any help?" They're good people up here.

Reassured of the route, I rode for a while behind a Gold Wing, its rider in shirt sleeves. A BMW Adventurer passed in the oncoming lane, its rider in Kevlar, and we all waved at each other. The Wing stayed west and I turned north through Neustadt where the wind was stronger, building with every concession. A Harley passed in the opposite direction and its riders were wearing rain gear. The western sky was black.

Scone was still 30 km to the north but the weather was rushing through. I wasn't going to make it.

I've been caught in the rain many times and it's never pleasant, but not that big a deal. This was different, though. The wind picked up dust on Hanover's main street and it swirled everywhere. People ran for cover. This felt like a tornado on the way.

A Tim Hortons – shelter. I parked the bike with its sidestand propped against the wind and moments after getting inside, the storm hit. Sheets of water swept the lot. There were no cars moving on the road. This was a big one.

A couple of other motorcyclists scurried inside, caught short on a ride down from Barrie. Their rat bikes were in the lot and a Mazda parked alongside. Two women jumped out and hurried to the coffee shop, carrying a baby. They were the riders' partners, following close behind as they all tried to escape their cares for the day. To each their own.

Why did I come here, killing time over coffee while the temperature dropped outside and the rain washed over everything? To go for a ride, get out of the GTA for a while, relax on the road less travelled to finally find some time to think about the last 30 years of riding.

Outside the window, the water cascaded over my bike's leather seat, splashed through the fins on the engine, slipped around the paint of the gas tank. I didn't bring any rain gear. The forecast didn't call for rain.

If I had five bikes in the garage, should I have chosen another motorcycle?

Not a sportbike. This ride was supposed to be a loop over to Thornbury where a corner-carver would have excelled, but not today. I'll head back on a shorter loop today.

Not a dirt bike. This is too wet and wild to venture onto the trails. They'll be saturated and – if they're passable – not much fun.

Not an "interesting bike." Riding home in the cold damp will turn into endurance, and that's no element for a vintage machine, or a custom chopper, or a one-off close to the heart.

Maybe a tourer, though. Get me back swiftly and efficiently, dry behind the fairing and warm from the protected riding position. Yes, maybe a tourer.

And the rain stopped, blown out as rapidly as it blew in. I left the Tims to escape its air-conditioned chill. The sky was still overcast. The worst was over, but the cold and the damp won't go away.

Riding the last few minutes north, the air was cool against my face and the road patchy with puddles. But I could stretch out in the comfortable seat, legs forward on the highway pegs, arms resting on the handlebars, as the bike loped along again.

She was dirty now, her chrome dull and her paint grimy, but no different under the surface.

And finally, here at Scone, the Harley Blues Cafe is closed and there's just a sign that says "Open soon." Not to worry – I'm coffee'd out from the Tims, anyway. And there's no disappointment. Like the T-shirt says, for any decent road trip it's the journey itself that's the destination, not the other way around.

There's no disappointment with the bike, either. Riding a motorcycle is all about finding the right attitude – inside the head, there's plenty of room for five bikes.

My cruiser is just about as good a tourer as I want her to be, and more protective against the wind and rain once the windshield is adjusted a little higher. She tips bravely into corners and has no fear riding slowly on gravel roads. And she's my bike, which makes her unique.

It'll take a couple of hours to get home from here, but that's okay.

Outside the closed cafe, I dig out a sweater from the saddlebag and reach for the map. Might as well figure out an interesting route back.

Mark Richardson is the editor of Wheels. mrichardson@thestar.ca

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