Nothing is quite as exhilarating as rolling down the highway on two wheels. It changes the whole process of traveling. It is less about getting where you are going and more about the ride itself. On two wheels you become part of your surroundings. You see things you would not normally see and the road shares it’s imperfections with you as you hurl yourself along. If you love motorcycles, you will not likely get it out of your system. It has for me been a lifelong obsession and from my very first ride on the back of a small honda I became drawn, like an addiction, and I knew someday I would own one of my own. My first motorcycle was a Honda 750K and everybody told me to start out with a smaller bike. WHY? That bike took me so many places and several long hauls from Kentucky to Augusta Georgia, while I was in the military. As happens with us from time to time in our lives, decisions must be made and one that I made was to give up riding while raising a family but I never gave up my motorcycle license. I always knew that someday my family would be grown. I always knew that someday I would own another.

      So two decades after I put my riding on hold I climbed onto my first Harley Davidson, a sweet little Heritage Softail Classic. The man who sold me this ride watched me drive away on a cold March day with nothing to cushion me from the chilly ride home but a huge smile. There are just not a lot of sad people riding Harleys. Trust me on this one. This motorcycle reacquainted me with open road riding and a few years later I traded it in on a new ’09 Electra Glide Classic. This is a much different animal. This is a much different ride. A heavy horse built for long trips,and comfortable riding. This motorcycle is a pack mule and I have along with my wife taken off for a week or so at a time bringing way too much stuff along with us because you just can’t tell a woman to pack one pair of jeans! There will come a time when I will be forced to trade in heavy for a lighter motorcycle, and shorter trips but not yet. I am still young enough. It is not time yet. When traveling, some prefer large groups, I prefer small groups or alone. I was recently invited along with my wife to ride with three other bikes on an awesome trip down the Natchez Trace. A little under fourteen hundred miles, it was a great ride with friends and family and you just can’t make this kind of connection traveling in a car. We started in rain so hard we could not see five hundred feet ahead of us and ended five days later slicing the rain,staying just ahead or running down the edge of several rain systems! And that was fun! And everything between day one and day five was new, and fun. The weather could not have been better! Nothing better than a brew and a great meal after a day on the road. I would go again tomorrow. Maybe day after tomorrow because like everyone knows, after a long ride, you have to do some detailing because you can’t start a trip on a dirty motorcycle! Give it a try someday and maybe it will become an obsession for you as well,if so ride safely!