How We Got To Where We're Going – Part I – Catching
the Motorcycle Bug
I don’t know when I first caught
the motorcycle bug. Probably in the early ‘60s when I was just a kid.
It might have been when Mr.
Cournyea, a teacher at St. Michael`s School in my hometown of Cobourg, Ont.,
rode to work on one of those early Honda Super Cubs. The red and white ones.
Remember their advertising slogans – “You meet the nicest people on a Honda!”
and “Different strokes for different folks!” Along with a wicked softball
pitch, I thought Mr. Cournyea was one cool dude!
About the same time, there was a
hell-raisin’ motorcycle club that operated in and around Cobourg – Satan’s
Choice. Every once in a while, a bunch of these deliberately dirty, tattoo’d
and tough-looking SOBs would show up, park their oh-so-cool choppers outside a
local watering hole and proceed to make life difficult for the local citizenry.
Nothing too outrageous – smoking and drinking beer while sitting on the curb
outside The Plaza or The British hotel, smashing the bottles on King Street,
our main drag, and harassing any poor woman who happened to stroll by. Cobourg
cops for the most part kept their distance.
I never had much time for the
one-percenters, but by God, those noisy, greasy, sexy bikes with their
stretched forks, sissy bars, straight-through exhausts and in-your-face paint
jobs were a young kid’s dream. As Ray Wylie Hubbard says, “some things under
heaven are just cooler ‘n hell!”
It wasn’t until I got to high
school in 1969 that the motorcycle itch really took hold. A couple of the older
guys (I was 14, they had to be at least 16 to get a license) had bikes. Then,
Al, a guy in my homeroom got one; can’t remember the year, make or model.
He gave me a lift to a track meet at the other high school in town. I think he
even managed to pull a six-inch wheelie with me up behind.
That was it! I was hooked! I knew
it was what I wanted, what I needed and had to have. The only thing standing in
my way was a total lack of funds – that and my dad.
Seems he had an old Triumph,
possibly a 100cc Tiger, back in Northern Ireland and coming home
one night had managed to pinball it and himself off the high stone walls
leading to the family homestead. According to him, he broke every rib and my
Granda Kenny still gave him “a good hiding” –for messing up the walls, not the
bike or himself. It put the old man off motorbikes forever, even unto the next
generation!!
The funding problem persisted
even after I left home. I didn’t actually learn to ride until I met another guy named Al, a fellow
reporter in 1976 at the now-defunct Brampton Daily Times, aka the BT, my first real (i.e. paying) newspaper job after college. (Another guy I
should contact!) Al had a heavily modified three-cylinder, two-stroke 500cc Kawasaki – handlebars welded to the top of
the forks, shifter set off the rear where the passenger footpegs should have
been, straight-thru exhaust and a homemade paint job. Looking nothing at all
like this one!)
He and I rode up to Barrie where
he was going to collect a debt. I waited for him in a local bar, but he was the
one who came back drunk.
“You gotta drive ush home,” my pal
slurred.
“I can’t, I’ve never driven
one,”said I, to no avail. So, off we went on the Kwacker down Hwy. 400, only
one of Canada’s busiest four-lane highways!
My first time piloting a
two-wheel bomb with a drunk for a passenger and, of course, we got stopped by
the OPP for weaving about in our lane. I figured I was done for, but my buddy
wasn’t so far gone. He slipped his wallet into my back pocket. (Luckily, this
was in the days before photos on licences!)
“Take it easy,” said the kindly
copper, letting me off with a warning and a conspiratorial wink. “I know what
it’s like to have someone up behind you who’s never been on a bike before!”
Al wanted to argue the
point, but I kept him quiet and the rest of the journey continued uneventfully.
Some months later, I got my first
bike – a Honda CX 500 liquid-cooled, shaft-driven, V-twin.
Bought it from my sister’s boyfriend in 1979 and rode it just about to death –
its and mine – for the next six years.
I rode it down to Chicago in
1980, chasing a girl after quitting my job at the BT. Rode it all winter long
in balmy Sarnia in southwestern Ontario where I started working at The Observer after she wisely sent me
home! I even moved once with all my worldly possessions bungee’d to every
available surface!
I think I’d still have it today,
except I had to flog it to pay a lawyer to get me out of a foolish first
marriage.
One thing I never did was tell
the old man. Not because I was afraid to or didn't want to, but he died before I could ever show
it to him and how comfortable a fit a motorcycle was for me. I still regret that.
Over the next 30 years or so,
I’ve had a succession of Hondas. A clapped out ’69 750 I bought from a biker chick in Petrolia (which may still be in the Welland Canal in Port Colborne
where it needed to go after pissing me off once too often!)
Then there was a nearly new ’75
CB550-4. Bought it from a guy I met in Ottawa when we both worked for the
now-dreadful Ottawa Sun. Put more
than 40,000 kilometres on that beauty. I still have it and hope to restore it
one day – it was the ultimate rice rocket of its day.
Prior to buying a 2001 BMW K12LT for this ride, my most recent bike was a 2003
750 Shadow ACE (American Classic Edition) bought new out of the box shortly
after leaving The Canadian Press news agency to go to work for the Alberta
government. Sure, it’s a Harley Sportster knockoff, but reliable, dependable
and one sweet ride.
And a few days before I head out,
my Shadow has been sold! Gotta pay for this bucket list ride somehow!
Hey, buddy. This is excellent. I very much look forward to following your ride. It will be nice to feel a part of the journey and to see the places and the faces along the way. Cheers, my friend.
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