05-03-2025, 01:07 PM
(05-02-2025, 04:41 PM)Gone in 60 Wrote: ...and that if this guy can do it, if Pdedse did it, well than what's my excuse?
You have none. Get your INT up here and visit (or on your CB1100...or your Triumph).
Just last week I was having a good email exchange with a friend. He has a BMW GS1250 and a GS1200, which he loaned to me last summer so that I would "keep up" with him on an Alaska / BC trip. We send each other vidoes / ride reports of guys doing long distance rides--we dream of doing one to/in South America. "What bike?" always comes up. I'm cheap and so my dual purpose bike is my Suzuki DR650. He wants "lots of stuff" on his bikes, and loves his cruise control, brakes this and that, riding options, heated grips, power to flick the throttle and whiz up to 120mph in a few blinks of an eye. He loves all the tech, the size, the comfort. I like simplicity and "can I work on it?" bikes that I can afford.
He found a couple of ride reports of guys doing RTW and northern hemisphere to southern trips on "postie-like" bikes (Honda CT110) and similar. He said, although he admired the riders' gumption, that he found it a bit ridiculous to try a trip and purposefully choose an underpowered, uncomfortable bike seemingly just to prove that it could be done. For him, it was as though one would scale a tall mountain barefoot or in cheap sandals just to prove that it could be done, even if one would finish with bloodied and bruised feet.
I brought up the fact that some people enjoy light, unassuming bikes that fit it, do not break the bank, and are easy to fix. In the end, we agreed with an oft-repeated answer to what's the best bike for a trip...likely, the one in your garage.