Guy Boutin's Motorcycle Touring and Travel Pages

Adventures in Sport Touring with the Honda ST 1100, 1300 and the BMW 1200RT

Exploring North America...One Road at a Time

Changes
February, 2002

I have been subtly changed, the last 16 months.  My bike and I have traveled thousands of miles, traversed the country, visiting hundreds of towns, and meeting more people then most folks do in 25 years of living.  Experiencing such things changes a person, it can't be avoided.

I look at people and life with a new sense of appreciation.  I never gave much thought to farming, prior to riding through Iowa and Kansas.  Now tractors, cows, fertilizer and crop dusting are things I know.  A farmer on a tractor brings back images of a farm in Kansas.  Hardworking men and women in the fields from dawn to dusk, trying to make a living.  I know a little of how they live their lives, where before I didn't.

Cold.  I mean true cold.  Prior to my trip to Canada, anything under 50 degrees was cold.  Now, I know the true meaning of cold.  I look to the north and its people with awe.  Hardy souls who think nothing of walking out to their cars in minus degrees, with snow banks head high, and going to work.  Just another day.  Winter shortened days, where it grows dark in just a few hours.  Winter comes, and they absorb its blows, and move on.  It takes a certain kind of individual to live in Northern Minnesota, the Dakotas, or Montana in the dead of winter.  The weak are quickly ferreted out, exposed, and dismissed.  Do not call the boss and say you can't make it to the office because too much snow is on the ground, or you won't have a job long.

Riding across the Rocky Mountains will also change a man.  Nothing can prepare you for the first time you approach them from the east.  They rise up in the distance.  Beautiful, and at the same time intimidating.  As I rode among the peaks and valleys of the Rockies, I felt insignificant.  I was but a spec on this Great Mountain Range.  They could have swept me off their peaks, anytime they wanted.  They only let me cross their peaks because they wanted me to.  The Mountains at anytime, could have summoned a snow storm, or fierce wind and shut me down.

I now appreciate the diversity of South Florida, and the Hotel California.  Many places in those states, are truly international.  Many different people, contributing something to make this Country great.  Prior to visiting these places, I never thought much about that.  I have experienced different cultures up close, and I am better for it.

I have a new found self independence.  I have always been a loner, but now it is even more intensified.  I have a new confidence, no matter what life may deal out to me, I will make it. 

America no longer seems as large.  I hear the name of a place in a conversation, and I think, "been there."  One of the most pleasant changes is how I can put "pictures" with places.  Someone can say "Yosemite", and I have mental picture of El Capitan, I can read "Big Sur" in some text, and I have a mental picture of color and ocean.  "New England in Fall", conjures up images of pumpkins, and leaves, and the list goes on.  It is a good way to remember places visited.

I have noticed one physical change.  How poor a passenger I am in a car.  I recently took the ST to the shop for a rear tire.  My wife came to pick me up when she got off work, to bring me home the 20 miles.

I got in the car and as we pulled out of the parking lot, I started back seat driving.  "Watch that guy right there baby, he ain't looking."  "Look out there's a car behind that guy turning left."  " HEY! that idiot is fixin to run that stop sign!"  Exasperated she said,  "Look YOU wanna drive?"  I said, "well..."

Thousands of miles on the seat of a bike, have honed my eyes and vision.  I, as most riders, have a different vision.  We see things long before a problem develops.  We notice the slightest movement, like a moving bumper beside a parked car.  I was seeing things my wife did not.  I was a nervous.  As a passenger I was NOT in control, and that bothered me.  These days, I am not in a car very often, and to be honest, I don't know if I can ever be a good passenger again.  I don't think I am unique among long distance riders, in such situations either.

Funny, when I rode across Orlando with brother Ron in his Toyota, I was calm.  Consciously, I knew he had the same vision I had, and I was relaxed.

Long Distance riding has changed me.  Not noticeable on the surface, but it has, and for the better.