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

                 Favorite Roads- A Roll Call of Great Riding

More than once I've been called to name my favorite roads.  At first, my list was short.  But now, 6 years later, it has become necessary to separate West Coast and East Coast riding.

I've ridden thousands of great highways, my total experience can be a bad or a good thing.  Bad, because I'm no longer easily impressed.  I've probably looked over some great roads, that by all rights could go  on any list, highways that have something to offer, but so many miles dulled my senses to their appeal.  Good, because if a road MAKES the list, it must be something special to stand out from the thousands in my mental catalog.

Here are a few things I evaluate before placing a highway on the list:  Curves, challenge, scenery, low traffic, and the intangibles- such as my mood on that day, the feel of the land, and its general location.

A good road surface is only important if the road is twisty.  A bumpy road still has a chance if it doesn't require much leaning.  For example, U.S. 83 in South Dakota.  A nice road through the farmland, a little irregular, but nothing compared to the Maritimes.

Americans have a tendency to take our highways for granted, only when we venture out do we realize how great a highway system we have.

A highway does not have to be curvy to make the list.  It can be a long, open straight, or a road through quiet farm country.  My list is not scientific, I'm not even sure what the criteria is for a road to make the cut.  I'm sure many of you will say, "why did he pick THAT road??" and all I can say is, "you had to have been there."

Several roads made my list because they were the beneficiary of a zone ride.  Two highways come to mind, Ks 96, and Colo. 109.  I may never ride either of those routes again, simply because I could never duplicate the feeling I had when I zipped down them the first time.   I might lock box those rides forever in my heart, content in the knowledge it could never be better a second time, and in fact could tarnish the memory of those glorious first rides.

Both coasts have their special nuances.  The east is hampered by crowds and dense traffic.  Thus, there are no lonely, pure, 100 mile run outs to the next town.  Each area has twisty roads, and sport riding nirvanas.  My hard core sport riding days are pretty much over, so many of the roads on my list, y'all can tackle at a much greater pace.  My sport riding is confined to roads I can reach in a day.  When I am far from home, on a new road, I want to sample what it has to offer, and trying to see how fast I can go on it, removes me from that. 

If you are planning a trip, browse this area of the site and get a few ideas.  I've broken down each region by state, to make it easy to browse a few of the great highways I've traveled.  

I hope you find my lists useful, and my wish is for it to inspire you to go out and find some highways to put YOUR list.

West               East      Canada