There's nothing that compares with getting on your motorcycle, with your buddies all on theirs, and heading off on a road trip.
Get yourself a cruiser, like a Kawasaki Vulcan 1700 Nomad, a Suzuki Boulevard M109R, or a Star Royal Star Venture S and the highway is yours.
Time to ride.
But sometimes things don't go as planned.
Sometimes, just when you're ready head out, mechanical gremlins appear.
What are you going to do? You don't want to leave your buddy behind, but if he has problems it still doesn't make sense for everyone else to sacrifice their trips.
Different groups may handle it differently, but in our group, if your bike won't run, we're leaving without you.
If you can get it fixed and catch up with us, hooray! We'll be glad to see you.
But we're leaving.
Everyone understands this and there are no hard feelings.
I'd leave you behind, just as you would leave me behind, and that's OK.
I don't want my troubles to spoil your trip.
And we have done this a few times.
One time John and I were waiting at John's house for Bill, and Bill was very late.
Finally the phone rang and it was Bill asking us to come down to a shopping center where he was trying to get his bike to start.
We rode on down and after some pushing managed to get it going.
Everyone agreed the best idea was for him to head to his dealership and find out what was wrong.
Back at John's house we waited until Bill called to say it was his stator and they would not be able to fix it today.
He would try to catch up with us in a day or two.
John and I left.
Another time I was the one with the problem, though it wasn't mechanical.
It was a jerk of a service manager.
I had taken my bike in for some major work a full three weeks before we were planning to leave, and had been assured that there would be no problem getting the work done before we were set to leave town.
This was not critical work anyway, so if there had been any doubt about getting it done in time I would have just waited until we got back.
But the service manager said no problem, three weeks is plenty of time.
As the time until departure drew nearer I started checking in regularly.
Each time I called I was told that no, it wasn't done yet, but no problem, it would be done by the time I needed it.
Despite the reassurances, I started getting nervous as time drew very near.
Every time I called, same reply.
Finally, the day before we were set to leave, on a Friday, I called and the guy told me no, it would not be done tomorrow.
Very annoyed I asked him to confirm that it definitely would be done on Saturday.
No, he said.
But for sure it would be done on Monday.
Can you imagine how angry I was?! Of course, Bill and John were sympathetic, but there was no doubt what they were going to do.
They left town without me.
When I finally got the bike back I rode two long, hard days to meet up with the guys and from there it was a good trip.
You can bet I never went back to that shop again.
I was the one with troubles again another time.
I loaded my bike, got on, and took off to meet up with the group, but the bike was running poorly.
After about a mile I turned and headed over to the dealership and they quickly checked it out.
They weren't actually going to be able to fix it that day, however, so I took a cab home with all my gear and loaded it on my other bike and headed off.
I was late, and people were getting concerned, but at least this time I didn't get left behind.
Having two motorcycles also came in handy one other time.
Johnathon's bike had developed a problem about a week before we were taking off and he couldn't get it fixed in time.
No problem, I told him, ride my other bike.
He did and he didn't have to stay home.
But we absolutely would have left him, if it had come to that.
Sometimes you've just gotta do what you've gotta do.
And we're all cool with that.