In 2020 when Covid 19 hit the country, I decided to live my lifetime dream, get on my motorcycle and leave for a tour of the United States. It took several months to get ready but in June 2021, I loaded my motorcycle and I finally hit the road for a journey around the USA that would last several months.
I first spent several weeks riding in the south east including Louisiana, Florida with of course a trip to Key West, Georgia, and South Carolina. Then from Charleston, South Carolina, I started the journey across the country to end up in San Diego California but the journey is not over.
My motorcycle is a VStrom 650XT, a Sport Adventure Touring motorcycle built by Suzuki. I chose this midsize adventure bike first because the bike is not too heavy to rife on dirt and gravel roads and the bike is also very comfortable and performs great on highways. During this journey I was riding sometimes on road and sometimes off road. When you ride off road, it is not if you will drop your bike, it is when you will drop your bike. I dropped my bike a few time on the trails and picking it up when fully loaded was a workout in itself. Picking up the bike alone by myself with a bigger and heavier bike would have been a nightmare.
Even though this bike has a smaller displacement of just 650cc, the VTwin engine has plenty of power to complete the journey comfortably. The engine has enough power to cruise on the fastest highways across America and still has a lot of passing power left in case more power is needed. My motorcycle has been fantastic and fully reliable during the entire journey, This bike is amazing but yet simple. The maintenance is pretty easy and I was doing most of the maintenance by myself on the road. With just ABS and traction control, the bike does not have a lot of expensive electronics that could go bad during the trip and would be expensive and difficult to fix in case of failure.
I Love the VStrom. A simple, affordable, easy to ride, easy to maintain, a very reliable, and very comfortable motorcycle that can take you almost everywhere you want to go in the world. During this first journey across America, the bike performed extremely well, and did not even get a flat tire. She was my perfect partner for this amazing journey.
What about now? I am still riding. At this time I ride mostly in the south midwest of the United States, in an area that includes Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Texas. I create and organize off road routes and take some people along with me for a private guided tour of mostly the Ozark mountains and the Ozark national forest area. I am also preparing a second trip around the USA, a tour of South America, and a long ride across Europe. A lot of new journeys are coming soon.