Friday, March 30, 2007

Why I’m taking a 20 year old bike on my trip.



I’ve never sold my first bike. I don’t know if my other bikes are jealous of my first love sitting there next to them, but SPARE is here to stay. Something really big would have to fail on that bike for me to give it up.
Why would I choose a 20 year old 750 over a 3 year old 1200? A friend asked me this the other day, my immediate response was comfort. But as I thought about it more, I realized there is more to the story. For all day comfort, the K75 is my choice with its upright riding position, for both driver and passenger. I also prefer the easy access, full size hard cases on the K75, over the nail-breaking, limited capacity bags on the K12GT.

An equally import, albeit less tangible reason is approachability. The K75 is not a fancy looking bike. People outside of the BMW riding community, don’t really recognize it. It’s a bit generic looking. I feel that people will have less preconceived notions about us on this bike. It doesn’t have the BMW snob factor that my shiny sleek K1200GT has. We'll get enough attention as a mother/daughter on a motorcycle. The bike doesn't need to be the center of attention.

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