Musings from one who writes, and rides…
Originally published in Rider Magazine. Recently I visited one of my favorite cafes, a short ride up the Pacific Coast from my Santa Cruz, California, home. Called Downtown Local, the place is a syrupy mix of old motorcycles, vintage gas tanks stacked on shelves like cordwood, and decades worth of vinyl, which sound a little…
Originally published in Rider Magazine. Lately I have been spending a lot of time on my 1974 Honda CB 750. I enjoy the sit-up-and-grin riding position, the languid feel of the bike, and the visceral growl of those four pipes—the world’s first true superbike. But there’s another reason the old CB is so enjoyable: It never…
Originally published in RoadRUNNER Magazine. I’ve logged a lot of motorcycle miles with my wife, Meredith, riding pillion, but I’ve never seen this before: she’s back there snapping photos of a straight, four-lane interstate, as if we’re riding god’s own highway. “What’s up?” I ask her. “Well,” she says, “It’s the most amazing thing. I’m looking…
Originally published in RoadRUNNER Motorcycle Touring & Travel Magazine. Rain slants down outside my garage as utility trucks scurry about, fixing downed power lines. A fire truck screams past, heading up the canyon to deal with the latest meetup of a car and tree. Meanwhile, a dull glow emanates from my garage shop, like an ember—I’m in there…
This article was originally published on Motorcycle.com. Photos by Randy Wilder. Forty sweaty high school kids are on a group mountain bike ride in the Fort Ord National Monument, outside Salinas, California. They don’t seem to know, or care, about the identity of the tall guy in their midst. To them, he’s just another well-meaning…
Originally published in the BMW MOA Magazine. Call me grumpy, but as the saying goes, the more people I meet, the better I like my dog. Or my motorcycle. In other words, when it comes to crowds and motorcycling, my general impulse is to go as fast as possible in the opposite direction. And so it…
Originally published on Motorcycle.com. Photos by Randy Wilder. In the pantheon of vintage motorcycle shows, the Quail Motorcycle Gathering is a little like your neighborhood block party. Part Concours d’Elegance, part custom show and part biker bash, it’s a place where a hardtail chopper with springer forks sits happily alongside an impeccable Manx Norton. Vincents, Velocettes,…
Photos by Randy Wilder. Article originally published on Motorcycle.com. Not long ago, Santa Cruz County was the perfect place for a weekend shop crawl. You could find every major motorcycle brand within a few salty blocks of the ocean: Honda, Kawasaki, Suzuki, Harley-Davidson, BMW, Yamaha, and Hinckley Triumph. There were multiple incarnations of Ducati and…
Note: This article originally published on Motorcycle.com. Photos by Randy Wilder. Robb Talbott is late. We agreed to meet at the site of his forthcoming motorcycle museum in Carmel Valley, but the guy is nowhere in sight. Just then, a late-model pickup comes rattling up the drive, towing a trailer. On the back is something you…
This story was originally published in City Bike Magazine. We like to say that motorcycle restorations are like archaeological finds. History is revealed beneath every layer of dirt and dust—a thousand stories told in the arcane language of slapping pistons, worn valve guides, and multicolored wiring bodges. That’s not just a cute analogy for this…