What is the best ride you've had?

[Ms Piggy]

Ok all I was thinking last night about how much I love riding my motor bike. :love:

I was wondering what is the most memorable and enjoyable ride anyone has had?

For me (so far) it would have to be riding up to Tokaanu in the pissing down rain and then riding back the following day and it being bright and sunny. I was with a good group of mates and we all had an awesome time.

[Yokai]

2 really good rides for me:

1 - Down to Whitianga this New Year's eve - first time on the Coromandel - what a larff!
2 - The Auckland meet with Frosty's sparkshow!

[MSTRS]

Most memorable ride..........from Taupo to Ohakune via Saddle Rd /National Park, winter of '75, sub-zero temps all the way, snowed from about the bridge over headwaters Wanganui River for the rest of the way. Wearing jeans & a ski jacket in those days with fleece-lined gauntlets. Scoot was a T500 (naked of course). I have never been so cold (in fact I sometimes wonder if occassional stiff knees today are a result).
Most enjoyable......Every ride when the sun shines and flow of ride is unmolested by dorks in cages & :Police:

[SPORK]

Oh dear...

Saying "What is the best ride you've had?" is just ASKING for someone to say:

LOLOLOL UR MOM!!!1111

*Shudder*

[Wonko]

First ride on the GPZ600 after riding a GL145 for 9 months(top speed 120 with a tail wind). Heading over the Paparanga bridge away from the lights by the mall, just opening it up wide to see if there where any problems, and then noticing the speedo was doing 140 and still climbing.

[vifferman]

I was wondering what is the most memorable and enjoyable ride anyone has had?

Hmmmmm....
It'd have to be a toss-up between a Honda Owner's Club ride I went on in 1975, with about 400 present, and riding from Hamilton to Christchurch in September 1994. The latter was my first significant highway ride.

I also thoroughly enjoyed riding from Tauranga to Hawera for the first time in 1997, especially the Awakino Gorge on the way home.

More recently, the Maraetai-Clevedon-Kawakawa-Hunua-home ride on January the 4th was very nice.:scooter:

But I think the most memorable ones are yet to come...

[merv]

Yeah loved them all. (Just like fine women eh!)

I especially like the adventure rides on the dirt bike and on the road bike Lindis Pass is still one of my favourites with probably Upper Buller Gorge as next best. I like the feeling of reasonably high speed curves.

So on the opposite tack one of the most painful rides is doing the Wairau Valley on the dirt bike on the way back from Rainbow. Straight roads for km after km just vibing along about 100 - 120km/hr.

[jimbo600]

Around Biarittz in France and the Pyranees on a gsxr750. Bloody awesome.

[Ms Piggy]

Oh dear...

Saying "What is the best ride you've had?" is just ASKING for someone to say:

LOLOLOL UR MOM!!!1111

*Shudder*
:Oi: Whats with the shudder???!!! I'll have you know that my Mum is a very classy lady - so shut your mouth! :shutup:

[Devil]

I swear she was 16... honest.

[Joni]

In South Africa - went on a rally called the "Swazi" - in Swaziland. About 800km's there and back, twisties and some of the best scenery I have ever seen... green, beautifull, amazing roads. There were about 75 bikes riding together. Good long weekend. I talk singular, it happens every August... :niceone:

In NZ -Boxing day this year, I rode down to the Coromandel. Still getting to know the roads here etc, but it was a really good ride.

:sunny:

[SPORK]

No officer, wasn't referring to ya Mum, me was referring to the people that make the MumJokes!

Honest!

My bad if it was interpreted wrongly!

[TwoSeven]

Some good rides touring around france on a chopped bonnie. The french were great because whenever we pulled into a village, someone would turn up with a bottle of wine and food.

[Ms Piggy]

No officer, wasn't referring to ya Mum, me was referring to the people that make the MumJokes!

Honest!

My bad if it was interpreted wrongly!
Thats ok I wasn't overly offended :blah: My Mum on the other hand would give you a good clip around your ear hole!

[NordieBoy]

Every ride on the Nordie is great :D

But going wfo on a customised Magna 750 from 30kph on a deserted straight was fun :yeah: :ride:

That would be my choice of cruiser.
V4 750 - sound, speed and smoothness.

[dangerous]

Brisbane to Sydney via the inland rd...... and it was only betered by returning to Brissie via the coast rd on the 97 VFR.

Local rd's would be the west coast one end to the other on a fine day, most memorable would be the n/i trip to Kaitaia and up 90mile beach on a 500euro in 89 and a 750ez in 90.

[F5 Dave]

Best rides;

Blenheim kart race track, reverse direction over the rise at the highest point knee dragging, suspension compresses & pushes your knee in. Scary & Stella at the same time.

Many trail rides where you stop & the scenery is primo-rrific (ooh I dun made a new word).

Trials riding Whitby forest downhill tracks before the buggers mowed it all down. :brick:

Any road-ride when it’s been a long time since you’ve ridden. I used to ride every single day, but now there are often gaps of a week.

[F5 Dave]

Oh yeah, 90 mile beach. Good point. Had a great trip with the soon to be mrs on the back. Up the stream 2 up on an 1100. Picnic half way & no one passed by for 1/2 an hour. Won't post the pic, I might get in trouble, but it made me smile. Edit: that makes it sound worse than I intended.

[merv]

Trials riding Whitby forest downhill tracks before the buggers mowed it all down. :brick:

Did you ride with the Meads?

[Blakamin]

Brisbane to Sydney via the inland rd...... and it was only betered by returning to Brissie via the coast rd on the 97 VFR.


Pacific highway???? farqin rocks!!!! specially if ya detour thru Port Macquarie etc... (used to teach sail-boarding there)

[Hitcher]

The last one!


Fancy having to choose. There have been so many excellent rides. Into and out of Milford was a standout. The Glenorchy road. So was riding my first bike home from the dealership. The Grand Challenge. Most of the South Island. Large chunks of the North Island. Riding with some of the reprobates on this site. The list goes on...

[Jantar]

Fancy having to choose. There have been so many excellent rides. Into and out of Milford was a standout. The Glenorchy road. So was riding my first bike home from the dealership. The Grand Challenge. Most of the South Island. Large chunks of the North Island. Riding with some of the reprobates on this site. The list goes on...

I must agree fully with Hitcher... So many great rides and so difficult to compare. The splendour of the South Island's West Coast, or the twisty roads between Opotoki and Te Aroha? The lakes of the McKenzie Country, or the Western Taupo route? How do you rate a great ride?

Possibly the most memorable rides are those where I have set out into an area I don't know, and at every intersection I decide left, right or straight ahead, but never follow the main road. You can find some really great motorcyling country that way.

[Paul in NZ]

Dunno... Still having it....

[ajturbo]

i had a DAM good one last weekend,

but then again all the years i spent in the south Island riding....

the buller, west coast, ... every where!

andy

[SPORK]

Thats ok I wasn't overly offended :blah: My Mum on the other hand would give you a good clip around your ear hole!

No more mentionings of "holes" when we were so recently talking about mum jokes. Please?! :sick: :confused2

[Skunk]

Middle Earth Adventure was good - stands out cos it was my first adventure ride.
Haven't had a bad road ride yet. :niceone:

[MSTRS]

i had a DAM good one last weekend,

but then again all the years i spent in the south Island riding....

the buller, west coast, ... every where!

andy
Hitcher must have gone to bed. Damn. :msn-wink:

[Velox]

Diff rides for diff reasons...
- Heading up the hill behind our place by myself on the Ag., totally concentrating on keeping it upright as it bucks its way along, melting bits of plastic onto my jeans and screaming its head off, and then switching it off at the top *Queue: orchestral background music* and looking out over the Kaikouras and Wgtn harbour with just the wind (ie. no screams of the Ag in its death throws).
- Ripping it upa certain section of Makara hill (the real twisty bit where you just continuously flick the bike from one side to the other) and getting all the corners down pat.
- Riding in 'herd formation' in the Coast to Coast. So many bikes, everywhere around you!
- Playing on the Port Hills in Chch while I was killing time. Early evening so nice gold light, explorating the place - just hooning around not knowing what roads I was on and loving it!
- Even just getting a good run up Aro Valley!
But the list could go on for ages..........................

[FROSTY]

There was this one race meeting at Wanganui. Stinking hot day.
Back then wanganui was part of the nationals so all the top riders were there..
The crowds were huge -especially round turn 1 and through the esses up to rosegardens.
It was a F2 race which the 250 proddy guys could cross enter.
Something in my head went click that day because all race long everything seemed to be in slow motion. I was a midfeilder and battling it out with a guy on a cbr600.All through the race we were swapping places 3 or 4 times a lap and up through the esses we lap after lap were trading paint.
side by side we would go over the bridge popping (it seemed) huge mono's as we crested the top.
on the cool down lap the crowd were on their feet roaring at us 2
We Finished 9th and 10th respectively but I diddn't care, it was the ride of a lifetime

[Al]

In SA we used to do a lot of bush/forest riding, I had an IT465, forests near Melmoth in Zululand, still have video footage of awesome wheelies through rivers (and magnificent wipe-outs too).
Best ride in NZ was last years trip up to 90 Mile Beach, stopping at all the turn-offs you wouldn't normally do with a cage!

Al

[Bonez]

A certain young lady after a memorable new years party many many years ago.......

[inlinefour]

Ok all I was thinking last night about how much I love riding my motor bike. :love:

I was wondering what is the most memorable and enjoyable ride anyone has had?

For me (so far) it would have to be riding up to Tokaanu in the pissing down rain and then riding back the following day and it being bright and sunny. I was with a good group of mates and we all had an awesome time.

But I also like the Fireblade and would also like another RD 250 LC, although now that I'm bigger it might not be as good as I remember from my youth :Punk:

[erik]

I haven't got a favourite ride, but ones that stand out are:

When I had just got my learners and didn't have a bike yet, borrowing my brother's zzr250 and going for rides around auckland in the early hours of the morning on the weekend to avoid traffic. I wasn't riding hard or fast and the roads weren't anything special, but being out there early, learning to ride a bike with few other people on the road, it was neat.

There've been a couple of KB rides where I pushed it a bit and felt like I'd tuned in to the bike well and was riding well. They were more of an adrenaline rush type of fun.

Riding to uni, splitting past all the traffic is kinda fun too.

[F5 Dave]

Did you ride with the Meads?

um, no Andrew & Wayne who is a local. Too much debris there now.

Velox, I know the very bit of Makara hill & used to use it as my reference when buying a bike if I could.
P.S. RSV1000 very snatchy fuel injection through there.

[Hitcher]

Route 52 was doing pretty well as an "outstanding" ride on Saturday until about halfway between T-tree and Wimbledon (I had fun this morning explaining this to an insurance claims officer whose map had a fold that ran right through these places)...

We'll finish it on another occasion.

[Monsterbishi]

Best for me was my first ever open road trip, from Christchurch to Blenheim on my '83 CB250RS, 80kmh the whole way, ended up draughting a mini for about 20% of the trip, the weather was perfect, about 20deg, although I was walking kinda funny afterwards...

Was almost a decade ago(Yikes!) August 1995.

[Slipstream]

it would have to be a toss up between:
1. A night time ride on the back of a Deuce, to help out a friend.
and
2. To and from Wairapa time trials on a GSXR 1100...also as a pillion.


no wait there's one better and it's the best too :love:
...but I'm not going to share. Some things are just better if kept quiet...

[Yokai]

My best ride has had to have been this weekend - AWESOME....

The iPod handled well, Magamiko was going great guns, and I didn't bin it! Wonderful weather - sparkling water - good mates! awesom... thanks guys!

[XP@]

Best rides have to be a Rusty Nuts ride. either the 1000 miler or the southern cross.
Even though here are times you ask yourself "why?" they are just the best.

No compromise, total immersion in mototcycle.

[TonyB]

My best ride would have to be a wee round trip I did from the Hokinui Moonshine Rally to Milford Sound and back in a day a couple of years back. The weather was near perfect, and the road from Te Anau to Milford sound would have to be one of the best in the country. Very well sign posted with hardly a straight bit in it, plus simply awesome scenery. I will never forget that day.

All the roads on the West Cost (SI) are awesome, as is the Lindis Pass and Fairlie to Geraldine. Chch to Nelson is awesome no matter which way you go (once you get off the Canterbury plains). The Mackenzie country would be great with an excellent radar detector, but at legal speeds it's just as bad as the canterbury plains, (except the veiws keep you going), there are a few corners but they're all so gentle they may as well be straight at legal velocities...

[Lee Rusty]

and back via Route66 from Chicago to LA

[clint640]

All through the race we were swapping places 3 or 4 times a lap and up through the esses we lap after lap were trading paint.
side by side we would go over the bridge popping (it seemed) huge mono's as we crested the top.
on the cool down lap the crowd were on their feet roaring at us 2
We Finished 9th and 10th respectively but I diddn't care, it was the ride of a lifetime

I hear ya man. That sounds like my favourite ride ever on the track, at Manfeild I was on my 'ol VFR400, the other guy was on an XR650 motard. On the last lap I came 'round the sweeper at 10/10ths with the VFR squirming underneath me. Coming onto the front straight I could feel the XR thundering up behind me as I knew he would with his superior punch out of the turns, I tried to mould myself into the bike, tucking in elbow, knees, ears, everything, hoping that the better top end of the VFR would manifest itself in time. It did. By 1/2 a wheel I took the chequered flag ahead of him for a prestigious 3rd place in D-grade :laugh:

Best road/adventure ride was last feb, thrashed a rental DR250 'round the top of the South for a weekend - the combination of good weather, good mates, great roads & scenery made for a trip my mind still wanders back to during slow days at work. Best thing is, we're going back to do it all again (& more) in a couple of weeks :banana: and this time I'll be on the 640 :banana:

Cheers
Clint

[Fryin Finn]

My most memorable ride was back in 76 on my first bike, a Yamaha 360 RT3 around the South Island. Just 2 of us. The engine had just been rebuilt with a Suzuki 400 piston because the barrel was too worn to fit the largest oversize Yam piston. I had fitted Girling shocks from a Triumph Bonneville (way too stiff) and the seat was redone with some foam and pvc from Para Rubber - I basically sat on the frame rails. The lights didn't work and It didn't have a WOF. And I ran premix in the tank as the oil pump didn't work properly. We wore gumboots, jeans and pvc.
It was about 2000k over 11 days. I ran out of gas twice on the west coast. We camped in an excuse for a tent and it rained only once when we stayed with friends in Dunedin. My sidestand broke off in Rangiora and I rode with a flat back tyre from Springs Junction to Murchison (all dirt road back then)
There were so many memorable little incidents.
2 weeks after returning to Wgtn the bike kicked back and split the crankcase around the kick start bearing. I never rode that bike again.
Now I'm so old I videotape my rides to remember them.

[PSYCHO]

Best ride ? hmmmm... probly one from Nelson to Franz Josef Glacier.

Awesome weather great roads...NO COPS!!!

Westport to Greymouth along the coast is magic.

Another favourite of mine is Arthurs Pass. Yeefukinhaaa!!

[750Y]

the best ride i ever had was around the track at pukekohe on a practise day, i was the ONLY BIKE 8-)

[Biff]

This weekend, from Nelson around the coast to Havlock, then through the Buller Gorge and back down through Lewis Pass. Windy (not the blowing kind, the curly kind as in winding), fast, scenic and not a cop to be seen. Oh and getting a peg down on a mates hired VFR. MMMMMMMM

[ResidentAngel]

July 2002. Palmerston North to Auckland, through 6" of snow on my VF1000. Desert Road closed, had to take the road through to National Park, snowed all the way to National Park (stoopid should have stopped at Waiouru for the night, but of course stoopid was thick as a brick!). Several patches of black ice going down to hill into Taumaranui - somehow I didnt fall off, but the cage behind me nearly bought it. And I was somehow travelling faster than the cages (cant quite work that one out!). Drank quite a lot of coffee at Taumaranui before I moved on!