2015...The Year of the TW Adventure Motorcycle Riding part #1

When I first got the "Bug" {that desire to return to riding a motorcycle after 25 years or so "Out of the Saddle"....I knew I wanted to do the Off Road/Dual Sport riding like I had done when I first began to ride, back in 1974....

I was 25 when I first purchased that Kawasaki 250 On/Off Road Bike....the reason I waited that long was because my dad despised Motorcycles, he had seen to many deaths in his years as a Mechanic, via untrained riders....when he passed away on Christmas Eve in 1972, the reason for not riding was gone with him.  I finally I purchased my first MC, a new one from the local dealer in the spring of 1974....a couple of nasty wrecks, one my fault{1975}, one an  inattentive drives fault in 1987...convinced this father of three to give up riding...at least until the kids were grown and out of the house.

During the winter of 2013/14 I decided I would purchase a "Dual Sport" as they are called now, after discovering "Big Dog" Mark Sampson's web site on his adventuring riding across the US, Canada, and Mexico....

http://www.bigdogadventures.com/default.htm

I had the bug again, and I began to look at 250 Yamaha and Kawasaki bikes....a downsize to that time 40 years before....the last Motorcycles I owned were various sized Kaws, Suzuki, and Yamaha rides...I preferred the slower pace and a chance to get off road as much as possible.

Finally, after months of looking and deciding which ride I could afford to pay cash for, I discovered another web site, dedicated to this little 200cc dual sport Yamaha nicknamed the "T~Dub", as in TW or Trail Way....the folks on the site followed their fellow riders like cult, and the TW had a cult following....funny looking, not very fast, fat tires, slow but dependable, I knew I had my ride chosen....question was "New" or "Used"...?  New it was decided, a 2013 leftover or a new out the door 2014?   After a couple more months of looking {I was in no hurry, it was mid winter} and not being able to get the dealers in Ohio and Indiana to budge on the price of a 2013....I called "Honda East" in Maumee, Ohio{ a berg of Toledo}....and pulled the trigger on a new blue 2014....

I had the TW Forum to thank for my new purchase:  {out the door at less than $4400 with 1 mile on the speedometer}:

http://tw200forum.com/


2014, March to be exact, is when I brought the ride home, in the back of a Harley Davidson trailer...the entire year I would put about 600 miles on it....steady and slow would be it...never riding over 60 or so miles in one ride....but I had plans for bigger and better riding in calendar year 2015, I would ride and ride some more....

that story up next>>>>>