What am I doing here?

For the first post on this blog I’ll share a little bit about me, what I’m about, and what I hope to be able to do with Maryland Moto. 

About Me:

I started riding in May of 2016. I had no more experience than about 5 miles on a 50cc scooter and a half hour riding pillion, but I decided I was going to become a motorcyclist. I signed up for the Motorcycle Safety Foundation (MSF) Basic Rider Course (BRC), sold my gremlin infested Saturn Vue, and bought some gear. In my MSF class there were some people who had ridden before, some that had bought bikes already, and a few people with no experience but just wanted to learn and see if they liked it. I got a few looks when I said I was replacing my car with a motorcycle. Since then I’ve followed through with that plan. As of this writing I’ve put down about 8000 miles commuting almost every day in nearly any weather, finding backroads on my commutes home and weekends, and took a 1200 mile trip down Skyline Drive and the Blue Ridge Parkway to Asheville, NC. I’ve done a lot in the past 9 months and plan to do so much more.

Riding:

My motorcycle is a leftover 2014 Honda CB500X I picked up new from a dealer’s showroom a few days after passing the MSF BRC. I shopped every dealer in my town that day and strongly considered several others that were all about the same price. The CB500X was a bit taller than a couple others, which I knew would be a challenge as a new rider, but I wanted a bike that could do a little bit of everything. The upright seating position, little extra suspension travel, dual sport tires, forgiving amount of power, and Honda’s reputation for reliability won over everything else for me. Everything I’ve done so far has been a blast and the CB500X has handled it all; carving corners, getting loose on gravel, highway cruising, scrambling down fire roads.

This Blog and the Future:

I hope to be able to share things I’ve learned and will learn via this blog. I intend on reviewing my equipment and motorcycle in depth. I’ll share ride reports and routes, and I hope to be able to come up with some cool merchandise that other Maryland riders will like. I want to take some longer adventure and camping trips and want to be able to share those experiences with others. Western Maryland is seeing a reopening of a public trail system, there are mapped Trans-Pennsylvania and Trans-New Jersey Trails, West Virginia is just a few miles away and full of awesome roads, and I do wish I had documented my last trip down Skyline Drive and the Blue Ridge Parkway better. So keep an eye out for me, subscribe if you’re so inclined, follow me on Instagram and Twitter; I’m gonna make this good.

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