I went to my first Touratech Rally in June of this year.
I’m not much for motorcycle rallies anymore, mostly because you are camping in a field, under a hot sun, with no place to rest in the shade. I hate heat. Rallies are also incredibly expensive and I don’t always see the value for all that money – I’d rather spend that money on campsites and hotel rooms while out riding. But I also like meeting other adventure riders, and we haven’t met many in a while. Touratech rallies have become incredibly popular and I wanted to attend at least one, and this year seemed like a good year to do it: with so much of what I love disappearing, who knows how long Touratech rallies, and adventure motorcycling, will be around.
For those that don’t want to read this whole blog, I’ll cut to the chase: the Touratech Rally 2025 was a very well organized event with friendly people, and the variety of motorcycles available for the test rides, and the test rides themselves, made the whole thing well worth it for me. For others, it was the group rides on their own motorcycles that they loved most and keep them coming back year after year. There was only one presentation I really wanted to go to, and it turned out to be outstanding. I hate port-a-potties and was dreading having to use them – and I was stunned at how well these were maintained. Very good food selection onsite, and there’s also a cafe across the street that has a great breakfast (which we had every day of the rally). Plenty of free water, though it was a schlep to get to and from (bring a large water container to cut down on trips).
I did hear two or three people say that what they missed was the communal fire rings, and that made it harder to meet other people and socialize, but the reality is that the days of communal fire rings are over, because of climate change and the eternal fire risk we are always, always under. Hope Touratech can come up with some kind of alternative. And the showers were way too far away from where we camped and weren’t worth the hike through uncut grass and dirt – I’d be covered in dust by the time I got back to my tent.
We decided to make the rally the kickoff for an early motorcycle trip (we usually wait until September for a long trip), and I decided to offer to present at the rally, both because I really wanted to on this particular subject and because it would get us in for free: I offered to present on how to “do good” (volunteer) while on a motorcycle adventure and was accepted!
I started my first day off at the rally with a SheADV training. I have been riding for more than a decade, and have been riding off-road more and more for a some years now, but I took the most basic SheADV training because I still feel like a beginner off-road and, one of my mantras in life is that until I can teach the class, I have something to learn from the class. I learned some techniques I really need to practice in a field, and that made it worthwhile. I was impressed that there were 24 women in the class! The downside of the class was that I didn’t get any one-on-one instruction, even for just a minute or two (other big classes I have taken have provided that). But I’m still glad I took the class.
The best part of the rally for me was getting to ride so many motorcycles! I rode the Honda 300 LS on dirt and pavement, the Yamaha XT 250 on the same (swoon! – memories of Guatemala), the Zero electric dirt bike (I swear it can climb a wall) and, on pavement, my first Harley ever: the Pan American (smooth as silk, amazing throttle). All of the motorcycle manufacturer representatives were so nice and seemingly happy to be giving people the chance to ride these motorcycles. And the routes they chose for us were fantastic and gave you a real sense of what the motorcycles can do.
If you go to any motorcycle rally that has test rides, get to the manufacturer sign up place an hour before it’s time to sign up for rides that day – trust me on this.
I didn’t do any group rides – I was really tired of the dust from just the test rides. Plus, I’m not good on group rides. But for many attendees, the group rides were their entire focus for the rally, and they seemed SO happy about them.
I went to the best video editing workshop EVER at the rally, by Matthew Williams / Tall Man Moto (it’s on his YouTube channel). It doesn’t matter that it was focused on motorcycle-related content – the advice is fantastic for anyone who wants to try to tell stories with video. That includes nonprofit organizations.
We also got to see our friend Emma, from whom we rented motorcylcles from in Belize. She was there to talk about her motorcycle rental and hostel biz in Belize. She had a fantastic turnout for her evening workshop, both because of the perfect time slot (nothing else was happening) and because she brought rum and coke for attendees.
I owe Emma big time because she let me use her computer for my workshop on volunteering while motorcycle traveling. Unfortunately, my workshop did not go well. I thought that, with 1500 attendees at the rally, at least a few would want to attend my workshop. But it was a horrible time slot: at 11 a.m. on the first full day of the rally, when everyone wants to be out test riding a motorcycle or taking a group ride or riding a trail on their own that the organizer’s have mapped out. Plus, there was a tire changing workshop at the same time, and I’ve been to enough rallies to know that is THE most popular workshop, always. Two people came to hear me – and left early to attend the tire workshop. Two more came in towards the end – one was presenting after me and one was there for that guy’s presentation.
And another one of my worst fears regarding presenting came true: I got trolled by a “well, actually…” guy. It hasn’t happened in a long while, but it does happen: a person, usually a white male, will show up at a presentation and claim that something I’m saying is NOT true, and he KNOWS it’s not true because of this time when… whatever. I get flummoxed, try to keep my cool, and after being through this a few times, I ask questions like, “Can you tell me the name of this organization where this happened” and “Can you tell me when this happened and where there’s a web site that says more” and blah blah, trying to pin down some facts to back up their claims. Usually, if I keep my cool and keep asking for these facts for verification, the person starts to back off – the story suddenly changes to whatever they are claiming being something they heard from someone else, or they “might” have some of the info wrong, but they will be sure to email me later with the full details (they never do). So, not only did I barely have an audience, one member, who claimed to be “the most famous round the world traveler you’ve never heard of”, sat there and contradicted me. I’m still angry about it. But at least, after a lot of online searching, I know now I was being trolled.
Anyway, I have my slides, with notes, here, and I will do a video on YouTube in the coming weeks for anyone interested.
I spent the rest of the rally quite humbled. Suddenly I wasn’t as bubbly and excited to be there as before. I keep telling the universe, since I moved back to the USA, that I have been humbled enough, I swear, I don’t need any more humbling experiences. I really would have liked even just five people at my presentation…
When Stefan would go do something I wasn’t interested in or when I just needed a break, I’d go get a drink and walk up to someone sitting at a table and say, “May I sit here?” and it was always “Yes, please!” And then a nice chat. Most people were so friendly and happy to chit chat. But we never did find buddies in our camping area, people to just sit and drink and laugh with in the evenings. In fact, we managed to camp right next to someone who was beyond annoying and that we end up avoiding. It’s just our bad luck of where we chose to camp in that vast field.
I was pleasantly surprised to see black men on motorcycles at a motorcycle rally for the first time! I counted five. And one black woman! That’s not many, out of 1500… But this was a first for me. Still… I would like to see a lot more diversity among motorcycle riders. I would like for everyone to feel welcomed and supportive in the ADV motorcycle world (and so many other places as well). I don’t want anyone who wants to do something to feel like they shouldn’t or aren’t allowed to because of their gender or gender presentation or ethnicity or religion or whatever.
I was really pleased to see all the women riding their own motorcycles, some of whom came by themselves or with other women.
The weather was a gift. It rained the first night, which got the dust down for a while, and it was never so crazy hot that sitting in the food tent with a cold drink or actually riding a motorcycle didn’t offer relief. But after the first day, the dust was awful, and I’m convinced that it’s why my chronic cough got so much worse.
I kept thinking about Mom during the rally. I like adventure riders for the same reason she loved Honda Goldwing riders – they are all friendly, they love riding back roads, they love having experiences. Our motorcycle gatherings are so different than the Harley stuff: there’s no bikini bike wash, no wet t-shirt contests, no “adult entertainment” – instead it’s friendly people, being supportive, sharing trip ideas, laughing together. I wanted to call her and tell her all about it. And had to realize yet again I couldn’t.
Will I go to another Touratech Rally? Probably not. I’m so, so glad I went, but I’m not sure what I would get out of a second one I didn’t get out of the first. I would love to return to the area and go on some of the roads Touratech mapped out. But not during a rally. But that’s just me – if you haven’t been, and are even marginally interested, you should ABSOLUTELY go.
We did go to Levenworth one evening for supper. It was a tourist-clogged mess with no free parking. My knee wasn’t too bad then, so we ate downstairs at the Andreas Keller Restaurant. I realized something on this second visit to the restaurant I did not in the first a few years ago: chicken can be substituted for almost all of the pork dishes. So Stefan had the pork schnitzel and I had the chicken version. Would have been fantastic with beer, but we don’t drink and ride. We didn’t walk around Levenworth this time – we know what’s there (it is really nice – do it if you have the chance). I do think it would be fun to go in a snowy winter month. But if you’ve been to Levenworth before, there’s really no reason to go again during the Touratech Rally – it’s just completely overrun with tourists and walking around in biker gear in the heat is no fun.
I was already dealing with a chronic, nasty cough that I was afraid would end our trip, but Friday night, our second night, I got out of the tent around midnight to pee, and I experienced excruciating pain in my left knee, pain so bad that I almost cried out. The next day, I saw that my knee was badly swollen. I could still walk, and so I did, and rode my motorcycle up to the main area so I could do a test ride of the Harley, then rode my motorcycle back, and of course got on and off the bike over and over the day after the rally, for breaks and what not as we continued our trip. We stopped at the Big Four Ice Caves trail head, and it took a long while for me to get off the bike without hurting myself more. I stayed behind in the shade while Stefan hiked to the snow field and back. We continued on the Mountain Loop Highway, which had just opened. It’s a terrific road and oh-so-easy, even when it turns into dirt and gravel, at least when we did it. But here it was Sunday evening and a lot of the rough campsites were occupied – this was going to be a zoon as of Friday, July 4th. The road dumped us into Darrington, where we enjoyed fantastic milkshakes at Moe’s Darrington.
But my knee was getting worse and worse, to the point that I burst into tears getting on it after lunch. We were headed to a hotel in Arlington, Washington that night – I had wanted to so we could finally clean up – and by the time we got there, I could not get off the bike without help, and had to limp with my walking stick to the room. I knew between my chronic coughing and this injury, the motorcycle trip was over and we would not be headed up to Canada afterall.
We stayed the night at the hotel and had some rather delicious Indian food from a nearby restaurant. Thank goodness the hotel put me in a room for people with disabilities – I was able to take a shower and use the bathroom on my own because of that. The next morning, Stefan unloaded his bike and rode the four and a half hours back to our home in Oregon, hooked up the trailer to our car and drove back (it took much longer). I laid in the room that day sleeping, waking up to cough and watch “Alfred Hitchcock Presents” (I love you, hotel with a Roku), and hobbling to the bathroom and back. After he arrived, I kvetched about the safety of the trailer and the bike – we’d watched the video of Noraly (Itchy Boots) getting her bike stoken in Wales, and given how near we were to Interstate 5 and all the stories I’ve heard of people getting trailers stolen at hotels, I was feeling extra worried – so he went out and did what he could to secure everything.
The next day, he loaded up the bike and we headed home. And at some point on that drive home, I realized how I had injured my knee: I bought new boots – real motorcycle boots – two weeks ago, that come up way over my ankles. They don’t let my ankle twist at ALL. What I didn’t realize as I got on and off my own motorcycle, as well as all those test rides of other bikes at TouraTech, was that I was twisting my knee each time I got on and off a bike, instead of my ankle. And according to the Interwebs, “If you’ve torn your meniscus, it might take 24 hours or more for pain and swelling to begin.” So… it’s day four of babying this knee (ice, limited walking, a brace), and there’s a part of it that is STILL swollen. As soon as an appointment opens up, I’ll go in for an assessment regarding physical therapy. And I’m hoping that by August 1, I can start exploring new ways to mount and unmount my motorcycle, so that I don’t twist the knee.
And now dealing with emails and phone calls from all those motorcycle dealerships who believe I’m in the market for a new motorcycle…
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