A Road Such As This

Man can climb to the highest summits; but he cannot dwell there long.
– George Bernard Shaw –

ON A ROAD SUCH AS THIS, bone-weary settlers suffered in silence as they cautiously picked their way along the gnarled and treacherous trace, spun like a convoluted, recondite thread atop the arched and fearsome backbone of an indolent dragon. As prowling mites traversing the spine of a vicious, sleeping dog, they pressed on, the clatter of steel-shod, wood-spoked wheels and the clump of heavy hooves the only sounds to drift through the still and frigid air. On a road such as this, velocity on a motorcycle demands extreme concentration. Hundreds of razor-sharp turns are compressed into perhaps a dozen miles. Lines must be chosen with a precision measured in millimeters, not inches. Scores of minute control inputs—a slight touch of the front brake, a barely perceptible rotation of the throttle, a subtle shift of body weight—are required to quickly negotiate each unpredictable bend. These commands must be woven together in a seamless flow that dispatches the myriad hazards and challenges without abruptness, without hesitation.

On a road such as this, one can lose himself in the stark, unreal grandeur of nature. Stop for a moment along the narrow track and watch the vast shimmering expanse of pale blue sea, thousands of feet below and miles distant, its wind-whipped, glittering whorls shifting in an ever-changing interplay of cerulean fire. The rider is at once diminutive and omniscient; an intruder, yet anointed. Listen carefully to the tick and groan of contracting metal as the engine sighs its paean to the machine age—the technology that once, twice, and thrice removes us from the covered wagon and ox. Touch the slightly roughened surface of the tires, warm from their tryst with the road, and note with satisfaction their pliant resilience.

On a road such as this, one must intuitively understand the razor-thin margin for error that conditions impose upon the aggressive rider. To one side lurks a precipitous fall of hundreds of feet, with great jagged shards of stone jutting from the steep incline to rend man and machine. On the other waits the unknown: the sheer face of the mountain prevents precognition of errant travelers and wayward beasts. Between these bounds lies a slender strip of broken, potholed asphalt, its convolutions littered with gravel often camouflaged as pavement. Decisions must be made in milliseconds. A miscalculation leaves no room for error.

On a road such as this, conventional techniques of riding are discarded for unorthodox, advanced methods that would have a riding-school instructor cringing. The front and rear brakes are played against the throttle to maintain the composure of the chassis; both brakes are trailed deep into turns, the front released first to guard against the threat of unseen sand and stones. Countersteering is anathema here; one’s entire body must be brought into play to assure a swift and fluid transition of both man and machine. Some turns demand the widest of lines and latest of apexes, while others have bike and rider clinging to the side of the mountain lest a traveler who has chosen four wheels instead of two appears in the same time and space.

On a road such as this, one can find himself suddenly plunged into the most desperate of circumstances. Successful negotiation of this perilous track is the sum of tens of thousands of decisions, thousands of control inputs, and hundreds of directional changes. If done expertly, the result is pure rapture, resulting in the kind of delicious fatigue only achieved by concentrated effort coupled with superior skill.

Few riders attempt roads such as this. Even fewer return once they have had a sampling of such grueling and unforgiving fare. But for a select minority, the spoils are sublime and addicting, much like those realized by a beleaguered group of expert climbers when the summit of a particularly difficult mountain is reached: exhaustion, exhilaration, a profound feeling of accomplishment, and a sense of mastery over technology and terra firma. Whatever form they take, for a motorcyclist, these rewards can be found in abundance—on a road such as this.