When were you happiest?

[bad Chad]

This is a rabbit hole to be sure.  But trying to keep it a bit above water, "what bike were you riding when you were/are you the happiest"?

A lot should go in to this.  Your position in life, your bike, the world, how the stars aligned, and perhaps a thousand other variables.   What was the best combinations of bike, life and more?

[oldbike54]

 Hmm , that time I didn't run out of gas was a good day .

 Dusty

[Ncdan]

I really have given this question an honest assessment and simply can’t nail down one given time or bike that fills that position alone. Sorry BC🤔🥵😊

[GeorgiaGuzzi]

Right now. Just celebrated 9 years sober. Made my peace with “just” having a simple job, left ambition by the wayside. Love my Guzzi for commuting/daily riding. Also looking forward to having the triumph as a change of pace bike. Great wife, healthy new nephew. House is warm even tho it’s cold out. Life is quite nice!

[Huzo]

If we are talking about our motorbike life, then the greatest elevation CHANGE that I ever had in happiness, was going from having no bike at the age of 13, to this exact bike overnight.


At that stage of life within my circle of riding mates, it was impossible to conceive of owning something so fabulous.
The list of demands that came with it from Dad, read like the Magna Carta and the Australian Constitution glued end to end, but it was a fair deal and was never broken.
I’d be up at dawn on Saturday morning, vegemite sandwiches in a Tupperware container strapped to the back.
Empty the (2 stroke) fuel out of the family lawnmower and with the 40 cents that Mum left on the counter for the midday refill...
I’d be gone all day.
Home for tea and into bed..
Nothing’s changed and hopefully never will..

[JJ]

Sadly, as we age, we all get much more cynical and jaded..so to totally avoid "The Rabbit Hole", mentioned, maybe a very happy and innocent time of my life was at age 12, when my Dad and I brought home this used 1965 Yamaha YG1-K 80cc Rotary Jet...my very first motorcycle!!

Many fond memories of riding the dirt roads, back roads, fields, and corn fields of upstate New York on this bad boy...

[Guzzistajohn]

Probably in my 20's when I was really taking woods and trials riding more seriously. I'd just gotten a new Fantic trials bike, man that thing was sweet running. Rode it up this bad ass hill called Yellojacket 1st try. Damn it felt soooo good! Not a care in the world!

[Motoark]

Most happiest without owning a bike would have to be back in high school in Germany. It was the early 70s, got to ride my friend's Trail 50s, Benelli Mini, Zundapp 125 beast and Bultaco 125 Persangs on a regular basis and the hashish was cheap. What more could you ask for?
Happiest when owning a bike was the early 90s, on my Ambo.  with my late wife. Sam. going to rallies before she quit riding with me when I got the 98 EV and things got too fast. The  kids were grown up, the job was good and I had a good band.
Not that I've really got anything to complain about now, but its a way different world these days.

[Knuckle Dragger]

That giddy lightheadedness, where everything just seems that much brighter, happier and wonderful.  Where one's whole existence seems to exist on a higher level than ever before or since.

I'm talking about first love.  Apparently a heady cocktail of Oxytocin, Norepinephrine & Dopamine floods the nervous system, inducing euphorically erratic irrationality.  Personally, I don't give a toss what happens.  It's just the best feeling ever.

It's only ever happened once, & that was well over 40 years ago.  But it's the best high of all.

[Tom H]

My Eldo. Been the happiest with that bike!

My other bikes have done very well. But the Eldo was a boat storage yard find. Fixed it up and have run it for 40 something years. Years of the best and the not so best of times.

Tom

[Sasquatch Jim]

When Was on an Icebreaker enroute to the Antarctic or sailing home from it, to my motorcycles.  Mid eighties.

[cliffrod]

Right now. Just celebrated 9 years sober. Made my peace with “just” having a simple job, left ambition by the wayside. Love my Guzzi for commuting/daily riding. Also looking forward to having the triumph as a change of pace bike. Great wife, healthy new nephew. House is warm even tho it’s cold out. Life is quite nice!

Congratulations.  Sounds like a great place to be and much like what I was thinking.

Certain things converge for me, in terms of a great ride or machine moment, and then it's there vs a single absolute "best of".  Last night was another one of them, I drove my still running old truck alone with no heat or radio for about 4 hrs- perfect late afternoon winter light through sunset into the clear evening, mostly away from traffic, great roads just cruising along- to get yet another piece of an old bike (the Guzzi tractor) for dirt cheap money with exact parts needed to fix yet another bike.   Lots of time thinking about how many times I've done that in the past, how lucky I was to do be doing it again and now starting to appreciate every next "this time" when it happens even more.  Sometimes on a bike, sometimes in my truck- that on the road perfect ride/drive experience that could easily be a dream.  Feels like you're flying.

By the time I got back, I was chilled cold like I had been riding a bike.  It was nice to come home to a happy wife with a fire blazing in the stove.  That made the whole last night moment even better.

Life has been a lot worse.

[John A]

On a ‘71 Ambassador, somewhere on the Wind River Range just riding my fool head off a thousand miles from home.
A close second would be burning up the road on a Cal2, running up the North Cascades in third gear and five K + rpms, passing everything in sight.  I think I was happiest just being out in the hills looking at country I’d not seen before, on a bike I’d made as good as I could with my own tools and abilities. A well tuned Guzzi is an amazing machine.

[Gliderjohn]

That is a dangerous path to go down. I would say my college years in the 70s. Basically a mid-sized KS town farm boy meets independence and people from all over the world and most all was new and exiting for better or for worse, but by far for the better. There was still a fair amount of anxiety and self-doubt too at the time .
GliderJohn

[Ncdan]

Let’s try and clarify something. From the responses I’m not sure we are all on the same page. Please clarify, are you asking on what bike was we the most happy with at a given time in our lives or at any given time?
Sorry if I misunderstood the basis of the question, it’s been a long day🤔

[twowheeladdict]

Sitting in camp after an amazing day of riding when I get to reflect on the day of extreme focus.  Even better if wife and friends are there.

Putting a big smile on my face were when I test rode the Kawasaki Versys 650 and accidentally lofted the front tire.  SOLD!  and the test ride on the Livewire.  I WISH.  Are those times of happiness or just exhilaration.

[Guzzistajohn]

Let’s try and clarify something. From the responses I’m not sure we are all on the same page. Please clarify, are you asking on what bike was we the most happy with at a given time in our lives or at any given time?
Sorry if I misunderstood the basis of the question, it’s been a long day🤔

what bike were you riding when you were/are you the happiest   That's how I'm takin' it Danny <shrug> Time w/ what bike........right??

[Guzzi Gal]

Recent adulthood: Pre-pandemic, when I was a stay-at-home mama and I could go out for a ride on my V7 III whilst the kids were in school.
Childhood: When I could be a horse for hours on end, exploring small towns, orchards, fields, valleys, deer paths, redwood forests, oak-covered hills, creeks, rivers, and too many backroads to count.

[Joliet Jim]

The day I held my oldest daughter for the first time on 2/11/85.  I think the bike at the time was a 78 Bonnie that was stored in my friends garage attic. No it was not running condition.  Didn't really matter at the time.

[oldbike54]

 Tomorrow , because every day I wake up is another day to enjoy .

 Dusty

[Joliet Jim]

Tomorrow , because every day I wake up is another day to enjoy .

 Dusty

really you're a moderator. how good can it be. :)

[Huzo]

really you're a moderator. how good can it be. :)

Probably better than it is..

[oldbike54]

really you're a moderator. how good can it be. :)

 Most days it is an honor ...

 

Probably better than it is..

 ...not to be ? It is really like being an umpire , you really need to attend a live game to understand they are just a part of the game , not a star and certainly not the highest paid 

 Dusty

[Shorty]

Might be the time I rode home in my 1959 Ranchero with a 69 Bonneville in the back, brand new wifey in her summer clothes next to me.  Or, the times I turned discarded buckets of motorcycle parts into useful running machines. 

[Scout63]

Ten minutes ago watching tv wrapped up on the couch with my wife. My happiest bike memory is always my most recent ride, but last Columbus Day week stands out.  I took the Commando to Vermont and on Thursday took a five hour solo ride between the Mad River Valley and the lake. 

[balvenie]

That would be a toss-up between fanging up Mt. Glorious and spending an afternoon in the garage, fettling my bike. I believe that it boils down to not thinking about myself.

[tris]

“The best moments in our lives are not the passive, receptive, relaxing times . . .
The best moments usually occur if a person’s body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile”

(Csikszentmihalyi, 1990).

This pretty much describes how I ride my bike most of the time 

[lucky phil]

If we are talking about our motorbike life, then the greatest elevation CHANGE that I ever had in happiness, was going from having no bike at the age of 13, to this exact bike overnight.


At that stage of life within my circle of riding mates, it was impossible to conceive of owning something so fabulous.
The list of demands that came with it from Dad, read like the Magna Carta and the Australian Constitution glued end to end, but it was a fair deal and was never broken.
I’d be up at dawn on Saturday morning, vegemite sandwiches in a Tupperware container strapped to the back.
Empty the (2 stroke) fuel out of the family lawnmower and with the 40 cents that Mum left on the counter for the midday refill...
I’d be gone all day.
Home for tea and into bed..
Nothing’s changed and hopefully never will..

Only bested at the time by the XR-75

Ciao

[Huzo]

Most days it is an honor ...

 
 ...not to be ? It is really like being an umpire , you really need to attend a live game to understand they are just a part of the game , not a star and certainly not the highest paid 

 Dusty

They reckon the best umpires are the hardest ones to see..
The more it looks like you did nothing, the more you probably got done....Most of it happens out of sight..(apparently..)
 

[Huzo]

Only bested at the time by the XR-75

Ciao

That’s the conventional wisdom, but just like in life..
You might not remember your second, but you will remember your first.. I couldn’t sleep knowing I was going out on my SL 70 in the morning.