Sure enough, I awaken the next day to a slate-gray sky, and a chilly smirr—a fine misty spray of a drizzle—eddying up the Royal Mile. Passersby snap photos of the retro-glamorous bike as I prepare to set out for a week-long Scottish Highlands adventure on the North Coast NC It stitches together various roads to form a tortuous loop around the untamed northern extreme of Britain.
The already iconic NC combines epic scenery with thrilling twisties and switchbacks, presenting perhaps the most exhilarating motorcycle tour in the British Isles. You can add to that artisan whisky distilleries, white-sand beaches, salty-aired fishing villages, and historic castles.
No wonder bikers are drawn to the NC like bees to brambles in bloom. Most of those bikers, I will discover, ride adventure-tourers. My attention-grabbing Roadmaster seems an oddly deluxe ride by comparison.
Seconds later, as if on cue, I note a flash to my left and spy a deer running almost within fingertip reach. The next instant it skews right and bolts in front of me. As I jerk on the brake lever, the panicked buck misses me by inches and goes sprawling with hooves flailing. The drizzle gradually thickens to a prolonged pish-oot, the North Sea barely visible as I pick up the A9, hugging the coast throughout my mile ride north to Wick.
Ensconced in a sculpted well-heated saddle, I ride cocooned in top-of-class comfort. This early NC section offers heaps of cultural draws, including neolithic burial chambers and Pictish stone stelae.
