My First Motorcycle

by Chet Phillips

In the Spring of 1971 I had the sudden urge to buy a motorcycle.  Up to that point, my motorcycling experience had been limited to riding homemade cycles consisting of old bicycles with lawnmower engines attached.  I searched through the local classified ads and found a 1966 Honda 305 Dream being advertised for $300.  I had no clue what one looked like, but went to check it out anyway.  When I arrived, the owner handed me a helmet and said to take it for a ride.  I had no idea what to do and he had to show me how to use the gearshift and clutch.  I was finally able to navigate it up and down the street, getting it into second gear and said I'd take it.  It was one of the ugliest motorcycles I had ever seen, completely white with a frame of pressed sheet metal.  The next day he delivered it to my house.  It was now time to tell my mother what I did.  Needless to say, she wasn't thrilled, but my parents permitted the motorcycle to remain.  I bought a couple of cans of spray paint and painted it a combination of flat black and metal flake green.  It was now ready to ride.

During that Spring and Summer, I got a learner's permit and taught myself how to ride.  This was before anyone had heard of MSF courses.  My friend bought a 305 Honda Superhawk and we began to ride together.  By the end of that summer, we decided it was time for our first motorcycle trip.  We figured that Canada would be a good destination.  A couple of other friends wanted to come along, riding double on a new CB450 that one of them had just bought and we began to plan our trip.  The plan was simple, pack camping gear and head north.  We would figure out the rest as we went.

We packed my Dream and the Superhawk high with all of our supplies and took off from Long Island to Canada.  Our first overnight stop was Lake George, NY.  Those were the days before the Americade and we encountered a strong No Motorcycles Allowed attitude in town.  We finally found a campsite that would accept us and spent our first night there.  We had brought an old canvas tent with us that ended up tearing that night so we abandoned it in Lake George and continued tentless on our motorcycle adventure.  The next day we arrived in Montreal.  We didn't have enough money for a room, but one of our friends knew someone who also happened to be in Montreal that night and we spent the night camping on the floor of a boarding house room.  No such luck the next day, so we ended up sleeping on the ground in a park in the middle of the city.  We then decided that our next stop would be Quebec City.  After talking to people when we arrived in Quebec, we found that there was a youth hostel in the city.  It was the old Bastille, the centuries old city prison.  We were provided bunk beds in prison cells and used the old prison showers.  An interesting experience to say the least, and we were only charged 25 cents per night including a small breakfast.  After two days touring the old walled city of Quebec we headed home, spending our last night on the road on the floor of a laundry room in a Vermont motel that took us in for no charge.  The picture shows the three bikes in the Quebec countryside, my 305 Dream on the left.  This was the first of countless motorcycle trips I have taken over the years, each one unique in its own way.

 That was the only season I owned that bike.  I decided after that trip that I wanted a larger motorcycle and bought a CB450 Honda in the Fall.  However, I'll always look back at that CB305 Dream with a certain fondness.