How to Ride a Vespa Scooter — With Your Eyes Wide Open
A couple weeks ago I left the house on a damp morning with no goal other than to find breakfast. For me, that’s how to ride a Vespa scooter — without limits or preconceived notions of what it was designed to do or how it can perform. At the most basic level, the scooter can do almost anything you want it to do.
This post isn’t about technique. I won’t discuss lines or counter steering. There will be nothing on braking technique or road awareness. Learn those things from experts and through enlightened practice. What I want to do here is suggest a few things to broaden the riding experience.
I know motorcycle riders who think in terms of performance. Their descriptions feel like there’s a competition between them and the road — how fast they can travel, how aggressively they can chew through curves, how smoothly they can overtake obstacles in their path. While I’m certain there are Vespa riders who share this approach, I don’t know any personally.
When I think about riding a Vespa, it’s about an experience of the world. And it starts with your eyes wide open.
Riding is About the World
When I’m riding I see things, smell things and feel things. Things in the world around me as I travel down the road. While I do pay close attention to the road and the necessity to handle the machine and environment in a safe manner, my riding style is neither aggressive or demanding in the way some motorcycle riders must embrace. Instead, riding a Vespa is about being in the world and connecting with it.
Being alive and riding (or walking) through the world provides a rush for those able to slow enough to feel it. Riding a Vespa has changed my life and opened my eyes to the details of place and time. It’s allowed me to see and feel that the glass is half full.
An example of the kind of ride that provides a rich experience appears in The Price of Better Pictures.
On this particular morning I was able to watch the world change from a damp, gray wetness to a bright sunny day as the scooter and I wandered through Penns Valley.
Vespa in Amish Country
While I have no statistics of the Amish population in our area the evidence of growth is everywhere along the winding roads that I love. Homes and farms once replete with electric lines and vehicles now reflect the spare, simple signifiers of Amish life — buggies and laundry on lines and well tended vegetable gardens.
Like so many standout trees in this part of Pennsylvania, I’ve likely photographed this one several dozen times over the years. It looks no different now than the first time I saw it 45 years ago. The only difference is a Vespa rather than a VW Beetle in the photo.
Riding a Vespa has a special power to allow me to think. The experience swells beyond the technical action of piloting the machine. It becomes a platform for something more. I shared some of that in a post called Just Thinking.
Non-Amish Horse
This horse doesn’t look like those in a team pulling a plow or hauling a buggy down the highway. He was too well groomed to be a work horse. And his squeals and nickering indicated a more anxious temperament than you would expect from a horse that’s working and around people all the time. I could be wrong. But that well mowed strip along the electric fence doesn’t exactly scream Amish either.
I can’t fully articulate the satisfaction felt from these small moments of observation that collect during a ride on the Vespa. They are part of the unexpected joy of riding. It’s as if riding sets you free.
Showing the Way
I can’t tell anyone how to ride a Vespa scooter. The experience is unique to the rider. It doesn’t matter if you have a scooter or a motorcycle, the ride will reflect what you bring to it — your skills, desires and expectations. If you’re lucky, things will all line up to provide some profound revelation.
What I can do is share my own experience riding a Vespa and hopefully provide a jumping off point for other riders to explore their own experience. And for those people with a Vespa parked in their garage, thinking it’s limited to short trips to the grocery store or a weekend ride around town, perhaps they might reconsider the power to explore more expansively. The Vespa really can take you farther than you might imagine. If the Amish can tool around with one horsepower, you should be able to go a bit further.
I finally found breakfast in Millheim, Pennsylvania at the Inglebean Coffee House. And I learned a little more about how to ride a Vespa scooter.
The possible assumed breakfast location is not as important as the experience of reaching said eatery..
As with fast looming retirement; it is not the destination, rather the
journey that shall allow you to reach what hopefully will be of a lessor
stressed existence.
My appreciation of eating is strong but where I do it isn’t. I had a general idea of where I might end up but you never know when you’re riding.
One more week and I wrap my paid experience at Penn State. It’s strange to think it’s over…
“Being alive and riding (or walking) through the world provides a rush for those able to slow enough to feel it. ”
I agree completely. It makes no difference what the machine is; the PTW is just a tool for connecting with the environment. Scooters, by the nature of their design, are more friendly to this kind of exploring.
I can’t just blast through a landscape like so many other riders do. They may cover hundreds of km (or miles) in one ride, but (at least to me) their almost non-stop ride provided only quick glimpses of the landscape they ride through. I like to stop, observe,
take pictures, go for a walk to inhale nature even more strongly. It doesn’t get me very far,
but when I come back home I feel good.
I remember one tour I did on my scooter a few years ago. There were a few days of not going for a walk – more riding than exploring. At the end of the day I felt something was missing. Yes, the ride itself was nice, but I didn’t feel I connected with nature as deeply as when I stop and explore.
Yes, slowing down makes the world Shirley and I pass through so much more digestible. A riding day or not we make every effort to have a lengthy stroll wherever we happen to be. “I haven’t noticed that before” is often repeated even as we explore even local haunts. Not Scooter equipped YET but I am contemplating plating my 90cc Honda as I slow down.
You and I have similar approaches and expectations of riding. If I have a measure of riding it may be time on the road but not miles. The most I’ve ridden in a day is 350 miles and it was exhausting and empty. Just moving through landscape like I would in the car on the highway.
I find now, even on short rides, I feel good. That’s a gift.
Thanks for the reflectful over your Saturday morning eggs read, very much enjoyed both. This piece got me to thinking about your future. In the unlikely event that you don’t feel you have enough to do in retirement I might suggest a future in part time Vespa sales, I think you would do very well!
Not sure Vespa sales is in my future — at least not the machine. But I can see myself selling the alternative Vespa lifestyle — one focused more on riding and experience than culture and style. Not sure what the market might be…
Glad the post gave you some enjoyment. Looking forward to not being so rushed to write…
A year and a half ago, after I bought my KLR, I soon felt that I should have bought something faster. Like a motorcycle that would provide intense acceleration and cornering thrills, etc. Some of that feeling came from attending demo rides, and selecting supersport motorcycles or high-performance sport tourers. After the demo ride, my KLR felt…well…slow.
But when I ride my “slow’ motorcycle, I realize that for me, the desired experience is very similar to yours, Steve. And so being honest with myself regarding what I really enjoy, I have resisted the temptation to add a street rocket to my garage. I hope I can continue to resist.
I know what you mean about something feeling slow after being on a rocket. I remember after spending a couple days on a Ducati Hypermotard, my Vespa seemed positively snail like. But it passes quickly and I fall into the riding rhythm that works for me — slow and steady.
I definitely like the KLR. Seems like the pickup truck of motorcycles…
Thanks for another thoughtful post. You can put into words what many of us think and feel. Peace and safety the coming week.
Thank you for your kind words John. I appreciate them.
I few weeks ago I was riding a local mountain road that was covered in huge patches of wild flowers. I would come around the corner and be engulfed in the sweet smell. One of the thing I love is being able to have so many sense stimulated while traveling down the road. Nothing does it the way riding my scooter does.
One of my favorite experiences while riding is the sudden recognition of a new fragrance in the air. Could be wildflowers or honey locust blooms, fresh cut hay or even manure. In the car I’m generally oblivious to it all. It’s the simple things that reveal themselves while riding…
Yeah, you know what riding is really about. Nicely written.
Thanks Robert. And thanks for hosting the Moto Hang. It was a great time.
Only one more week until everyday becomes Saturday…
Is that what it’s really like?
It’s called Minefullnes, it’s is in anything you do., in the moment, it’s tasting the air, it’s seeing with your ears. I could go on.
when I was riding horse for wages awhile back, a coworker that did not like riding horses, he said” horses were for eating ” , he was from Cuba he said that about Dog also. That summer of 72 he couldn’t wait for my Sam ( horse ) to keal over. He came to me one Florida rainy day, he said you & Sam are mindful of each other, in his broken English, he went on talking about his grandmother saying ” once a man gets mindful of animal it will never die. I didn’t have the courage to till him that I was getting stoned in the back paddock, about 300 acres worth, & I would share what Sam & I saw , as I hearded the cows in to be milked. Today I don’t need the THC to experience what I see hear, taste, smell, to be mindful. As you get to this age of retirement ,things look &sound different.you are doing well Steve in this part of your life.
I think you hit the bell first Mike with a mention of THC. Horses, cows, Florida and 1972 — makes perfect sense. Back then I wasn’t mindful of much save for girls and ping pong balls. I’m in a better place today though my back will disagree on some days. But mostly things are well.
Time to have breakfast again.
“I know motorcycle riders who think in terms of performance. Their descriptions feel like there’s a competition between them and the road — how fast they can travel, how aggressively they can chew through curves, how smoothly they can overtake obstacles in their path. While I’m certain there are Vespa riders who share this approach, I don’t know any personally.”
I can’t speak for all motorcyclists, only myself. The best rides are the ones where you become one with the bike. When it feels like it’s an extension of you, the ride is pure symphony. I don’t get the same sensation on the scooters. Their rearward weight bias makes them feel cumbersome on even broad, sweeping turns. I have never felt confident tossing them into tight corners or areas that require flipping them from side to side for rapid left-right direction changes. In addition scooters seem to ooze acceleration off the turns where a bike pulls with authority much quicker.
Of course I’m not in a Zen connection with the surroundings. It’s the road, with it’s sinuous nature and change of texture that I am in touch with. The experience of me connected with the bike, flowing with the road is the sensation I enjoy. That’s probably even the prime difference between the average scooter owner and a motorcyclist. Especially since motorcyclists have to shift. Viewing scenery could leave us in the wrong gear at the wrong time.
I think you hit the nail on the head with the notion that we’re all unique individuals when it comes to riding. What works for you may not for another. Reading your ideas about the differences between scooter and motorcycle again could be unique to you. I’ve ridden scooters that were not at all conducive to a rambling ride. And motorcycles that were. The Kawasaki KLR, Triumph Tiger XC, Scrambler, BMW F650 and 800 GS, all of them were quite relaxing and able to deal with my meandering, slow riding style. Others were terrible — all the Ducatis, the big BMWs, and generally all the big cruising style bikes. But again, that’s me.
The more I think about all of this the more I think that what’s important perhaps is that riders consider the possibility of other ways to ride rather than whatever they fell into. It’s easy to understand how someone who started riding to join their friends on the road may know nothing other than their friends approach. Like growing up with meat and potatoes and then you get to college and a friend introduces you to pizza…
Thanks Jim for your comments. They always make me think.
Reading this put me in several contiguous states of mind, particularly when I backtracked to Riding Sets You Free, written shortly before I became aware of your blog. Your passage about feeling like nothing could touch you reminded me of something I would frequently say about a particularly good home-cooked meal, and extends to riding as well: a heightened sense of well-being. This has likely been described by others in different ways: the “runner’s high”, being “in the zone”, feeling at one with the Universe et cetera, but I must say I like my description just a tad better. A good moment on the road certainly does this for me. And, the experience riding the Vespa, which, IMO, imparts more sensation of the road and one’s velocity traversing it than a larger, heavier machine, enhances this. You can’t do the riding equivalent of sleepwalking on this machine – it pretty much insists on your full engagement, but not my assaulting your ears with snarls and violent shudders, but with a closer-to-the-ground intimacy that I think goes missing from more than a few high-powered rides of the day. As we’ve both written before, you can go about as fast as you want (and reason allows) on the thing, but notching it back a bit reveals such rich rewards for the senses and sensibilities. I, for one, can’t think of another machine on which 35mph could feel so vital. And anything but boring.
You’re absolutely right about the Vespa GTS feeling vital at 35mph. The sense of flying is there at that speed. There’s no feeling that something is being held back. I have ridden motorcycles for hours in the 25 to 45mph range, stopping frequently for pictures or to look around, waving cars my so I can rubberneck the landscape. But I can’t remember if I felt like the machine was being held back. Many of them could easily surpass the 100mph mark with startling acceleration, but were they being restrained like a racehorse at the starting gate? I just can’t remember.
As far as sleepingwalking goes — I seem to be able to do that on anything. Even walking. It’s a frightening place. The Vespa allows for a lot of experience, but for me, I always have to pay attention lest my wandering imagination sends me into the sleepwalking place.
Thanks for sharing. Great stuff.
I am the odd guy out in this conversation. Where I much prefer riding my Vespa GT to my motorcycle, I like to ride it faster than most. And farther.
Yesterday, I rode to meet Ken Wilson and his brother Scott for lunch, 138 miles each way. Most of the ride was through the flat North Florida landscape, at speeds over the posted speed limits. There are a few hills and curves, but mostly very green forests and farms on the route I took.
The highlight was a perfect BLT at Pouncey’s with friends. But the riding there and back was a blast.
I thought about you Bill when writing the post and some of the rocketing rides you’ve described. Having never met you though I did’t have enough information to fully illuminate those experiences. I’ve made those 100 miles and up rides to an eating establishment but they’ve been decidedly slow and meandering rides.
Bacon….
It is Monday afternoon June 26, 1917.
And you Steve, are probably scrambling at work to ensure there is
a smooth transition to formal retirement and your replacement (you mentioned a while back doing interviews, did you find somebody?) is settled more or less.
The header on the blog should maybe now be: Ride More , Work Not
and variants.
We’re still in the process of finding someone to take on my role.
Maybe my header title will become Ride More, Work More. I have plans!