Honda Gold Wing Se
HONDA GOLD WING SE
Have trailer, will travel
If you’ve been to a Gold Wing gathering, you’ve seen the lights, the murals (Hey, nice eagle!), the stuffed animals.
Not our cup o’ tea.
In fact, prior to this tour, the CW staff had little interest in CB radios and chrome accent packages, let alone trailers. Face to face with the luxo GL1500SE and its Bushtec Quantum tagalong (www.bushtec.com), first-time Winger Mark Hoyer shuddered and exclaimed, “It’s longer than my girlfriend’s Jaguar!”
That said, all warmed quickly to the bespoilered Quantum, especially when stowing gearbags, helmets, photo equipment, leftover pizzas, etc. Then there’s the tongue-mounted cooler-a wonderful addition, especially at remote overlooks. Evian, anyone?
Reactions to the electronic add-ons were just as positive. Tucson-based J&M Corp. (www.jmcorp.com) supplied fulland open-face Arai helmets equipped with its latest headsets and connectors. To these, we added a six-disc Alpine CO changer,
Valentine One radar detector and a Motorola StarTAC cellular telephone. J&M sells the trunk-mounted player, and makes interface kits for both detector and phone.
All told, the Wing was the most costly of our quintet, with more than $2000 in electronics and $5500 for the fully optioned trailer, hitch and wiring, for a grand total of $26,000. Expensive, but worth it, especially with your baby on the back, Francis Albert on the CD and a bottle of bubbly in the cooler.
Matthew Miles
