American dreams

Photojournalist Olivier Touron explains how the thoughtful gift of a motorcycle from a friend proved to be life-changing in more ways than one

WORDS AND PHOTOS BY OLIVIER TOURON

My native country is France. I was born there a little over 53 years ago and lived there until I was almost 50, always returning home during 20 years of roaming the world as a photojournalist in order to tell stories of its inhabitants, its geography, and its economic and political issues.

It all started in 2014 – a classic moment of crisis in my early 40s when I found myself searching for meaning. My very good friend Thierry Butzbach gave me a birthday present that changed my life: a small motorbike with a 125cc engine. He couldn’t have chosen a better gift. I rode thousands of kilometres, first in France, then in Europe, on various Japanese and European models of different sizes.

In 2017, after three years of intensive riding, someone from Leica Camera France (a brand I work with) told me about a reporting project that might interest me since I had become a motorcyclist. A French crew was preparing to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I by crossing the US on a century-old Harley-Davidson® motorcycle brought by American soldiers at the time and left on French soil after the victory. It promised to be a great adventure, reflecting the strong relationship between our two countries.

I jumped at the opportunity to tell the story through images, and Thierry (himself a journalist specialising in the world of motorcycling) joined me as my travelling companion. The trip would allow me to ride a Harley-Davidson for the first time: a 2018 olive-coloured Road King® Special, lent by H-D® Europe, a major partner of the project (named Operation Twin-Links). Over several months, I documented the refurbishment of the sidecar, the road tests and a visit to an American cemetery in the northeast of France to pay tribute to the soldiers killed in the Great War.

In June 2018, the old Harley® crossed the Atlantic by boat, reaching Mobile, Alabama. The sidecar crew then embarked on a three-month road trip through the US, which would take them from Florida to California, passing through Milwaukee and H-D Headquarters, where the motorbike was born a century earlier. Thierry and I followed on two beautiful 2018 Harley motorcycles supplied by H-D US – Thierry on a black 1,868cc Heritage Softail® and me on a 1,750cc Ultra Limited. Riding across America on a Harley, I was living a dream and felt as if I was on another planet when I thought back to the little bike I started on just three years before.

Riding across America on a Harley, I was living a dream and felt as if I was on another planet

Of course, we had heard about the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally and took the opportunity to go there, leaving the sidecar for a while to travel to the Black Hills. There, we met a Native American motorcycle club that was organising its national run to coincide with the rally. I had come across the club through a photo showing a Native American on horseback alongside another on a motorbike at Standing Rock; a reservation in North Dakota where the Native American residents were fighting against the construction of a pipeline carrying oil over their land and risking pollution of their water supply. And so it was that I found myself immersed in the world of motorcycle clubs in the heart of the biggest motorcycle event in the world.

The event brought together dozens of bikers from all over the country, and the president had asked a friend to be road captain. Shelly Denny, from the Ojibwe tribe, and originally from Minnesota, is a Dyna® girl – a hardened biker who grew up in the biker world and has undertaken multiple solo cross-country rides, including more than a dozen to Sturgis. She led the bunch of tough-looking bikers through the fabulous winding roads of the region more or less with her eyes closed. That was the day I started photographing the woman who would become my wife.

I was the rookie of the company, my only reference being episodes of Sons of Anarchy! At first, Shelly totally ignored me. Then, after several months and encounters, we gradually began to realise that we had a lot in common, and she asked me to come and join her permanently in the United States. There are times in life when you have to decide to grasp the nettle or to forever regret a missed opportunity. I took the risk to be happy, and left France to live in Phoenix, Arizona. Thanks to Shelly, I discovered Native American women’s struggle against injustice and the history of the First Nations, as well as the geography of my new home country and – of course – American biker culture.

There are times in life when you have to decide to grasp the nettle or to forever regret a missed opportunity

From Sturgis to Daytona, passing through Texas, Arizona and California, we went to every kind of rally. While riding fabulous roads – from the sweltering deserts to the highest ice-capped mountain passes – I met all kinds of genius bike builders, masters of mechanics and paintwork who spanned generations. My two passions for my work as a photojournalist and for motorbikes merged, pushing me toward motorcycle photojournalism. I started to share my experiences of motorcycle events and my encounters with the people of the biker world in various special-interest magazines. Today I’m the US correspondent for the French magazine Freeway, and I freelance for the Canadian Revolution Motorcycle Magazine and for American Rider.

When I arrived in the US, naturally I had to buy a motorcycle. In America, I wanted to ride an American bike, and for me the iconic model was the Harley-Davidson Road King. I found one from 2005 in good condition despite its high mileage. Then at the end of 2019 I had the opportunity to upgrade to a 2016 model with lower mileage and a better engine, thanks to Mandi Love, an acquaintance of Shelly’s and an excellent salesperson at Chandler Harley-Davidson. That purchase brought me a little further into the Harley world, as I officially became a member of Harley Owners Group®. I decided to join the Scottsdale H.O.G.™ Chapter closer to home, and that’s how I got to read a few issues of HOG® magazine before it became The Enthusiast™ once more.

I’m delighted to share my experience with The Enthusiast’s readers today. Because if motorcycling has radically changed my life, then riding a Harley to the sound of that V-twin 4-stroke symphony has truly changed my world.

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