About BigLefti

Lanny Badten started this blog in July 2007 with no particular plan except to document a road trip. Eighteen years later, 29 blogs, 419 posts, and somewhere north of 50,000 miles of American road, he is still at it.

He rides motorcycles. He rides ATVs. He has ridden in the Arizona desert in summer, which is either brave or foolish depending on who you ask, and he would probably tell you it is neither. He has been to Alaska, Arkansas, Mexico, Idaho, Utah, and most of the American Southwest. He has photographed nearly all of it with a Canon PowerShot SX620 HS that he knows how to use better than most people know their phones.

His captions are short. His observations are dry. He once wrote that a naked ocotillo cactus might offend sensitive viewers. He has photographed his food in Albuquerque, sat in the shade of a fountain in Fountain Hills, and taken a little girl named Rose for peppermint ice cream on the back of his motorcycle because she was too shy to ask and he could tell she wanted to go.

He is a handyman by trade, a rider by vocation, and a writer by habit. He is working on a chapter book called Tales from the Road. Chapter One is about the night he parked a 57 Pan Head chopper in a church parking lot at midnight and two sheriffs showed up, sat on the bike, and left without writing a single ticket. He says it is a true story. There is no reason to doubt him.

His wife Jeannie has been along for more of this than the blogs let on. His riding buddy Garry has been patient. His friend Sherm has strong opinions about helmets and cell service. Together they have covered enough ground to fill a decent atlas.

This site collects all of it in one place. 2007 to the present. Every blog, every post, every photograph worth keeping.