Goa has a way of turning me into more of myself, for better or for worse (I like to think it’s always the former). Maybe it’s the vastly diminished frequency of traffic signals, but I suspect it runs deeper than that and is usually aided by a bottle lined with condensation. Goan beaches are beautiful, but I prefer looking at them from a comfortable distance. I also don’t quite care for the timbre of the Konkani language; it sounds a touch too brusque to my ears. But I do love the place, and that’s why I’ve been going there for the past 20 years at the drop of a hat. I’d even go so far as to say that I consider myself a Goan by nature, if not by birth, and people who know me might just wholeheartedly agree. The same goes for the Royal Enfield Goan Classic 350.
With the Goan (the bike, now), you sort of already know what you’re getting. It’s the same mellow and characterful J-platform you’ve seen before, with a little bit of the old and a little bit of the new. Sort of like Goa itself these days, and it does nothing to diminish their own specific charms. When I first saw the Goan in this ‘trip teal’ paint scheme, I thought, ‘Man, that’s way out there… and I like it.’ Like the place it takes its name from, the Goan is a synthesis of a laidback core character and an eye-catching aura, a proper paradox of being. Needless to say, the Goan looked right at home wherever it went in Goa. And that feeling tasted much better after a couple of days, as Goan sorpotel does, when I gazed at the bike in the right settings, too.
It was an early rising sun on a misty Goan morning that first drove home the rightness of the orange on the bike. I kid you not, it was the same exact colour, although I’d earlier guessed that it was the region’s distinctive ferrous soil that lands somewhere between red and orange on the cone cells in my eyes. Then I saw the Goan on a ferry; take a look for yourself and tell me that blue isn’t the same on the bike and the vessel. Ferrous soil and ferries; isn’t that too much of an alliterative coincidence to be one? Nonetheless, the Goan’s vibe goes beyond the pigments it’s sprayed with. The rest of the bike sees to that.
That new mid-ape handlebar sits atop the traditional casquette, drawing a fairly steep line down to the bobbed rear end with its 16-inch wheel. Small rear wheels and their mudguards, no matter how fat, have never looked right to my eyes; the Goan is no exception. A 17-inch or even an 18-inch rear wheel would’ve done a lot for the Goan’s proportions and even its ride quality. Also, those whitewall tyres become brown faster than a Russian on Morjim beach at noon, and stay that way. Then again, the Goan surprised me and everyone else with tubeless wirespoked wheels, and that’s enough to forgive whatever shortcomings I might’ve perceived. Especially since it rides so well.
The Goan felt tailor-made for Goa’s narrow and twisty backroads. So much so that I started imagining a custom poee basket mounted somewhere on the bike. That Goan form of leavened dough is my favourite kind of bread on this planet, I promise you, and I can eat sacks of it. Much like the Goan wanted to inhale one corner after another with no sign of letting up. And with each sequence of manoeuvres, the mandalas set in the orange on the Goan’s tank seemed to resonate more and more. Chaos and peace seem to have their own speeds in Goa, and the Goan’s throttle catered equally to both whichever way it turned. RE did miss a trick by not turning that saree guard into a psychedelic butterfly, though.
The Goan is the best-handling J-platform bike till date, no doubt about that. The small rear wheel did seem to have a mind of its own over bumpy sections and during really hard braking, but it was only a case of some welcome drama and not eye-widening regret. But it’s not for a pillion at all, in my opinion; other than uglying up the rear end, the standard pillion seat is of little to no use, unless you have a special dislike of your passenger and want them to end up on the rear wheel. This is a one-person motorcycle, which is what I always say a fun motorcycle should be anyway. Goa is always better with good company, but the Goan doesn’t think that way.
Also, as I found out, the Goan is good for about half a day in that floating seat, thanks to that small rear wheel and stiff suspension. This can be an A-to-B motorcycle, sure, but only if you stop to rest your backside at C, D, E and F along the way. Again, that’s the best way to get to B anyway. Like Goa itself, the Goan seems hellbent on showing you the best time down any given road, not the fastest one. And one of the best times to be had with motorcycles is in customising one, right?
Riding through the northern part of Goa, we chanced upon an old cast-iron Bullet transmogrified into a chopper-esque creation. That took my mind back to a story I read in Auto India magazine when I was back in school; it featured custom REs from Goa, nothing else, and I burned holes into those pages with my eyes by staring at them for hours. It’s been 30 years, and I remember wondering back then when I’d get to see Goa with my own eyes. I suppose even my formative mind could sense the magic in the place’s creative culture that’d found its way onto the most characterful machines of the time. Which were inevitably REs, of course. I suppose that makes the Goan more special for me, even if I thought the aforementioned local custom carried its tail better than the Goan.
By the time my half a day on the Goan ended at our favourite watering hole, where we park our bikes right next to where we sit, and the only emissions are fun and laughter. And I was thoroughly confused. I hadn’t done any of the Goan things I wanted to do on it. Sure, I parked it outside a church and took photos, but that didn’t do anything to me except looking out for the inevitable watchman to appear and shoo us away. Yes, we had photos with a bunch of cows, what with the word ‘Goa’ meaning ‘land of cows’ and all. But something was off. Then I realised that my ears were still ringing with the Goan’s slash-cut exhaust’s rorty sound. And then it fell into place.
Goa is what I’d like life to be, it has always been. Relaxed and rewarding, yet loud and proud. I’ve only ever made friends in Goa, so the Goan’s preferred lack of a pillion seat is an apt contrast to that fact. My friends ride their own bikes anyway. Its nuance and rhythm are very different to what I’ve seen and I’m used to — that goes for both the place and the motorcycle that might look familiar at first glance but proves to be otherwise. And for those who want to keep a bit of Goa wherever they are, well, what’s better than the Goan?
