With Babes Ride Out 5 fast approaching – it’s hard for me not to think back on BRO4 – my first time!
Last summer I finally built up the courage to buy myself a ticket to Babes Ride Out. I’d known about the event for a year or so before, but since I didn’t know any women riders I was too intimidated to go on my own. But 2016 was different – I was determined to find women riding partners and to do something new.
My husband Jordan introduced me to a woman he worked with after I bought my ticket (Lexy – now an amazing friend and a fellow rider/Babes Ride Out attendee) and the girlfriend of a co-worker – none other than Sanna! I hadn’t even attended the event yet and I was already over the moon that I’d decided to go.
The first day of Babes Ride Out dawned warm and bright – and I hit the road with some of the most welcoming, lovely women I’ve ever met. As someone who struggled to find like-minded riding partners, this was just the beginning of an overall blissful experience. We hit the road 15 women riders deep and while it was my first time riding in a group so large, I was stunned by the total power we represented. 15 women riding their own motorcycles in a pack up the Interstate 15…I was hugely unprepared for what the weekend would bring.
There are plenty of write ups about Babes Ride Out that discuss what a genre-shattering event it is in the motorcycle world, and I read each of them before I went. But I don’t think at any point I really understood what that meant. It meant that for nearly four days the entire town of Joshua Tree is completely overrun with women on bikes. Everywhere you turn – women on bikes. In a world where you feel like a novelty at every gas station, it felt like complete and total freedom; the freedom to stand out by NOT standing out.
While the bands, food trucks, and activities were great – I think the true magic of this event is the ability to really develop a sisterhood. I know I’m not alone as a woman who struggled to find other women with my interests, and it was really an incredible experience to essentially ride into a campground with 1800 new friends and have the best sleepover campout of all time. They say in their marketing materials that you make friends for life at Babes Ride Out – and that couldn’t be more true for me. When I headed home from the weekend, it was with a full heart and a feeling of acceptance.
And as a little aside – I have never in my life been to an event with cleaner porta-potties. A clean and dry urinal full of new toilet paper rolls is a little festival luxury I never knew I wanted.
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