It’s big! Cars don’t try and share a lane with you when you’re on Harley-Davidson’s Ultra Limited. One wag quipped that it must be like sitting on the roof of a Landcruiser with handlebars. Yes, it’s big. Yes, it’s burly, but that’s not by accident. It’s adorned with all manner of bell and whistles and it’s very good at doing what it is designed to do; punching out vast kilometres in a comfortable fashion while allowing you to drag along the contents of half your house.
A bike of the Ultra’s size and weight takes some acclimatisation, if you’re not used to a bike of its magnitude. My first experience of it was when I jumped off a mid-sized nakedbike at Kangaroo Valley in New South Wales’ southern highlands. I don’t recommend learning the quirks of a motorcycle that weighs almost half a tonne in an area littered with 45km/h hairpin turns.
I did and I survived, but it took a fair bit of concentration and required a fair swag of skill. Add to those parameters a solid downpour and a splattering of diesel on the racing line and the Ultra had me feeling like a novice again. But point the Ultra at more open sweeping corners or a highway and not only does the big girl start to make really good sense, you also start to appreciate it.
Pricing on the Ultra Limited starts at $41,495 (+orc) which puts it a whisker above its closest comparable competitor, Indian’s Roadmaster at $41,995 (ride away), and in the same ballpark as more contemporary big tourers like BMW’s K 1600 GTL and Honda’s GL1800 Goldwing Tour.
The Ultra Limited offers the comfort, luggage capacity and technological trinkets to make it a supreme long-distance mount. And Harley’s talent for offering all manner of bling – including 13 colour options for 2020 – means the choices for customising your long-haul ride have never been better.
