End of the road - and it's been quite a ride

American patriotism and religion make a tragic mix, but the people are polite and the regulations are liberal.

In this final dispatch it's time to sum up best and worst impressions from this 29,000km traverse of Canada, Mexico and 26 states of the United States.

Top of my "likes" would be the greater personal liberty and responsibility US citizens have compared to us. The difference is huge and reinforces the feeling that petty rules and misguided regulations have reduced the quality of life in New Zealand.

Some examples:

Liberal interpretation of speed limits. In the US the idea of a highway is to get you from A to B as fast as possible. It's recognised that the primary cause of road deaths is incompetent and aggressive driving rather than speed, per se.

One state, Montana, introduced a numerical speed limit only in 1974. It repealed that law in 1995 and went back to telling drivers just to drive at what they consider reasonable and prudent. Under pressure from federal Government do-gooders, it reintroduced a numerical limit in 1999. The road toll went down significantly during that four-year respite.

Despite statutory limits, however, it is still the practice virtually everywhere on US highways to drive at what you consider prudent. Travelling at 125km/h we'd often be passed by groups of trucks and trailers - and by cops.

Contrast this to New Zealand, where adults are prohibited from exercising responsibility, where arbitrary numerical limits are strictly enforced, cops have quotas of fines to meet revenue targets (isn't that asinine?), and our highways are bottlenecked. The irony here is that incompetent and reckless driving is lightly policed and the punishment for it is limp-wristed.

Another example of personal freedom would be the gun laws. There are no fewer guns in America today than 30 years ago, yet the US crime rate has plunged since legalised abortion in 1973 reduced the supply of delinquent kids.

Today's crime rate is the lowest it's been since 1970. It's not guns that kill people, but rather people, and delinquent people kill most often.

Being motorcyclists, the liberal motorcycle helmet laws were most pertinent to us. It's not that you won't wear one, it's that you don't have to that's worth an awful lot to a libertarian.

Another major like we had about the US was the general courtesy of people. They would have to be the most polite people on earth and that behaviour is infectious. You find yourself leaving your cussing back in New Zealand, and the consideration you show to total strangers you encounter, on the road or in the shops, is at a totally higher level.

But there were dislikes too. Top of my list would be the mindless religious zeal that permeates the homeland states of George Bush's constituency.

Let's face it, religious belief is an invention of man to control other men. My God is the true one, yours is an impostor.

That so many of the world's population are suckers for this stuff is tragic enough, but in the US they take it to another level. The abundance of churches and the high rate of church attendance is testimony to a fundamentalism we have seen paralleled only in Muslim dictatorships.

McCarthyism is back, though it wears robes and dominates free-to-air television. Intolerance rules and it is not a good look.

Second dislike would have to be US patriotism, which, if you scratch a little, reveals itself to be little different to Serbian nationalism. The flag assumes far too much significance.

For example, the Iraq situation is ridiculous - "regime change" is selective activism by Bush and now he can't get out of the quagmire. Anybody knows there are heaps of awful regimes and the US can't fix them all. So why did he try to change just one? Seems his logic failed him - al Qaeda wasn't there.

But since that realisation, the US has shown a total lack of courage to admit its mistake, and pull out. So, young nationalistic Americans - who don't know anything about it but are loyal to the point of stupidity - volunteer to give their lives to a dumb cause. We saw this and we talked to cannon fodder marching off for an exciting time in the Army.

Small-town America hangs out banners and says prayers about Iraq yet all the while, it's generally agreed in the US that the war is inexcusable.

Their own polls are shouting that, so tell me, where is the logic?

Finally, one feels empathy for this great nation. America is the policeman of the free world, whether we want it to be or not.

As David Lange said, each nation has to choose its own course. So one can readily feel for the American people trying to do the right thing. But where the Administration does seem to be weak is in recognising, admitting and correcting mistakes and remembering the limits to what is achievable.

For all that it was a great country to tour, the people were great as always, and the lessons to take home, substantial.

* Travel blogs and photos from the Backblocks America road trip are on WorldByBike.com