I was going from freeways to backroads to dirt roads and even the occasional fire trail when it hit me: the CFMOTO 800MT explore is the modern example of the British twin of the ‘50s, the Universal Japanese Motorcycle of the 1970s the adventure bikes of the 1990s — affordable, versatile, practical go-anywhere motorcycles.
By modern standards those older bikes wouldn’t be considered “go anywhere” bikes, but plenty of people, myself included, didn’t hesitate to take their road bikes down dirt roads and byways, simply because we didn’t have anything else.
Of course, for decades we’ve had extremely capable adventure bikes with lots of the latest tech for their generation, but they have often had price tags which made eyes water, or affordable dirtbikes that were awful to ride on anything with a speed limit of more than 80km/h.
But now we have CFMOTO producing a machine which has all the tech, a long list of standard equipment that is usually only found in accessory catalogues, and all at a price which is not just affordable, it’s downright cheap… just $16,490 ride away for a 90hp adventure tourer with cruise control, radar, heated seat and grips, switchable ABS and traction control, Apple CarPlay, standard spill protection and even pannier frames!
KTM-BASED ENGINE
The motor is, of course, based on the 790 powerplant KTM launched some years back which has now grown into the 890.
It’s a great platform fora touring machine, while its
