your going down the road. Do you wave at all 2 wheelers? or try to determine if they are first. you wait, then they wave and you don't get a chance (darn it!!) or you wave, they don't. (DARN IT!!!!)

In the UK the greeting used when encountering a fellow rider is to nod. France I believe they stick out a leg!

On the whole I tend to acknowledge most riders. Not to the detriment of safety though. Until the other day I had an open attitude to all riders.

Peak summer over here is a no - no to rice rockets. There too busy with their noses up there own exhaust pipe. HD riders are on another ethereal plane and see no one other than HD riders!!! (Strange breed.)

Ours is a unique down low 2 fingers out motion

Here, riders coming in the opposite direction 'wave' by taking their left hand off the bars and sort-of just straightening the arm - it's not an all-out wave as such.
Overtaking riders do stick out their right leg if one waves as they come past.
I tried the 'leg' thing once on my X9 and the wind nearly yanked me off the bike so I don't do that!

thats close to ours. I don't thinks i'm going to adopt the stick - the - leg - out thing either

"Ours is a unique down low 2 fingers out motion"

Around here most riders acknowledge each other with a similar friendly gesture - two fingers down low. The exception to that would be that only a few Harley riders wave to other riders who are not on a Harley. I agree - strange indeed.

Then of course, there is the tightly clenched fist held at arms length with middle finger extended towards the sky which is used to acknowledge idiots in SUVs talking on their cell phones who mindlessly drift into your lane without so much as a glance to see it the lane is clear.

I waved, nodded, and acknowledged headlight flashes for years but nowadays it's pretty meaningless so I don't usually bother, and it's no big deal if no one waves or nods at me. You don't wave to every other car driver on the road do you. I'll still give and acknowledge courtesies from other drivers and riders with a wave or nod or a headlight flash, and I like to give bus drivers the extra space they need on busy streets.

I've always tried to wave, nod, or signal to other riders. I never heard of the "stick out the leg" thing. Maybe they did that and I didn't notice. Whether they wave back makes no difference to me. Maybe I'm the tenth person to wave at them and they'll realize that the biker community is special and they will join it.

As Meldrew says, the whole acknowledgement thing is pretty silly.
Would I wave at someone in my car who I didn't know? Never.
The guy on the motorcycle I am waving at could be a low life, drug dealing, stealing, Oxy addict for all I know. He could be a child molester. I don't know the guy nor do I know anything about him. If I'm out on the highway on some lightly travelled road with nobody around and a motorcycle or scooter happens to appear, I'll give them the low arm 2 finger acknowledgement, more out of boredom than excitement to see somebody I do not know. Otherwise, I'll return a gesture but rarely initiate it.
I think Meldrew and I finally agree on something.

I find in the spring when the temperature gets over 50F and the sky looks like it won't rain, that motorcycle riders come out like a bug hatch. They are everywhere. In their excitement, they will wave at anything on two wheels, no matter how far away it is. If it isn't moving, they have this instinctive need to polish it.

My point is, that there is a logical time to wave and not to wave. I saw a list once that I wish I could find again. It said things like you didn't wave at riders on multi-lane roads. Or when going to or from Sturgis. Your arm would fall off!

There's a guy who I used to see every morning on the way to work. I loved his excitement. He rode a sports bike, and his left arm was flung up as high as it could go waving at every biker he saw...which was almost constantly. His side of the freeway was only moderately busy. My side was always jammed with rush hour commuters. I only returned his wave a couple times, then decided it was better to keep both hands on the grips in case one of the cages next to me decided to be where I was.

I can see myself lying in a hospital bed, all broken up. My wife and kids are standing next to the bed and ask me how it happened. I tell them I had to see if the rider on the other side of the freeway returned my wave or not. Or that I was looking for riders on the other side and didn't see the guy cut me off till it was too late. Nah...that won't go over so well.

People who don't live in heavily populated areas usually don't understand. But if you live in an area with lots of traffic like Seattle, and especially with the thousands of bikers that come out for a couple months, you will. I'll wave at other bikers on every two-lane road. But otherwise, the traffic is too heavy to pay that much attention to wave at others...who probably won't see you anyway.

In a week or so, the garage queens will be tucked away safe and dry for another 8-9 months and there will be only a few bikers on the road. They are easy to pick out at times like that...and I do feel an affinity for them. At times like that when the temp is in the 30s and the rain is coming down...I'll wave at them if at all possible. They are like me.

Chris