My companion, Samantha, and I had decided to take a week’s sojourn in Bermuda. From the air, the country’s 150 bridge-linked islands look like one side of a Rorschach test. The archipelago’s scorpion shape is a 100 million-year-old volcanic hiccup surrounded by a ring of coral reefs that prevents the land from wave erosion.

After settling into our rental cottage, we took a cab to Oleander Cycles. Samantha climbed onto a scooter and tried it out on the practice course. She looked about as comfortable on it as a red snapper. The agent and I gazed grimly, picturing a catastrophe in the making. When it was my turn, I jumped on, and with cursory abandon, jabbed the kick starter with relish and gunned the throttle.

The engine roared throatily. I released the brake and shot straight into the first curve, flipping head over heels. So much for male bravura. My pride was a bit bruised as I witnessed Samantha shaking her head dubiously. The agent solicitously recommended that we share a bike — at a very reasonable price, US$ 186, for the week. With Samantha clasped around my waist, we sprinted off on what sounded like an asthmatic lawnmower.

For a small fee, tourists can rent a scooter to travel along the beautiful Bermuda coast.

As an environmental measure, Bermudian law stipulates only one automobile per household. The country is a mere 21 miles long and a mile wide, and it’s populated by more than 58,000 people, 21,000 of them owning cars.

The added congestion of rentals would be overwhelming, so tourists can travel via bus, ferry or scooter only. The Suzuki scooter is an impressive beast. It goes in the direction you tell it to go before you’ve finished telling it, and stops going while the rest of your cranium catches up. The experience offers a vicarious thrill.

Driving is on the left-hand side of roads no wider than a thin alibi. We enjoyed lazily winding up estuaries of streets or plunging along the coastline beside translucent turquoise water. These occlusive arteries, otherwise known as roads, usually lack a shoulder, or even a sidewalk.

Although Bermuda’s relaxed manner is reflected in the 40-kilometer (20 mph) speed limit, no one takes the slightest bit of notice, judging by how fast they zoom past in their boom-boxed, souped-up Hondas and Peugeots, even if your bike is rattling at its redline of 70 kilometers. Nevertheless, Bermudians are very considerate of tourists, who usually drive their scooters a bit faster than mammal evolution, and give them a wide berth when passing.

We discovered that the horn is the Bermudian way of saying, “hello, cousin.” Car horns aren’t used as a warning, bumpers are, as we discovered a few days later.

We had scheduled our visit for May after being informed by brochures and travel agents that it was considered the “wedding month” for its blissful weather and lack of rainfall. Don’t believe it. It rained intermittently for five consecutive days — nearly the duration of our stay. Bermuda rainstorms are torrential, lasting anywhere from 15 minutes to eight hours.

Sheets of rain stung our eyes, soaked our clothes to the skin, dampened our enthusiasm and made riding as hard as filling out an income tax form.

Ironically, it was on a beautiful day that we were suddenly struck from behind by a Bermuda Telephone van as we were signaling to turn into the entrance to Crystal Caves. I heard a screech, glanced into the rearview mirror and there, careening toward us at frightening speed, as though we were the last piece of chocolate at a weight-watcher’s convention, was a yellow van. The violent impact sounded like a thunder clap.