FarRide #8 Reports

RSS
Email

0 Kudo

<< Previous Topic Next Topic >>

Author

Comment

Sebastionbear

FarRide #8 Reports

Lead

[-]

Posts: 426

(14-Sep-08 2:45 PM)

failure to launch

Tags : None

Whoa! Managed to do 2,212.5 km from Mount Pleasant to Tottenham and back in 23 hours 38 minutes!

Report soon - rode the last 180 km in some of the wildest weather I have ever experienced.

Cheers, Craig

michaelp

[-]

Posts: 386

(14-Sep-08 6:33 PM)

Mudgee Guardian (not)

Home safe 3:10pm Sunday.

Farride distance to meet was 929.7km.
Final distance 1078.9km.

I'll add a report shortly.

michaelp
2008 1400GTR
1986 1000GTR

SidecarDON

[-]

Posts: 884

(14-Sep-08 7:05 PM)

3 wheeler

Hi Craig was that a Saddlesaw 2,000 ?

Sebastionbear

[-]

Posts: 427

(14-Sep-08 8:08 PM)

failure to launch

Yes it was Don, funnily enough didn't hurt the butt too much

Cheers, Craig

michaelp

[-]

Posts: 387

(14-Sep-08 9:16 PM)

Mudgee Guardian (not)

Edit: Added some photos. Text is the same - no need to read it again!

We left Sydney 16:40 on Friday afternoon, heading for Wagga. I had planned to leave at 16:00, but we couldn't find the camera, newly purchased the previous evening. We searched the house for half an hour, me cursing and kicking the furniture the whole time. Of course, it turned up in the tank bag once we got to Wagga

. Yes, I did search it, twice.

Ready to go - took this one on my phone, since the camera was 'lost'.

We hit a little traffic heading south, but made good time once past Campbelltown. We had a little trouble with the Starcom - the VOX was too sensitive, so Allyson's mike was on pretty much permanently once we hit highway speeds. However, my concerns about my mike proved unfounded. For the first time on a ride we were able to converse while on the bike, which made it a much more enjoyable experience. We stopped for fuel in Yass at 19:20, 20 minutes late. We adjusted the VOX sensitivity, and all was good from then on. Finally got to the motel at Gumly Gumly, which is just short of Wagga Wagga, right on time at 21:20.

We got away towards Narrandera at 05:54, 15 minutes late (this time I lost my keys, eventually found them, in my jacket). The sun was rising behind us as we left Wagga. We stopped for fuel at West Wyalong, right on time. The only problem I had with the bike was the short screen - I got wind noise pretty much permanently. If I ducked my head down behind the screen, that exposed Allyson's mike to a direct blast of wind, which I got through my speakers. Sometimes, I got wind noise both over the screen and through the speakers. Can't wait for the Cee Bailey screen to arrive.

We passed some bikes at a servo in Condobolin, but we didn't stop - gotta stay on schedule! A little way out of Condobolin, we passed a turn off with a sign saying 'Tottenham 104'. But the GPS said keep going to Tullamore. I figured it was steering me to the sealed roads. Wrong! Not too far from that turn off, we came to the end of the bitumen, which was a bit of a shock. However, as some of you know, I'm a dirt track dude, and after getting used to the back sliding around a bit, and thankfully seeing very little oncoming traffic, we negotiated around 40km of pretty good quality dirt without too many troubles. I was incredibly careful braking for corners - I'm sure the 1400's ABS works really well, but how well will it handle dirt? I decided not to find out.

Evidence of dirt tracking.

I should stop at this point and make an apology to my GPS unit. I was complaining to anyone who would listen at lunch about the fact that it directed me onto dirt despite the fact that my Zumo550 was configured to avoid the stuff. In fact, when I was planning the trip it suggested a different route from Wagga to Tottenham, avoiding dirt. I forced it to go via Condobolin. It would have been nice to get a warning when it was calculating the route, but in the end I was the author of my own misery. From talking to a local, there is no way to get from Condobolin to Tottenham without some dirt. Oh, and someone (Baz I think) was asking whether you can set this preference in the Zumo 550. You can - select Tools | Navigation | Avoidances and tick 'unpaved roads'. Not that it does you any good.

After Tullamore, we got on the Nyngan-Tullamore road, which was all tar, except for some road works. This took us into Tottenham. We arrived 11:20, 6 minutes behind schedule. Not my best effort, but good enough

.

Allyson at Tottenham.

Me at Tottenham.

After lunch with old friends and new, we wandered off down to the race track (more dirt!), made a donation to MARI, then headed back into town to get ready to head to Dubbo for the night. We decided we needed fuel, but the only petrol station was shut. Thankfully, the lady who ran it flagged us down and asked if we needed fuel. We said we thought we might, so she very kindly opened up for us and we filled up. In fact, we would have been stuffed if we hadn't, as there was nothing short of Dubbo - we might have made it to Narromine, but there was nothing there, so we would have been stranded. Fueled up, we headed off to Dubbo, after doing a couple of laps of the Tottenham pub until the GPS was satisfied that we'd finished with that way point

.

We were going to go via Trangie, but the lady at the petrol station suggested a short cut direct to Narromine, which turned out to be a good one, but the GPS was not happy, and attempted to send us down a non-existent road which suspiciously had the same name as a farm at that location, and down a number of minor roads just short of Narromine. We ignored all that and headed through to Narromine, then onto our motel in Dubbo, where we arrived at 16:08.

Farride distance was 1078.9 in 23 hours 28 minutes.

Allyson at Dubbo.

After a pleasant night in Dubbo (except for the result of the rugby), we left at 10:00 for Sydney. We saw some threatening clouds, but hoped to avoid the rain. No such luck - a little way past Wellington, it started to come down. We stopped by the side of the road and put on our rain gear. The rain got heavier, and by the time we hit Orange, it was absolutely belting down, my gloves, rain pants and boots had all given up, and we were thoroughly miserable. The mike on my intercom also failed - I think the mike was just wet, since I ran with my visor up until not far from Orange. I could still hear Allyson, but she could not hear me through the intercom for the rest of the trip. We were thoroughly sick of the rain, so we traded the bike for a used Toyota Corolla in Orange, and continued the journey in that.

We stopped for fuel in Bathurst, where the rain started to ease, and it was pretty much gone by the time we hit Lithgow. For some reason, the GPS decided to send us over the Blue Mountains via the Bells Line of Road. Against my better judgement, we followed the GPS's advice. This was no fun, as the road was very slippery and I was pretty tired. I'm sure this was the slowest ever traversal of the Australian Motorcycle Atlas's Ride No 16.

Finally home at 15:10. 1459.6 kms in 2 days.The bike was great. Nice to get it out on the open road after a month of commuting.
Oh, and I was only kidding about the Corolla

Home safe, but wet.

michaelp
2008 1400GTR
1986 1000GTR

Last Edited By: michaelp 16-Sep-08 6:54 AM. Edited 4 times.

Sebastionbear

[-]

Posts: 428

(14-Sep-08 9:58 PM)

failure to launch

FarRide #8 - Far Cairn Rally and SaddleSore 2000 Ride

Looking at my watch, I realised that it was 8pm and I still hadn't got the fairing back on Das Boot. Shit! Only four hours until I leave.

Hurriedly I put the finishing touches to a couple of weeks part-time work on the bike - new wheel bearings, brake pads, spin-on filter adaptor, power outlets, cruise control spot lights, progressive springs, head stem bearings, fork seals and wipers, K&N filter, heated grips, Murph's grips, Iridium plugs, oil change, new coolant, nulon, stripped and painted the fork legs black, wheel centres black and disc brake rotor centres black (can you tell I like black?). A couple of short test-rides and a few minor problems rectified and all was set for the off.

Trying to get to bed at 9.30pm for a couple of hours sleep after packing the bike and getting my gear ready, a friend rang from Melbourne and wanted to talk bikes - so I did, finally bedding down after 10pm. 1.5 hours sleep later the alarm said "Get the Hell out of Dodge".

Gently warming Das Boot up I marvelled at the warmth of the night and thought I had over dressed with liners, thermal gloves, 2 pairs of socks etc. My mother had lent me a camelback for re-hydration, and I have to say it was worth its weight in Murph's parts. Off to the bank across from Ryecroft, I did a balance check at 1 minute to midnight and pressed the OK button on SPOT (should have done it earlier in the evening). Right, we're off - taking it gently, I've got 24 hours to get to Tottenham and return to Mount Pleasant. Plenty of time for a 2200 km road trip.

The first 90 odd kms to the ferry went quickly and as I dropped the 500 metres down onto the Murray Flats the temperature descended as rapidly and I switched the hand grip heaters on. Great - 90 kms in about 46 minutes - 10 minutes on the ferry and I'll still maintain the 100 km/h average I need for the run to be a success.

Das Boot not paying the Ferryman to cross the Murrray. Note how clean he is. This was to change dramatically.

Ferries in SA are a 24 hour affair, and the night watch sleeps until you wake him with a buzzer and he heads over the Murray to collect you. The driver and I chatted about the ride and the calm night during the crossing - this too was to change later in the day.

Up onto the southern bank of the Murray, I headed out onto the Loxton road, known for its crazy roos and settled down into a nice fastish rhythm for the duration. I had to test the springs, fork brace and new front tyre didn't I? This road has beautiful sweeping bends and soon I was enjoying it a little too much and forcibly slowed myself down. Sports bike riding roots are very hard to exorcise.

The river town of Loxton came and went, then riding along Pike River Road to the Yamba turn-off, another beautiful road at 2 am in the morning that deserves to be ridden quickly. The fruit fly checkpoint passed it was onto Sunset country in the Wimmera on the way to Mildura. At about 3 am I hit a bit of a bump in the road a bit quickly and by the time I settled down I noticed my magnetic tank bag was gone! This not only had my maps, but also SPOT, my phone, wallet, lollies, a knife, batteries and most importantly my sunglasses in it. Shutting down quickly I noted where I stopped knowing that the tank bag wouldn't be past this point. Back tracking I thought the bag probably ended up in the middle of the road. I was wrong. 40 minutes later after finally parking the bike and searching the road side with a torch I found it 15 metres into the scrub with no damage apart from a slight scuff on one edge of the clear plastic top. Not a thing was damaged. I took this as a good sign and got back to the bike and rode a little faster to make up lost time.

Unbelievably, the fuel stations on the Mildura bypass were closed, so I crossed the bridge into NSW and made for the Shell at Buronga. 364.1 kilometres in 243 minutes including the ferry crossing and lost tank bag. I'm going to have to do a little better.

On the road again to Euston, then Balranald and onto the mighty Hay Plains.

Das Boot trying to out stare the sun with his new spot lights. Sunrise over the Hay Plains.

The great thing about the Hay Plains is there is nowhere for any little blue clothed men with cameras to hide. I gave Das Boot his head as we made for Hay. Fuelled up in Hay - now 651 km in 409 minutes total. Riding through Hay then north-east towards Lake Cargelligo, the scenery was if anything flatter than the plains. Spectacularly barren. Goolgowi, then Rankin Springs and finally Lake Cargelligo appeared ahead. I was going to try to get to Condobolin on the tank, but the winds had picked up and fuel usage was a bit higher than expected. Mileage 888.3 km in 562 minutes.

Made Condobolin and filled up again for the run up to Tottenham and back, Speaking to the petrol station owner, he gave me two routes to Tottenham, one predominantly dirt and the other sealed. One was shortish and the other long. Guess which I took? Das Boot was soon fish-tailing on the dirt as I realised yet again, all my planning was based on central time, and Davo's window for signing in (11.30 to 12 noon) was eastern time. I had time to make up. The dirt road was a series of right hand corners that had me over-cooking it a few times into the turns. Kept at it though, as I wasn't going to have travelled this far to have the sign in time pass when only a few kilometres away.

Made Tottenham with 5 minutes to spare - 1098.0 km in 718 minutes.

Some bikes in the main street. Mel's (Rice cooker) 600 to the left.

To be continued.

Last Edited By: Sebastionbear 15-Sep-08 6:50 AM. Edited 3 times.

Sebastionbear

[-]

Posts: 429

(14-Sep-08 11:17 PM)

failure to launch

FarRide #8 - Far Cairn Rally and SaddleSore 2000 Ride - continued.

More bikes outside the Tottenham Hotel

Catching up with everyone in Tottenham was a hurried affair - I wanted to stay for about an hour but my butt was itching to be back in the saddle for the return journey. Next time, I'm going to finish a saddle-sore at the rally as Mel did this trip. Mel had completed a saddle sore 1600 on the way to the rally. Well Done Mel!

Managed to put faces to a few GTR-AUS names at the Tottenham Hotel such a Charlie and met Michael P's better half Allyson. Davo gave a welcome and pep talk to the crowded room and most people settled into their lunch. Knowing my predilection for a rest in the afternoon, I forewent lunch and moved Das Boot under a sign outside and took some pictures of the bikes then got ready for the homeward leg of the ride.

Das Boot a little dusty but still clean - soon to change!

The decision was not to ride the dirt section back to Condobolin - so after saying my goodbyes and getting Davo to sign the all-important turn around form for the IBA, I set off on the sealed road via Bogan Gate (what a name).

Nice road with some road work patches that just demanded to be slalomed at speed on this bright sunny afternoon. I was so hot prior to leaving Tottenham I removed my jacket liner and put on summer gloves. Fuelled at Condobolin at 1/4 to 3 in the afternoon - 1260.2 km in 850 minutes including the hour lunch stop. Saddled up again for Hay and noticed the big black clouds in the west. Ah, so what, it's a big country I thought, I'll probably miss them

. You can't get much more wrong than I was. The wind picked up greatly, then picked up some more, debris being blown across the road. Then as I came down to the farming country the top soil was being blown furiously across the road. As the rain hit, and the dirt was still airbourne it rained mud for about 20 minutes. I couldn't see out of my visor, the bike's screen was brown and trucks passing in the opposite direction literally covered you with ooze.

I passed a couple of cars hoping I would get out of the farming area whilst it was still raining so that Das Boot and I would get cleaned by non-muddy rain. The rain continued (with mud) until the sun came out about 70 kms north-east of Hay. By the time I got to Hay the mud on both of us had dried nicely. I filled the bike and attempted to wash my visor and the screen but all I managed was to smear both nicely. Well if that's the worst weather of the trip I thought, I can cope. 1589.7 km in 1042 minutes total time.

The sun had just set as I entered the Hay Plains and once again the throttle hand became a little heavy. The new spot lights worked very well and I felt confident as I set out. The smeared visor and screen meant that I kept the visor up and peered over the screen. This gap was just big enough for a bloody insect to smack into my left eyeball at warp factor 9. Bits of insect are still in that eye as I speak now. For some reason insects - particularly any evil, smelly, large or venomous kind - are attracted to entomologists.

After a lot of blinking and rubbing to remove the major portions of insect debris, I could kind of see - after a somewhat blurry fashion - out of that eye so picked up the pace again.
The Buronga Shell loomed into view, so another attempt at cleaning the visor and screen resulted in success, and washing my eye relieved a little of the pain. 1875.4 km in 1223 minutes total.

The last leg - boy was this great. As I crossed the bridge into Victoria and Mildura, I noticed the wind picking up. Heading due west now, the buffetting from the head-on wind was becoming progressively worse. Even down behind the screen the wind was terrific. By the time I got to the fruit fly checkpoint it was blowing a gale. I turned towards Loxton and the bloody wind got stronger again, the last 90 kilometres from Loxton to Swan Reach were a challenge. The buffetting by this time was so great it felt like I was doing round after round with Muhammed Ali. Decended down to the ferry and commented to the driver that I might get sea-sick as the ferry was bobbing uip and down that much during the crossing. I have never seen waves that big in the Murray. Ominious black, sinister, laden clouds blocked out the stars to the west and I knew I was to be drenched again. This time not with dirt but with velocity. More boxing rounds as I headed into the wild weather towards Sedan was exciting and just tolerable. As I turned south at Sedan for Cambrai the wind was now side-on and insane. The bike plus me plus luggage would be well over 400kg. This wind and rain apart from making me ride at a 40 degree list to starboard in a straight line was attempting to gust me off the road. However my determination to see this ride through successfully overcame all commonsense. Definitely a few sphincter moments. What really scared me though was the thought of going over the top of Cook's Hill. On the calmest day winds whistle over this ridge. Gotta bite the bullet on this one.

As I got to the bottom of the hill, I passed a car doing about 30 km/h - the force of the wind and the rain having overcome their wipers. I carefully rounded the 25 km/h bends on the rise up the hill so not to become part of the armco and the bike was being bounced all over the road. Cresting the rise, the wind was not that much greater, so with a sense of relief I opened up the throttle to a mind numbingly rapid 80 (well in this weather it was). 15km to go and I could feel the warmth of my bed (it was actually sweat in my jacket -but it felt good anyway).

The rain was still pelting down as I pulled up at the bank opposite Ryecroft. Logged off at 11.38pm with a balance check and lit up a celebratory cigarette (sorry Mrs Tosh but this was one of those moments where only legal drugs would suffice). Alana made me a coffee and signed the IBA end witness form and it was over.

2212.5 kilometres in 23 hours 37 minutes. 136.66 litres of fuel Average of 13.4 kilometres per litre. This was more a function of wind rather than speed. Hey who am I kidding - it was both

.

Things I learned:
1. Tank bags can fly - it will have a cord clipped to the bike for the next run.
2. Lemon sherbert boiled sweets are fantastic on long journeys
3. Camelbacks - don't leave home without it
4. 2000 km can be done in one day

Location	time/date	time total (min)	time corrected	time diff (min)	odometer	distance	distance cumulative	average	cumulative average	fuel	kms per litre	NOTES
Mount Pleasant, SA, -34.7741, 139.0497	12/09/2008 23:59	0	0	0	67229.0	0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0	0.0
Swan Reach, SA	13/09/2008 0:49	48	48	48	67321.8	92.80	92.8	116.0	116.0	n/a	n/a	1
Buronga, NSW	13/09/2008 4:34	273	243	195	67593.1	271.3	364.1	67.0	91.5	24.24	14.1	2, 2a, 2b
Hay, NSW	13/09/2008 7:20	439	409	166	67880.0	286.9	651.0	103.7	95.6	18.94	15.1
Lake Cargelligo, NSW	13/09/2008 9:53	592	562	153	68117.3	237.3	888.3	93.1	94.9	16.5	14.4
Condobolin, NSW	13/09/2008 10:43	642	612	50	68210.2	92.9	981.2	111.5	98.2	8.52	10.9
Tottenham, NSW	13/09/2008 12:29	748	718	106	68327.0	116.8	1098.0	66.1	92.9	n/a	n/a	3
Condobolin, NSW	13/09/2008 14:41	880	850	132	68489.2	162.2	1260.2	73.7	90.2	22.88	12.2	4, 4a
Hay, NSW	13/09/2008 17:53	1072	1042	192	68818.7	329.5	1589.7	103.0	91.8	22.9	14.4	5
Buronga, NSW	13/09/2008 20:54	1253	1223	181	69104.4	285.7	1875.4	94.7	92.1	22.68	12.6
Mount Pleasant, SA, -34.7741, 139.0497	13/09/2008 23:38	1417	1417	194	69441.5	337.1	2212.5	104.3	93.3	n/a	n/a	6

NOTES:
1. Ferry Crossing the Murray River
2. Lost tankbag, back track and search
2a. Time change to EDST (+30 minutes)
2b. Included 5 litre top up from Jerry can
3. 1 hour stop at Tottenham (turn-around point)
4. Travelled longer sealed road back to Condobolin
4a, fuel consumption reflects 70 km stop/start on dirt road
5. From Hay to Mount Pleasant, increasing storms/headwinds
6.Total km/L, 2212.5/(136.66+28) = 13.4

Last Edited By: Sebastionbear 14-Sep-08 11:50 PM. Edited 1 times.

Sebastionbear

[-]

Posts: 433

(15-Sep-08 12:45 AM)

failure to launch

Hey Michael, glad you didn't get the Corolla, but if you had it would have been Fully Sik Maaaaaate!

Click for larger image

Michael P at speed with doof-doof speakers

Aussiedav

[-]

Posts: 4352

(15-Sep-08 7:39 AM)

FarRider

Report later, some pics now.

Davo
1400GTR "Roo" & 1000GTR "Griff"
IBA #22575 - Davo's Pages

Last Edited By: Aussiedav 15-Sep-08 11:07 AM. Edited 1 times.

oldbitz

[-]

Posts: 20

(15-Sep-08 9:26 AM)

Well it was nice to put some faces to names and find out more about far riders and what better way to do it. As for the ride home I have riden and driven in some awful weather over the years but yesterday was the worst I can remember glad we only had 180k's to travel. But having met a lot of you both Heather and I are fired up to give it a go in fact the first thing Heather said to me yesterday when we got home was when is the next official one and I sure hope we are planning to go and do it as a far ride. I recon this must be addictive given before February this year Heather had never been on a bike as either a pillion or rider (so now you guys have a lot to answer for)..

..

As a foot note Davo you got young Jason fired up and thinking about it he has already started planning

plane

[-]

Posts: 3

(15-Sep-08 9:29 AM)

Aussiedav wrote:
Report later, some pics now.

Bugger!

Cheers,
Pete

Aussiedav

[-]

Posts: 4354

(15-Sep-08 11:08 AM)

FarRider

Didn't get booked, I did nothing wrong he is now number 4 cop to pull me over just to talk about the bike.

Davo
1400GTR "Roo" & 1000GTR "Griff"
IBA #22575 - Davo's Pages

michaelp

[-]

Posts: 388

(15-Sep-08 11:57 AM)

Mudgee Guardian (not)

Sebastionbear wrote:
Hey Michael, glad you didn't get the Corolla, but if you had it would have been Fully Sik Maaaaaate!

I could get an extra job delivering for the local kebab shop

.
Quite a few of those models around Auburn, where I used to live.
The locals favoured old Corollas, Honda CRXs and Geminis to do up with extra dials on the bonnet, ridiculous sound systems and funky paint jobs.
They must enjoy talking to coppers even more than Davo does

, as they're just asking for a defect inspection every time they leave their driveway.

michaelp
2008 1400GTR
1986 1000GTR

ricecooker

[-]

Posts: 28

(15-Sep-08 1:37 PM)

I Came Back

Well done on the SS2000 Craig!

I only decided on Wednesday last week that I would be attending the Farride... was trying to decide what route I would take as Tottenham is only some 400km from home... decided that I would have a go at the SS1600

so I devised a route that according to Google Maps would be 1655km in total.

Friday morning I was up about 7am - I relaxed for a bit, packed up all my stuff, loaded the bike and still had hours to go... I had my sister who I live with do my start witness form and I set off for the servo at long last... I was aiming for midday but my fuel receipt is 11:50am... I am a little impatient

I slabbed it up the Federal to Goulburn where I filled up and head off towards Taralga. Just out of Taralga I found a 4WD being tailed by Constable Care so the pace was a little slower then... eventually, just before the descent down to the Abercrombie River crossing, Constable Care overtook the 4WD and then the 4WD waved me past but I kept to the limit as I knew he was up ahead somewhere... passed a copper on a bike coming the other way in the twisties - he was going hard!! Got flashed by a few cars coming the other way so kept the pace nice and easy and was feeling a bit sore by the time I got to Black Springs so I pulled up and had a quick smoke before rolling through Oberon and onto Lithgow for fuel. I was now 1/2 an hour behind schedule.

I left Lithgow and headed over Bells Line of Road where I had a fairly ordinary run - a fair amount of traffic and I got stuck behind a caravan for a bit... eventually got around and cruised along then made my way to the Putty Road. Just before the start of the 10 mile, I was stuck behind two cars and was looking for a place to overtake them but it was getting a bit darkish and my visor was very bug-splattered so instead I found somewhere to pull over and swap for the clear visor. No other cars came past while I was doing that so I hopped back on knowing the road ahead was clear... yay! All too soon I caught up to the two cars again and got around them fairly quickly before rolling into Singleton - the bugs were out in force, it looked like rain where my headlights caught them. I stopped in Singleton for fuel and had a quick sandwich and cleaned the visor before heading off towards Tamworth. I was now 1 hour behind schedule (I'm not as quick as I thought!

)

It was a very sedate run up to Willow Tree, with the memory of the ticket I got last time I travelled that section of the New England fresh in my head, and also there are a lot of towns through there. After Willow Tree I picked the pace up a bit - I really enjoyed this stretch, it was quite a pleasant temperature and I love being out on the road at night, it is so peaceful. The road was just rolling by... eventually I got into Tamworth and pulled up for fuel - I was a bit cold now so had a (terrible) coffee to warm up a bit and then continued north - Glen Innis next stop. I was now 1.5 hours behind schedule... oops.

A close encounter with the arthritic suicide bunny was a bit of a worry but other than the temperature varying about 10 degrees I swear it was a good run into Glen Innis. Fuel and I added my flanno to the collection of clothing I was already wearing and a bit of a chat with a local who warned me of the deer, roos and pigs on the Gwydir highway... I set off towards Moree very cautiously... but eventually the pace picked up. A few close calls along here, a bunch of roos on the road (one hopping right in front of me... yes my brakes work!) and a very smart bunny who did an about face as soon as I hit the brakes and a suicide hare(!). I still felt good along this stretch and only started feeling tired about 50km out of Moree (I have found this before, even on much shorter rides, when the destination is near I get tired?!). Got into the motel at 1:30am, still 1.5 hours behind schedule. Not too bad really, given that it was a real last minute plan! Sent the obligatory text messages home and crawled into bed.

Alarm was set for 5am and I heard Rob and Charlie leave about 5:30am(?) so thought I had best get a move on too...

packed up, and moved out, fuel receipt is for 6:03am. I wasn't sure if Davo had been through or not yet so I kept an eye on my mirrors... got into Coonabarabran and found Rob and Charlie at the servo there... filled up, smoke, gogo juice and a bit of a chat and we all headed off together. Passed Davo having a chat with Constable Care along the way and stopped at Gilgandra, Charlie was calling home so Rob and I decided it was a good excuse for a smoke break (I can't recall exactly what time it was, but I had been making really good time). Davo came passed and said *something* to Rob... suddenly the pace increased somewhat

We had a good run through to Warren where we stopped for fuel and a bit of a chat - Rob asked how I was going for mileage and time etc and all was going well - I think I had something like 1 hour and 50 minutes to do the 80 odd kays to Tottenham. It was an extended stop and we got going - at Nevertire Rob's GPS was trying to send him left but Charlie and I voted to go straight - I don't think GPS recognised this road (I know Google Maps didn't!) and we got into Tottenham. I calculated how much kays I had actually done according to the Odometer and it was only 1618???????? According to Google Maps I should have done around 1650... I still had a bit of time so upon Rob's suggestion I headed for the next town, Albert, some 24km away.

I passed a lot of riders coming the other way, it was great to see all the bikes out on the road. I got to the pub at Albert and bought a stubby holder to get a receipt (its a really pretty pink one!). I felt a bit bad as there were two blokes in the pub who were really keen to talk about the bike and stuff - and usually I'm all up for standing around talking about my bike! But I had to get away and I felt a bit rude

Back into Tottenham, having taken my odo up to 1660km total and got there 11:42(?) ish. Eventually got into the pub and got my receipt - the first one he printed out, the time was fast!!!!!!!! but then the eftpos machine had the correct time (11:49 - phew!)

Lunch was great! I hadn't eaten yet that day and was starving but two plates of chinese later I was well sated... purchased some supplies and it was off to the rally. I got the award for longest distance ridden by a female... yay!!!!! I was really chuffed about that. Also ran into a dude I met at Barkly Homestead on my trip in August which was cool! I was pretty tired but felt okay mostly. Had a little nanna nap around 5pm(?) for about 20 minutes then went to bed about 9:30pm, only to be woken up by one hell of a storm about 1am. Very impressive - I crawled out of the tent, found a squashed can to put under the side stand on Jimmy then had a smoke and just watched all the action... amazing. After it let up a bit crawled back into the tent only to find it had sprung a leak and was dripping onto my head... grrrr... jumper over my head fixed that and I woke up to everyone talking around me and Skip calling me to breakfast... yum!

Headed off about ummm 7:30? 8:00am? I can't remember

Skip was heading back to Orbost and was heading via Canberra so we consulted the maps and decided to head back going Forbes, Grenfell, Young, Harden, Yass etc. We stopped at Forbes for fuel then figured I could make it to Yass on that tank so headed off... it started raining a bit before Young so we pulled up in Young so I could wriggle into the plastic pants. It was dry after that for the run into Yass. Got fuel, had a quick pie, and was watching the black clouds heading our way... seemed a good time to get going but as we headed for Canberra it hit us and rained pretty much all the way - it was very wet coming in to the ACT. Waved goodbye to Skip and got home dripping wet on the outside and only a bit on the inside...jacket failed me on the zip though and let a bit of water in

and boots leaked a bit but otherwise was dry

Got home about 1pm I think (I didn't actually look at the time). Got out of the wet gear and promptly curled up with my book until falling fast asleep for a few hours

.

All in all it was a fantastic weekend and I am very glad that I chose to do the FarRide in the end! Was great to see everyone and I am so pleased that I made my SS1600 - thanks to everyone for round of applause, it was fantastic!

Mel - 03 ZX6R
I ride like a girl...

The miles take time but the time is mine, and always moving suits me fine...

Grey Gentry

[-]

Posts: 672

(15-Sep-08 4:39 PM)

No Apex