Part 1 A trip up the Oxley and back

'Twas the night before Xmas.. ^H^H^H oops wrong yarn.

Yeah well, so by Friday all the girly wooses had piked because they were
scared of getting wet (waves to Dave Ello and Eskimo Bob), Postman Pat
said he'd be there, and Pisshead Pete was up for a beer and a ride. PP
and PP are going to have to fill you in on their Friday as muggins 'ere
was at work. However at 7pm by the time I'd packed my bags and was ready
to getting going I'd had a text or two from Pete telling me Pat had
delivered and he still wasn't as funny in person, but was doing OK on
the drinking.

On my bike and out of Balmain by 7.30 Friday night, Victoria Rd,
Centennial Ave, Pacific Hwy and on to the F3, boring but good to be on
my way. Hit a few spots of rain halfway up the F3 so stopped and put the
wets on, of course there was no more rain after that (if I'd *not* put
them on it would of course have poured).

The run on Bucketts to Gloucester was a bit interesting, the rain and
warm weather during the day made for a VERY foggy run, it's probably 60K
or so from the Pac Hwy to Gloucester, but it took nearly an hour -
visibility was poor !

Hit Gloucester at about 10.30, stayed at the Avon Valley Hotel, Pete and
Pat were in the bar giving the grog a good nudge. By midnight they
booted us out of the bar, the chef who owned a VTR1000 kept us company
and plied Pete with Jack Daniels for a while before we crashed out at
about 1.30

Saturday morning the weather was beautiful,warm and sunny, Pat and I
were up and off to brekky by about 8.30, but Pete was still out like a
light. Calling his phone worked well as an alarm clock though seeing
he'd left it on the other side of the room <evil grin>. We got out of
Gloucester by about 10.30.

Good run up Thunderbolt's to Walcha,280K, great bit of road, found a
spot to open up the Raptor and was surprised to find it called 254K as
top speed (slight uphill slope),speedo was probably 15 or 20K ambitious
I guess. This was of course on a private airstrip on a friends property
en route officer. (I am from the area

Got to Walcha and had lunch at the New England (take away burger from
the cafe next door and a beer), got away about 1.30. Pete managed to
scam a room at the Newie - someone had cancelled, so I cancelled on the
commercial's room I'd booked.

Warm and sunny,probably 30C, Pat took the lining out of his jacket, I
opened all the vents and Pete went with just a T shirt and Vest -
luvverly riding weather !

The 80 odd K from Walcha to the start of the windies seemed to take
forever, been waiting for months for this Finally got to it so I
dived around and Pete and started giving the Raptor a thrashing, only
light traffic which was good, lot of bikes parked at Gingers but not so
many on the road as to hold me up too much, only a couple of cars as
well. Excellent run, 65K of 25/35/45's with no more than usually 50-200m
between corners, constant flip flop from side to side. At the end of the
windy part there's another 40 or so K into Long Flat. Pulled up there to
refuel, Pete and Pat were along soon after. The "Long Flat Rally" was
on, so there were at least a couple of hundred bikes out the front with
a band playing.

We stopped and kicked back for a bit, while Pat and Pete fuelled up,
then Pete and Pat headed over to the pub for a beer, while I headed back
to the windies for another couple of laps.

Rode to Ginger's Creek, the uphill run is quite different to the more
downhill run heading east, was great, giving the tyres quite a caning
this time, backend was squirming around on exits, getting better grip
out of the BT56's than I would have expected given they're not cutting
edge. Run was even better this way for traffic - hit 2 cars and that was
it. Stopped at Gingers for a break and fuel (running at high rpm and WOT
was sucking the juice down quicker than an alco at a free beer night).

There was a group of about 30 bikes there from the the Wollongong area,
including a Bon Trike which apparently my uncle sold him (as I found out
in conversation), stopped and had a break there for a while and chatted
to the guys, the Raptor evoked a fair bit of interest as it usually does
(WTF is that ?), after about 20 mins my legs had stopped shaking from
all the hanging off so I went in and got a drink, and the Wollongong
guys headed off while I was having it. Gave 'em a 5min headstart then
headed off for Long Flat, I should have given them more as it made for a
bit too much traffic. was able to overtake the first half reasonably
safely, but got a bit frustrated stuck behind a couple and made a bit of
a silly passing move where I was on the wrong side getting too close to
the next corner, certainly didn't put anyone else in danger other than
myself - gave them heaps of room. But should have been a little more
patient. Anyways got around them and got a clear run until I caught up
to the R6, the ZX12 and the VTR, smoothly around the latter two, but the
R6 was a bit quicker, waited a while (~2Km) for an opportunity and
nearing the end of the twistys was a 35K with a a good 500m straight
before the next corner, closed the gap up and gave it full throttle to
exit a good 1/2 sec before he got on the gas and rocketed past him with
enough time to brake for the next corner and get away from him from
there. Unfortunately the corners ended about 2Kms later :-( He soon
caught me again as I carefully toddled along at the speed limit and he
overtook me on the straight.

Had almost reached Long Flat when the trike and the Postman went past
the other way. Bugger, they'd obviously got tired of waiting. Wasn't
anywhere to safely turn around so I went the extra couple of K into Long
Flat and chucked a U-ey there.

Caught up to them a couple of K short of the start of the twistys again,
Pat led for the first 3 or 4 Ks and then pulled over and indicated for
us to go through, I hung behind Pete who was giving the trike quite a
caning, looked like bloody hard work from where I was sitting. Just
short of where I knew there was nice set of undulating left right left
right 35's I overtook Pete (I think these are my all time favourite set
of corners). Cranked it in hard, damn that feels good

Pulled over 10K up the road in a reast area to put the ear plugs back in
I'd forgotten to put in at Gingers, Pete and Pat went past, and I caught
them up and followed them through to Walcha, that last 80K after the
twistys was hard work staying awake ! Got into Walcha at about 730.

Dinner at the Chinese in the Newie, everyone was tired, Pat was
sunburnt, we all said we were going to have an early night. Many beers,
southerns, turkeys (and I had some stones green ginger wine to go with
the beer much to everyone's disgust later we got to bed at about 1am.

Part 2 to follow...

 

JL wrote:
...snip

Forgot to mention that Saturday was 550 odd km for me, probably 250K of
really windy road, and about 150Km of sweepers - not a bad day's ride at
all.

Sunday morning, up at about 830, blue skies and sunny looking good - Pat
and Pete still fast asleep, so grabbed the book I buohgt for this
contingency and went to see if the cafe was open - which it was - brekky
coffee and a litre of OJ to rehydrate later I was feeling pretty
good,albeit my legs were protesting loudly about all the hanging off I'd
been doing ysterday.The weather unfortunately wasn't looking as good -
clouds started coming over. Went back at 930 to see if they were up -
they weren't so I settled in out the front to read Pat surfaced a bit
later and Pete by about 1030 or so. Checked out the weather map via
Pete's flash new phone and seeing as the wind was blowing south west we
figured we'd head from Walcha to Tamworth via Niangla and Nundle, Pete
had heard this road had been tarred lately. Around about Noon we got
away from Walcha, spotted a turn off to Niangla 2Km out of town but
decided to press on for the one we'd picked on the map, we hit some
fairly heavy rain which lasted about halfway to the Nundle turn 45K out
of Walcha, but the road was dirt 100m off the turnoff so I piked - would
have been willing to do a bit of dirt in the dry, but a road bike on wet
clay was asking for trouble.

The run down to Gloucester was reasonably uneventful, as Pete said "a
bit of a drizzle, not really that wet". My waterproof boots aren't
though, time for a new pair they're 5 years old now.

Some poor bugger on a Katana was broken down half way but refused any
offers of help.

Got to Gloucester at about 2pm had a leisurely lunch (man I ate too much
this weekend !) and several coffees and headed off at about 3.30.

Fairly uneventful trip on Bucketts and down the Pathetic Highway to the
freeway, about 1Km short of the halfway servos on the freeway however
the traffic choked up really badly, was down to about 20Km, I needed
fuel anyway so I pulled into the servo and fuelled up. Was just as
choked still when I pulled out of the servo, almost stationary, so I ran
up the breakdown lane for about 20K at about 50K/hr until I got around
the blockage - there seemed to be no reason for it whatsoever, no smash
or breakdown, just too many cars. Had a decent run then until it did the
same thing again another 50K up the road - another 2K in the breakdown
lane dodged that. Down the Pacific Hwy onto the bridge and home to
Balmain at 7pm

1150Km in the weekend, lots of corners and good fun.

Thanks to the Postman and Pisshead Pete for coming along, was a great
weekend.

JL
04 X Raptor - no longer feeling unloved and in need of a new rear tyre

 

I enjoyed that ride report John , you lucky bugger

Graham
GSX750F

 

Don't tell Dave but I think we found out why they call it "Thunderbolts"
too! A very enjoyable weekend.

 

That'll be all those stormclouds you downloaded into it from the BOM...

Postman Pat

 

Make that refurbished with a hairdryer. No more weird arking behaviour!

 

Ahhh well, Telstra declared it redundant last week anyway !

JL

 

Damn! Just as I'd gotten hold of two of each animal ...

-----sharks

 

JL wrote:

<snip>

As you've probably guessed, the first turn was the one you should have
taken if you wanted tar all the way. Last time I was through there (a
couple of months ago) there was a short section of gravel left before
Niangla but that was pretty much it. It's probably sealed all the way
now.

 

Bugger !! No we didn't guess it, we had a short chat and decided to go
with the original plan, ahh well - we know for the next run hey Pete ?

JL

 

Just to confirm we're talking about the same turnoff here, it's the one
just before the weird totem pole thingo. If you do take it next time
(bearing in mind there could still be some gravel, but to my
disapointment it was certainly shrinking each time I've been through)
bear left through Niangla. Then when you come to the T intersection
hang a right for Tamworth which takes you via this
http://turing.une.edu.au/~ashley/advrider/Gallery_05/cutting1.JPG to
Dungowan (see, I rode the gravel with road tyres). If you've never
ridden it you'll be pleasantly surprised (though it's over all too
quickly).

 

Yeah, pretty much, Ash. The first turn off you're talking about is just out
of town and goes down through Aberbaldie. We stopped there but pushed on as
I was under the impression the newly tarred one we were looking for was
further on towards Nowendoc. It wasn't but we know now! When locals say
"just out of town" I'd expect it to be more like 40k's than 2k's!

 

I was scouring ebay before it came good. There's no way they're gunna sucker
me into buying _another_ new phone with an unannounced use by date!

 

Trust you to bite at Clem's bait!

 

Hmm don't remember the totem pole. The turnoff I was thinking of is
where you take the Walcha to Gloucester road (Thunderbolts) out of
Walcha, get maybe a km or two out of town and there's a sign to Niangala.

The one we investigated and didn't do was the one 45K south of Walcha
(on T/Bolts)

OK, sounds good, yeah something like that was what we had in mind,
however that road on the GPS looked like about 40 or 50 K of dirt which
I wasn't keen on. A couple of K is fine in the dry but the Raptor just
isn't a good bike for extended distances in the dirt.

I've done the Dungowan to Tamworth road many times, just not in the last
15 years

JL

 

Well it was announced, it was just announced AFTER you bought it

JL

 

Re: PDAs and the like, does this change things?

Cheers

Hammo

 

Errm yeah it does actually - if you buy a GPRS equipped one then it'll
only be good for about 3-4 years (at which point you'll probably be
wanting to upgrade anyway).

Safest bet is to go with the bluetooth phone, bluetooth PDA combo,
there'll be a bluetooth 3G phone available by the time they close down
the GSM and CDMA networks

JL

 

I think I'll wait until you pop over for a beer and you can draw me some
diagrams to be sure I am following all of this techie stuff.

Thanks

Hammo

 

On 2100MHz you can, not on 850 MHz you can't

JL