9000km in Oz , Sydney to the tropics & back

[BlueBull2007]

Excellent report, Im thoroughly enjoying it.

How many hours/day were you on the road?

 

[Mark Hardy]

More please....... :thumleft:

 

[atgreg]

there were only 4 bikes ahead of us when we arrived at lorella, more dribbled in during the arvo with varying tales of the track in from "what a hoot" to "what a shitfight" a few falls in the sandy sections and even a few intrepid (silly) souls came in after dark, about 30 of us there for the thursday night.

During some bike maintenance and checking over I dound that my soft bag supports had suffered on the trip, the left side had both mounts broken and the right side had one, a couple of the mounts fell to pieces as I unbolted them, oh well , I'll sort it out tomorrow.

Thrasher & Sonia of TTT rally fame were there

Some drinks, a feed cooked in the camp oven, it was a very pleasant night

A couple of intrepid sidecar guys arrived well after dark, 1 with a broken chassis

 

[atgreg]

Friday dawned and there was a small stick welder at lorella so thrasher kindly welded some washers to my racks to make some new mounts that would hopefully get me home

The sidecar chasis was welded up as well

More bikes rolled in with varying stories of fun or horror

As people were arriving they said people were crashing all over the place in the sand, damaged bikes and some were turning back. Wow it really shows 1 persons fun is anothers horror. My group took about 45 mins to do the 30km in, some did it considerably quicker and others took 2-3 hours.

this poor girl was almost in tears when she arrived

then this fellow arrived with no dramas , proving it's the rider not the bike

While this was going on some of the early arrivals were partying hard

 

[atgreg]

Mal arrived

and waved me over to look at his 640 Adv, fark !!!!!

the top clamp was cracked through all 5 holes, he T-boned a DR650 in some sand, the KTM was barreling along up on the pegs in 1 wheel track and the DR rider was paddling along in the other track and flopped straight in front of the 640, and the gearlever put through the cases of the Dr650, no ones fault really but a bit of a pain for both riders.

Some creative work with wire later and Mal hoped to be able to ride out, the cases on the DR were repaired with devcon

 

[atgreg]

While all this was happening afew riders decided to go for a ride to the coast. The track was 70km long and described as extreme 4WD, the guys that went were all good riders and looked forward to a great ride with no gear on the bikes. Pete, paul and brett on 640's and gazz and tony on 950's headed out.

Some video
https://atgreg.smugmug.com/gallery/5791728_FdoAF#358602663_uKaW7-A-LB

https://atgreg.smugmug.com/gallery/5791728_FdoAF#358604662_tTKji-A-LB

https://atgreg.smugmug.com/gallery/5791728_FdoAF#358605302_muq83-A-LB


I'll let Tony describe what happened next.

The fire damage was caused buy my bike exploding. I didn't hit that tree that is down on the track but I will take the credit for it anyway. . I hit got sideways ran off the track and hit the tree side on with the fuel tank and instantly a fire ball came out from the right hand side. I let go of the bars and back flipped of the bike, somehow landing on my feet. The bike continued on for about 2 meters before falling on its side and exploding. I didn't even get the chance to remove my wallet from the tank bag, or my camera and tools. I also watched helplessly as to Zumo 550 and the touratech seat melted. I found my camera in two pieces, 5 meters from the bike on oppisite sides. Parts of the tank were scattered everywhere, on piece was stuck about 2 meters up a tree.

.

KTM BBQ video
https://atgreg.smugmug.com/gallery/5791728_FdoAF#358609787_DqZmP-A-LB

 

[atgreg]

when brett arrived back in camp we didnt belive him but 1 look at the vid convinced us,gazz doubled tony back to the campsite.


more rolled in with horror stories, a few of th sidecar boys went back out on the track to take luggage of the ones who were really struggling and to dop water to others who decided to camp beside the track, an angel of a 4WD'er who was camped at lorella made a couple of mercy dashe as well.

Lorella's a pretty small, lowkey operation, normally only 5 or so 4WD's a night during the season and the most ever was 15 so they struggled a bit with 100 odd thirsty and hungry riders but they tried hard and most people got fed & watered.

One rider (Adv Aussiedakar) had crashed and broken an arm so he and his bike were retrieved

Our resident medico DrAT checked him out and liased with the authorities and he was picked up by a 4WD ambulance in the early hours of sat am
sat am dawned and after all the carnage a few of us were getting nervous, thinking that with most of the bikes leaving sun am, witn lots of varying skill levels a repeat of mals crash could quite easily happen, so we decided to miss the big sat evening  and leave.

Brett headed out early, Murray & I left late morning and Norm was staying so our little group was splitting up, It was a pleasure travelling with you guys and I'd do it again at the drop of a hat :clap :clap .

the sand on the way out was bit harder than coming in, all the tracks kept making the front end go all over the place. half way there were some riders campd of to the side of the track, Advrider human one amongst them,

here's his story.

Well, I made it 15.8kms from Lorella Springs only to stop to try and work out why my 950 felt like sh*t. Once I looked at the rear wheel bearing my journey was over ....

[:yikes

I camped the Friday night with Dave and John and on Saturday we tried Dogsbody's 990 wheel - which wasn't going to fit because of the 990's ABS and consequently differing wheel and caliper spacing.

But much thanks to DrAt who I affectionately now call "Baby Jesus" because he came from nowhere and showed me "the light" by leaving "not myrrh" but a set of wheel bearings before disappearing into the dust on Saturday morning.

I slammed the bearing into my molten hub, tightened up the swingarm enough to stop the bearing falling out and rode into Lorella Springs, where I thought I would have to leave my bike and find a way to Katherine or Darwin to hire a 4WD ute to come and collect my bike at a later date.

But with the help of my new best friend "Diamond" John, who I also affectionately call "Diamond" because he is an absolute gem of a gentleman ...

"Diamond" John is shown here on the left of Faraway Man Dave and myself

... we were able to find some tubing in the junk yard at Lorella which we cut and made a new spacer then glued the bearings in with Devcon ...

We let it set overnight and on Monday morning we cut a final spacer from what was left of the molten aluminium spacer and I bolted it all back into place. It looked fine. It felt fine. But I rode carefully (at first) out past the scene of all the carnage on Friday afternoon. The 950 felt much better and rode nicely.

I was waiting for the big sandy stretch and before I knew it I was crossing the 2 creek crossings and realised that I had already ridden through the sand. :thumbup

At the intersection to Lorella I checked the tension on the rear axle and for any cracks in the Devcon - all good so far :wink:

Then I rode to the tar leading into Borroloola - all good :thumbup I figured if I could get the bike to the Stuart Highway, I had a better chance of getting a ride home for both myself and the bike.

We made it into Alice where I thought I could leave the bike with Race Motorcycles to repair and catch a flight home to Adelaide then return later to pick the bike up. The bearing was great ... and hence a few days later I arrived home on my doorstep - job done!

I wouldn't have been able to do this without the help provided by "Diamond John" and everyone. Slab - for coming out continuously to check on me and for lending me tools, etc. And especially to DrAt for flipping me his bearings. Dogsbody for frantically running around making phone calls trying to organise another wheel and transport, etc. Bloody legends!

We'll have a full Ride Report in the coming weeks. It was a great turnout and it was excellent to catch up with old friends, many of whom I met at the last OCR in Gascoyne Junction and to spend time making new many friendships too.

Getting excited about 2010 already!

To all who suffered injury and damage trying to get to Lorella Springs I wish you all a speed recovery.

Murray was really struggling in the sand and had a couple of falls but had a great smile on his face when we got to the main Gulf track.

 

[atgreg]

Murray was a very happy boy when we hit the tar at Cape Crawford, we were't the only ones who left, between the leavees and some who didn't make it into Lorella there would have been 15 or so bikes at Cape Crawford for the night

an interesting auxillary fuel tank on this 1200GS

Late in the afternoon, this rolled into Cape Crawford

It was Mal's bike with the broken triple clamp, instead of trying to ride the bike they'd strapped it to the bullbar of a 4WD to bring him out, more luck for mal, there was an empty explosives truck and after some talking a deal was done and mal would be trucking at least halfway home.

there was another bonus from leaving early, the rides who tuned up at Cape Crawford later on sunday found them out of fuel and there were 40 or so bikes camped there waiing for the tanker.
well we all left Cape Crawford heading for barkly homestead, incredibly flat and boring mitchell grass pains for hours and to make it worse there was an amazing headwind, i had the throttle flat to do 100km/h, half of us ran out of fuel, I ran out 5km short, a bit of tooing and frowing to the aservo with jerries and on the road again. Most of us ended up at the Camoweal pub for the night

Then it was on to Mt isa where Murray and I parted ways, I replaced my tyres, did an oil change and planned an early start the next day as i had 3000km to do in 41/2 days to get to a friends 50th B'day, mostly a tar drone so i fitted up some universals

140/80 x 17 Mitas e09 Dakar after 4000km, Sydney to Lorella Springs, approx 60/40 dirt/tar and the front D908RR ( bear in mind my bike weighs 209kg dry and I weigh about 140kg)

After 5000km at Mt isa on the way home, the last 900km 120km/h on the tar.  Im impressed, the tyres gripped at least as good as the Deserts Ive run on outback trips before.

 

[sidetrack]

Those tracks sure claimed a couple of bikes and riders ! Great riding  :biggrin:

 

[BlueBull2007]

Absolutely brilliant report! Thanks for sharing.

They make them tough in OZ.

 

[DeonDj]

Wow a Blacbird on those roads, no great RR ;D

 

[Welsh]

Excellent report, impressive just a stupid question, do you know a sidecar rider/ DR650 rider called Brian Bailey, he was over here for a few months, last I heard he was off to the North East up the peninsula?  I only ask as I assume its a fairly small community over in Aus as well?

 

[GO GIRL]

Wow What  a report!!! as  a child I wanted to ride the country in on horseback!!!

I think I wud rather prefer to do that on my Beast!!!!

This really takes for more in depth reading... :biggrin:

 

[Tonteldoos]

Wow nice report, some pictures might just as well being taken in africa

 

[atgreg]

Excellent report, Im thoroughly enjoying it.

How many hours/day were you on the road?

It varies, longest day was 800km, shortest about 200km

 

[atgreg]

the next few days were a blur of straight roads and featureless countryside with just an occasional break in the monotomy

The MP3 player and custon moulded earplug speakers were a godsend

The main interest on this stretch were the towns, names steeped in our pioneering and pastoral history. Winton, Longreach ,  Barcaldine,Augathella, Blackall.

I spent the night at the nth gregory ( how appropriate) hotel in Winton

they let me park the At in the beergarden :evil

went to the old outdoor cinema, 1 of only 2 left in Oz

went to the Stockmans Hall of Fame in Longreach

it celebrates the pioneering and pastoral history of oz

it's really worth a whole day but I had to keep moving so only spent a couple of hours thee.

The Quantas founders museum is also in Longreach,quantas started here.

 

[atgreg]

As i was filling up in Augathella this truck pulled in

another OCR refugee, no crash damage but a broken gearbox i believe

I stayed in Mitchell and decided to have a soak in the thermal bore where water comes up from the great artesian basin , a toasty 40 degree water temp was magic on the old bones

wandering to a pub for dinner , who should I find but Ron Durkin from motorcycle Adventure products, he'd just ridden into town

It turned out there were a few other OCR returnees in town so we had dinner together and I had the biggest steak ever

we met up again in the morning for an early morning saok before going our seperate ways

had a great nachos at a pub in the middle of nowhere

then it was onto narrabri for my friends b'day, it was an excellent party and great to catch up

Sandra looks pretty good for 50 I reckon

not to shabby when she was younger either

it was great to have a day off the bike, though a checkover showed one of the rewelded mounts cracking so it was reinforced

 

[atgreg]

Well , lets get tis finished;

After the B'day celebrations were over I headed to burren junction to meet a mate, stopped at the bore for a swim but bugger, due to concerns about waisting water they've reduced the size and flow so it's not as hot as before.

Steve got to Burren just as the sun went down and was frozen, a few cleansing ales in front of the fire fixed that

the next day dawned cool & clear and the wind had dropped so riding was very pleasant, we checked out the radio telescope, 6 dishes on a 6km rail track.

We headed to Bingara from narabri to cross over the top end of Kaputar national park, lots more tar on this road than last time I was here but very scenic once into the mountain

At Bingara we stayed at the imperial, highly recomended !!!

we decided to stay a 2nd night in Bingara and do a day ride.

we visited the Myall Creek memorial, the site of a massacre of Aboriginals and also significant as it was the 1st time whites were prosecuted for killing blacks

Did some wine tasting

we rode to have a look at Copeton dam, very low !!

We had lunch with some friendly locals

and back to the imperial for another good night

 

[atgreg]

we headed via some nice easy tar and dirt backroads to Gunnedah to visit Agquip 08, a huge rural show.

Plenty of big toys for big boys

stayed at a pub in Coolah, great balcony and a bargain, $15

Steve had to head home and I headed for bathurst where I got snowed on for half an hour

clear the next day , excellent. Bathurst is a motorsport mecca, the annual 1000km car race and for years a bike racing festival at easter, no more for the bikes sadly. The Mount Panorama track is a scenic tourist drive normally and is closed off for a week in October for the car race. The track goes up & over a mountain and the descent is quite hairy

This is the view from the top of the track, from about where the Mt Panorama sign is in the previous piccie

and the descent

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Bathurst also has a great motoring museum

A good selection of bikes too

A couple of Wayne gardners race bikes

Gregg Hansford, a sad loss

 

[atgreg]

For the last night of my trip I met friends from my touring club at a farmstay between Bigga and Crookwell, it was a lovely place and a great way to finish the trip.

A blast up the motorway and I was home. Thanks for hanging in with me, I know it's been a bit of a read but it was a hoot of a trip.