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Being the sometimes adventures of Clint and Charleen Lovell, motorcyclists
of Brisbane, Australia

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18-04-10

Around Oz

Where we are in 2010
Hint: select All Days

Around Oz Day 13 - 2 March 2010 - 766km

Bit of a long day today. Port Campbell was clouded in but didn't look like rain at all. I had a little look around the spectacular shoreline. Everyone knows of the famous 12 Apostles formations, but that is only part of the whole. These are hundreds of these tiny islands both sides of Port Campbell. They make for a spectacular coastline.

Then it was across to South Australia and Mount Gambier. No visit to this town is complete without going to view the spectacular Blue Lake - when it is blue. It is a crater lake fed by an underground aquifer which for part of the year has this spectacular blue colouring to the water. Around winter time it loses the colour and is a murky grey just like any other. No one is quite sure why or how the colour change takes place. Today, it was blue.

Then it was north through the Coonawarra District. This is an area well known for its wine production. The local soil is apparently perfect for growing red varietals. Every major Australian wine brand has a vineyard here, it seems.

The country soon opens out to wide plains dotted with the spectacular Murray River Gums. Eucalypts that grow tall and fat but are gnarly due to the plentiful droughts. Very picturesque.

It was getting late in the day so I began looking for some digs. I've had this problem before. There are not very many places to stay in this part of the country. Motels are few and far between and most pubs don't do accommodation.
Took me a while travelling around the Adelaide Hills - great riding as I went - before I eventually located a caravan park where someone was home and willing to let me in. No cabins though, the vintage is starting, so I was given a nice patch of grass for the tent. Bloody thing broke just after I put it up so I am sitting in a half fallen down tent writing this. Ah well - it is pretty cosy.

Took quite a few photos today:

Islands off Port Campbell

Typical highway - lots of places for the wildlife to hide

The Dash layout - GPS, Ipod and SPOT

Mt Gambier's Blue Lake - click for a nice panorama from the opposite side

Red is for bikes - blue is for lakes

Coonawarra road. Poplars and grapes

River Gum

It's a Post Office thing

The Murray River

Bridge over the Murray with a B-Double crossing

Through the Adelaide hills, the roads were great fun.

Around Oz Day 12 - 1 March 2010 - 375km

Overnighted at Adams in Elsternwick. They have a very comfy couch. I still can't get used to daylight saving. I wake at what feels very early to look at the watch and it is past 7am.
By the time I rushed about and re-packed the bike it was nearly eight and about 50km through heavy traffic to Jeffrey Honda. Stopped in at John Brak's to pick up the tyre monitor and presented the bike for service.

They also wired in the lower tail lights, the GPS, the tyre monitor and a 12v plug. It took half the day but the bill was surprisingly small. I can thoroughly recommend Jeffrey Honda. They do good deals, nothing is a problem and they are happy to assist. They went to a lot of trouble to help get it registered in Qld with my 60FLY plate, in cooperation with Pro Honda in Brisbane.
If we can't be rich, it is good to have nice friends.

Finally left there at around three and back to Braksy's to pick up the rest of my load, have a quick bite and realise I didn't have a remote locking device for the bike. Back to Jeffrey's and they hunted one up and had it keyed in to the bike - that's a frustrating job, done with a smile by the mechanic. (But I think he was getting exasperated with me coming up with stuff to do.)

Finally away by 4pm and I was off West at last. Through the Melbourne traffic again, taking the Burnley Tunnel and out along the freeways to Geelong. Took the new bypass and before long I was on the Great Ocean Road. I promised JohnG I would get lots of pictures of Aussie roads on this journey to show our overseas friends, but the camera ran out of battery just after I took a photo of one lonely GoldWing parked outside Jeffrey Honda.

I did manage a couple on the phone camera, but it has a special cable which I didn't bring, so those won't be available until after I catch up with Charleen in Perth.

The run along GOR was terrific. This is a major scenic tourist road and has lots of corners. But due to the general tourist traffic it is usually full of slow moving cars, caravans and campers and not conducive to quick motorcycle riding - though many try.
Today though, being the first of Autumn and a little chilly, there was hardly a tourist in sight and I was only slowed about four times by mobile road-blocks. There are quite a few signed slow-vehicle pull-ins and these helped.
Best time I've ever had on this road, although like I said, it was a little chilly. But with the heaters on full and foot-flaps open I at least had a warm-ish lower body.

Finally it started to get dark so I pulled in to Port Campbell and found a nice motel which has a heater. Just made it to the fish and chippery before closing.

Here's my only photo for today:

Pride of place.
Frans might notice they keep the blue one hidden inside.

Around Oz Days 09-10-11 26/7/8 Feb 2010 - ??km

I'm well sunburned, overfed, over-indulged altogether after three days at the Superbikes.

I won't bore you with all the details, but I sure had a great time. Caught up with several friends there from past Superbike trips, and from FarRiders. I also found that the little camera isn't very good at photographing fast-moving bikes, so there won't be much in the way of photos. I did do a panorama of the starting grid with all its colour so I'll try to post it.

Doing this up waiting in the showroom of Jeffrey Honda while they do a first-service on the new bike and transfer across some of the accessories. Hope to get going this afternoon out of Melbourne and heading west.

Stay tuned.

Click on the photo for a larger version, big download.

Around Oz Day 08 25 Feb 2010 - 589km

After a most convivial night at the Alpine Hotel, Bright, we were all - well, almost all - up and ready to go at 7am. We had to wake Andrew though.

Turns out all the others had decided to go a different way this year and it was exactly the way I had come yesterday. So they went off and I went the other way. There was a road I had heard of that had recently been bitumened, between Falls Creek and Omeo. Now was a good time to take a look.

Just outside Bright I took the short sharp set of twisties across to the Kiewa Valley Hwy then turned right towards Falls Creek. This is a lovely road. Lots of turns and fairly smooth surface. There was also very little traffic, I only had to safely overtake one truck and one mower tractor. Thirty kilometres of Motorcycling Heaven to get to Falls Creek.

Falls Creek is very quiet at this time of the year, so I kept going, past the lake and out on to the high plains. It feels like riding on top of the world. OK it isn't very high by world standards, but with nothing visible higher and lots of lower ranges in the distance - you get the idea.

Then I came to the new piece of road that takes you down to the Omeo-Talangatta Road. This was only recently finished and sadly, it wasn't done very well. So although it isn't a good riding road, it was a time to take it easy, ride the bumps and enjoy the scenery.
Being mostly downhill and fairly steep, I was reminded of the famous Banjo Paterson poem, I didn't have a stockwhip, but was going a bit quicker than a "torrent down it's bed". I certainly did a good job of bedding in the brakes on the bike. They were a bit smelly by the time I arrived "at the bottom of that terrible descent".

Then it was travel in to Omeo along 35 kilometres of very tight twisty road. Both the bike and I were getting a good workout. I'm planning to do a lot of long straight roads in the next few weeks, so I made the most of it.

Omeo bakery was a good place for morning tea and a bit of a break before tackling the Omeo-Bruthen section which is always a lot of fun. I teamed up with a couple on Ducatis. He was uncatchable, but I could just manage to keep her in sight, so whilst we were probably travelling a bit slow by Ducati standards, I enjoyed it.

After Bruthen, it was back in to civilization with lots of traffic and long sections for the few hundred kilometres to Phillip Island.
I arrived there an hour or so ahead of Andrew and Sheryl so got the chance to meet our hosts for the weekend, Laurie and Jan. Very nice people and this should be a good weekend of watching other people go fast on motorcycles.

Everyone's ready to go, But Where's the Boyds?

View of Kiewa Valley from Bright-Tawonga Road

Quiet reflections at a power station

Getting Artsy

Is it a fixed Wing?

All quiet for the summer

The beginnings of the new road, snaking across the high plains.

Lovely old Norton on the road to Phillip Island

All the bikes safely tucked away

Me, Laurie, Jan, Sheryl and Andrew tucking in to Mexican fare. Yep, that's my Mango Margarita

Around Oz Day 07 24 Feb 2010 - 400km

The New Beastie.

Picked up this morning from Jeffrey Honda. A gleaming new 09 GL1800 Goldwing.
Colour? Is there another? This one is a nice deep rich red. Just glows in the sun.

Left Adam's quite early, we both went our own ways on our bikes. I turned east and travelled in to the sun all the way to Jeffrey Honda at Ferntree Gully. They advertise with AWRA and did me a good deal on the about-to-be-superseded model. I'd heard they had to get rid of floor stock so I picked up the demo model (410km on odo) for another swag of dough less.

Very Happy.

After getting the rego and insurance sorted - keeping the 60-FLY plates - I headed off for Bright where I hope to meet up with Andrew and Sheryl from Casino so we can travel together to The island tomorrow.

Really nice ride - fine weather - new bike - good roads - Mark Knopfler on the Ipod. The kilometres slipped by. Naturally the bike is much tighter and easier to handle than the old one which had 127,000km on the clock. My first Brand new GoldWing.

Ahh - you're all going to get sick of me writing about the bike.

So here's some pictures of it:

The Old and the New

On the Road - nice dash.

Parked and washed for the afternoon

Pretty colour huh?

Around Oz Day 06 23 Feb 2010 - 69km

Not too much actual riding today. More of a social day around Melbourne. I caught up with JohnG and Kaz for breakfast, John and Margie Brak when I went to their place to do some work on the bike. Bought a new bike. Also caught up with Dean (Yankee In Oz) and we had a nice long lunch and a good talk. Then finished up at Adam's place for the night.

Tomorrow I head out again for Bright, Vic to get ready for the mountain ride over Hotham and on in to Phillip Island.

Didn't even take any photos. Guess I was just too busy socialising huh.

More tomorrow.

Around Oz Day 05 22 Feb 2010 - 653km

Storms through the night made me happy I decided to stay in a motel. Woke this morning and it was lightly overcast with rain showers around. Ah well, this is Victoria - or close enough.

Today I need to place the FarTH in some scenic out-of-the-way place and then head on in to Melbourne.
So I had heard of the Bonang Highway from Bombala, NSW to Orbost, Vic. Supposed to be pretty good. We'll see.

South through Nimmitabel and pulled up for some breakfast in Bombala (pie and coffee - it's all they had). Just after it is turn off and go through Delegate. Had a strange experience on this section. I was getting ready to go from Bombala and a bloke got in a Commodore in the other side of the road. I had to fiddle with a few bits and noticed he was just sitting in his car.
So I eventually moved off and he pulled out behind me.
I headed to Delegate whilst the main road turned off to the south, but the Commodore stayed behind me. I set my cruise at 107 and he stayed fairly close behind. I don't too much like being followed closely as I never know if the driver behind is on the ball or not. Some nice corners came up, so I flicked off the cruise and layed in to a few corners just for fun. Sure enough the car increased his speed to match. Grrr.
Pretty soon the town of Delegate came in sight and he pulled in to a side street and I continued on my own. Some car drivers are just annoying.

That behind, I continued on towards the border and encountered several small stretches of gravel. Not too bad as I could always see the other end. But then one stretch continued around the corner. it was wet and with some clay sections was a bit slippery for the GoldWing. back on bitumen I hoped this wasn't going to happen too often.
Then another stretch with a sign "Gravel Road Next 7 Kilometres". Oh well, I had come this far so I can deal with 7 kliks.

Gingerly, I rode on. This bike really does not like rough gravel roads. Skips all over the place and slips as soon as it gets into wet clay. Eventually got to the end of it at the Victoria border. Phew! Bitumen all the way now. These Vics know how to build roads!

Sure enough the road turned into a lot of tight twisties and I began to have fun. The surface was wet and lots of dropped tree bark strips made me a bit careful but it was fun nevertheless.

I came across a sign that showed 105km of winding road. An excellent place to leave the FarTH. So I stopped and set it up and took the required photos. Later today I'll post the coordinates and it is up to someone to come get it. I must remember to tell them to come from the Vic side and miss that 7km of dirt.

Off I went again, having a nice ride on the 105km. Went through the small town of Bonang, after which they named the highway.

Then something went wrong. "Gravel Road" the sign says. Did I take a wrong turn through the town? No. There weren't any turns. Oh well, can't be too much surely.

12 kilometres later I was wondering when this was all going to end. Surely not the whole 80+ kays in to Orbost. Someone has had a lend of me telling me this was a good road. I do not like dirt roads on a GoldWing!!!

But soon enough the hard black stuff returned and I had one of the best rides ever the last 80 kays in to town. Lots of twists and turns and hardly any traffic.

All too soon I got to Orbost, got some fuel and headed on the long couple of hundred kays of boring Princes Highway into Melbourne. Ah well, time to listen to a few podcasts. Nothing like settling in for a long ride hearing about how a photon of light has the characteristics of a wave as well as a particle.

Got in to Melbourne with a lot of windy weather and finished up at JohnG's place for the night.

Got places to go and people to meet tomorrow. Should be a nice day.

Today's piccies:

Got the FarTH on the dash and looking for a place to put it.

Looking back into NSW and its gravel road.

Vic roads will all be blacktop won't they?

Looks like a good spot. A few stickers on the sign already - all motorcyclist stuff.

There it stays until someone picks it up.

Thank goodness that's over!

Rest of the road was a bit like this only twistier. I didn't stop for pics on the really good bits.

This'll give an idea.

Around Oz Day 04 21 Feb 2010 - 851km

Alone at last. Don't get me wrong, I love riding with mates, specially other GoldWings and certainly the group this weekend. All seasoned and willing to ride.
I also love riding with Charleen - the best of all.

But today I set out on my own and that is another dimension altogether.

I didn't hear JohnG take off very early. I roused when the Queenslanders rode out - too late to run out to say goodbye (might have scared the horses too). But I sauntered out to farewell the remaining three. I downloaded a couple of podcasts then packed up and got under way myself.

Keeping off the highway, I retraced yesterday's steps back to Binnaway and continued on to Coolah. Nice cruisy riding. I slowly caught up to a lone Harley rider so sat behind for a while. He wasn't noisy so no problems there.
I was thinking it was nice. I didn't know this guy from Adam but saw him glance in the mirror and there we were, without words, sharing the experience of riding in the country - two kindred spirits.

Then we came to a couple of corners......

So, after leaving him well behind, I rode my own pace for a while.

Fuel in Coolah then head further south, turned west on to the Golden Highway through Dunedoo and almost to Dubbo, then cut through to Wellington. A short break for morning coffee then on to the Mitchell and Olympic highways.

I had two goals today. First was to visit the town of Stockinbingal, NSW. It isn't much of a town, actually designated a village, but it is semi important to me.
There's a song from years ago by an Aussie singer Lucky Star, called I've Been Everywhere Man. In my travels over the years I have visited all of the towns/ locations in the song. Except two. Now there is only one. It is actually only a couple of hundred kliks west of Stockinbingal, but I'm not sure if I should go there.
Maybe another time.

Then it was head east for another goal. In FarRiders, we play several riding games, the latest being a Treasure Hunt or FarTH. A small sticker is placed in an out-of-sight spot, generally at a scenic place and the coordinates logged and posted on the website. Then it is see who gets there first on their travels. Find it and take it to another spot. Repeat.
So the latest spot was at Mt Ainslie, overlooking Canberra. I found it easily enough from the posted clue and it now sits on my dash awaiting another scenic spot tomorrow.

That all done, I went further South to Cooma and tomorrow I might head into the Big Smoke. But nothing is certain.

Just a couple of photos - I should do more:

Parked up in Stockinbingal.

Hiding place for the FarTH

At the Lookout

Canberra from Mt Ainslie

Around Oz Day 03 20 Feb 2010 - 203km

Today was a day for looking around the area. Started with a breakfast at a local cafe, with seven red GoldWings and one blue one parking up in the main street.
All fed, we set off to take a look around the district. Of course, first stop was Siding Springs Observatory. Can't do much observing during the day, but we had a look at the huge telescope, (through the glass of course) and saw the great view of the Warrumbungles from up there.

Then it was down through Warrumbungle Nat Park, including the visitors centre, then travel back down the other side of the range and out across to Tooraweenah. We were a bit early for a pub lunch so we had cool drinks (publican could not operate the coffee machine and "the Boss" was out) and then carried on another 80 km to Binnaway for a pub lunch.

All the countryside we travelled through was green and lush. Long grass in all the paddocks but little stock to feed on it. Some of the graziers probably have been hit too hard by several drought years to re-stock just yet. Australia can be cruel.

After lunch it was back to Coonabarabran and a refreshing dip in the pool, before heading out to tea at a local pub. They serve BIG meals in Coonabarabran.

Tomorrow, most of the crew are departing early to travel the long roads to home. Not exactly sure what I'm doing just yet. Got a few days to spare before meeting up with Andrew and Sheryl in Bright, Vic for our annual run to Phillip Island.

Here's a few pictures.

Parked in Coonabarabran's Main Street. It is on a major highway so lots of trucks thunder through.

Wing at Siding Spring

We walk up to the Observatory

The huge 3.9 metre Anglo-Australian Telescope.

JohnG admires the surrounding view of the Warrumbungle Range

Annette attempts a group shot with the mountains behind. All mirrored.

The lush countryside near Tooraweenah

We surround the Binnaway Pub

And in the Imperial Hotel, Coonabarabran, I get served the largest steak I've ever had.
I didn't get through it.

Around Oz Day 02 19 Feb 2010 - 635km

Well it certainly was an early start and nice and cool. Stanthorpe is always a very cold part of Queensland and this morning was no exception. But it was only down to 14C so quite bearable.
Away at 5:00am on the dot. Winston and Jan did turn up around 11:30 the previous night so didn't get much sleep.
First stop was at Stanthorpe fuel and Maccas to top up tanks and have a cuppa before heading in to the wilds.

We turned off the New England Hwy at Stanthorpe and went down through some of my favourite back roads. Through Pikedale and past Glenlyon Dam and join the Bruxner Hwy at Mingoola. We followed this for 50km or so then turned south again and went through Coolatai and stopped for fuel again at Warialda. It was a great ride as we were able to ride to the road rather than the speed limit. Not a well patrolled area - or so we thought.
We saw quite a few kangaroos on the roadside but a quick blast of the horns sent them on their way.

After Warialda I slowed down a bit on the road to Bingara. This road is a bit rough in parts, but still bitumen and very little traffic. A far cry from the major highways. We did see a Highway Patrol and he had me dead to rights at 114kph but didn't bother us. Apparently after bigger fish.

Come 10am and we had been going for five hours, we stopped at a cafe at Barraba for a nice coffee and carrot cake. Others had scones, jam and cream. All made by a couple of nice ladies and quite yummy.
All refreshed we continued on at an easy pace as we had plenty of time.

Getting close to Gunnadah, I reckoned we had just over 100km to go and I had at least 200km left in the tank, but was a bit worried about Larry on the GL1500. The earlier "spirited" riding had taken its toll. But he decided to push on as I am carrying a spare 5 litres. We made it in to Coonabarabran and he put 23.39 litres in his 24 litre tank. Running on fumes.

The motel was just across the road from the servo so we checked in and found we were ahead of our Victorian mates who were coming from the opposite direction.
So we cleaned up the bikes and went in to town for some supplies to keep us going for the afternoon.

After a while three more GoldWings turned up. To our surprise they were all red. Same as us. So we had seven red GoldWings in the carpark - albeit in several different shades of the colour. Lovely.
Later in the day, the motel staff came out with all the makings for a BBQ and we fired it up and cooked our meal and had a great get together.
it is always great to get a group of GoldWing owners together. It is true what they say, "You meet the nicest people on a Honda."

Here's a few pictures:

5.00am - ready to go

Breakfast At Maccas

A bit of roadwork to keep us on our toes

Another coffee stop at Barraba

The countryside is green and lush for the moment

I'm being followed...

Look at all the Red!!

Tucking in to our BBQ dinner.

Around Oz Day 01 18 Feb 2010 - 279 Klm

Not too far today. Had to mow the lawn before leaving - it has been too wet up until now.

Leaving about 11am, I went the usual way through Esk up to Crows Nest to visit Mum and Dad in the nursing home. Mum is doing fine considering her circumstances. She reads books and letters from Nadeen in Kununurra. We tried the alphabet point-and-spell but it still doesn't get through. Dad is doing it a bit tougher - not really happy there but doesn't really try to get along.

I spent a couple of hours with them then, said goodbyes and back on the bike. It wasn't too far to Toowoomba and all its traffic then a fairly straight through run to Warwick and the Jackie Howe motel. Here I met up with Larry and Annette and we had a nice afternoon chinwagging. Later Eric and Deb showed up and we all went out for tea at a local pub. Very nice it was too.
Winston and Jan were supposed to turn up very late but i didn't hear them.

Up at 4am today for a long ride to Coonabarabran. Lets see how it goes.

Larry backs the Wing in undercover for the night.

Eric arrives at Warwick