Not A Mid Life Crisis, Just An Extended Tour (Part XX) - The Sydney Contingent Arrive

DAY 26

We tucked into the complimentary hotel breakfast with slightly heavy hearts. Today was the group’s last day in Tassie as we would board the Spirit of Tasmania and be spirited back to the mainland and thus, reality. Mt Owen put on a spectacular farewell for us.

We would head north out of Q’town, taking the Lake Plimsol road to Tullah. This is a far better road in all respects to the main highway and pleasingly, it was very quiet this morning.

As we had all day to get to the boat and not very far to go it was a leisurely pace. In fact, so leisurely that cars were banking up behind us. unheard of!

We turned off the Murchison Highway onto the C132 (Belvoir road) across to Cradle  mountain. Here we met some traffic going even slower than we were. A Toyota Prado was doing 60km/h in the middle of nowhere. Strange but quickly dispatched. Pulling up shortly after at the Cradle Mountain lookout, old mate in the Prado pulled up behind us. Out hopped the most excitable Chinese guy I have ever met! He was gushing over our bikes and we eventually deducted that he had a bike back in China and we were “brothers”. It was sort of funny but he was so genuine that it was actually pretty cool. Yeah, bikes do that for people, the love of the “ride” breaks any and all barriers, no matter your creed or colour.😎

He and his partner followed us up to the lookout, 200 metres away, gabbling all the way. They kindly offered to get the only photo of all of us that we got for the whole trip. I reckon it is a cracker. 😉

Leaving the lookout I suggested to Steve he go ahead and get a shot of each rider coming down off the hill. He got some nice photos and I waited for him to pack up before we headed on to the cafe’ at Moina.

Huge scones were washed down with non traditional coffee before we continued on east. Plenty more corners were enjoyed before Steve and I ducked off a side road for a photo of Mt Roland.

Just down the road we turned off at the Paradise intersection but couldn’t find the actual town/village/locality. I guess the view alone indicated we found it.

Sheffield is one of the “must do” towns in Tassie and I was proud to have not been here once in the two months my bike had been in Tassie! Today we made a flying visit as some of the guys needed to inhale a scallop pie or two. Seafood and pastry? Yuk! Not for me, a standard curry beef pie was inhaled, despite not technically needing to eat - something to do with Chiller’s Saving Tassie One Bakery At A Time philosophy. 😜

From here the riding became “filler”. We headed for Beaconsfield - the town where two miners were trapped underground for six days, then incredibly, rescued. I was also going to meet my workmate, Andy, whom I had shared a storage shed with in Launceston as he was bringing his Africa Twin home on the boat tonight too.

After meeting up the lads wanted to go out to Georgetown for a look. As I had done that a few weeks prior and found it dead fcuking boring, Andy and I went for a look up at the top of the Tamar on the western side. We took a look at the Badger Beach lookout.

We eventually rocked into Devonport via some awesome back roads. I needed to wash my bike because - well, O.C.D. - and Steve and Andy joined me. Clean bikes underneath, we rode over to the Argosy Hotel for dinner with the other guys. Located very close to the embarkation point we were able to relax, even when the boat arrived late, rather than standing around the staging car park for 3+ hours.

And boarding was late. Once aboard we dumped our gear and headed down to the bar for a couple of quick drinks. As this was Andy’s only night “on tour” he was going hard. The rest of us were pretty busted but I managed to keep him company…until 2am. 😯

Steve’s words and photos here.

Day 27

All too soon we were roused to arms, ready to disembark. Unfortunately (or more accurately, yet again) it was raining in Melbourne for our arrival. 9 times out of 10 when I ride through or near Melbourne it is cold and wet.

We farewelled the Sydney crew on the vehicle deck, before following them off the boat. Our route was the same initially before Andy and I peeled off for Ballarat and hence, Adelaide while the others were hunting for the Hume Highway to Sydney. It was miserable and cold with drizzling rain and fog as we climbed out of Melbourne. The shiny tar was NOT pleasant at all in the wet with Andy scaring himself with wheel spin at 110km/h climbing a rise. He is relatively new to road riding and has no wet weather riding experience. It highlighted to me how much concentration is required to ride a motorcycle long distances in the wet. We pulled over at a road house at Ballan. This was about as bleak as it got and we hungrily downed a greasy spoon bacon and egg roll with a truck stop coffee to follow up. Rain liners were fitted, somewhat belatedly.😕

Victoria is a notoriously strict state with regard to speed enforcement. 3km/h over the speed limit will see you issued with an extra, unwanted taxation notification, even on a dual lane, dead straight, empty highway. This demands much attention being directed toward the speedo rather than the road/traffic/conditions etc. Frustrating is one way to describe it. As a result I fcuking hate Victoria (well, everywhere but the ranges in the far east of the state).

We stopped again in Horsham for fuel and to work some kinks out.

2020 on the left, 2018 on the right.

Andy had wanted to do the Great Ocean Road on the way to Adelaide but I had managed to convince him it would be rubbish in the wet, on a Sunday. (which his wheel spin incident reinforced) Added to this was the fact that my rear tyre was very, very short of rubber. The 720ish straight kilometres across to Adelaide would see it out. Unfortunately, coming this way resulted in the Twins being reclassified as a…..

Boy, is it FLAT out here!

Crossing into South Australia we took a short break for a beer at the first pub we saw in Bordertown. This is Andy’s home town and we took a short diversion down some dirt roads to take a quick look at his family farm. No photos as we literally rode in, rode around then rode out.

From here to Adelaide was only 270 kilometres but with the reluctance to exceed the pedestrian 100km/h limit it felt like it took FOREVER. We stopped at Tailem Bend for fuel and I checked my rear Michelin tyre. It was mighty thin, with the knobs all but gone and evidence that I was running on the carcass in the centre of the tyre! I wasn’t very happy with this tyre as an 80/20 (it IS marketed as a 50/50 to give it some credit) but it did get to about 6000 kilometres on a 240 kilogram motorcycle before looking like this.

We eventually rolled into Adelaide at about 5pm. That was a very looong day on the bike for just 720 kilometres. We were very glad to be off the bikes.

Dinner at a local pub in Norwood, washed down with a few glasses of red was a very fitting end to the day.

The next morning I headed in to GC Motorcycles on Main North road to look for a new set of tyres. Local members of the Netrider forum had recommended the place and I wasn’t disappointed in the selection of tyres on hand! Despite the limited longevity of the rear, I went with a new set of Bridgestone AX41 Adventurecross tyres. 

While the rear doesn’t last that long (6000km in my experience) I decided that as I would have the bike in Adelaide for some time and it was coming into late Autumn/early Winter I wanted good grip while riding in the damp, shady hills roads. They also feel more like a road tyre but also work so well on the dirt.

New AX41 rear

Holding the new AX41 front near the old one I was amazed at how scalloped out the knobs were on the old tyre. I didn’t get a photo unfortunately, but the old tyre HAD done nearly 12 000 kilometres and at about 10 500 kilomtres was still fine on the dirt of the Western Explorer two days ago.

A quick ride up to Uraidla in the Adelaide Hills for a coffee served to scrub them in.

With this done, it was time for me to fly home. I put the bike into another storage shed, ready for my next bunch of days off.

I won’t count today as a “ride day” as it was just a day of “sorting shit out”.

720 boring kilometres…..🙄

To be continued…..in South Australia now…🥳🥳