Not The ADV Fest Ride

With adventure bike riding taking off here in Australia - as it probably rightly should because we have unlimited bits of dirt to ride an appropriately shod motorcycle on - there have been a couple of organised events over the last few years. The "Dirty Weekend" at Tingha last year was one that had run for a couple of years but I hear nothing about it this year as I think this event at Dorrigo may be organised by the same (or similar) folks.

ADVenture Fest  is getting all the attention this year with the culmination being this weekend on a property at Dorrigo. They have organised adv loops in some of the best riding area in the country (if you like rainforest on a big bike 🫤 😆 no seriously, it’s magic country), they have enduro legend Ben Grabham doing training sessions and even glamping tents so that you could ride your bike to the event carrying just a toothbrush and a change of undies! 

Of course I am working this weekend 😞. 

I would have liked to have looked at other rider’s set ups and how they load their bikes but mostly I would have loved to do the training sessions with Grabbo. Learning the right way from a master can’t be beat! 

Like many other events, I had days off either side of it so I decided on a quick, few days, lightly loaded dash along the roads around north eastern NSW in the days leading up to Adv Fest. I wanted to see how the bike handled without all of my camping gear so I was packed with just the minimum clothing for cold overnights in a pub.

 I was also trying out my new ADV Worx crash bar bags for all my tools and tyre fixing gear. This is all in the name of trying to get the load down lower and more forward ala Mr Rieman’s advice. (I reckon he probably knows his shit) Plus, having the tools in the crash bar bags would negate me having to mess around with them when fishing for my gear like I normally have to do with the full camping setup.

Day 1

 I decided to high tail it out of town via the Logan Motorway and Mt Lindsay highway to Boonah for lunch at the motorcycle friendly Flavours Cafe’. It was lunch because I had left home quite late again - I am finding it hard to get up early these days after long, late days at work.

Flavours is normally an efficient place to eat but today it took 45 minutes for a toasted sandwich to come out despite there only being a handful of customers in the place. I decided to ask about the sanger after about 35 minutes in case they forgot (which they clearly had 🙄 but they bullshitted that they were busy) because it came out shortly after.

Anyway, belly full and photos of some Army quads, I tootled off down Carney’s Creek road toward White Swamp road and Old Koreelah.

 This is a very scenic dirt ride that crosses into NSW at a little cattle grid in the middle of nowhere.

Once I adjusted to the feel of riding a big bike on dirt I began to notice how good the front tyre felt. 

I was a bit nervous of putting something called a “Goldentyre” on the front but I must admit, it was feeling very confidence inspiring!

From Old Koreelah (just an area really, not a town) I turned back around the Taloom road which Steve and I rode in early 2019. At the time it was sooo rough and it kicked our arse big time. Today though, it had been resurfaced and was nice and smooth. Until I turned a corner on a hill and then BANG, I was in rainforest. It was like a switch had been flipped! The road was a bit rough with very tight, loose corners here so it was slow going but no issue at all on a Desert X.

I then turned down Paddy’s Flat road. I have done this road a couple of times now but this time I hooked along as the front tyre grip was so inspiring, even on the loose downhill corners. 

I took a short stop at the Clarence river crossing for a pee and to look at the tank trap blocks that were built for the Brisbane line that apparently didn’t exist.

Paddy’s Flat road has been sealed for quite a bit further on the southern side of the river so I was soon back on the tar. 

I was originally going to turn onto Rocky River road just prior to Drake and make my way to Tenterfield that way but as it was now around 4pm I decided to just stick to the highway....

…..but not before a stop at the Lunatic Hotel in Drake.

 There were several patrons who had clearly been in attendance for some time. I grabbed a Toohey’s Old and sat outside admiring the scenery.

The ride up the range from here is an absolute cracker - I always forget how good it really is.

 I gradually pushed the speed more and more.

 For a knobby tyre the GT823 works really well on the blacktop. It doesn’t feel great if there is a big bump mid corner or if I needed to change direction while hard on the brakes or power but overall, for a knobby tyre it is more than acceptable on paved surfaces.

Rolling into the outskirts of Tenterfield I took a right and headed out the Mt Lindsay highway just a couple of kilometres. 

At the going down of the sun, we will remember them….

I made a couple of calls to find accomodation but the Tavern and bowling club motel were booked out. I managed to find a room, so stayed in the Settlers Motel and must say, it was a nice clean, modern room. I’d be more than happy to stay again.

After a shower I wandered into town to find something to eat. I ended up at the Commercial Hotel which was quite unexpectedly upmarket actually. I settled on the beef cheek with garlic mash and broccolini, all washed down with a nice house Shiraz.

I don’t normally go for desert but I thought I’d treat myself tonight. The deconstructed affogato was the winner. I normally wouldn’t go coffee this late at night but I thought “what the hell”!

(It was pretty good too….)

A wander around the main street to walk off dinner was a nice end to the day. 

Angry Bull trails office.

Day 2

I set an alarm for 0730 as I wanted to get up for a walk around town. 

Why? Well, more on that another day but It was a nice cool morning which is why I love coming up here onto the range. 2800 ft of elevation does that.

Breakfast of muesli bars and yoghurt was taken care of by a visit to Coles last night so I loaded up and set off around 9am. I had decided on a mostly dirt loop down off the range, along its base southward, then climb it again into Glen Innes. Yes, I could just ride 1 hour south to Glen Innes but where is the fun in that when you can spend all day on the bike ? 😏

Starting down Billyrimba road it soon became familiar as I had ridden this with Hodgo on the way back from the Dirty Weekend last year. The road here is a crushed granite surface which is super slippery when dry like today but is awesomely grippy if wet or damp. Considering I was running road pressures in my tyres 36/40 I was very pleased (again) with the grip of the front tyre and quickly dispatched several 4wd vehicles along here.

I stopped at Demon Creek for morning tea. 

After my last couple of Japan trips I finally get these little cans of coffee.

 Their native location is in a vending machine along a street or road in Japan. While a public vending machine in Australia wouldn’t last as long as a snowflake in summer, we can buy these little beauties in the supermarket.(At 4x the price they are in Tokyo🫤)

From here I carefully wound my way around Rocky River road. Last time I did this ride I found it loose and skatey on the crushed granite but as I said above, the tyres made all the difference today. 

Still, it is slow going with hundreds of ultra tight bends and switchbacks as the road follows the river.

 I didn’t stop to take many photos as I wanted to stay in front of the 4wds that I had passed. These GoPro shots do it justice though.  Stay well left kids! Too many adv heroes out there think they are on a closed course or in a race....

There is some nice open stuff as you get further east.  It's still pretty loose though. 

Hitting the Bruxner Highway I turned right for the short blast along to Plains Station road  where I would turn south. 

I stopped here for ten minutes to have a drink and look around the countryside, enjoying the cool breeze. It was hot work along Rocky River Rd.

Plains Station Rd drops down to the level of the Clarence river and provides some spectacular glimpses through the trees down to the river valley (but nowhere safe to stop for a photo). The road eventually crosses the river, where there were quite a few campsites set up along a sandy, beach like stretch. 

The road climbed steeply out of the crossing then switched back to look across the camping area and crossing. Very pretty!

I turned right onto Clarence Way and I was expecting plenty of dirt as reported by Steve back in this ride report of his.

 What I found was kilometres of wide, smooth, fast tarmac! It was interspersed with a couple of small sections of gravel but would be totally do-able on a sports bike.

At the intersection in the tiny hamlet of Baryugil I stopped next to three guys on KTM adv bikes. We had a quick chat and they said they were on the way to ADV Fest from Maryborough. They were just waiting for their support car to catch up, then they were off.  A short time later I saw one of them sitting at the Carnham road turn off. He was acting as cornerman for the support vehicle. We chatted again and it looked like they were planning the same back road route as myself to around Jackadgery. This made me feel a bit better knowing that some adv friendly people were in front and behind me as I wasn’t sure whether the river crossings were bridges or simply fords….and these were some big, wide rivers.

There was a lot of smoke around the district and I soon found out why. The farmer had been burning pasture which made for some interesting patterns on the hillsides. 

I couldn’t stop for too long as the Maryborough bloke’s support car keep appearing like something out of a TopGear special.

Thankfully, the river crossings were all low level bridges. There was evidence that the Clarence river had been over the bridge recently.

 It was still flowing very strongly which is unusual for most inland Aussie rivers.

There were plenty of campers here and with good reason. It is such an idyllic spot (use your imagination because I forgot to get photos🙄)

The next bit of the ride was up hill, down dale and twisting and turning.

 There were great views across the counutryside as I crested a hill, then the road would dive down with great sight lines so the DX could be pinned for a few seconds before climbing up to the next hillside corner.

The Mann river crossing was another long, low level bridge. The water was running hard here too.

Fish traps.

Crossing the Mann I was surprised to be met with a road that looked very much like dry river bed! It consisted of pebbles of all sizes (read river stones) that were deep and loose. Think sand riding. Yep, I was puckering but remembered to get my weight back and stay on the gas. The DX plowed its way along the few hundred metres of dry river bed before climbing up the bank, back onto the familiar gravel road.

It wasn’t very long before I came to the Gwydir Highway but not before I stopped to check out another active pasture burn off.

It wasn’t late but it wasn’t early afternoon either so I decided to climb the range and head toward Glen Innes.

 The road up here is cracking fun but it did look damp in the shadows and with an unproven knobby tyre on the front I took it pretty sensibly.

I decided to stop at Raspberry Lookout as I had always just motored past on (many) previous rides. I am so glad I did stop because the views over the Great Dividing Range were awesome!

I chilled out for quite a while, sipping some water and taking in the views.

When a couple of grey nomads towing their self contained effluent tanks….er caravans turned up, I decided to turn out. After all,  I’d had my fun. Time to let someone else soak in the view.

It was getting late in the afternoon and this road is ususally lined with marsupials of every variety, just waiting to take your front wheel out from under you so I took it carefully. I saw little black wallabies by the side of the road that just watched me motor by. I saw big eastern greys, toes up in the air, dead as doornails but none were jumping out at me……until I was only one or two kilometres from town and had let my guard down. Then a huge eastern grey bounded out in front of me. I hit the anchors and was interested to see him change direction to go along the road so that I was now mowing him down from behind. Much better than being sideswiped I guess? In the end I managed to wash off enough speed and he decided to step left and continue with his unnecessary crossing of the road (I mean, there were 1 000 000 acres of land he could have skipped into on the side of the road he was on 🙄) so that the crisis was averted. 

FFS.🤦‍♂️ 

Rocking into Glen Innes I fueled up the bike then rode the fifty metres to the Great Central Hotel where I secured a room for the night and celebrated with a stiff glass of Deepwater Brewing Deliverance Imperial Stout! Just a middy mind, as this stuff is near 10% rocket fuel.

I parked the bike in the shed out the back where two other ADV bikes were already in residence, unloaded, found my room, found a shower then hit the bar for one of the biggest chicken parmys I’ve seen. Good value, this place. 😉

I did have a quick yarn to the two KTM boys before I turned in. They were both from SE QLD and headed for home tomorrow, like me as they had to work the weekend too.

It had been a solid day in the saddle today. Dirt roads require a high level of concentration. Much like road riding at warp speeds used to - until that became very unfashionable twenty years ago.

Damn, that Stout is good!

Day 3

Today began with breakfast next door at the appropriately named “The Local”. The food and coffee are great here and the location couldn’t be better, right next to the pub!

I rolled out of town heading north on the New England highway to make some miles but turned off at Deepwater to ride the Torrington road to Stannum. While it is sealed all the way to Stannum, there was one very interesting ninety degree corner on the edge of Stannum that was covered in about 50mm of fine blue metal for the entire width of the road!

 A better motorcycle trap you could not make!

🫣🤨🫤😡 

I stood the bike up and thankfully because I wasn’t going very quick and had great tyres (for gravel) was able to make the corner in one piece. I was awake now!

Stannum is a one horse locality so I was through it in twenty seconds and onto very skatey crushed granite surface road. It took me a minute to find my “loose bike” bearings but then I had fun. I have done this road the last few times I have come this way so am getting to know it. 

That doesn’t mean I go fast - it demands respect or you will be down in a flash - but the scenery is ever changing and the ride challenging for a gravel road.

 I filled up in Tenterfield then decided to just head for home via the Mt Lindsay highway to Old Koreelah, White Swamp and Carneys creek roads through Boonah and home as I wanted to beat Friday afternoon traffic.

Cobb & Co museum, Liston.

 I hate traffic so much these days that I tend to tailor all of my riding around missing it. The joys of living in the big smoke.

My welcoming committee/lawn mowing service was home to greet me. At least she didn’t cut across in front of me in some suicidal endeavour. Nope, just pooping weed seeds into my lawn was enough for her today….

That was just over 1000 kilometres for the three days (2 full days away really). The tyres performed flawlessly.

Travelling light with my tools in the crash bar bags made for a sweeter handling bike on the dirt.

 I might not have made it to ADV Fest but hell,  I don't like crowds much anyway....🤨

 Now, with the DX all squared away, I pumped up the mtb tyres and headed out for a some singletrack goodness. Most of our local trails have been given a facelift by council in the last few months so that they are like new again - some better than new actually! And none of it needing us volunteers to bust a gut.  All that hard work ten or so years ago is paying dividends now. 

Living the dream!

 😉

Cheers.