It was a balmy six degrees when I
arrived at Nicholls for the start of our adventure. The skies were clearing to what would be a
beautiful day. I even contemplated
stripping down to a T-shirt and opening the vents on my jacket, but Kipper gave
one of those looks that said “Are you bonkers?”
We wandered over to say hello to a growing crowd. It was a big turnout for Adelong. What a great day we had ahead of us. There was quiet murmur as we approached. Eyes flickered downward, feet shuffled, and
people seemed to move quietly away from the chosen ride leader. Ian Paterson, aka ‘The Tall One’, aka ‘Jimmy’,
stealthily moved towards us, ostensibly to say g’day. I was too slow to duck and too old to
weave. Quick as a flash, I was elected
to the holy position of ‘Scribe-for-the-day’.
Suddenly, I knew why everyone else had avoided TTO, aka ‘Jimmy’.
TTO proceeded to announce to all that as
it was well-past the appointed departure time, we should get a wriggle on. He asked for a tail-end-Charlie and ended up
with a tail-end-Kipper. The group were
being particularly unhelpful today. Many
continued to chat amongst themselves as TTO gave his ride instructions to those
within beating distance. Some pretended
to be listening intently but were clearly picking next week’s Lotto
numbers. The rest of us ignored his
ramblings and prepared for departure, now some 15 fashionable minutes
late. I heard someone ask “Where are we
going again?” and thought I saw a tear of resignation start to form in the
corners of TTO’s eyes. Such is the pain
of leadership. We departed Nicholls in
an orderly fashion, some 18 bikes and a couple of pillions eagerly heading
towards Yass. The intrepid travellers in
no particular order were as follows:
 |
| Ian being studiously ignored |
Ian Patterson (Ride Leader aka ‘The Tall
One’ aka ‘Jimmy’) on a Honda GL 1800
Darryl Cullen on a Suzuki 1250s Bandit
Alan and Lyn Munday on a Yamaha FJR 1300
Robert McNeilly on a Honda VFR 800
Peter Arday on a Honda ST 1300
Ewan Ward on a Honda ST 1100
Andrea Lanagan on a Suzuki Boulevard and
winner of the ‘Crash-bar-left-in-a-tree’ award
Garry McCurley and Natalie TeBay on a
Honda VFR 1200
Gary Thomas on a Suzuki DL 650
Chas and Jen Towie on a Honda ST 1300
and NOT winners of the ‘Most-reliable-bike-of-the-day’ award
Janet Mulgrue on a Suzuki AN 650
Kerry Mulgrue on a Honda ST 1300
Mark Mitchell on a Honda VFR 800
Mike Kelly on a BMW R 1200 RT
Chris Dietzel on a Kawasaki GTR 1400
Andrew Campbell on a Kawasaki ZX 14 R
Marilyn Starick on a BMW 800
Mick Beltrame and Kipper on a Victory
Cross Country (Scribe and Tail-end-Kipper)
 |
| Harden lineup |
I was thrilled to have taken Kipper’s
advice to stay warmly dressed as the temperature went from the balmy six
degrees to a chilly four degrees as we approached Yass. The usual fog accompanied the usual low
temperatures either side of the township.
Why did they choose a fog-filled cold hole to build that town? It’s one of those things in life one must
ponder occasionally. We pondered for
about 20 minutes as we slowly cold-soaked our respective body-cores, and then
broke into clearing skies and warming temperatures. It was almost into double figures by the time
we reached Harden, but I doubt anyone looked as they scrambled for hot tea, hot
coffees, hot food, hot anything! I had
the urge to warm my hands in hot liquid while Kipper peed on the grass. No ………… not that liquid. I wanted a coffee, so I wandered on to a
quieter café and ordered a hot long black.
Our morning tea was another leisurely
affair, much like the leisurely start. By the time we brushed the food from our
chests, mopped up the spilled drinks from our chins and suited up, it was
another 30 minutes gone from the ‘overtime’ clock and I knew this was going to
be a long day. Lunch was looking like it
would be a 1 pm affair, if we were lucky.
Hold that thought. Sometimes,
your luck runs low on helpfulness. The
run from Harden to Tumut is a mix of sweeping ups and downs, some sharp bends,
some rough patches, some blindly crested roads and some narrow strips of
tarmac. In the mix are a lot of turns
and poorly marked route options, so TTO (‘The Tall One’ aka ‘Jimmy’ if you’ve
forgotten already) had asked for corner markers all the way from Harden to
Adelong.
Corner marking is an art. Kipper is an expert at marking corners and
proves it every evening when we go walking, so I eagerly awaited his stamp of
approval on what I believed was an excellent job of corner marking by the
corner markers. They parked in sensible
places, clear of traffic. They were
visible and near the corner. They waved
to make sure they were seen. They didn’t
move off until they were sure that ‘Tail-end-Kipper’ was in sight and ready to
turn. I’d have thought a 10/10 was the
very least they deserved. Alas, Kipper
was only mildly impressed. He gave them
a good (but not excellent) 8.5/10. Marks
were deducted because they failed to mark the corners by actually leaving their
mark! Kipper said he didn’t see one damp
patch on any corner. I tried to explain
that people don’t mark corners that way, but he wouldn’t have a bar of it. C’est la vie.
And speaking of bars ………………………..
There are times when rides just don’t go
to plan and the unplanned happens. I
shall try and save any further embarrassment for our intrepid riding colleague,
but there are salutary lessons to be learned here. We had a very lucky escape for Miss Andrea on
one of the tricky diminishing radius and steeply crested narrow corners on the
Brungle Road about a dozen or more kilometres from Tumut. I was too far back as Tail-end-Kipper too see
the event take place, but I was waved down as I approached the left-hander
where a few of the group were salvaging the bike from the high-side of a dirt
embankment and long grass over on the right side of the road. The rider was thankfully upright and seemed
ok. It was a low-side slide into a
soft-banked and treeless table-drain.
There was no on-coming traffic.
The gear being worn did what it was supposed to do, although it’s a bit
‘used’ now. The bike was parked at a
farmer’s house as it wasn’t rideable.
Andrea was relatively unhurt and rode pillion into Tumut. It wasn’t my place to ask ‘why’ or ‘how’ and
I won’t do any guessing in this ride report.
It could have been far worse, and wasn’t
The front few of the group had missed
the event and ridden on without knowing that most of us were parked. A lot of time was spent trying to get the
damaged bike straight enough to ride, but it wasn’t possible. It had to be left behind in a farmer’s
yard. A broken section of the bike’s
crash bars was left hanging in a tree. A
reminder perhaps? A blight on the
environment? Adelong was looking
unachievable. Most of the group headed
off to Tumut to find fuel and reassess the day’s lunch plan. Some of us decided we liked the spot so much
that we would sit around in the sunshine a little longer. The usually reliable (so I’m told but don’t
believe) Chas and Jen Honda decided that it had had enough. Maybe it got scared? Maybe it didn’t like not going to
Adelong? Maybe Chas and Jen had been
cruel to it. The roads had been pretty
rough in places. Either way, it decided
not to start. No amount of bump-starting
was going to change its mind! Bugger.
 |
| Chas steed fails to proceed, Alan M attenpts a laying on of hands |
Chas rolled the bike down the hill to a
safer driveway and we had a play.
Nope. No good. Call the NRMA. We killed another half hour or so fiddling
with some inadequate jumper leads I carried and getting a jump-start from the
VFR. We also avoided the biting
green-ants on the ground. Kipper had a sleep. He’s a useless helper when it gets mechanical. The NRMA arrived in good time. The bike started easily with a heavy-duty jumper
pack carried by the NRMA chap, so we headed to Tumut for fuel, food and a trip
direct to home. Unfortunately, the bike
died while idling at the service station and would not restart again, so we
were back to square one, except that the square had moved a dozen kilometres
from Brungle into Tumut. So much for
Honda reliability. We let the others
having lunch in the main drag know the story while we got the NRMA called out again. Marilyn arrived and was carrying a portable
jumper pack that worked great and enabled the Honda to start. The NRMA chap turned up too late, but it was
decided that there was a fair chance that if the revs were kept up on the bike it
would enable it to get home
Did the Honda get home? I hope so.
I left with Kipper as he had had enough of not seeing Adelong and was getting
weary from all the stops. Chas and Jen
had a goodly number of escorts for the run back to Canberra, so we left in
advance of the bulk of the group. Our
time as tail-end-Kipper was over. I
didn’t see Andrea in Tumut, but hoped she was ok and not feeling too bad about
trashing the bike or feeling too sore in the shoulder where her gear was
heavily damaged. For her, it was a lucky
escape. This was not the ride we set out
to do today. We had to abandon our
adventure to Adelong after a series of unfortunate adventures on the way. What wasn’t abandoned was the willingness of
people to help, the general camaraderie of the group and the many offers of advice,
support and assistance. Even those who bore the brunt of the adventures seem to
have held their good sense of humour, at least on the outside. The temperature was falling rapidly as I hit
the ACT border and it dropped into single digits as I turned into my
street. What a day. What an adventure.
Mick B
