Adelaide hills ride

This was to be a ride report for the Southern districts, a ride around the southern forests around Adelaide.

Amtra SA is one of the few clubs that manages to get permission to go into these forests and because of the great scenery its a popular ride.

However, it is getting harder and harder to get permission, and Mark tirelessly works to organise the ride every year in close cooperation with the forest Rangers.

Unfortunately, this year the recent (great) rain we've had meant that the Rangers called off the ride the day before, as the tracks within the forest would be very soft and slippery.

While that sounds like perfect dirtbike conditions, it is also the conditions in which dirtbikes do the most damage, so was a fair call.

So when Mark called and let me know that the ride was cancelled, I was hoping that he had a fallback plan, and there was, an Adelaide hills ride!

I woke up Sunday and got ready then headed down to Echunga in the mighty Subaru Brumby ute, with the TE510 in the back. I made a custom wooden carry rack, which worked a treat. My loading ramp however needs work.

We all gathered in the oval carpark, and it was very cold and frosty. There were 23 riders in all, with all sorts of bikes, from DRZ400's to Blinged up KTM530's, 300cc 2 Bangers to 620cc bikes with over 30,000 kms on them!

There was a bit of chatter as we got organised, and I checked out Darrens WR450 which he's had lowered, and Ken has had the same thing done to his WR250, which he loves.

Off we went, and I was corner man on the second corner, but was waiting for quite a while, I think there was a reluctant WR that reduced us to 22 riders right from the start.

Anyway, things moved on briskly from there, and within 30 minutes we'd found a "summer track only" area which had a VERY slippery greasy, muddy, slick hill.

The Big TE510 grunted up it with no problems, but I quickly parked it to one side as I knew that at least a couple of the guys would be "inspecting" the mud very closely.

I think there were three bikes & blokes who ended up on the ground, but there were no injuries, and apart from getting a bit dirty, it was all good fun. Some assistance was given for those struggling, and we once again rode onwards.

The rest of the day consisted of mostly dirt roads around the Adelaide hills, with plenty of slippery and wet spots, and lots of drifting and wheelies.

Late in the afternoon we found ourselves at a quarry where a few of the guys had a bit of trials style hill climbing up a short rocky slope before we all decided that it was getting a little late, and we headed back to the carpark.

I finished up the day a little tired, but happy to get a ride in with the Amtra SA guys. Looking forward to the next ride in a couple of weeks, which will be a lot tougher.

A big thanks to Mark, who had apparently been awake since 2am, and put in a real trooper performance just turning up, let alone leading the ride!