Well what happened to all you keen trailriders out there. A long weekend and only 5 turn up Well 6 if you count Tom and OK 7 if you count Stoneman who came on the Sunday but without his bike so he cant really be counted as a rider.
Yeah I know it looked bad on the weather report but when there is an opportunity go riding is my motto.
As it turned out the weather was OK with sunshine on the Saturday morning.
Chris Welly, J Paynter, Russell Saint, Mark Jarvis and myself took off at the gentlemanly hour of 10 to head to Hattah having camped right on the border of Vic/SA. Excellent tracks to Hattah as there had been rain recently which made the sand hard packed and grippy. Long straight bits with sharp corners to suck you out of your complacency. Bombing along doing probably 90 to 100 ks and oh shit there’s a 90 degree corner, frantic breaking, down the gears, hit the apex, slide out to the berm and nail it. Good fun but on occasions, down the gears, mad breaking and whoops not gonna make it and over the top of the lip on the outside of the corner. Oh good, safe, no one saw me. When asked by Mark who was that that ran off the corner all professed innocence and extreme affrontery that he could suggest such a thing. Must have been the phantom trailrider.
There was one particularly good track, moonlight bore or something I forget now which was excellent, tight and twisty and over blind brows etc.
Chris gets us to Hattah without geographic embarrassment and he runs out of fuel not 50 meters from the bowser. Hows that for planning.
Hattah was interesting with the signs dotted around the place, with what is a friendly rivalry between the husband and wife of the place eg “the decisions made by the husband of this establishment are not necessarily those of the management” or words to that effect etc. Fuel up and have lunch of hot pies and then the weather takes a nasty turn. Could rain maybe so on with the waterproofs and handbags for the bars just in case.
Russell tells us we are a load of wooses having the poofter handbags on the bikes. He would regret that statement later.
Leave Hattah and start heading back and it rained. Well it pissed down actually, cats and dogs and blowing a gale.
Those of us with the handbags and decent wet weather gear stayed relatively dry but those without, read Russell got as wet as a drowned rat. Hardy Ha Ha. It must have rained a lot as I even got wet thru my Dri rider Alpine Jacket. Thank god for those handbags as my hands were dry as a nuns you know what (not that I would know but!) The tracks as you can imagine were slippery as fresh dog turds on wet cement so it was take it real easy on the throttle. This is pretty easy on an XR 400 as they don’t put out a lot of power in the first place and twisting the throttle only produces gradual forward motion, so I was able to remain shiny side up. I actually think no one tasted the dirt but I reckon there were plenty of close calls.
One corner was illustrative of the conditions of the track with an identical wheel rut the whole way thru, all the way out to the lip and all of us hitting the same bush on the way out.
Chris took the shortest way home and we arrived damp but happy back at camp by about 3.45. Russell was frozen solid. Hardy Ha Ha. What a relevation cooking AND eating dinner in daylight. Amazing and something to be recommended.
Sunday was fine and dry with the ride going to Murrayville and back. Good tracks, with long straights and oh shit 90 degree corners. Bugga missed it again. Stall. Did anyone see me? Oh poo sprung by Russell. Look down and look innocently at tyres hoping he wouldn’t notice I had run off the track. Good Try Bucko. Gave JP a wakeup call at one point. The stealth bomber strikes again.
Had a burn on Wellys Alfer. Bloody hell this thing really hauls arse. I now know what having power means. I could get used to this. 120 ks on the clock in no time at all and had to back off at that. Where’s 7th and 8th gear as it could easily use them. The bloody XR4 would struggle to even get to 120 ks and that would be downhill with a following wind. Hmm what four stroke would have this much grunt. A 520 Katoobm I suspect. Heh Di have I got a deal for you. Wouldn’t know of a lazy 12 grand hanging around would you? Didn’t think so. Oh well dream on and the little Honda will have to hang on for a while yet, poor thing.
I was impressed with the Alfa even if it is a two stroke. Mind you Dazzs CR is a two stroke and is only a 125 and does that thing get up and boogy when it gets on the pipe. I think I just said something really silly in the above, actually contemplating buying a KTM. God I must be deranged, taking drugs or something real bad has come over me. I’m spinning out man, tapped out dude with this orange cloud descending upon me, AAAARRRRGGGHHHHH.
Back to camp at 4 oclock and no Tom waiting for us. Can’t be far. Ah Ha 4 wheel drive tracks in camp means he’s been abducted by a priest or Stoneman has come and they have gone four wheel driving. The latter proved true as they turned up about a half later with Tom a bit wide eyed as Dave had some fun testing the Jackeroo suspension over blind drop offs.
Good campfire with the usual talk about bikes and other worldly topics.
Get up on Monday to fine weather yet again but no interest in going for a ride as we had already done about 650 ks for the weekend, so pack up and go home. Another good weekend so thanks Chris for running it and for you wooses who didn’t go coz you thought it would be wet yah missed a good one.