It Came From the Sky
by Ian
By 10:30pm on the Friday, I had given up on Snowy arriving any time soon. He had planned to leave Canberra at 4pm and should have arrived long ago. Because he tends to put his phones through the wash and Virgin Mobile hates him, you can never ring him in any case.
So I went outside to close the garage figuring any number of scenarios as to his absence when I heard the thrashing of a big single in the distance. I opened the door back up as he roared up my driveway swearing and cursing the world and all in it.
"Fucking stupid fucking Sydney cock suckers how the fuck do I end up in fucking two hours fucking around fucking due north is not Kirribilli fucking cock sucking fucking I don't need this shit I'm fucking selling the bike and buying a car fucking this is fucking ridiculous five and a half hours to fucking this shit hole every fucking time I come here how can I get so fucking lost having grown up..." As he stepped back from the bike and started delaminating the ranting only got louder as he removed his helmet.
"Have a good ride?" I chuckled. He eyeballed me and switched his internal programming to DO NOT KILL. I hoped it wouldn't go all fuzzy and malfunction on me.
He settled a little as my wife greeted him and instantly assessed his mood. "How is the new granddaughter?" she asked. Women are smart like that. Whereas I wanted to needle him over the fact all of his gear was locked in the site shed at work delaying his departure and then he ran out of fuel on the highway, my wife redirected him to love and happy thoughts while making him a cup of tea.
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I am so buying a car |
Early to rise, we made good time to the roadhouse at Kurrajong where I had already lost two bolts. We topped back up knowing this was our last fuel for 300km, and had a coffee and a pie while we waited for the others. David was first to arrive all splendid on his 650 BMW with a gazillion litres of fuel. Dave is the one we heli-lifted out of the Brindabella ranges three years ago and a mountain of a man who lives for his adventure riding. Soon enough we were eight riders consisting of my XR650R, two KTM 625s, the Beemer 650X and four DR650s in various states of tune.
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| A fine stable |
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| Hi I'm Snowy... ask me how it's going so far??? |
From here it was a repeat of our ill-fated Wrong Way Down ride and we darted up to Bell and across and down into Hartley towards Jenolan Caves, stopping at the Hampton Halfway Pub for refreshments and drinking supplies. It's amazing how nice a lemon squash is on a thirty degree day and these stops are a good time to sniff each other out and understand each other's machinery. My front tyre came under much scrutiny from the gang along with dubious looks of concern. They were justified and Dino had remarked on them only the night before but hey, I am an adventurer.
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| Bikes and Pub go well |
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| As happy as I had seen him |
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| These guys play serious |
The tar into Jenolan Caves is tight and winding and after Dave managed to escape around a car I set my sights on hunting him down. This also served to justify my tight arse take on front tyres. It was a spirited run in and I managed to catch Dave just as we rolled into the cave. The troops were only just behind and we sprinted up the winding road to the turnoff where we adjusted our tyre pressures down and then chased down the wagon train of 4WDs that had passed us all talking on their CB radios.
I can't say I have ever seen such dust. It was amazing and would stay with us for most of the weekend. Large thick plumes of dust that meant you could hardly see the rider six bike lengths in front of you. It was like that scene from Days of Thunder where he exits the smoke cloud into the unknown. I didn't like it but the 4WD's liked our stone parade less and frantically talked to each other and pulled aside until we were gone.
