Wednesday, October 9, 2013

Riders beat fine after 'reckless' police operation - Old Pacific Hwy

This article courtesy of the Sydney Morning Herald. This happened on the Old Pacific Hwy just on the northern outskirts of Sydney on one of Sydneys best known biking roads. Good on you guys for sticking up for your rights. Poor form on the part of the police.  Watch the video to see what happened. It's funny my wife used to work for the solicitor that defended these guys.





Maybe the police should have issued themselves with tickets for negligent driving? Hope they refunded all 65 riders but I bet they didn't.

Tuesday, October 8, 2013

2013 Formula Xtreme - Eastern Creek Rnd 5

Yep it's that time of year again when the Formula Xtreme juggernaut rolls into action at Eastern Creek or Sydney Motor sport Park as it's called these days. The anticipation for this has been building for months now and it did not disappoint. Sunday was the fifth round of the championship and as always the racing was pretty good. Unfortunately Bushpig couldn't make it out this weekend as he had a fiftieth to attend, the loser, so I decided to take the family instead. They loved it and I got to drink beer err, I mean spend quality time with them.

Turn 2 action and R1's kicking ass

600 wheelie time
The Kawasaki pictured below won the super bikes race one by some margin, but in race 2 I watched as he crashed out of second place at turn 9 ruining his championship title challenge. Great effort and racing though.


The Yamaha factory outfit was professional as ever with the mechanics at fever pitch getting the bikes ready for race 2. Looks like it worked as they won race 2. Rick Olsen in the picture below was the winner.



By the end of the day I told the kids it was time to go home and little miss 5 said she didn't want to leave she wanted to stay and watch the motorbikes. Looks like I may have started something.

Get out of the way dad - look motorbikes

Saturday, October 5, 2013

Time to Relax

Last month we went on a family holiday in the south Pacific to the sleepy little tourist island of Fiji.
Fiji is about a four hour flight from Sydney to Nadi(pronounced Nandi) which is on Fiji's west coast. The first thing you notice when you arrive in Fiji is how friendly everyone is and that everything seems to be no problem for anyone. Everyone was running on Fiji time. It's like everyone everywhere is in relax mode. The Fijians are so warm and welcoming.

It was only a short 20 minute trip from the airport to our hotel resort at the Sofitel on Denarau Island. We got in at night so kind of missed out on seeing anything on the way there. When we got up in the morning we were greeted with a fantastic dawn with beautiful weather. In fact spending 11 days there it didn't rain once and the weather couldn't have been better. This is where we stayed at the Sofitel Fiji. It was a massive place. The foyer area must have been at least 3 times larger than our entire block at home.

Sofitel Fiji

The view out the back of the resort was magic, overlooking the pool and out to the ocean. The photo below is about 1 third of the pool as it went a long way to the left and to the right was a slippery slide for the kids and the adul..... er big kids.

Sofitel Pool

We managed to get out on a cruise of some of the outer islands during the trip. We stopped off on South Sea island for a couple of hours where we enjoyed swimming in the pool with the kids and a quick dip in the ocean. Georgia also enjoyed painting at the kids club where the Fijian's got to enjoy our children. Great swap in my opinion, I think we won that one! They had snorkeling, kayaking and other activities but it was far to short a time to enjoy them all especially when the put on such a great BBQ with a great range of side salads. This was fantastic with free beer included. Yes I was in my element.

South Sea Island



The Fijian's we met were all a very happy bunch and loved to sing traditional Fijian songs. When we had lunch on the Island there was a group singing us some lovely tunes. It wasn't my favourite metallica music but it was still good.


Lunchtime music


After lunch we were ferried back to our boat and island hopped around a bunch of fantastic little islands. We stopped briefly at a little island called cast away island. I was wishing that we had stayed there it was so secluded and beautiful. The waters were an amazing colour of light blue and aqua. The camera just doesn't do it justice.
Cast Away Island
Georgia even got to participate in the evening torch lighting ceremony that the Fijian's put on. All the kids got to dress up in traditional Fijian grass skirts and light the torches around the resorts pool area. Little miss 5 enjoyed this immensely.





Needless to say this was probably the most relaxing holiday I have ever been on. Most of the time on holidays we usually rush around everywhere so we can see as much as we possibly can cram in but this holiday wasn't like that. Just about every day we swam in the pool and lazed around in the hammock, with beer of course. I loved that hammock and beer. Although I found it a little difficult to drink the beer in the hammock but I managed it. I wonder what the poor people were doing!

Heaven

When we visited Nadi during our holiday we had a traditional Fijian welcoming ceremony and got to try out Kava, which Fijians consider to be a tradition. Well I don't know if you've ever tried it but it tasted somewhere between dirty dishwater and water filled dirt. Oh god it was really bad. Even back at the resort later that day the first 2 or 3 beers I drank just tasted like Kava. Thankfully it wore off by the next day and the beer tasted normal again.

Kava tasting


On the last day we did some para sailing and jet skiing. Little miss 5 wanted to go para sailing with mummy after I talked her into it. Unfortunately for little miss 5 she was slightly to small to fit into the harness on the para sail so she had to watch mummy have all the fun. She was pretty upset at this to which she was bribed with a jet ski ride with daddy.


After a few laps on the jet ski little miss five wanted to go back to land, but I was having to much fun and pressed on despite the crying and whinging. Although there was no motorcycles during the trip I did get to ride the motorcycle of the water and had great fun doing it.