Sunday Lunch

I had spoken with VTRman during the week about going for a ride on Sunday and I thought that we could ride somewhere and have a good counter lunch. Sounds like a cunning plan. It was a bit of a late start as I'd been trying to contact bush pig who was also supposed to come along. After a couple of calls and texts there was no answer so we decided to head off. The weather today was decidedly dodgy with showers predicted along the coast so I was thinking of heading west. A quick discussion on where to have lunch and it was decided to go with the pub at Wisemans Ferry.  It was dry when we left but when we got out near the northern road turn off the road was looking wet in patches so it was careful riding. At least it wasn't raining on us.

We stopped in at the lookout for a quick stop and photo, the place was deserted when we got there but soon enough there was starting to get quite a few cars. We headed into Wisemans for lunch.

I ordered the home made pot pie and VTRman got a chicken schnity. The pot pie was fantastic and the schnitzel looked good to. I'll be getting one of those again when I come back. It was all washed down with an ice cold beer. Does it get any better than this.

The sun finally reared its ugly head just before we left. It was very welcome because it was cool out today and would make the trip a bit more enjoyable and hopefully start to dry up some of those damp patches on the road.












Instead of coming straight back the way we had come we decided on taking the river road. VTRman hadn't been down here before so I thought he might enjoy the fabulous scenery through here. When we pulled up to take some pics he commented on how great this area was with all the sandstone rock formations right besides the road. Some off them had to be carved out so that the road would fit between the cliffs and the river. You can see some of those photos from a previous blog post here.

We decided to take the lower Portland ferry across the river. There's something about ferry's I just enjoy riding them. The ferry master had 3 kids helping him out today. As the ferry came close to the shore it was very sideways. I mentioned that he must be drinking or something and we both had a laugh. Anyway once it pulled up the little kids ran out and opened the ferry gate and also the boom across the road. Looks like the ferry master was having an easy day with these helpers.

 On the way home we hit a brief light shower coming back down Windsor road. It wasn't even enough to wet our jeans but I could see more bad weather ahead so it was a quick ride back home. Thanks for the great day out VTRman. We will have to do it again soon.

2 Tickets to Paradise

I finally did it. I went online and booked tickets to this years MotoGP at Phillip Island. There's been lots of things said about Phillip Island but I think Barry Sheene said it best with this classic line - "Welcome to sunny Phillip Island, gateway to hypothermia". It's still a crack up, god bless Barry. Looks like this time round though Mrs Chiller and myself will be flying down and staying in Melbourne. The missus has been at me for years to take her to Melbourne, so it looks like I can do the two things at once. I get to go see motogp and the last time we will get to see Casey Stoner racing and she will get to see the city of Melbourne, it's win win in my books. This will also allow me to go on the annual Snowy ride a couple of weeks after the GP. I think i'd be hard pressed getting 2 trips away on the bike in a couple of weeks especially seeing as both trip would be multiple over nighters.

When I was booking the tickets Siberia stand had already sold out within a couple of days of Casey annoucing his retirement. So I decided on Bass Straight stand instead. On every other trip I'd been to the Island we had watched the race from Siberia from either slumming it on the fence or upgrading to the grandstand. Hopefully the weather will give us a break this year. I've seen some dodgy weather in my time at the island and it would be great if the weather gods shine down on this years MotoGP. I can only hope and pray.....

Photo via Google images

Sportsbikes Blogs

I have only been blogging for a little over 1 year now and in that time I have been searching for other blogs similar to mine from other sports bike riders. Searching for motorcycle blogs is hard enough, finding a sportsbike blog is near impossible. I mean what the hell is wrong with google when it can't find other sportsbike blogs What gives blogger is owned by google? Searching blogs seems to be very poor in the search engine arena.

I have found many supposedly sportsbike blogs that the blog just consists of road racing news and new bike releases. Nothing to actually do with riding a sportsbike in the real world on public roads. If I wanted to read that I would just go buy Australian Motorcycle news or something similar.

I am sure that I can't be the only sportbike blog on the internet, I have found a few blogs from a bunch of great guys on sports tourers such as Motorcycle Paradise,  All things Rogey and Tarsnakes of which all are great blogs that I follow regulary. There are numerous blogs from Harley riders and people on cruisers and even scooters, so many in fact that I could not list them here. There are that many but it still remains that I have only been able to find 1 other sportsbike blog, and its by a girl that rides a BMW S1000RR and a former Haybusa rider. Her blog here if you like sportsbikes. Thanks Trobairitz :-) I found this on your side bar of blogs.

It seems funny to me that a sportsbike blog should be easily found but not so. You might ask why I myself have only been blogging for over a year now and haven't taken it up long ago. Well I guess the answer to that is I never knew that there was such a thing as blogs, until my brother showed me his blog about a year before I started mine, you can see his here at A view from above. It was from there I got the idea of making my own sportsbike blog. Who would of thought that the internet had more to offer than free music, movies and porn. Maybe sportsbike riders are in the class of 'Meh I don't care' frame of mind and couldn't give a shit. Sadly that looks to be more true than I'd like to think. I hope I am wrong about that. I'll just have to keep on searching..............

Sydney Harbour Holiday

 This post has nothing to do with motorcycles but I thought I'd post up some pictures from the weekend my wife and myself spent in the city for some relaxation. I am sure that no matter where you live in the world that you will instantly recognise the following pictures. They are the iconic symbols of this country after all. We don't normally come into the city often unless it is work related so a weekend doing some touristy stuff was welcome.Unfortunately the photos don't quite do justice to the real thing.

If you look closely on top of the bridge you can see tourists on the bridge climb. I did one about 8 years ago and it was fantastic. If your in Sydney on Holidays you should give it a go.

We visited the Opera house and I wanted to get some close up photos. This building is absolutely amazing in both its sheer size and its complexity in its design. The closer you get to it the harder it become to take a good photo. The danish engineer/architect that designed this was a genius.

Here is a close up picture of between the shells and the peak of the roof. Looks like they used copper plating for the front section. As the copper age's in the weather it changes colour to faded dull green you can see here.

I recently worked at the Yacht Club building on Hamilton Island that had an all copper roof. It was brand new and all brown but they said that in about 12 months time it would be all green as I had seen in the artists impressions of the place. That roof would be worth a fortune at the scrap metal yard.






I'm sure that the poor guys quoting the tender to tile this place could have tripled their quote and still went broke. The amount of tiles on this thing is phenomenal. The curvature of the shells would have made this very hard to work on. I guess that's why it took so long to build the thing. Touching the tiles near the bottom they were smooth like glass.

The afternoon sun reflected a brilliant orange light on the side of the building. It looked quite spectacular. They sometimes have light shows at night times where they shine different lights and lasers  on to the shells creating awesome effects.

This picture is looking back towards the city from the opera house viewing area on the western side.
I may be a bit biased but we sure do have a pretty special harbour with some excellent views. Its very photogenic.

Tourism Australia, you can start sending through the royalty cheques anytime now.