Ride to the Spirit of Tasmania

The beginnings of another epic trip were in the makings on the last night of last years Snow Mountains ride. It was thrown out there to do another Tassie trip. Hell yes was my response after a dozen or so beers.......I'm all in even before I ask the missus, I never did get around to asking her......

Heading off on a cold thursday morning with Stu and Geoff into mist and rain I got to test out the heated grips, these are great. It was a quick stop in at Trappers bakery in Goulburn for the first pie of the trip. The weather was good after this.

Next stop was at Yass service centre to pick up the rest of the crew that had left the day before. From Yass we slabbed it down the Doom & Gloom Highway to Coolac where we then turned off onto back roads to Tumut.

It was another nice ride up and over the Rosewood raceway, I was following along behind Geoff here and a big Eastern Grey Kangaroo jumped out in front of him, just missed him by a couple of metres. Close call for the middle of the day too.

We stopped for a brief lunch stop and to top up the tank in Tumbarumba. The bakery does an excellent chicken salad roll, I couldn't have 2 pie's in a row now could I? 

From here I lead the group along the Murray River Road to Tallangatta where the Tuono's required fuel again.  Dave's bike seemed to be extremely thirsty using 3 litres more than Stu's???? An awesome ride along the river today, was flowing nicely with no traffic.

I stopped along the road near Granya gap for a break, when we got going again the others had actually stopped in Granya for the same reason so we had two breaks, before the Granya GP track.

Granya Road

Granya

A good fun ride through the gap was had by all and I was really surprised how fast I could push the big AT on knobby tyres. I was a little concerned before the trip I'd be so slow on the knobbies in the twisties but I shouldn't have worried about it, you can still go pretty quickly. The knobbies are fairly loud on the tar though but not a problem with ear plugs.

I lead out and down towards Dederang on the Gundowring road. However I wasn't exactly sure where we were supposed to turn. I just passed a turn off and noticed the others taking it. Well I guess that was the one, then we came into Tawonga and I thought we've come too far, it's back the other way. Oh well I wasn't leading this bit from the back. So we backtracked to the Dederang Pub, about a 30 minute diversion. 

Over a few beers Dave revealed his Tuono had a power commander fitted and his bike was using extra fuel, he needed to fill up now at 200kms instead of 230kms, so I'm getting double the range of his Tuono. That hurts when fuel is $2.30 per litre, ouch. The Dederang Hotel do a great feed and have cheap accomodation about $50 per person.

Next morning I was up early around 6.30am so got ready and took a few snaps. It was foggy and cool out this morning. Pictures on the trip will be from both my S9 phone and my Nikon D500. Usually days like this turn out to be warm and sunny and that's exactly how it turned out.

Fog on the barrow downs

We split up here with Geoff and Doug taking the high road to Myrtleford whilst the rest of us took the Tawonga Gap. I was following Dave down the other side and noticed that my fuel light had come on. I was trying to think where I'd filled up last which was Tumbarumba. I'd forgotten to reset my trip meter so couldn't tell how many kms I actually done. Filling up in Myrtleford I put in 16.5litres(18l total). A coffee stop was needed, they do good coffee here in victoria. The sun was biting quite hard now.

The ride took us up to Whitfield and up through the hills to Mansfield where we stopped at the bakery for lunch. The Mansfield bakery does a pretty good pie and they were flat out today. We then made our way up into the back country from Jamieson to Eildon. This bit of road is bloody fantastic we stopped briefly at the lookout. Looks like a bushfire or burn off in the hills across the lake.

I thought I'd head down the hill a little and get few shots of Stu and Dave coming up the hill. That didn't work out too well for me leaving the camera in single shot mode and having to rush down as I heard them coming up with those booming V4s brapping it up the hill. This was the only decent pic I got. Photo fail#1.

I pretty much rode the whole way from here on my own as I packed away my camera everyone shot off. About 5kms from the end I hit a large stick in the shadows and the front tyre rolled and tucked. That was sphincter puckering, so I slowed a little after that and found the guys waiting for me at the Eildon turn off.

We were now on the outskirts of Melbourne. I'd bought a quadlock just a couple of days before leaving and we were about to enter friday night peak hour traffic with no clue of  navigating Melbourne. I put on google maps with the ferry as destination and it took us out on the northern outskirts on some nice country roads before dropping us down into the thick of it. We made it to the terminal with no troubles so parked up the bikes and got some diner and a beer into our famished stomachs while we waited for the boat.

It seemed to take forever to board the boat this trip. I think we waited for 1 and a half hours in the line before eventually getting on the ship.

Finally it's boarding time.

Where's the bar.....

By the time we boarded and got into our cabins and then hit the bar is was around 9pm, we were a bit beat but the beers made up for it. Tomorrow we hit Tassie........

Return from Tassie - Day 12 & 13

DAY 12

It was beginning to feel like we had been on the road for the 12 days I was getting tired and the others looked it too. We got off the boat and stopped to gather everyone together. It took a few minutes before we were all together again. I think I was all photoed out by then as I didn't take any photo's. The shot below is supplied by our fearless group leader. Thanks Dougie.

Disembarking the Spirit of Tasmania was the easy part. Heading straight out into Melbourne's peak hour traffic was going to be the difficult bit. And I wasn't wrong there we stopped 2 or 3 times within 2 kilometres to consult google maps after a couple of uncertain turns. I wasn't offering to lead here cause I had no idea where I was going and I hadn't even been bothered to look at a map to see where we should be going. East and North is about all I knew.

Turns out that's where we went whether or not it was by luck or good management I can't be sure. At one point I found myself leading and turning off the free way with 2 options north or south with me slowing down but no one offing to come up and take the lead, so I went north and everyone followed. Not sure this was right but we eventually went the right direction.

We stopped in a bakery at Lilydale for some breakfast before we retraced our step from day 1 & 2 almost to a tee. We headed through Warburton and back up the Reefton Spur. I can confirm that riding up the spur is much better than riding down it, as you are not on your wrists the whole time.
Doug rode at the back of the group as his bike had been playing up since yesterday just after Rosebery, it was losing power making riding the real twisty bits difficult. The spur must have been hard work for him.

As we got close to the Eildon - Jamieson road turn off, Doug said he would meet us in Mansfield and bypass the twisty bit as the bike wasn't working well in the twistys. Well that's a real bummer.
 Now that we knew what the road was like we had a pretty good run through the Jamieson road. The first part had quite a bit of leaf litter over the road and I had a couple of front end slides on them but after about 20 minutes it cleared and we had a sensational run to the lookout.

Jamieson Road

Stu had been waiting for us at the look out for about 15 minutes as we stopped earlier for the above photo's. The picture from the lookout today was much clearer than it was when we came down. We picked Doug back up again in Mansfield.

We had another brilliant run over to Whitfield with plenty of spirited riding taking place. We stopped in at the Whitfield Hotel. I wasn't ready for a beer yet so we hit up the Whitty cafe. The owner suggested Iced Coffee's which we agreed was a great idea, it was a hot day today and they were fantastic.

Geoff and Bruce decided they'd like a beer instead so they stopped at the pub. We parked the bikes out the front so they would be in the shade.

Whitty Iced Coffee's

 The ride back into Myrtleford was quite boring and I was thinking that I was going to fall asleep, lucky then I didn't have a beer as that would have made it worse. Stopping in Mytreford Stu, Dave and Myself decided we'd like to ride through to Bright and then do the Tawonga Gap and then come back up to Dederang from the south rather than take the Happy Valley Road. I followed Dave across the Gap and and it was fantastic fun, this is one of my all time favourite roads.

We were soon in Dederang after about 20 minutes and back to the Dederang Hotel, again in the cabin out the back.

Day 13

I'm not sure that finishing a long trip like this on day 13 is a great idea, when riding motorcycles one should not poke the superstitious road gods in the face. Again today's ride was also going to be the reverse of the first day. We fueled up in Tallangatta and then headed up over the Granya Gap and onto the Murray River Road. This was another fantastic ride along the river until we turned off at Jingellic and up to Tumbarumba. There was quite a lot of road works along this bit of road, I didn't remember being this much on the way down, seems like they were ripping up lots of the road. It would be nice when they finish it.

We stopped in Tumbarumba at the bakery(again) for a spot of lunch and coffee's. Rather than ride all the way out to Rosewood we took a more direct approach and took this nice little back road that cut out about 20km's of boring bit and it spat us out right onto the Broadleaf Park Rd and up through the pine forests.

 We were soon in Tumut for a fuel stop and a drink of water as it was quite warm today. Geoff's zipper had broken on his jacket and he was wearing his rain jacket over the top of his leathers for the last 4 or 5 days. He got sick of that and just wrapped duct tape around his leather jacket. Pity we didn't tape his arms up as well.

The pic below was the last time we would be all together at the same point on the trip. I put my sheepskin back on the the long boring bits coming up. After we got on the Hume Highway aka Highway Patrol central the guys were riding off at a blistering pace. There was now also very strong crosswind that was also battering us about. Must have been 40-50kmh gusts. It was very tiring riding along here and by the time I pulled in at Marulan for fuel there was only Dave getting some fuel. He said Geoff had pulled in at Goulburn and Stu pulled in at Yass and Bruce had stopped for fuel at Gunning. Talk about getting split up.

Rain was predicted for Sydney by 6pm so I got underway again pretty quickly just after Dave had left. About an hour and a half later I was pulling into my drive way with a severe case of sore ass and I was exhausted. A few minutes after getting home it just started to rain so it looks like the timing again was spot on. 

Looking at my rear tyre it was pretty well shot. It was down on the wear markers and the centre was now starting to get cracks in it. The Bridgestone S21's are a fantastic tyre, with great grip and superb handling. The tyre has done 7,707kms since I put it on last November which is pretty good out of a sports tyre. 

It has done 2 tours, the Vic High country tour at the end of last year and this Tassie trip, I wasn't sure if it was going to make it back but it all worked out well. This Tassie trip was around 5400km over 13 days, although 2 of these were technically non riding days when we were at the World Super Bikes.  It's now time for a full service on the bike, tyres, chain+sprockets, oil & filter.

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed the trip as much as I did.

World Superbikes and Tassie Trip 2018 - Day 1 and 2

Last November plans were hatched to go to the World Superbike opening round at Phillip Island and then after that we would take the ferry across Bass Strait to Tasmania. It has been about 15 years since I'd visited either by motorcycle so I was excited to be heading back.

With my recent knee injury I was a little concerned about being able to ride for long stints. An MRI turned out that I had a knee fracture but the only thing for it was Physio, so I got hooking in to get as well as possible in anticipation for the ride. It has been so long since I'd been on my motorcycle I'd almost forgotten what it was like to ride it, I hadn't been on the bike since November last year.

DAY 1

We left early from my place with Stu and Bushpig just after 7am headed towards Goulburn via the dreaded Hume Highway. I packed my sheepskin just for this section. Two hours later we had arrived and refueled the bikes and met the others(Dave and Bruce) at the bakery for a spot of breakfast.

With the hunger wolves now at bay it was more dreaded highway down to Yass where we picked up a couple more people, Doug and Craig with now seven of us all told. We continued down to Coolac where we finally turned off the highway (yay) and took the back way into Tumut. Headed out of Tumut we took the Rosewood road up through the pine forests, this is a great bit of road in the middle of nowhere, thank you logging industry for providing some motorcycle heaven. We then stopped in Tumbarumba at the bakery for a spot of lunch.

Leaving Tumbarumba behind we headed down to the NSW/VIC border via Jingellic and onto the Murray River road and up over the Granya gap. I struggled riding through the Gap a bit as I couldn't put weight through my knee to weight the pegs and hang off into the bends so I had to counter steer every corner without hanging off, which became a bit slow and tiresome but still a lot of fun being back on the bike.

Dederang Hotel

We were soon pulling into the pub at Dederang which was to be our destination for tonight. The accommodation is quite reasonable at $40 a night with continental breakfast. Dave and I stayed in one of the cabins out the back which cost a little extra but we were in total luxury.

The local constabulary turned up to the pub and was checking out our bikes, he said a quick hello and then went off to see the publican. Putting the bikes around the back we settled in for a few well earned ales.

Inside our cabin

Dederang pub can be contacted on 02 6028 9325 the rooms are quite good and the cabins are fairly new and very comfortable so its a good spot to stay also putting you in reaching distance of the Victorian high country with many loop rides nearby.

Day 1 Map Reference

 DAY 2

Today's trip would include some great motorcycling roads unlike day 1 which was half highway half twisties. I'd skipped the free toast for breakfast as Doug had said we'd stop at the whitty cafe for breakfast about an hour away. We refueled in Myrtleford on the way to Whitfield. Sitting at the cafe eating breakfast we watched probably over 100+ bikes go through. They do a great breakfast here too and are very bike friendly. 

I hadn't been down the Whitfield road for about 20 years so it was almost like a new experience for me although I did remember the big views over the valleys. It's a great bit of road with a bit of everything, sweepers, tight bends and elevation changes with views and vistas.

Bushpig nick-named Doug's bike the Stukka, because;
A: Its German and
B: It comes in from behind and dive bombs you before shooting off into the distance.

Here's a short video of the Stukka in action on the Whitfield road.

We refueled in Mansfield for the trip across the Jamieson to Eildon Road. This is a road I've never ridden on before but had read a lot about it so this was a first for me. The road didn't disappoint it was an absolute cracker. There were so many bends by the end of it I think I was just about all 'bended' out and was hoping for a few straights. SHIT did I just say that?

Goulburn River

Jamieson - Eildon Road

Lake Eildon

The lookout is at the Jamieson end not far into the twisties but with superb views below of the lake. From here the road twists its way around mountains with 55km corners which slowly turn down in speed until you doing 35km and 25km corners. I was quite exhausted by the end of 60kms of just bends. With counter steering the whole way it wasn't making it easy, I couldn't ride my normal ride by not being able to hang off and attack the bends but boy was it still a hell of a lot of fun.

Lake Eildon Lookout

Here is a short 2 minute video of what the first section of the Jamieson Road is like from the lookout above. The road tightens up after this.

We had a brief reprieve from the twisty goodness that was the Jamieson road as we pressed on down to Marysville. Then we turned off here and instead of doing the black spur, Doug took us down the Reefton Spur yet another first for me as this is another famous bike road that I'd read about but never done. Two first's in the same day with brand new twisty motorcycle roads. I'm loving it, bring it on.

Mansfield

Reefton Spur

R1 on the Reefton Spur

The first section of the spur was a little more open and flowing as the road ascended into the forested hills. There were so many dead trees, probably from bush fires in recent years that have swept through the hills killing all the trees. It was quite erie to behold.

After this the road seemed to descend for miles and miles and the road became narrow and very twisty, plenty of 25 and 35km corners and all this after the work out earlier on the Jamieson road. The constant downhill bends were giving my wrists a workout. I bet this road would flow much better in the other direction as it would be mostly uphill. I didn't put my gopro on here as it was almost flat from the jamieson road but it would have been nice to get some footage.

After what seemed like ages of corner after corner action we finally came through Reefton (not much there) and into Warburton. Refueling the bikes it was time for some lunch so we found, you guessed it another bakery. With coffee and pies dispatched we then turned towards the Island which was not too far away, only about 2 hours. I was thankful as I was beginning to get tired by this point.

Map of the 2 Spurs

After some more great little back roads out through to Drouin we reached the Island and our rental house where we unloaded our gear and got ready for diner and beers at San Remo's pub(s), I also found out that there is more than 1 pub in San Remo. Who would have known as I never made it past the first one.

The view from our house over Cape Woolamai

Cheers Boys

All up a great days riding down to the Island, I think I prefer this way to come because most of the riding is very twisty and often at or below legal speeds as opposed to the Great Alpine Road which is very open and conducive to higher speeds and then after that there is 4 hours of boring flat straights to ride along to actually get to the Island. The way we came today only had about 30 minutes of boring bits to get to the Island so that's a big win in my books. Bring on the SUPERBIKES!!!!!!!



Map Reference