Southern Highlands Ride

Geoff suggested a quick road ride to the Southern Highlands. Count me in, so we met at the Servo on the M4 at 10am and set off soon afterwards. We took the back roads to the Oaks and down to Mittagong avoiding the highway via Thirlmere,

We took the range road out the back of Mittagong, the road has recently been resurfaced and was in good shape. It's an awesomely scenic ride through rolling hillsides with hedge & tree alleys and rockwall fences.

Range Road

At the end we took a left turn instead of the usual right and went further along on the tourist road which comes out at the top of Macquarie Pass. We turned left at Robertson Pie shop and headed down Jamberoo Mountain Road, which was a good scenic bit of road.

Top of Macquarie Pass

We went through Albion Park which was going to be the lunch stop but I said to Geoff I know a nice little pub up past Robinson, he said "lead the way". So we tuned back up Macquarie Pass. There are a lot of new housing estates built out the road to MP.  We got a great run up the pass with almost a car free run. It's fantastic surface hot mixed all the way. The new AX41 tyre was handling this very well, tipping in quickly and effortlessly and easily held the line. 

We took the road into Burrawang and stopped at the Burrawang Hotel. Not the cheapest place but quite nice, they have a beautiful outdoor beer garden area but it was quite cool out today at 18°C so we ate indoors. They do an awesome hamburger, which was washed down with an ice cold beer.

Read this next bit in a David Attenborough voice. 

"Here we have a rare photo of the crimson nosed beer guzzler in his native habitat".

We returned back home via the same roads through Thirlmere, we stopped in for a quick beer at the Wallacia Hotel. A short but enjoyable ride out with the boys. Good ending to my holidays.

Kangaroo Valley

Kangaroo Valley is on the list as one of New South Wales best motorcycle rides. I'd find it hard to argue against that as I have ridden here many times in the past and will continue to do so into the future. I had to travel down to St Georges basin down near Jervis Bay during the week for work. I could have chosen the main Hwy down the coast but I'd rather drive a great biking road than go along a boring Highway. So I packed the camera to take some pics for this blog.

Besides the scenery is spectacular when you descend Barrengarry Mountain coming into Kangaroo Valley from the north. The views through the tree's is awesome although there was to much fog down low this morning to see anything. There are about 10 kms of steep winding mountainous road descending down to the valley floor. This is great fun riding.

Once you reach the valley floor you soon come into Kangaroo Valley township. There was much fog about this morning as I came through here. The whole valley floor was covered as you can see from the following pics.

As you leave kangaroo valley village the road climbs back up the side of Cambewarra Mountain. There is lots of fun to be had on this twisting section of road. The road winds along for about 12 kms until it comes out at Bomaderry near Nowra. I like the look and feel of the hills here kind of sub tropical rain forest like.

The best part about riding through Kangaroo Valley is that there are many other great bike roads nearby. I like to incorporate the ride up through Macquarie Pass with a stop at Robertson Pie shop for a break and a pie. I also like to do Jamberoo Mountain road and combine all 3 roads together into one pretty sweet ride.

Here's a pic of me on these curves taken about 5 years ago.