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2-14-09
Back to USA

I have seen these iron crossties before but never did get a chance to take a photo. They were replacing the ties and these are the ones taken out. Notice the metal ends they put on the wood ties to keep them from splitting. I am not sure how they get a spike to stick in the metal ties but maybe they use something else to hold the track down to them.

I have been just about laughing myself silly reading the names of the different towns that I go through. One of my favorites today was Wee Waa…. Then there was Wagga Wagga.

I should have gone over to look at Burrumbutttock. How did it get its name?

I have found that it doesn’t pay to cut the corners tight as the trucks kick up gravel from the shoulder of the road and makes the inside corner iffy.

Go fast farmers…

Now this farmer had a great time putting this together.

I saw the sign for an Auto Museum and pulled in to take a quick look. I had been traveling a long day and didn’t want to spend much time looking at cars but thought I better check to see if they had motorbikes in there too. Well they had this one outside and the woman I talked to said they had one more little one inside.

She let me stand in the door and take these pictures. It really wasn’t something I NEEDED to see right then. If it had been early in the day and not too far for me to go, I would have gone in and looked. Maybe next time eh?

Some hot rods in there as well.

I am staying at the hostel in Dubbo where this bird is the house bird. He looks kind of fuzzy and I wonder if he is a baby.

When I pulled in last night it had started raining and I was lost as usual and just happened to pick an off ramp to the down town area. I was looking for the hostel on my map when a guy came up and asked if I needed help. He got the map and figured out where I needed to go and then got out a piece of paper and drew me a map. All this time he was trying to call the hostel but the phone there was busy or no one was answering. He finally put his number down at the bottom and said if there was a problem and I needed a place to stay I should call him and I could stay at his place as they had an extra bedroom… That is the kind of people there are down here. It is truly amazing how friendly and go out of their way to help you they are down here. I have only met three people down here that I haven’t liked. Two were women at major petrol stations and I am sure they have to deal with thousands of people all day. They were not mean to me but just not friendly as normal. The other gal was a real Bitch but I think she was a tourist from South Africa and had her tail tied in a knot for some reason. Other than those three, these people are really fantastic and a pleasure to be around. I am rooming with a guy now here in the hostel that was born on a ranch near the town of Packsaddle…. He used to herd cows on a Suzuki DR. Last night there were a lot of what I thought were Japanese kids here and the place was being held down by an older woman for the owner. This morning the kitchen was a huge mess of rice and veggies and dirty dishes and shit all over the floor and tables. I have never seen this kind of mess at a hostel before. My roommate says they are Koreans and he has even told them to clean the shit up or ELSE!!!! They certainly are not as nice and considerate as the Japanese are and to say nothing of they way they treat the kitchen. I bought milk for my cereal in the morning but have eaten lunch and supper downtown. The owner came back and things are cleaner now……

I listened to the radio this morning and found out that the way I am headed up north has been having a major flood. They say it is a 120 year event and everyone is amazed to go from fire hazard to major flash flood and all without warning.

I have to say that I am hearing from the people on the street that the government is the main problem with the houses burning down. There have been almost two thousand homes lost to the fires. The problem is that the government wont let you cut down trees next to you home. I guess they wont let you cut down trees anywhere. They passed some sort of law that says you cannot clear land and cut down tees. I guess they were concerned that too much land was being cleared and wanted to keep the trees for weather stability? Not sure what the reason is but these homes were just unable to protect themselves. When I was with my friends on Kangaroo Island they had cleared some around their place but had used the excuse they were putting in a fence line. They had a major brush fire headed their way and tried to prepare as best they could under the law. There was an architect on the radio that was saying that there is just no way they can build a house to protect them from these fires. He said even cement houses get so hot the rebar explodes and down they go. In the early days people built dugouts and they are starting to think about going back to that for peoples own safety. It is along the same lines as tornado shelters and underground fallout shelters.

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I really like these shirts that almost every guy wears while working. It almost seems like the national shirt to wear. I am sure it helps cut down on accidentally running over someone. I think I am going to try to buy one before I come home but can’t pack anything else on the bike now.

When I was leaving this morning I spotted this big bird in a cage next door and went over to take his photo. It looks like he could take your finger right off with that beak.

The birth place if the Howard I own. Mine was made in England.

All along this highway were these signs that had each planet on a bill board in a rest area. There is a big observatory that sponsors it. I finally stopped all the way out here at Neptune. You might be able to see the little arrow saying ‘you are here’.

I headed into some serious farming country and the crops looks really good. Nice flat farm land.

I skirted a few of these thunder storms as I rode along.

This is/was the major flood zone and there were several spots along the highway where this was the activity. I was caught unprepared on the first crossing as I slowed way down and was easing my way across when a truck passed me!!!!!. DAMN,,,,, I was wet and pissed off and was working my self up into a ROAD RAGE incident when I settled down and thought how much fun that trucker had doing it, and I am sure telling all his friends how he almost drowned a motorbike guy……… still a little rage in me….

After that I would wait along side the road and wait until there was no traffic coming either way and then I would cross. About the deepest, was only maybe a foot deep which was plenty for the Ozdog.

Nice little swimming hole down the creek but it was a little muddy…I have two friends with names almost like this, so had to insert it here for good thoughts of them.

I should have gotten a closer photo of these huge cactus trees. They were just loaded with fruit buds.

On these flat farming plains the houses were built up on stilts. When it rains it can get pretty deep it looks.

A Southern Cross windmill. I have been seeing these along the way and they sure are different fans than ours.  Dennis said they are made or were made right in Toowoomba…

In some places it was like Nebraska but there sure were a lot of places that looked a lot like I was in Montan.

Some of these were really big farms.

I made it on up to Toowoomba (another cool name eh?) and found the person that Sabrina (on Kangaroo Island ) wanted me to meet. Dennis just got in from a BMW club ride that turned out to be three days in rain and muddy forest trails and wet, wet, wet. Dennis rides a R100GS/PD just like my yellow dog except it is red. He said everything he owned was wet after that trip. He had a cheap tent with him because it was not supposed to be bad weather and it leaked so bad he just laid on top of his sleeping mat in a puddle of water all night and just froze…. Wow, sounds like fun eh? What motorbike guys will do for entertainment. Dennis is going on a major ride across Russia, Tibet and parts of the Middle East. He will start in England where he is having a  R100R outfitted for the journey. He is going alone on the trip and is having all the fun of visa’s and travel plans. It should be a great trip.

I stayed the night in the spare bedroom and woke this morning to some really different bird sounds. He and his wife live on 40 acres in a rural area in a house Dennis designed. They built it with lumber that was harvested from the property. Even the hardwood flooring was cut here. Dennis is an ecologist and works for the government in some sort of farm program that tries to get farmers/ranchers to take better care of their land.

I had to walk around the house and take a few photos of the different flowers they have.

Dennis is a Peugeot lover and has several of them. He used to race them and says that they are his favorite cars. I sure liked this lion.

This sign would catch my attention if I was thinking about going swimming. In the news yesterday was the info that they had cut open a crock and found the pieces of a little kid that had gone missing. Between the crocks and the sharks it sure seems iffy to be out there in the wild getting wet.

It was wonderful staying at Dennis and Lyndy’s (pronounced Lin-Dee) place. I stayed two days just catching up on naps and using the computer.

Dennis decided that he would like to buy my Ozdog so he would have a nice little bike that he could ride the rough stuff and not have to beat up his primo R100GS/PD. That made it a lot easier for me to not have to deal with shipping the bike or storing it someplace while someone tried to sell it for me. I am sure he will like the bike as it sure has been fun for me to ride.

Dennis worked the phone magic for me and was able to get my plane ticket that was originally for me to depart Sydney on April first and had it changed for Friday.

I needed to go to Brisbane and visit my buddy Roger Wickham that I had met a couple of times when he comes up to Amigo Bob’s summer solstice party. Roger has been a big help to me in just getting me to come down to Australia. Roger is the caretaker of the Vietnam Veterans Motorcycle Club in Brisbane. I took off in the morning in a pretty heavy fog and made it down to the club grounds and after a little tour around the area and help from a trucker I found the gate.

The gate was locked so I was in the process of climbing the gate when I could see Roger and Rex coming to see what was going on and who was invading the grounds as I was not supposed to be there for another couple of hours. Rex (the dog) is really cool once Roger tell him you are OK. I sure wouldn’t want to climb the fence at night without some sort of warning to Roger to keep Rex in check. He likes good hard pets and I have a few for him…..he doesn’t usually have his tongue sticking out.

They have a really nice place of about ten acres that has lots of nice grassy areas as well as good trees with a small lake. They have a really nice kitchen setup as well as nice covered eating and social areas. I am going to bunk in a little bunk house which is nice so I wont have to set up my tent and pack it up in the morning as I need to go back to Dennis’s place and from there I will take a bus to the airport in Brisbane to fly out around noon Friday.

Here are a few photos around the place.

A few signs

The dining area an just general hang out place.

I found these hot water dispensers all over Australia and just love them. They dispense boiling hot water instantly. It sure saved a lot of time around those hostels for making tea, coffee and I saw several folks use it for those instant meals in a cup.

A cone headed dove…….. for you Lowell…(he wanted bird photos)

Phil and Roger thought it would be good to give me a send off ride up to Toowoomba. It was really nice gesture. There is something special when there are your friends riding with you on a little trip like that. It was a three dog deal here… Penelope, Rex dog, and the Ozdog.

Dang, if they don’t have toll booths on the expressway. They don’t rob ya to go through but is sure is a hassle when on a bike. I really liked down in South America when they had tolls they would often have a motorcycle lane that you could scoot by and not have to pay.

The ‘Boyz and their vests. They are really proud Vets and I got filled in on how close they feel to the USA and was amazed at how many ‘wars’ the Aussies have been in with us. I  learned that Australia was bombed by the Japs for over three months and they dropped more bombs on Darwin than they did on Pearl Harbor. If it wasn’t for the US they might be speaking Japanese.

When we got to Toowoomba we had a really nice lunch before they had to turn around and head home. I headed up to Dennis’s place and started to pack for my return trip. As you can see, all the fish and chips settled just around my belt line….. What a great winter.

Something strange is going on in the Brisbane airport….

A 747 that took me back to the USA….

I write this in the Denver airport and will head to Billings tonight at 11:11. Charlie is going to pick me up and take me home. Wow, what a wonderful trip. I know it is going to be good to get back to the Doghouse and see my friends again. I sure am glad you all came along for the ride with me, I hope you had some fun too……..Rx

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