Sydney to Dubbo

12-5-08

Here I am after just escaping the city. I took the Great Western Highway that went right past my hostel. I asked one of the desk guys how to get out on that road since it is across the way actually. He said just go right and quickly turn left. I said ‘isnt that sort of illegal?” well he did agree that it was sort of illegal but it would probably be ok on a motorbike. SO, I start my trip on an illegal step so I am sort of proud of that especially since I didn’t get caught or mashed in the heavy traffic. I have that 22liter plastic gas tank tied on top of my dry bag as I just didn’t have time to deal with mounting it. It was supposed to have a leak where the petcock attaches to the tank and it would need some ‘fixing’.

I had a chance to stop and take this closer shot of a yard for my flower friends.

I stopped at a little park where there was a waterfall. A person could not see the falls from the easy walk and I couldn’t make the longer walks to see the falls because I had a pretty bad blister on my heel from all the walking I had done around town. I wore my good boots that I hadn’t worn for a while and need to get my feet in shape.

I stopped along the road at this nice over look. The country is starting to open up now.

Cows are pretty much the same everywhere, they like to hang out at the water hole.

Cow country.

The cows need to eat in the winter here too. I saw several bales made that were all wrapped in plastic so they must have been silage bales.

I stopped in at a motorcycle shop and asked if anyone could adjust the carb. The bike was running a little rough and I figured it would just take a ‘touch’ of a master mechanic.  I was lucky to find a nice little moto shop and an old guy came right out and adjusted that carb. It now runs very well. I decided to pick up some chain lube while there as well as some face shield cleaner. I told him that I was surprised to have a Hells Angle pass me on the way and he said that there are quite a few of them near here. They don’t cause any problems and he said he works on their bikes from time to time. He said since I was in town I needed to go to the Mount Panorama Motor Racing Circuit. He said that it is the finest raceway in the southern hemisphere. He said that it is open for anyone to drive their car on. It is actually a road and has traffic both ways. LEFT side REMEMBER!!! Sounded like a nice thing to do so off I went. Here is the gate to get in.

I am on the track and going down the straightaway in front of the grandstand.

The road goes up a hill and I stopped to take a photo from top. There are several wineries down there in the center of this race loop as well as some high class hotels.

You cant hardly imagine how much fun this was to ride even on a little 650cc dual sport bike loaded down with too much stuff. The road surface was perfect and without doubt the best road I have ever been on. This little down hill stretch must be quite a challenge. They close off the road when they race on it. It sure is cool that they let a person get on it and have a little fun.

For guess who?

This seems to be a quite common old style house. All the houses have either tin or concrete tile roofs. I wonder if it is for fire protection. I often see fire warning signs to call in fires.

I stopped at this litte rest stop and talked with one of these folks. He said that he used to farm but now he just buys stuff  because he had to get out of farming because of the drought. I guess it has been really tough here. I don’t see any irrigation so if it doesn’t rain, you are done like this guy. It is interesting that this is fresh cherry season. It will be a few weeks before the cheeries are ready in Montana. It wasn interesting to me when he said that they had some hail up near Orange, but they were lucky around here. hail is a problem in many places evidently for cherry growers.

Here is a guy that has a nice crop of carrots and broccoli and what ever. He is near a river so he may have some way to irrigate but I didn’t see any sprinkler activity.

This was a shot on the road photo of a wheat field. Some of the fields have already been harvested while some are still green.

I made it as far as Dubbo this late afternoon. It is a nice mid size town and I got a motel with wifi. Last night I camped in Bathurst at a caravan park. That mean ‘trailer park’. I would have hooked up to the internet but they wanted ten bucks for an hour. What a rip off.

After two days on the road I have only had a few close calls and just a few people honking at me. It sure is easy to not remember LEFT and then it has been a learning experience on how to drive the ‘roundabouts’. Mostly it is just learning the right of way and which lane I need to be in. It sure is a lot better being on a bike rather than a vehicle with the steering wheel on the wrong side. I am feeling more comfortable all the time. I think I may actually live through this…..