Day 189: Rocking The Suburbs... Of Tamworth

It had to be done, I've never been to Tamworth before so I had to get the photo in front of the large guitar. Obviously I didn't take this photo as it's a picture of me acting the goose, my special guest photographer today was Pete and I think he did a great job of capturing the moment.

We'd actually already started heading out of town when Andy pulled over and to make a U turn so we could go back for my photo. He's a good bloke like that.

From the overgrown country & western guitar we headed off toward the Upper Hunter region passing a few wineries along the way. There were some spectacular bits of road and some equally impressive scenery which I'm now regretting not stopping to photograph. It was a tough call for me, stop and take a photo of the amazing escarpments along either side of the valley we were riding or keep going on that particularly enjoyable bit of road... I chose to keep riding.

The time that I did stop for a photo in the afternoon sunlight as we were heading in to Oberon gave Pete and Andy a scare. I was following along behind with no way of letting them know I wanted to stop for a photo, they arrived at an intersection and I wasn't behind them so thinking the worst they turned around and headed back to try & find me. It's nice to know your mates will come looking for you if you're running behind, it didn't take long for us to catch up to each other and then continue on to Omeo where we stayed for the night.

Day 188: The Morning Stroll

After a good nights sleep at the Ocean View Hotel in Urunga we were all up fairly early for a gentle stroll down the 1km long board walk that's pretty much out the front of the Hotel. We did this before Breakfast and I took a bunch of photos along the way. I chose this one because it's a bit of a break from bikes and blokes in leather.

After Breakfast we rode one of the best bits of bitumen I've had the pleasure of traveling on two wheels, it was the Water Fall Way that heads up into Dorrigo. From there we headed to Nymboida for morning tea at what has been dubbed 'Rusty's Pub', it's actually the Nymboida Coaching Station Inn which is owned by none other than that famous Kiwi, Russell Crowe. It's a beautiful old building that sits high above a river that flows behind it and next time I'm up this way I'll actually have a look in Rusty's 'Museum Of Interesting Things'.

From Rusty's pub we headed on to Tamworth which unfortunately involved a fair bit of highway riding which was less than comfortable on the R1.

Day 187: Wet & Grubby

I can't remember exactly where this is... I know it's somewhere between Clarence Town and Urunga and I know it was where we stopped for lunch. I think it was Walcha Road or Thunderbolts Way... Are they the same thing?

What ever it was, it would have been an awesome stretch of road to ride in the dry, instead we had light rain and muddy roadworks to contend with. I don't think the R1 has ever been this grubby. From here we continued on in the drizzle and did a section of highway that lead into Urunga, it was nice to be on smooth roads, it was also nice to have the heated handgrips running.

Day 186: Lunch At The Grey Gum Cafe

Day one of our ride saw me leaving Canberra on a balmy -4 morning, I met up with Pete and Andy at Bungendore where we headed out to Tarago, down to Nowra, up through the Kangaroo Valley, on to Moss Vale and then up the highway via the M7 to Windsor and the Putty Road.

Today's photo was lunch at the Grey Gum Cafe which is along the Putty Road, the burgers are great and the road you travel to get there is even better.

From here we continued along the Putty Road and off into territory I'd never visited before, the last 30 odd kilometers of our roughly 650km day were some of the bumpiest roads I've ridden on a road bike. There was one section with some fairly steep rises and falls that made the front wheel feel light. I thought it would be a good idea to wind the throttle on a little as I approached the crest of one of these rises and promptly launched the front wheel up into the air, this was fun until the rear got light causing the tyre to spin under power while the front was still in the air. It was an interesting sensation, the bike never felt unstable and touched down nicely when I eased out of the throttle. All's well that ends well.

We arrived in Clarence Town a little after dark, Andy's mate Al was kind enough to put us up for the night as well as feed us a fantastic slow cooked stew and share his beers & wines with us.

It was a pretty big first day.

Day 185: Full Moon

Driving home from picking Jenna up tonight we both noticed that the moon was very full and was quite low in the sky. My photo today was taken using one of the long exposure settings while resting my camera on the roof of the car in our driveway, I liked how the moon was peeking through the branches of the tree but the photo doesn't really convey how big the moon looked. I think I need more practice with my funky little Nikon...

I'm off on a five day ride with Pete & Andy tomorrow morning and due to the limited luggage options on the R1 I'll be taking Belinda's little Sony point & shoot. I'm sure I'll get some good shots over the next 5 days.

Day 184: Finally Finished

I didn't get time to put the bike back together over the weekend and since I'm heading off on Wednesday morning I thought I should get it done tonight. It all went back together pretty smoothly but I did have to tie wire the throttle grip on because it kept slipping on the tube.

My photo today is of the little switch that turns my Chinese Hot Hands on & off, it's not a very pretty switch but I guess one can't expect too much for a $15 kit.

Day 183: Cold Karate

Jenna had her first Karate tournament today and it involved her spending about 5 hours in a freezing cold high school hall. I have to say that I'm beyond impressed with how well she's done and is continuing to do.

Today Jenna's events were the Individual Kata, Team Kata and Individual Sparing (I can't remember the proper name for this one).

Jenna scored a 1st in her Individual Kata, a 2nd in her Individual Sparing and a 3rd in her Team Kata. She also came away with a cold that had her off school for a couple of days.

My photo for the day is of Jenna scoring a 'stomach level punch' in one of her 4 bouts on the way to coming 2nd outright in her age group. She did incredibly well considering she ended up having three bouts back to back with barely 5 minutes rest between them in the lead up to her final round.