Woke to an ear splittingly loud alarm radio that Dad had set, playing country music, jumped out of bed yelling at the top of my voice “If it ain’t country it ain’t Music!” threw on my running gear and went out to pound the pavement down the country lanes of Cann River. It was pretty cold but not a frost. There were lots of Kangaroos in the paddocks and a couple on the road, all hopping away when I came into view. They are timid animals, probably for good reason.
Had breakfast on return and packed up and we were off headed for Canberra in what will be our last big day of riding. It was “breath test positive” cold and the sun was shining in our eyes through a forest lined road giving a bright flashing light in our faces that added a challenge to the first stage of the day. The road winded up the valley of the Cann River and was in excellent condition making for a very enjoyable start to the day. Dad lead out and carved his way up the valley. It was after 9 am that we got underway so the Kangaroos had all lost interest in the road, which was just as well as seeing them in this light would be very difficult. I had to hold my hand up to shade my eyes to be able to see the road ahead on most corners, so there was a lot of one handed and body weight driven cornering going on.
As we approached the top of the river valley we entered New South Wales again, and passed a sign saying that we were in the Snowy River National park. I looked around for devilishly hansom horse riders descending impossibly steep slopes on horseback, but couldn’t see any, perhaps it was the light in my eyes that was blocking the view. We came into Bombaia and stopped for a cuppa and to warm up. Dad doesn’t seem to be too bothered by the cold, but I am. I am usually pretty good with tolerating the cold, but seem to be struggling a bit on this trip, clearly I need to harden up. Or, I could put on a jersey I suppose. Bombaia is pretty high at around 800 metres altitude, so this was explaining the temperature to a degree. As we were riding out of Bombaia we had the first of three encounters with the law enforcement experts. We were pulled over by a roadblock for a breath test. “If they are looking for too much Coffee, then I am in trouble” I thought, as I started the day with a cook up on the oven top Espresso machine that I have been carrying (Inspired by fellow Caffiend, the young Haxby), and had a quadruple shot to get me going, then this was topped up with the Latte that Dad had just ordered. Thankfully they were looking for alcohol, which I would have known if I wasn’t so bothered by Caffeine driven anxiety, so I was fine. I asked the Officer if they caught many people drunk at this time of the day (about10.30), not really intending to imply that his job was a waste of time. He said that they do catch people that have been up all night partying. I said “have a good day”, then thought I had better brighten up their morning, so I smoked up my rear tyre and then pulled wheelie off into the distance changing through the gears while up on one wheel, with one hand in the air whipping around as if I was looping a lasso, and above the roar of the twin boxer they would have heard me “YEEEHAAA! If it ain’t country, it aint music!”. Honestly, that is just how it happened. It’s true.
I became interested in the altitude and watched this on the GPS over the next stage as we rode up onto the Great Dividing Range. We got up to 1100 metres, which is the highest point on our trip. We could see the snow covered peaks in the distance. It is meant to be a nice ride up to and around Thredbo, but given that I was shivering away down here I did not suggest a detour, there has been recent snow also so the roads would likely be icy. The land up on the Great Dividing Range was open country with gently rolling contour and very few trees. It did look like the kind of country that should be under snow for big chunks of time.
We were slowly descending to Cooma and the traffic was light but present. There were a couple of caravans on the road and the road was gently twisting so that there was plenty of good passing points but also bad areas where you could not see ahead for passing. A Holden Statesman passed us and then sat behind a caravan. They got impatient and passed when there was a bad view of the oncoming traffic due to a bend, and sure enough, a car came in the opposite direction when he was half way passed. The puff of smoke announced a car under full throttle and he sped forward and pulled in quickly. I hit my breaks as all of this was happening as it looked like potential disaster from where I was sitting. The driver of the Holden must have had a bit of a fright, but probably even more so when he noticed the car behind the one he just about had a head on collision with. This car was a bright red Police car. The police car flashed his lights as he went passed, and I thought, “Here we go then”. Dad passed the caravan, but I waited in position behind the Caravan and watched my rear vision mirror to see if he was turning around. There were a few cars behind me so I couldn’t see he had turned around or not. After a few minutes I thought he must have let it go, but then, no, here he comes flat out with siren and lights blazing. The Rolling Stones were singing in my ears from the MP3 player on the GPS, but my internal Dialog drowned them out, with Cool for Cats “The Sweenies doing ninety, cos he got the word to go, to catch a band of villains… nowhere near a shed at Hefrow” The speeding Police car flew passed me, then the Caravan, then Dad who sensibly was not speeding, then followed the Holden who did not initially seem to want to stop. They both pulled over up the road and for some reason Dad pulled over as well. I rode past thinking surely Dad doesn’t think he was being pulled over, I figured I would let him work that out on his own, and stopped further up the road. After a few minutes Dad pulled up and I asked, “what that was all about?” “I thought I would put in a good word, and point out that I thought it was an out of character misjudgement” Said Dad. “ Are you nuts? It is that sort of driver that kills people, especially motorcyclists. You come a round a corner to find someone on your side of the road, no they deserve all that the Sweenie is about to hand out!” Clearly Dad is in a charitable mood, me I have had 5-6 shots of Espresso and am in no mood to take prisoners.
We fuelled up in Cooma and decided to continue on to Canberra. Fairly dull riding and the traffic volume was building also. There was no mistaking that we were approaching Canberra, as it became a bit grand with some large buildings, then Capital Hill came into view with its impressive tower above and formal gardens and fountains in the front. We followed Karen’s instructions into the city centre and tried to find a park near to a café for some lunch. Had trouble finding any parking and I lead us into a buses only area in our search and ultimately we thought it was all too hard and we would find somewhere out of town for a feed.
I lead us up to Capital Hill Parliament house for a look before we left and the road lead right in front of the building. I thought it surprising that you could park there but could see no signs saying no parking, so pulled up, jumped off the bike and fired off a couple of photos right in front of the control room for the whole country. If it wasn’t a public holiday I would have knocked on the door to congratulate Mr Rudd about the excellent roads around his country. I had been off the bike for maybe 1 - 2 minutes when a police officer rode up on his pushbike and said you can’t stop there. “What!” I said, as I had my earplugs in and couldn’t hear him. “YOU CANN’T STOP THERE!” he shouted. “OH AM I NOT ALLOWED TO STOP HERE? I COULDN’T SEE ANY SIGNS SAYING NOT TO” I replied. “YOU’RE NOT THE FIRST ONE TO MAKE THAT MISTAKE!” “I’LL BET I’M NOT”, “HOW DO YOU LIKE THE BMW?” Honestly, riding a bike is such a good icebreaker. “ITS GREAT, I CAN SEE WHY ALL OF THE POLICE RIDE THESE BIKES, IF YOU ARE GOING TO SPEND ALL DAY IN THE SADDLE THEY ARE GREAT, VERY COMFORTABLE!” “HOW FAR HAVE YOU RIDEN THE blaaa, blaaa blaaa” “JUST A MINUTE!” I took of my helmet and took out my earplugs, “Sorry I couldn’t hear you, I was probably shouting at you too?” He laughed and asked how far we had ridden. It was looking like I wouldn’t be arrested today, he was the third police encounter for the day and unless I said something silly arrest did not seem imminent. We had a long chat about our trip and the road conditions in the Northern Territory. He told the story of how the speed limit was introduced in the northern territory due to the accident rates, and the Ferrari crashing in the Gumball Rally Killing four people was the final straw. A second Policeman cycled up, probably thinking that his buddy was having a hard time getting rid of these BMW bike tourists. These guys were obviously having a dull day and glade for the company, or perhaps they heard of my circus tricks for the officers this morning and were hoping I would do some donuts in front of the parliament building to entertain them. After another few minutes a Red Police car turned up and the Policeman who was talking to me answered his phone. The second policeman was telling us that there were cameras all around this place and we were being filmed from numerous angles. It was starting to feel like you really were not meant to park right in front of the parliament building, so I donned my helmet and after a bit more advice from the gathered Force about where to get some lunch we headed off.
Eventually gave up on finding a Café and went to McDonalds as I wanted to use the internet to see where a Bike spare parts place was that Dad wanted to visit in the morning.
The rest of the day was sitting on the bike on the freeway to ride into Sydney. The traffic was heavy the whole way and about 60km out it slowed to 30 -50 km/hr for big stretches due to the traffic load and lots of road works. It got dark about 100km out of town but the risk of animal strike seemed pretty limited due to the traffic and freeway, not long after thinking this we passed a freshly squashed kangaroo. We stayed behind cars for the rest of the way in for protection. Found a Motel close to the parts shop that Dad wants to go to. Ordered Pizza to be dropped off and a quiet night in.
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