melb>canb>melb

Rode to Canberra on Thursday and back to Melbourne on Monday on my VTR250.

First proper long ride I've done since getting a bike in Feb.

Motorbikes rule.

JAn

 

Which way did you go?
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Cheers
The Happy Drunk
K100RT

 

Straight down the Hume. I wanted to get there and back as fast as possible.
Thursday was great, pretty quiet even if it did rain cats and dogs. Coming
back Monday was little busier but beautiful weather.

Would like a bigger bike so I could make it up hills and through headwinds
without playing with the gears so much. I think the 250 had a little trouble
carrying me + bag.

 

Trust me. Things get a whole lot better when you give up the
latter _and_ the former.

-----sharks (hint: whitfield, granya, cabramurra)

 

How long did it take you?

 

So what was it? Fireworks or porn

 

There about 9 and a half hours, back about 8. The rain/wind on the way there
made for a much slower ride.

 

I know, I know. I'll definitely be doing the trip again and next time I'll
probably take two days and ride along the coast.

Bandwith ist dort zu werden verbraucht.

JAn

 

The first leg of my ride during the weekend was a tad boring as well.
Sydney to Tathra via Canberra. Most of it was on the freeway. When you
have more time it's much more enjoyable

__


Cheers
The Happy Drunk
K100RT

 

Someone let The Happy Drunk at
loose on an internet connection and the result was:

south to north...north to south??

 

That's okay, just mentioning it. Across the mountains is better
than around the coast, BTW, but if you're heading around that
way, Cann Valley Highway and the road from Batemans up to,
ummm, inland is excellent. The HEMA motorcycle touring atlas
is really good BTW.

True, true.

-----sharks

 

I rode Sydney to Goulburn on Saturday, Goulburn to Batemans Bay
to Canberra on Sunday, and Canberra to Sydney on Monday. I rode
on the freeway for about 4km all up... The road from Tarago to
Bungonia was interesting - a little muddier than I was
expecting... I _think_ I may have ridden past BTH's new place
too...

big

 

Friday night I rode down to tathra. I admit I could of picked a better
seenic/enjoyable route but I just wanted to get down there. Monday was
to be the fun "take my time and enjoy the ride" day.
__


Cheers
The Happy Drunk
K100RT

 

That'd be Kings Highway, from Batemans Bay to Braidwood.

And yeah, its _great_ fun

I went down it on Sunday, planning on heading down the coast to
Bega then up Browns Mountain thru Cooma and back to Canberra in
time for the party[1], but just after I got out of Batemans Bay
it started thundering and lightninging and absoutely pissing down
- and I didn't have any wet weather gear with me, _and_ I had the
laptop in the backpack[2].

So I considered the options - 150 odd km to Bega, then up the
hill to Cooma, then an hour or so back into Canberra, possibly
all in the puring rain, during ski season, thru Cooma late-ish...
Or turn tail and head back up Kings Highway...

So I wimped it.

Luckily, the rain stopped about 5km inland, so the run back up to
Braidwood was really fun too Though it rained on and off
between Braidwood and Queanbyan and got _really_ cold, and I got
to the "I need to stop and run around a bit, if I start shivering
any harder I'm likely to fall off" stage about 15 km out... So I
pulled into a rest area and stuck the gloves in between the
cylinders to warm up and walked around briskly for 5 or 10 mins...

big (not quite the long weekend I had planned, but _fuck_ it was
fun!)

[1] You know how it is, you're in Goulburn for a wedding, you get
invited to a party in Canberra, so you think "cool, I can do
Kings highway *and* Browns Mountain on the way!"[3]

[2] I wasn't really expecting to end up in Canberra, I was
_going_ to just sober up a bit then head home from Goulburn...

[3] Oh, and sorry for not calling since I was in town, IK, but I
was a bit preoccupied...

 

So which way did you go?

I'd noticed the sign saying "Bungonia" in Tarago on the way down
to Kings Highway on Sunday, so I figured I take it and see what
it was like on the way home. So from Canberra I headed for
Bungendore (and just outside Bungendore I got treated to the
sight of a bunch of cops and fireys standing round a car on its
roof and scratching their heads at the sharp-ish turn at the top
of the pass , Tarago, then up this new (to me) road out to
Bungonia (which I knew would get me to the freeway just south of
Marulan, Boky showed me the road from down near Goulburn
aerodrome back to the Bungonia turnoff from the freeway on the
way home from Wakefield Park a while back).

It was fun. Theres about 40km of gravel road, which is in good to
reasonable condition mostly, tho where it was a bit wetter it got
quite muddy and slippery, which slowed the pace down a little.

big

 

Down to Canberra, Cooma then to Tathra. Pretty boring until you get to
Nimmitabel. I know the road from Canberra very well so I decided to go
that way. I find it quicker (for me), I think that's only because I
know the road better than the kings highway.

On the way back I should of gone inland at Batemans Bay instead of
finding trafic at Nowra.

__


Cheers
The Happy Drunk
K100RT

 

Fireworks.

 

Welcome to the club! That was quite an adventure on that size bike! You
have now paid your dues for getting a larger and tour happy bike in the
future! And next time keep of the boring old Hume. There are so many more
interesting roads to test out!

Cheers

Al

 

ohhh come on! Canberra has so much more to offer like... and... also... ok
porn and fireworks it is.

 

Holy shit; I didn't even know about the fireworks!!