Dibble's had an "off"...
Discussion
Well it's absolutely true, "You'll end up hitting what you're looking at"...
Which in my case, was a ditch at the side of the orad, just outside a place called "Wiseman's Ferry", north of Sydney in New SOuth Wales. The end of the second day, and we were heading back to Sydney to take the hire bikes back.
We had a brilliant couple of days blasting around some completely empty roads. There was me, my mate, and a friend of the people we were staying with. We'd hired a VFR and a 650 GS, and he had a Triumph Trophy.
Just done an overtake, and going round a slight left hand bend, I stopped thinking, and looked at the ditch on the outside of the bend.... which is where I ended up about ten seconds later!
I managed to remove both mirrors (!), and some scratches to the bar end, clutch lever, engine bars and left hand side pannier. Fortuneatly I'd bothered to take my own jacket and pants, and other than a bit of scuffing on the external materuial, I was undamaged apart from a few bumps and bruises. The damage to the GS cost me just over £500.
On the upside, we had a brilliant couple of blokey days, drank a few beers, ate some great food, chatted to plenty of other bikers, and didn't see a BiB the whole time we were out (apart from me and my mate, and we don't really count).
I may have managed to squeeze out 203kph on the VFR (on a private track), which is the quickest so far for me on a bike. I could only wring about 170kph out of GS, flat out (me being 19 stone probably doesn't help there).
And the "Putty Road" is fantastic. It pissed it down the first day, so we went back the next day, and did it all over again - twice, it was so good!
Have a look at the Putty Road on Google.
Which in my case, was a ditch at the side of the orad, just outside a place called "Wiseman's Ferry", north of Sydney in New SOuth Wales. The end of the second day, and we were heading back to Sydney to take the hire bikes back.
We had a brilliant couple of days blasting around some completely empty roads. There was me, my mate, and a friend of the people we were staying with. We'd hired a VFR and a 650 GS, and he had a Triumph Trophy.
Just done an overtake, and going round a slight left hand bend, I stopped thinking, and looked at the ditch on the outside of the bend.... which is where I ended up about ten seconds later!
I managed to remove both mirrors (!), and some scratches to the bar end, clutch lever, engine bars and left hand side pannier. Fortuneatly I'd bothered to take my own jacket and pants, and other than a bit of scuffing on the external materuial, I was undamaged apart from a few bumps and bruises. The damage to the GS cost me just over £500.
On the upside, we had a brilliant couple of blokey days, drank a few beers, ate some great food, chatted to plenty of other bikers, and didn't see a BiB the whole time we were out (apart from me and my mate, and we don't really count).
I may have managed to squeeze out 203kph on the VFR (on a private track), which is the quickest so far for me on a bike. I could only wring about 170kph out of GS, flat out (me being 19 stone probably doesn't help there).
And the "Putty Road" is fantastic. It pissed it down the first day, so we went back the next day, and did it all over again - twice, it was so good!
Have a look at the Putty Road on Google.
Edited by Dibble on Tuesday 22 January 17:48
IsMad said:
That is a fantastic looking road, looks like it would have been a lot of fun. 
Glad your excursion was not too painful. You got any pics of the trip?
Chilli - the £500 was the bits I damaged - the actual insurance excess was $4,000... But I didn't have to pay that, just for the repairs. Glad your excursion was not too painful. You got any pics of the trip? Is Mad - I do have some photos, I'll post them up in a minute.
Dibble said:
Phone_Monkey said:
Sounds like you had fun, even with the off. Hope you aren't too damaged
It was an absolute hoot - my first "proper" trip. We did just over 750kms in two days (which t'interweb tells me is 466.028394 miles).My wallet took more of a beating than I did!
80Bob said:
Glad you enjoyed the ride. Putty is a good day out - going up there at the weekend I think - sorry to hear about the off though, still as one who has a habit of a dropping it on dirt I can't say much more!
By the way, where did you manage to hire the bikes from?
We picked the bikes up from Bike Round Oz.By the way, where did you manage to hire the bikes from?
They have a place on Parramatta Road at Annandale - I think it's called Bikescape or something similar - they're basically agents for BRO. It was a bit of a trwal back out of the city, but it only took us an hour or so to get out to Windsor.
IsMad said:
Dibble, some nice pics, looks like it was hot and sunny. I can't wait for the sun to appear in this hemisphere.
It absolutely pissed it down just after lunch on the first day - coincidentally, jus when we got to the trickiest bit of the Putty Road. Some of the hairpins have an advisory speed of 25kmh (we worked out that you can pretty much double the advisory speed and still get round OK). I can't wait for the sun to appear in this hemisphere.It was raining so heavily that there wasn't just water running two or three inches deep - in places we were riding through flowing mud two or three inches deep across the road. That certainly focussed the mind!
We found our Motel in Singleton, and then had a blast out to Gresford to dry off. The road out there got a bit pot holey, but we still had a laugh.
IsMad said:
I take it there were no milage limitations on the hire?
No, unlimited mileage (or kms!) on both the hire bikes. The 650 GS was about £80 per day, the VFR a little more. The price drops the longer you have the bike. There are also some good deals if you can be flexible doing returns for bikes that have been dropped off one way (ie collected in Sydney, dropped off in Melbourne). If you're willing to pick up a bike and return it to the "home" rental location, you can save about a third on the hire.Gassing Station | Biker Banter | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff