no rules...no politics...just ridin'

Another Long Weekend....

Wow! What a weekend!! Always good when you can say that. Kat and myself started out early on Saturday morning and didn't get back to my place until mid afternoon on Monday. The only firm plans we had were to ride with the Honda Four Club on Saturday and spend the night with them up at Tin Can Bay. Other than that we thought we might as well make the most of the child free weekend. All up we covered about 1100kms on the VTX, some of that on gravel roads and some in pouring rain, but most on bitumen and in sunshine.

Saturday
We had booked to take part in this ride with the Honda Four Club about 6 weeks ago - we did it last year and had a great time with these guys so we thought we would do it again this year. Up about 6am and off to the BP servo at Burpengary to meet up with the Club for the ride up the coast. It is getting cooler in the mornings now and both Kat and myself donned the gloves, scarves and face protection to keep us a bit warmer on the first stretch. The ride was uneventful and we pulled in at about 6:45. Fueled up and then went and parked the bike. A mate of mine who arranged our accomodation and is good mates with the VP of the club, Steve, said he would meet us here about 6:30 for a coffee and we would then move over to the main group. Went inside and grabbed something to eat and a coffee. Man it was busy in here!! Saw Ynot, one of the Kobbers, and he told me that about 12 bikes were doing a 3 dayer via Wondai and Chinchilla - souded ok. Then bumped into Snappa - he was riding for the day with a few guys (Ulysses?) who were going onto Bikers Dream. Everyone was out and about!!


Some of the bikes at the meeting point


Nice gold 750Four...


...and a green one...


...and a brown one.

Anyway, we finally made it up to the muster point in the top car park and said g'day to all. There would have been about 30 bikes with just over half of them being 750 Fours - a couple of really nice ones too. The rest were on all sorts, with a couple of cruisers quite a few sports bikes (including a restored Katana) and we even had a couple of ladies in a support vehicle. The VP welcomed all of us and gave us an idea on the route we would take - which would include some sections of unsealed road.


We finally hit the road around 8:30 and immediately left the highway and headed out towards the sea to a place called Donnybrook - didn't even know it existed but it was a good ride. Lots of wildlife and farms out this way. Rode through the township and admired the view out to the over to Bribie Island - the water looked great. From here we headed back towards the highway - not before about 8kms of dusty, shitty gravel road - passing under it and eventually pulling in for our first stop at the foot of Mt Tibrogargin.

From here it was decided to take some of the more scenic roads up to Maleny and then out to Kenilworth and it was a great ride. Lots of nice sweeping corners and fast sections and the scenery was awesome - I haven't ridden this route for months and really enjoyed it. We regrouped in Maleney and then headed out to Kenilworth - another great road with some tightish type corners. More than once I scraped my bottom pipe while trying to keep up with some of the sportsbike riders - I backed off after a while coz there is only so much you can do 2 up on a cruiser!!

We rolled into the servo just south of Gympie on the Bruce Hwy right on midday so this was to be our lunch stop.

From there we rode the 50kms out to Tin Can Bay fairly hard - was great fun. Don't think the boys thought I would keep up with them. Made it to the pub at about 1:30 and checked in. The club had their meeting and then after that we walked over the road to the park for the traditional game of cricket against the locals - of course we won it and then the celebrations began!!!!

Sunday
Woke early the next morning to overcast skies - a lot 0f people set off home very early. I asked Kat what she wanted to do - lets ride, she said!!! We decided to head to Kingaroy and then over Bunya Mountain - a fairly long ride but worth it for the scenery and the fact we both had never ridden it. Jumped on the bike about 8:30 and headed to Gympie. From there took the road to Kingaroy, stopping at ?? (pumpkin town - cannot remember the name of this place) for a feed of bacon & eggs on the side of the road. From here we headed towards Oakey and Bunya Mountain. Long staight flat roads heading towards what seemed like nothing - cruised through numerous towns and kept riding for what seemed like eternity. Finally rolled into Kingaroy. Took the road toward Bunya Mountain and cruised the 80kms to the turn off. Turned onto a single lane strip of bitumen and followed this right up to Bunya Mountain. The clouds had been building all day and once we reached the top of the mountain they decided to let us know they were there, covering us in a light sprinkling of water. An amazing place up the top - lots of wallabies roaming free and a lot of people camping and also very much cooler than down on the plains. After stopping for a short break we remounted and decided to head to Toowoomba.

After decending the other side of the mountain on a gravel road we finally made it back onto the main road to Toowoomba - then the heavens opened. It absolutely poured down for the next hour or so and of course we did not bring any wet weather gear - we managed to pull into a pub on the way and enjoyed the dry stop.We decided to keep going all the way to Toowoomba and the rain did not stop - it was also starting to get very cold as we were riding up on the range. Anyway, we finally rode into Toowoomba at about 4:00pm and then spent the next hour trying to find a room in a pub. Finally got a room at the Overlander and warmed up in the shower thne got a feed. Watched a bit of the box for a while then went to bed pretty early.

"Looks like rain in them thar clouds"


The road from Toowoomba to Warwick


Riding down Cunninghams Gap


The range


Monday

Woke early and decided to ride out to Queen Mary Falls near Kilarney. The road from Toowoomba to Warwick is very straight and flat and the weather was very cold. We even copped a bit of rain, and the closer we got to Warwick the wetter it looked off in the distance. We rode into Warwick and hit Maccas for coffee - it was there that we decided to turn back to Brisbane as we were already cold enough. After heading back along the Cunningham Hwy and then riding down Cunnunghams Gap, the weather warmed up significantly and the riding became more enjoyable. We followed the highway all the way into Brisbane and made our way out to my place, arriving at about 2pm. Was good fun.

5 Comments:

Blogger Sniper said...

Cool... it's nice to see those old Honda's. I need to get down under soon.

Sniper

10:52 AM  
Blogger Biker Betty said...

Thanks for all the details of your ride. Sorry you got rained on. The pictures you shared are awesome. What beautiful countryside. I enjoyed riding along thru your words.

Safe Travels in Your Part of the World, Betty :)

12:41 PM  
Blogger Kathleen Jennette said...

Even though you had clouds, it looked so beautiful to ride in. You are very lucky to have such beautiful roads and scenery. Thanks for the ride.

1:41 PM  
Blogger RoyT said...

Anyone have a contact for the Four Club mentioned here. I am a former member (1973 - 79 ) of the original Honda Four Club Christchurch and think some of the "boys" moved to the sunshine coast and carried it on there.

5:18 PM  
Blogger Beaker said...

Yeah Roy,

You can view mobile numbers of the committee members on their website at....http://www.honda750four.com/sohc/index.php?topic=members

5:37 PM  

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